By Samuel Estefanous
Pretty soon I am sure that is what Secretary Austin is going to say to Biden when inquired how he is going to deliver the 61 billion dollar worth of arms to Ukraine.
‘Deliver did you say Mr. President? Deliver where? Russia has dismantled the rails and major military airfields and it is advancing towards Kharkiv.’
In the event the title of this article sounds a little familiar, it is because I had borrowed it from the Odd Couple II staring Jack Lemmon and Walter Mathieu. There is this scene where the characters do their trademark altercation after losing their bags and being lost themselves somewhere in California.
Walter Mathieu’s character, ever the guilty party, pleads with Phoenix- ‘time has changed now we can have Budget or DHL deliver our bags to us’ and Jack Lemon’s character snaps at the utter stupidity of the idea and exclaims
‘Deliver, deliver where? We have already crisscrossed California more than the covered wagons did one hundred years ago.’
(Incidentally I swear to God Walter Mathieu breaks character and for a fleeting moment betrays a smirk but for some reason the Director had chosen to keep it.)
At any rate that is how I feel about the gazillion of dollars’ worth armament NATO and the West are committing to Ukraine. It is going to be a logistical nightmare and it may actually end up being generously delivered to President Putin.
The Commander in Chief of the Ukrainian armed forces, General Syrsky, has eventually admitted the obvious to the chagrin of Western journalists and pundits. Apparently, the territorial loss of the Ukraine is acutely felt in the editorial rooms of most Western newspapers than in ordinary Ukrainian households.
I mean just try to listen to the so-called liberal Western media outlets affiliated to the Democratic Party. They would throw tantrums and foam at the mouth at the slightest hint that the war in the Ukraine is a spillover from the American sponsored color revolution in that part of the world or the Ukraine is losing the war. (As you might remember Georgia and the Ukraine were selected by the infamous NED–National Endowment for Democracy- to foment color revolution in the former Soviet Republics; Georgia was wise enough to boot out the program and lock up the West’s darling boy, Saakashvili. In our country, too, such attempts were made)
Contrary to their mantra about being entitled to one’s opinion, the liberal media would grill anybody that doesn’t echo back their ideas. A Ukraine born Republican member of Congress voted against the motion to indefinitely finance the war to the last Ukrainian and she is ruthlessly being anathematized by the vicious diabolical liberal media.
1-Russia Remains Unfazed
Except for the Deputy Chairman of the Security Council- Mr. Medvedev-Russian officials from Peskov to Zakharova kept their cool at the news of the arms delivery. They reaffirmed that no amount of aid is going to change the outcome of the war.
I had assumed Putin would send delegations to different parts of the world, would try to convene the SC of the UN, the Duma would be summoned for a special deliberation etcetera. The only unusual thing it did was intensifying long range attacks on Ukrainian energy and rail infrastructures.
For the large part Russia has remained unfazed at the much hyped historical armament aid granted to the Ukraine and it must have confused the West on no end.
2-The Miracle of Russian Economic Growth
Now we are into the third year since the West has slapped unprecedented economic sanctions on Russia. The energy dominated Russian economy was expected to crumble like a cookie within a few weeks. In a thoroughly globalized energy market an isolated net energy exporter and oil dominated economy was believed to capsize as Venezuela did- we were lectured by distinguished economists from Ivy League colleagues and Wall Street pundits.
Nothing of the kind happened. Russia kept issuing conservative forecasts of its economic growth between 4% and 6%; and guess what? However much it tried to even the IMF could do nothing but affirm the Report with slight corrections.
3-The Elivera Nabiullina Factor
No doubt about it-Elivera Nabiullina is the genius behind Russia’s staying the course and absorbing the shocks of huge military expenditure and the sanctions that included cutting Russia off the Swift payment system.
Not to mention the effects of the freezing and stealing of the country’s foreign reserves by Western democracies to the tune of $612 billion dollars.
In all these presumed travails the Russian economy is growing and some EU leaders like Orban are frankly admitting that though the United States is benefitting , Europe is suffering the consequences of the sanction- looks like with all their sophistications they had missed the obvious fact that sanctions work both ways.
Now when they couldn’t find a worthy opposite number to Nabiullina in Brussels, they are set to foment conspiracy theories to wedge a rift between the Governor and Putin. They couldn’t quote her opposing the Special military Operation, so they resorted to voodoo conjecturing that by the way she dresses she is silently expressing her unbridled opposition to Putin.
God knows, what we missed here in Ethiopia is an Elivera at the helm of the economy.
3- The Chinese are a Steadfast Principled Nation
Recently Secretary Blinken has cut a sorry figure in Beijing. The entire Western Nations, including Japan, South Korea and Australia have done everything in their capacity to subdue Russia but they couldn’t and swallowing his pride Blinken pleaded with the Chinese to help liquidate Russia once and for all times.
Xi’s reply? Classic Chinese! As we see no point in choosing your friends for you, we believe we can choose our friends by ourselves, thank you very much!
Then, the liberal media began chattering- the mystery of Russia’s infallibility is at last revealed. China and North Korea! One would think these countries didn’t exist around February 2022.
In the wake of the blank check they had written for Ukraine to do everything-anything-to defeat Russia, they shamelessly warned China, Iran and North Korea that the parts exports destined to Russia from their respective Companies might be used by Russia for military purposes.
Makes one wonder, are folks in Brussels and Washington on a non-stop drinking spree? I mean nothing they do and say makes any sense.
4-The Ukraine-the West’s Hired Hit Man?
The Ukrainians openly contend that the West is obliged to help the Ukraine as the latter is fighting the West’s war for cheap.
No one understands this better than the three satellite Baltic Republics and Poland. These four countries fear and hate Russia but it is no secret that they despise the Ukraine and they are using the poor Nation and its children to get at Russia. Obviously, they reason that if a beast devours a beast either way it is a good riddance.
Otherwise nothing justifies the fact that, on the streets of Vilnius, Riga, Tallinn, Warsaw and Prague Ukrainians are encouraged and cheered on to boo and insult ordinary Russians. It is so banal and disgusting that it looks like a staged rooster fight on the streets of Veracruz.
5- Is NATO a Paper tiger?
In recent battles in Eastern Ukraine, the much talked about NATO tanks including Abrams (each worth $10 million dollar) became kid toys at the hands of the Russians. Russia has reason to believe that among other factors the ineffectiveness of NATO military hardware in actual warfare was the immediate driving force behind Congress voting the $61 billion dollar aid to the Ukraine carte blanche.
I think that partly explains the reason NATO is on tenterhooks.
God Bless
The writer can be reaching at : estefanoussamuel@yahoo.com
Editor’s note : Views in the article do not necessarily reflect the views of borkena.com
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Russia-Ukraine conflict has never been about democracy. Never. Was “democracy” or “human rights” the reason for meddling in Iraq? Afghanistan? Syria? Palestine? Venezuela? Yemen? Ethiopia? “NATO” (read: the US) is there because Ukrainians, not Americans or Europeans, are the ones paying with their blood and at great cost to their nation’s future. Absent “NATO” interference the war would stop within few weeks. So what’s in it for the US (sorry NATO)? 1/ testing ground for armaments and a lucrative arms business 2/ weakening Russia (so far, didn’t work as planned) 3/ the primary goal, of course, is containing China. Can NATO stop China from becoming global leader? China is already a global leader in the economic sphere.
NATO’s involvement in Ukraine has various dimensions:
1) The USA plans to station nuclear weapons near the Russian border and possibly weaken Russia by breaking it up into smaller nations.
2) Europe views Ukraine as a reliable source of agricultural goods due to its highly fertile soil.
3) Germany is cautious about Ukraine potentially outpacing it in the future and has been reluctant to endorse Ukraine’s NATO membership. Angela Merkel opposed it for many years.