A historic date in history....

It was 25 years ago today the Hammer and Sickle flag of the USSR was lowered for the last time over the Kremlin in Moscow.  On that day the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics was officially dissolved.  A political movement that began with a bang, literally, 70+ years earlier ended with just a whimper.

I just finished listening to a fascinating 6-part podcast series (Dan Carlin's Hardcore History / Blueprint for Armageddon) about The Great War, aka World War I, and how it changed the course of history from June 1914 to this very day.  As it pertains to Russia, the short version:

Unable to withstand the hardships and hunger of everyday life in war-weary Russia, by 1917 the people seized control and, after a series of revolutionary consolidations, the USSR was born.  By the 1980's the old Communist revolutionary zeal was long gone, and their system, which was slowly withering away, was as rotten as the Czar's was back in its dying days.

Russia to this day seems to have a never-ending inferiority complex.  They SO want to be a respected world power, but they simply have never quite been able to pull it off.  You can only rule by intimidation for so long, and by the late 1980's they were losing their iron grip.  Unable to afford an arms race with the West, with a population begging, then demanding a better life, and with nations on their periphery they had effectively controlled since the end of WWII now beginning to stand up to them, the hopelessly exhausted USSR finally lost power.  

Their last (nominal) Communist leader, Mikhail Gorbachev, after desperately trying a series of life-saving institutional reforms, finally accepted the inevitable and officially dissolved the Soviet Union on December 26, 1991.

Most reading this probably haven't given the passing of the USSR much thought since that historic day 25 years ago.  But at least one person, one Vladimir Putin, probably hasn't let a day pass since that event 25 years ago without thinking about it.  And he isn't smiling.

S

[We've] got a tiger by the tail

Remember the old country song by Buckminster Owens, "I've got a tiger by the tail"?

I've got a tiger by the tail, it's plain to see;
I won't be much when you get through' with me
Well, I'm a losing weight and a turnin' mighty pale
Looks like I've got a tiger by the tail

Well, I thought the day I met you, you were meek as a lamb;
Just the kind to fit my dreams and plans
But now, the pace we're livin' takes the wind from my sails
And it looks like I've got a tiger by the tail

I'm thinking Minster Buck saw something the rest of us didn't.  Was he writing about the 21st Century world we would soon be living in?  Was he writing back in 1964 about how we in the West would soon be grabbing hold of a bunch of rag-tag religious fanatics in a part of the world we would be hard pressed to find on a map, only to learn they were a tiger we would have no idea how to let go of without getting mauled?

Here's how we got into this mess, the epitome of "unintended consequences":  

The USSR, wanting to support their puppet Marxist allies, invaded Afghanistan in 1979.  The collective Afghan warlords fought back, aided by 35,000 foreign Sunni Muslim fighters who became known as the mujaheddin, and were supported financially and materially by the USA.  Our goal was to simply foil our arch-enemy the Soviet Union.  There was nothing there for us, we just wanted to poke a sharp stick in their eye.  Our side eventually won and the commies permanently tucked tail and ran in 1989.

Shortly thereafter, in August, 1990, Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait, and the West was concerned (scared shitless actually) that he would get control of the Saudi Arabian oil fields.  If he did, we were SCREWED!  Geo Bush the First quickly offered to send our military to defend the Saudi's and drive Iraq out of Kuwait, and Osama bin Laden offered to bring his battle hardened mujaheddin and do the same.  The Saudi's cast their lot with the US.  This miffed bin Laden and the fight was on.  (Numerous groups of hard-core Islamic fundamentalists had begun to congeal under bin Laden by 1988 and eventually became known as Al Qaeda, "The Base".)

One of the hardest-core of the bunch, the branch in Iraq, later split off and morphed into what we know today as ISIS.  For a while they were going gangbusters, gaining control of large swaths of Iraq and Syria.  As the old saying goes, "success breeds success"....Muslim malcontents from all over the world looked at their brothers winning for a change and wanted in, too.

In short order ISIS began planning for their ultimate demise as a Caliphate controlling land in the Mid East....it was one of their prophecies....and began sending trained soldiers back to where they came from to snipe at us guerrilla-style.  Now they and their home-grown extremist buddies are stalking us.  Their numbers are still pretty small, but it seems like they're hitting far above their weight class.

I wonder if any of this would have happened if we had just told the Soviets back in '79, "You want Afghanistan?  It's all yours....the big rock piles, the ignorant pissed off peasants, the whole mess.  Good luck."  Would Osama bin Laden have ever assembled his merry band of jihadists without US support?  No Al Qaeda, no ISIS?  As objectionable as "fracking" for oil is, if we had pursued it earlier, could we have reduced our crushing dependency on Mid East oil sooner?  Would we have cared then if they had all just jihadided each other into oblivion?

Now the BIG QUESTION....do you think we've learned anything from this mess we've gotten ourselves into?

S

It's like losing a bet all over again watching the instant replay. DUH!

Every night the news is filled with the latest efforts of US SecState Kerry and other world diplomats as they try to start talks with Vladimir "Pootie Pooh" Putin on securing the return of Crimea back to Ukraine.

 

Look...a booger!

These people must be a very special variety of stupid!  Russia now "owns" Crimea, its troops are dug in, and it isn't going anywhere.  And we can't make it.  We need to quit beating our heads against the wall and face it.

Trouble is, this is the first....the second actually after Russia's little foray into Georgia back in '08....of many upcoming moves by Putin to reconstitute Russia's old empire. He telegraphed it back in 2012 upon his return to power as President.

At that time he told Russian industry / banking leaders (the oligarchs) "Owning assets outside Russia makes you too vulnerable to moves by foreign governments.  It's time to bring your wealth home."  Hello!  He wanted to make Russia "sanction proof".  This whole Crimean crisis, and the ones soon to come, are all premeditated.

Pootie Pooh is an unreconstructed KGBer.  All he knows how to do is step on people's throat to get them to do what he wants.  He once declared the collapse of the Soviet Union was the greatest geo-political catastrophy of the 20th Century.  He wants Russia's empire back.  

All the former USSR republics are now on notice....close ranks with Russia and you'll be left alone.  Step out of line and there can always be excuses found to invade "for the good of the people."  *Ha!  He cracks me up some times!*

We really should make a game of this.  "Who will be he next two-bit Russian neighbor to feel Putin's wrath?"  There's money to be made here Vegas!

S

This isn't going to end well

For those of you who have been napping for the past month, let me update you on world events:

The folks in Ukraine (formerly one of the Soviet Socialist Republics before the USSR went belly-up) are in full-fledge revolt.  They want to align themselves with the European Union as they see that as the surest way for them to grow and prosper.  As it is now they're a sneeze away from bankruptcy.  Russia doesn't want to let go of their influence there, and is pulling the strings of the current Ukraine leader.

Vladimir Putin (aka Pootie-Pooh), the Russian President, is about to blow a gasket thinking about one of "his" neighbors rejecting him and taking up with their neighbors on the other side. He's very possessive, a man scorned, and he's an old school KGB'er at heart....not a good combination.  

Meanwhile back in Sochi, the showcase Olympics that Pootie has spent the equivalent of $50B on is turning out to be a laughable mess.  These Olympics are to Russia today what the 1936 Berlin Olympics were to Nazi Germany; a way to show the world how advanced, modern, and powerful they are.  

So far that isn't working out well.  Their facilities are woefully crude and crumbling and many of the venues themselves are simply inferior.  The Russians are hockey obsessed and care about little else but their team winning the hockey Gold Medal.  Yesterday they were knocked out....humiliated even....in a quarterfinal round.  

Home-grown terrorists are somewhere in the Sochi shadows right now, hoping to cause mayhem.  They have so far been kept at bay only because Russia has stationed a not-so-small army there (for now) to step on them.  All this is taking its toll.  The Russian (read: Vladimir Putin's) psyche has been severely wounded.  

Remember the old joke...."What's worse than shooting at a charging bear and missing?  Shooting at a charging bear and only wounding him."

If the protesters in Ukraine succeed in putting in place a new government that turns it's back on Russia, don't be surprised if Putin does something violent in response.  Or maybe he'll even devise an excuse to physically go into Ukraine before it gets to that to "restore calm".   

Of course the west will respond with a meaningless statement of condemnation, the Russians will curtail natural gas deliveries to Europe (they provide the majority of Europe's natural gas) as pipelines go down for "routine maintenance", and from there....?

Most catastrophes don't start out with one gigantic "boom".  They're usually the result of a number of small things that go wrong and build on each other, culminating in one gigantic boom.  Nobody, least of all little 'ol me, knows yet what's going to happen.  But considering the crude, violent nature of politics in that part of the world, I'm guessing things aren't going to end well.

S