Why Putin can’t stand the bombs of Ukraine: The consequences of NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg’s invasion of Ukraine
The author of “A Red Line in the Sand: Diplomacy, Strategy, and the History of Wars That Might Still Happen” is a CNN contributor and two-time winner of the Deadline Club Award. He formerly was a correspondent for The New York Times and CBS News in Europe and Asia. The views expressed in this commentary are his own. CNN has more opinion.
None of these horrors matter to Putin. He has nothing to compare to the constraints Western democracies are expected to honor. He is willing to deal with whoever is in power and help them stay there, as long as they remain his friend.
Now Poland is facing the repercussions from these attacks – and it’s not the only bordering country. Russian rockets have also knocked out power across neighboring Moldova which is not a NATO member, and therefore attracted less attention than the Polish incident.
But the proximate reason for this action was in fact Putin’s utterly inhumane carpet bombing of Ukrainian infrastructure. This is all part of Putin’s misguided, and likely futile, effort to hammer the nation into submission – a hail of rockets designed to knock out electricity, water, and other critical civilian infrastructure as winter looms.
One thing is clear, whatever the circumstances of the missile. NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg accused Russia of continuing its illegal war against Ukraine.
The attacks began at the beginning of the war and have only increased in virulence since Ukrainian forces attacked a bridge close to Putin’s heart.
As Ukrainian forces continued to push back Russian units in the early days of the war, the Russian retaliation was expanded.
The Cambodian Khmer Rouge planted mines in large areas of the country, like the ones his forces have planted in Kherson. Indeed, Cambodian de-mining experts have even been called in to assist with the herculean task facing Ukraine in 2022. At the same time, Russian armies have also left behind evidence of unspeakable atrocities and torture, also reminiscent of the Khmer Rouge.
That said, a growing number of Russian soldiers have rebelled at what they have been asked to do and refused to fight. Russian troops may be willing to shoot retreating or deserting soldiers, according to the UK Defense Ministry.
Indeed a hotline and Telegram channel, launched as a Ukrainian military intelligence project called “I want to live,” designed to assist Russian soldiers eager to defect, has taken off, reportedly booking some 3,500 calls in its first two months of activity.
Diplomatically, Putin finds himself increasingly isolated on the world stage. He was the only head of state to stay away from the G20, as Zelensky dubbed it. Though Putin once lusted after a return to the G7 (known as the G8 before he was ousted after his seizure of Crimea), inclusion now seems but a distant dream. Russia’s sudden ban on 100 Canadians, including Canadian-American Jim Carrey, from entering the country only made the comparison with North Korea more striking.
Above all, many of the best and brightest in virtually every field have now fled Russia. This includes writers, artists and journalists as well as some of the most creative technologists, scientists and engineers.
One leading Russian journalist, Mikhail Zygar, who has settled in Berlin after fleeing in March, told me last week that while he hoped this is not the case, he is prepared to accept the reality – like many of his countrymen, he may never be able to return to his homeland, to which he remains deeply attached.
The French-German Joint Project for the Future Combat Air System: How Vladimir Putin criticized South Africa and his behavior in the ‘Fragment of Democracy and Democracy’
Rumbling in the background is the West’s attempt to diversify away from Russian oil and natural gas in an effort to deprive the country of material resources to pursue this war. “We have understood and learnt our lesson that it was an unhealthy and unsustainable dependency, and we want reliable and forward-looking connections,” Ursula von der Leyen, President of the European Commission told the G20 on Tuesday.
Moreover, Putin’s dream that this conflict, along with the enormous burden it has proven to be on Western countries, would only drive further wedges into the Western alliance are proving unfulfilled. On Monday, word began circulating in aerospace circles that the long-stalled joint French-German project for a next-generation jet fighter at the heart of the Future Combat Air System – Europe’s largest weapons program – was beginning to move forward.
He holds that attempts by certain countries to rewrite and redefine world history are becoming increasingly aggressive and attempt to divide our society, and eventually weaken Russia.
Editor’s Note: Joyce M. Davis, outreach and opinion editor for PennLive and The Patriot-News, is the president and CEO of the World Affairs Council of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. She is a veteran journalist and author who has lived and worked around the globe, working for National Public Radio, Knight Ridder Newspapers in Washington, DC, and Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty in Prague. The opinions expressed here are her own. CNN has more opinion.
Russia seems to have a better grasp on the United States in Africa. In recent days, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov underscored that stark reality as he wined and dined his way through a tour of four African capitals.
There is hope that the emerging leaders won’t see Russia as their friend but as an obstruction to stability, democracy and African prosperity.
While in South Africa, leaders treated him like a friend instead of being treated like a pariah by the US.
In South Africa, Foreign Minister Naledi Pandor greeted Lavrov with open arms. She did not use the meeting in South Africa last Monday to speak about Russia killing Ukrainians. She brushed off criticism, saying that it would be irrational to do so.
South Africa will soon hold naval drills with Russia and China, Pandor said, calling it an exercise with friends. The US and Europe did not like it.
It was a significant – though just shy of a majority – portion of the continent. 28 African nations voted to condemn Russia.
Eritrea was one of only four countries globally – the others being Belarus, North Korea and Syria – to openly side with Russia, which has a history of military co-operation with these decidedly undemocratic, authoritarian regimes.
In democracies, the leaders can be held accountable. Western democracies are supposed to care about human rights and rule of law. Putin doesn’t. No one holds him accountable.
Putin doesn’t care that the Human Rights Watch World Report 2022 says Eritrean forces have carried out large-scale massacres, summary executions, and widespread sexual violence, including gang rape and sexual slavery.
He doesn’t care that Human Rights Watch says that the government security forces in the country of Malian are responsible for extrajudicial killings, enforced disappearances, torture, and arbitrary arrests.
Russia’s private military group is bolstering authoritarian regimes throughout Africa, including in Mali, Sudan, Central African Republic, Mozambique and Libya. And human rights organizations say Wagner is guilty of its own atrocities on the continent.
And Putin’s influence in Africa has had a dramatic impact on the world stage during a time of crisis when the US sought unified condemnation of the invasion of Ukraine. Look at voting at the UN.
America has been guilty of covering up abuses of human rights in authoritarian regimes. Let’s not forget American atrocities in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and elsewhere in Africa.
President Biden made a pledge of $55 billion in economic, health, and security aid over the next three years to help counteract Russia’s influence.
US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellin went to Africa last week and promised more money. She announced American plans to expand partnerships with Africa on issues such as climate change and access to clean energy. And she said the United States will provide over $1 billion to support African-led efforts to combat climate change.
And as Russia focuses its efforts on controlling Africa’s despots, the US would do well to focus on the African people, especially on its youth. As they soon take over the seats of power, there are signs young people want more responsible and accountable governments.
As the anniversary of Vladimir Putin’s brutal invasion of Ukraine approaches, a Russian warship armed with one of Moscow’s most powerful weapons pulled into a port on South Africa’s east coast this weekend.
The frigate Admiral Gorshkov – carrying hypersonic Zircon missiles, according to President Putin – has a “Z” and “V” crudely painted in white on its blackened smokestack, just like the Russian tanks and artillery pieces that rolled into Ukraine a year ago.
The South African War: Why is South Africa a sell-out? A comment on South Africa’s anti-apartheid history
South Africa says it has been planning for a long time for naval exercise in the Indian Ocean with South African and Chinese warships.
The timing of the exercises has Western diplomats angry and critical of the government, which may result in an embarrassing backlash.
“The timing of these exercises is particularly unfortunate and will focus the world’s attention on South Africa during the anniversary of the war. Steven Gruzd is the head of the African Governance and Diplomacy Program at the South African Institute of International Affairs.
“By default, we are on the side of Russia. To us Ukraine, what we call a sell-out. In a CNN interview last year, Obey Mabena, who was a veteran of the ANC armed wing, said that it was selling out to the west.
The police brutality ofapartheid South Africa led to the escape of Mabena, like many other people in his generation. Many South African youth joined the armed wing of liberation movements when they were in exile.
The Soviet bloc was willing to give us everything that we needed. The first time we came across people who treated us as equals was when they gave us food, uniforms and weapons.
Fighters for the liberation movement have a different experience with the west. In the 1980s the US government supported sanctions against South Africa’s apartheid regime.
Nelson Mandela, South Africa’s first black president and anti-apartheid activist, was on a terror watch list until 2008 because of the Cold War. Many ANC members believe that the US Central Intelligence Agency was involved in his capture, something that has not been proven.
The anti-apartheid movement had powerful allies in the US. In Congress, then-senator Joe Biden famously lambasted Ronald Reagan’s secretary of state for backing the White South African government.
Source: https://www.cnn.com/2023/02/19/africa/south-africa-russia-china-military-drills-intl-cmd/index.html
The Cold War in South Africa – a message for the United Nations and the role of Zircon missile test-fired by the Admiral Gorshkov
We got a response that says you can leave it or take it. And in the face of that arrogance, we thought the only decision we could take was to abstain,” Naledi Pandor, minister of international relations and cooperation, told CNN in June.
She maintains that the goal for the global community should be a negotiated settlement between Russia and Ukraine under the authority of the United Nations. South African President Cyril Ramaphosa has offered to mediate in those talks.
Neither side has taken him up on the offer. South Africa still has a stance on the war. US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen, and other senior US diplomats have all visited South Africa since the start of the war.
It is difficult to argue that the pragmatic approach is the morally correct one, if South African officials think so. Certainly with a pedigree of moral giants like Nelson Mandela and Desmond Tutu – the late Archbishop of Cape Town whose foundation said this was no time to “sit on the fence.”
Pretoria may come under even more criticism if, as rumored, Russia test-fires a hypersonic Zircon missile from the frigate Admiral Gorshkov during the naval exercises.
Putin bragged about them before. He said that it has no analogues in any country in the world. “I am sure that such powerful weapons will reliably protect Russia from potential external threats and will help ensure the national interests of our country,” he added.