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Subject: Czar-Commissar Putin's Creeping War Of Aggression
SYSOP    4/8/2014 11:18:01 PM
 
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CJH    I Wonder -   4/12/2014 11:20:14 PM
1. What's going on here? Really, what motivates the sort of aggression Putin is engaged in? Was Milosevic out to forcefully reconstitute Yugoslavia under his leadership? Did he need to be a Tito?

What kind of domestic political environment affects Putin's decisions? Is the Kremlin a shark tank? Is Putin looking over his shoulder? Do domestic political considerations drive Putin to international aggression in order that he will not lose out to some rising star? If we understood this better, maybe behavior such as Putin's and Milosevic's would not be so common.

If a low birth rate threatens to leave ethnic Russians in a minority status in their own country, will acquiring Ukraine help with that? Does Putin anticipate Russia losing constituent territories which have large numbers of non-Russians - perhaps Muslim non-Russians?

2. What criteria determined the price Russia exacted for its gas originally? Was that price purposely low to make the implied threat of using gas pricing as a political weapon into an effective means of control over Ukraine? If Russia's western customers cut back on their purchases of Russia's gas - if they changeover to LNG from the US, will not Russia come out the worse?

3. If the more lasting result is that Western European nations elect more nationalistic leaders who place more stress on hard power, what will Russia have gained?

4. As it stands right now, if Putin succeeds in ingesting Ukraine, exactly where will that leave Putin and leave Russia? How will they be better off than now?

I guess I just wonder what's in it for Putin personally. He does not seem to be a nut case or a megalomaniac.

 
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ALEXISTAN       4/16/2014 8:45:48 AM
Indeed, a cursory glimpse of the map suggests that Slavyansk would represent a significant improvement in position for the Russians. Flattening the "Slavyansk Salient" draws the potential concentration of Russian forces ever closer to the "West". Note it well, and the rebirth of a pan-Slavic nationalism or even internationalism, headed by the "Bachelor Tsar" Vladimir. Speaking of Slav-on-Slav violence, is there any truth to the rumor I heard that there may be a nice hunk of Ukraine reserved for reunification with Poland? Never in my lifetime have the national forces carried such centripetal force while at the same time the vast edifices of state, finance, and religion begin to grasp ever-more-forcefully for consolidation, like aging supergiant stars. 
 
On might argue that the world's political castes view Russia's adventurism with something approaching relief, given that it represents at least a familiar pattern, whereas, here in the America... well, who know what calculated mis-step will further cast our nation into the world's obloquy?
 
I would consider Putin more of the Hetman, or Ataman, the leader of the Cossacks. He's a fit Uhlan, to judge from the pictures. The Emperor from the Steppes.
 
 
 
 
 
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