“Surprising” Ukrainian resistance, not Macron’s naïve “statesmanship,” is what is bringing the Russians to the negotiating table

 

As much as international sanctions are hurting Russia, a quick victory—Vladimir Putin assumed it would be merely a matter of days—probably would have been seen as a fait accompli by many European leaders and sanctions would have been less harsh. But because the strength of Ukrainian resistance “surprised” many Europeans and the war has dragged on for weeks without any apparent victory in sight for the Russians, stronger sanctions could now be seen as delivering a one-two punch to the gut of Putin’s ambitions.

But then if you are French president Emmanuel Macron, you might be under the illusion that it is your “statesmanship” that has brought Russia to the negotiating table. As seen in a previous summit between the two leaders, the “negotiating table” fittingly reveals the gulf between illusion and reality:

 

Like a true Frenchman, Macron’s conceits only confirm the notion of French snobbery. Macron had the audacity to try to be “friends” with both Donald Trump and Putin; he failed with the former because he met his match with the narcissistic Trump, who just saw Macron as a little man with delusions of grandeur, just like he does most other people. Macron may not be “little,” but he does suffer from those delusions, as we have seen in his attempts to “reason” with Putin; what Macron doesn’t realize is that Putin clearly has little more respect for him than Trump did.

Back at a NATO conference in 2019, Macron charged that the organization no longer had a clear “purpose” in response to Trump’s complaint that most NATO countries were not paying their “fair share” for defense, meaning at least 2 percent of their national budgets. Like Germany, France was willing to “work” with Putin even after the Crimea annexation if there was economic benefit; but while Germany made a U-turn following the invasion of Ukraine, Macron has sought to minimize the “damage” by groveling and pleading on hands and knees for Putin to stop his war.  Macron clearly doesn’t “get it” yet that Putin’s Russia wants to be the adversary--if it cannot be the strongman--of the rest of Europe, because of Putin’s own delusions of grandeur.  

Evidence of “ordinary” French delusion is that Macron is expected to just squeak by to reelection in April because he is seen as being a “statesman,” or at least he has convinced the electorate that he is one. Of course the alternative is the candidate of the fascist party, Marine Le Pen—who has lavished praise on Putin in the past—so it really isn’t a pick-your-poison choice; asking why someone like Le Pen would even be close to being elected the president of a “civilized” country probably isn’t completely fair, since this country elected someone like Trump, who recent polling suggests would defeat Joe Biden in a rematch (how quickly people forget).

So what has Macron the “statesman” accomplished? From the beginning of the year he has been having discussions with Putin to ratchet down tensions toward Ukraine. To wit:

It was reported on February 8 that Macron was had reached a deal with Putin to forestall military operations against Ukraine. Of course Putin had for some time been “explaining” that the Russian troop build-up near the Ukrainian border was merely an “exercise,” but according to Macron, Putin told him that he had no intention of “initiating” a military “escalation” against Ukraine, and there wouldn’t be any permanent Russian military presence in Belarus. Whatever the gullible Macron heard in private, it was vociferously denied almost immediately by the Kremlin that Putin made any such “concession.”

February 22:  The British newspaper The Times reported that “President Macron has been left red-faced (again) after his much touted diplomatic efforts failed to persuade Russia to de-escalate in the Ukraine crisis. President Putin recognized the independence of Ukraine’s breakaway regions yesterday just hours after his French counterpart had announced brokering US-Russian peace talks.” A few days later came the full scale invasion of Ukraine on three fronts. The Wall Street Journal observed that despite his failure to achieve concessions from the Russians, just to see him “strutting on the world stage has allowed Mr. Macron to cement his status as a statesman at a time when analysts say voters are seeking a steady hand.”

Macron being played for a fool (a common refrain from his detractors) by Putin hasn’t stopped the “lines of communication” between them, since Putin needs Macron for domestic consumption purposes. But according to Clea Caulcutt in a Politico report on March 10, Macron “hasn’t been able to demonstrate any sign of having influenced Putin’s behavior,” and Putin seemed confident enough of his “friendship” with Macron to believe that he would believe conspiracy tales about “human shields” and “Nazis,” although to his credit Macron wasn’t buying into that line.

Then Putin—apparently for domestic consumption—claimed that Macron had “agreed” to a plan to humanitarian corridors that lead only to Russia, where refugees would likely be left in concentration camps and probably never allowed to return home. This time it was Macron’s turn to be in denial mode, claiming he never made such a statement. But as Politico noted. Macron has been digging his own hole: “Some have pointed out that Macron has sometimes echoed Kremlin talking points, referring to Russia’s ‘contemporary traumas’” in order to foster greater “understanding” of Putin’s mindset—which of course ignores Putin’s “greater Russia” plans.

However, the idea of Russia joining in a super-duper pan-European confederation as both Macron and Putin have suggested (from “Lisbon to Vladivostok”) might be motivated by completely different assumptions—with France in Putin’s mind being a (very) junior partner in a political entity that means to crack what unity the West has and subvert it under the control of Moscow and what it wants (such as viewing the U.S. as the “enemy”) and making it even more vulnerable to Russian energy blackmail, and why not—of the nuclear weapon variety.

Politico goes on: “In his diplomatic outreach, Macron has sometimes appeared to be trying to compensate for past mistakes—or to draw some meager dividend from years of seeking to engage with Russia.” Macron even accused those in his own foreign affairs ministry of being “deep state” operatives opposed to Russian aggrandizement. “Many think Macron has preferred to listen to politicians who were nostalgic for past French global influence and who were too soft on Russia, such as former ministers Hubert Védrine and Jean-Pierre Chevènement.”

But as the  director at the European Council on Foreign Affairs, Marie Dumoulin, observed, no one really understands—especially Macron—the “rationality” in Putin’s actions, or that there is a different rationality than the one that drives Western policy.  This lack of understanding makes it appear that the French are in favor of appeasing Putin without really understanding his end game.

Putin may have played Macron for a fool whether he knows it or not, but he won’t give up, like a contestant on "Wheel of Fortune" who usually "wins" the prize box that is empty instead of keeping the cash. In the meantime, Macron has pushed for sanctions if only because he is angry that Putin made him look like an idiot. Furthermore, Macron is loath to acknowledge Putin’s and his military’s war crimes in Ukraine; in Chinese fashion he has criticized the U.S.’ contention that Putin has committed such crimes.

Of course Putin’s own whining about this is like a bully beating on a 90-pound weakling and then complaining that his victim is hurting his hand.  But Macron is claiming rather self-servingly that "I wouldn't use this type of wording because I continue to hold discussions with President Putin. We want to stop the war that Russia has launched in Ukraine without escalation -- that's the objective."

Or the illusion. Reports are now that the Russians are not actually “deescalating” but repositioning forces around Kyiv, and Putin’s reaction to a letter passed on to him from Volodymyr Zelenskyy suggesting a possible peace plan was "Tell him I will thrash them"—suggesting that Putin is not negotiating in good faith and is just biding his time.  The reality is that if Macron sees himself as a “statesman,” he has made a pretty poor showing of it so far with thousands of Ukrainian civilians killed and millions more displaced. The reality is that the Ukrainian military has given Macron more time than he deserves to roll those double sixes and claim “victory” for himself.

Three ways to defend your wife’s “honor”

 

There were three interesting stories this past week, although it was only timely to write about one them. But then I got to thinking that there was a way to tie all three of them together, since they all involved a man’s wife under “threat,” and each approached the problem in different ways.

First let’s rehash what happened this Sunday at the 94^th Academy Awards ceremony. I have to admit that it’s been a long time since I gave a damn about the winners of the awards, since I generally don’t give a damn about contemporary actors or the movies they are in. The only contemporary films that interest me at all are those that challenge the usual self-serving, self-congratulatory politics; I mean, CODA won best picture over a much better film (in relative terms), The Power of the Dog, because it was politically correct for the Academy to check off its “feel good” list (a film about deaf people) and had a female in an improbable “hero” role. The contemporary films I tend to like are the ones hardly anyone in this country has seen (because they are not “politically correct”), like the 2018 film The Kindergarten Teacher starring Maggie Gyllenhaal, and it is that kind of contemporary film that actually has something real to say or isn’t afraid to challenge the senses that makes it into my film collection.

So although I didn’t bother to actually watch the show, it did make “news,” after Will Smith responded to a “joke” by Chris Rock by advancing to the stage and slapping him full in the face before a “shocked” audience that later gave him a standing ovation when he won the Best Actor Oscar and spilled fake tears, probably in relief he wasn’t arrested or escorted out of the building as he should have been. While many people on social media defended Smith initially, gradually the realization grew that Smith had done something shameful.

First of all, I would say that 99 percent of the people in this country have no idea what Rock’s “joke” was about. On the face of it, he merely said that he couldn’t wait to see Smith’s wife, Jada Pinkett, in the film GI Jane 2, which will be like the first one—a feminist fantasia about women  as fighting machines. Well maybe, but they still are banned from serving in ground combat units, so this is will be another film that fits in the realm of cartoon superheroes. Here we see Smith laughing when Rock tells the supposed “insinuation’ about Pinkett’s lack of hair:

 

  

Then what he does when he notices his wife isn’t laughing, and he’s probably going to be in for it later if he doesn’t “do something”:

 

Mr. Tough Guy. And here we see Smith delivering embarrassing f-bombs, as Pinkett (off camera) doesn’t attempt to restrain him (we are now learning that Pinkett was seen laughing with Smith's assault):

 

 

At least Rock kept his cool. After the fact, we are learning just how out-of-control and unjustified Smith’s reaction (out of “love” he said) was; it is unlikely that Rock, who his defenders say is not a malicious guy (he just tells the truth, such as why Smith was paid $20 million for that awful Wild Wild West reboot) and was not, like almost everyone else in the world, aware of Pinkettt’s hair issues (and it is she who has made it an "issue," after all) when shaved heads are not an unknown fashion "statement" among black women; if there was any “joke” intended, it was merely a comment on seeming to be remaining in “character” with the hairless role she played in Jane. Personally, I think both Smith and his wife are jerks (well, he’s one for sure, and she for marrying one); in regard to Smith, when his name comes up I can only think of the disgust I feel over that racist The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air theme.

Of course there is plenty of room for jerks in politics. Take for example Sen. Ted Cruz. I mean, are not his constituents in Texas ashamed that they voted for this guy yet? But then again, that is like asking if Marjorie Taylor Greene’s constituents are ashamed by her antics. Cruz spent his time making ridiculous attacks on Supreme Court nominee Ketanji Brown Jackson concerning “Critical Race Theory”—which of course only demonstrated why race is still a problem in this country. No need for “dog whistles”; the GOP far-right unashamedly just goes straight into the gutter with their racist constituents.  After it was over, her husband, Patrick Graves Jackson, a surgeon, kept a grave face and his cool; there was no need to sink to their level, everyone knows what they are. After the disgusting show trial hearing, this reaction spoke much more deeply than Smith’s hyper-masculine “chivalry”:

 

 

But there is another way to respond to attacks on your wife: you can hide behind her skirts, like Clarence Thomas. One of the most appalling discoveries from the January 6 Committee investigation is that Virginia “Ginni” Thomas isn’t your average consort of a Supreme Court justice, but an extreme-right, QAnon conspiracy fanatic that Mark Meadows didn’t mind exposing when he turned over his text messages to the committee, since “Ginni” makes him look like a relative island of sanity. “Ginni” attended the rally that eventually made its way to the Capitol Building, but she apparently got cold feet along the way.

But “Ginni” wasn’t finished. While she was not physically present during the insurrection, she certainly was there in “spirit.”  We are told that she sent text messages imploring Meadows to do something to “stop the steal,” including providing Sidney Powell’s conspiracy theories as justification, and passing on a “news flash” that the “Biden Crime Family” was arrested and sent to Guantanamo Bay. Yeah, that crazy. When Meadows “encouraged” her to “keep fighting,” there came this interesting response:

Thank you!! Needed that! This plus a conversation with my best friend just now… I will try to keep holding on. America is worth it!

“Ginni’s” best friend is, of course, her husband, and she his as they have repeatedly told the world whenever the opportunity arises. Such good friends are they that Thomas has been quoted as saying that “I can rant with her.” Now just think about that for a moment: it’s bad enough that Thomas was unqualified both temperamentally and intellectually—and if you believe Anita Hill, morally—for the position of Supreme Court justice. Given that he was replacing an icon of the civil rights movement, it was how many ways you want to go insulting to Thurgood Marshall’s memory and what he stood for. It disturbs the mind, then, what he “rants” about with a crazed spouse; does that mean he is crazed too?

Wouldn’t we like to know what “Ginni’s” best friend had to say about overturning the election by insurrection that made his wife feel “good” about it, since he apparently gave her encouragement to act like a crazed psychopath spewing outrageous nonsense. This is the same justice who the only one to vote against turning over National Archive documents to the January 6 committee. Does Thomas believe that there are more incriminating documents about him and his wife in them?

There are now calls for Thomas to resign or be impeached if more evidence emerges that he supported the overthrow of the Constitution he is supposed to “protect.” Thomas as a man with no apparent morality or ethics is unlikely to do the “right” thing on his own; what he will do is try to conceal the truth behind his wife’s skirts and let her take the heat. Of course you have to admit that Thomas is in a bit of “pickle” here. His wife is a lunatic with no honor to defend (as it is defined by normal people), and to publically defend her will reveal him to be just as off-the-rails as she is—and given his “opinions” over the years, we can wonder what it means if his “best friend” has been his chief “counselor.".

Any “official” statement coming out of Russia—as in China—needs to be seen as for domestic consumption, and to be taken with a grain of salt by the rest of the world.

 

In its desire to see Russia’s invasion in Ukraine end, Western media has latched on to any “hopeful” news that Putin is trying to find a “face-saving” way out of his war. Thus it was when it was reported that a “top Russian general” issued a statement on Friday claiming that "In general, the main tasks of the first stage of the operation have been completed. The combat potential of the armed forces of Ukraine has been significantly reduced, allowing us, I emphasize again, to focus the main efforts on achieving the main goal – ‘the liberation of Donbas.’"

There is that old saying “Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.” When Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelenskyy urged the U.S. and the EU to preemptively sanction Russia, they refused to do so because they wanted to believe Vladimir Putin’s lies (especially the French president) that he had no “intention” to invade Ukraine. Such a preemptive action may actually have worked, or at least have given Putin pause and given more ammunition to those in his inner circle to voice “concern” about an invasion.

Of course, Putin takes the whole world for being fools. Instead of “focusing” on regions Putin intends to separate permanently from Ukraine (if it cannot annex the whole country as is his desire), this latest bulletin was naturally another monstrous lie. In the west, Russian missile attacks on the “safe haven” for refugees city of Lviv have only intensified. That city is just 43 miles from the Polish border, which is probably why the Russians are using up their stock of “precision” weapons on the city to prevent any “mistaken” landings on Polish soil.

Furthermore, far being “finished” with the “first phase” of the war which many in the hopeless media took to mean as a “face-saving” intention to wind down attacks on Kyiv, in fact attacks on civilian centers continue, and indications are that—probably due to morale issues—troops on the Kyiv front are being “rotated out” in order to bring in “fresh” troops to continue the fight when ready, although it is question of just how bringing in “fresh green” troops against battle-hardened Ukrainian soldiers will bring any more success. The head of Ukraine’s military intelligence, Kyrylo Budanov, suggested that Ukraine might start giving the Russians further headaches by engaging in guerilla warfare in occupied regions.

Nevertheless the Western media at least has an idea of what is at stake and the threat to democracy that Russia poses. In the other parts of the world where “democracy” is either a sham (Iran) or non-existent (China), anything that discomfits the U.S. and Europe can be tolerated. For example, Aljazeera’s reporting has shown much less concern for the immorality of Putin’s actions than the Western media, keeping its reporting “matter of fact” as if there is no moral distinction between Russia and Ukraine. Rather, we have seen Middle Eastern media only being “disturbed” by an infograph post with apparently misleading numbers of bombs and missile strikes by the Russians in Syria as compared to those used against Ukraine, supposedly evidence of an anti-Muslim “double standard.”

Of course the real hypocrisy here had been the relative lack of condemnation against Russia for its indiscriminate leveling of rebel areas in Syria in support of the Assad regime. To be frank, expressing “outrage” over a “relative” point of contention doesn’t disguise the fact that Muslim countries have otherwise shown little interest in Russian military activities in Syria, so long as it propped up a fellow authoritarian; that it would express “outrage” now over a self-serving “technicality” only demonstrates an indifference to the atrocities that the Russians have committed and are committing.

The upshot is that Russia has been conning the whole world since Putin took power. The former KGB agent is well-schooled in the “art” of misinformation, although as head of state of a country that has no allies—nor has sought any—in Europe of any note, Putin’s lies are magnified greatly, and with it his plummeting credibility and the view of Russia as an adversary. The phrase “I’ll believe it when I see it” should go multiple times with any suggestion that Russia is ratcheting down its unjustified war against Ukraine or its war crime-level attacks on civilians.

Will Putin call in for “reinforcements” from the human “cockroach”?

 

The stories about Russian troops coming out of Ukraine paint a sorry picture if they are at all true. The Daily Beast is reporting on a story of how Russians troops are “clueless” about why they are in Ukraine, and some are refusing to fight. Pravda even admits that 300 soldiers in one unit simply walked away with their equipment in the city of Sumy in northeastern Ukraine; the same outlet reported nearly 10,000 Russian soldiers have been killed and 16,000 wounded before removing the post, claiming its website had been “hacked” into. Reports indicate that many Russian soldiers are suffering from frostbite, and only have a few days’ worth of food and ammunition. The British tabloid Express claims that it is “waiting for confirmation” that the Ukrainian army is near “erasing” an “entire” Russian army it has encircled in the Bucha-Irpin-Hostomel area near Kyiv.

Meanwhile, Chechen mercenaries deployed by pro-Putin tough guy Ramzan Kadyrov have been tasked to engage in assassinating Ukrainian officials, shooting on sight any Russian soldiers they see abandoning their posts (since it is bad for morale if Russian soldiers were to kill each other in a war hardly any of them understand) and gleefully engage in atrocious behavior (or is it atrocities?) which they share on social media via their cell phones. Fortunately, word is getting out that the Chechens themselves appear to have suffered such heavy losses that they don’t have much time for any fun—those who are still alive have to return eventually to forestall any coup attempt against their psycho leader—who like Putin misjudged the Ukrainian combat capabilities.

The FSB, meanwhile, is near munity with two its top leaders under house arrest, and a “whistleblower” has reported that FSB agents have provided secret information to the Ukrainians, including the location of assassination cells. Further, Russian generals are also becoming “concerned” that they will be made to take the sword for Putin’s failure; it remains to be seen if enough of them and others in Putin’s circle feel brave enough to depose Putin. For now, the Russian troops around Kyiv are digging in, planting land mines in their forward positions while they wait to be resupplied. Attacks against “soft” targets, like unarmed civilians, continues unabated.

Of course if Putin needs a friend who still has some authority (meaning not Donald Trump); he can always turn to French president Emmanuel Macron, who is always good for a laugh when Putin needs a fool. The Russian propaganda/”news” agency TASS reported on Wednesday that Macron assured the French public “not to panic” because "We are not involved in the war…I want to stress we will never be a side of this conflict and Europeans will do everything to stop the hostilities without getting involved." Remember that Macron announced that Putin had informed him that he had no plans to invade Ukraine just days before he did, and Macron “the statesman” didn’t take the hint and is still playing the naïve village idiot being played.

So if Macron won’t take sides—and at least that is what Russians are being told—is there another Putin stooge willing to do what he is told to help out in the fight? Despite all the hypocrisy coming out of Chinese diplomats’ mouths—alleged “respect” for state sovereignty and the outrageous assertion that Russians are “suffering” as much as the Ukrainians—China doesn’t want to appear to be too overtly supporting the invasion which it is likely following as a blue print for its own invasion plans in Taiwan.

There is, however, a Putin stooge who may be willing to do what he is told. This past February, Yasmeen Serhan wrote in The Atlantic that “In the space of a month Vladimir Putin has effectively managed to transform a former Soviet state into an extension of Russian territory, in full view of the United States and Europe, without firing a single shot in the country.” She was talking, of course, about Belarus. 

In 2021, John Oliver did a profile of Belarus president Alexander Lukashenko 1  which revealed him to be a dangerous clown, one of those people who if they don’t actually “see” something, it doesn’t exist (i.e. Covid-19). Lukashenko made many promises in his early years that made him into some kind of “rock star” in the eyes of Belarusians. But Lukashenko’s promise to combat corruption fell apart only months into his presidency, mostly unreported because of enforced media blackouts and persecution of journalists; Lukashenko, in fact, has only managed to become the poster boy of corruption. 

When Lukashenko clamped down on street protests in 2012, a few enterprising political opponents staged a stuffed animal protest, which led to arrests: 

 

Lukashenko has also been satirized as a cockroach, and he even felt compelled to call a news conference to protest against such imagery: 

 

But the reason why Lukashenko is now a threat to Ukraine is not because he feels Ukraine is any threat to Belarus or even himself, but because like Kadyrov he is an authoritarian who owes his very survival to Putin. As Serhan observes in the Atlantic article, “the country captured the world’s attention after a rigged presidential election (in 2020) ensuring the continued reign of its longtime leader, Alexander Lukashenko, sparked some of the largest prodemocracy protests in Belarusian history. He survived with the help of the Russian government, which provided him with the police forces to quash the demonstrations and the financing to overcome the West’s sanctions. Suddenly, a nation that purported to be neutral (military neutrality is built into the Belarusian constitution) and whose leader often complains of Russian overreach came to be seen around the world as a vassal state.” 

In the last month, the Belarusian constitution was “modified” to allow a permanent Russian military presence, as if anyone thought that Lukashenko was fool enough to take on NATO himself. Despite the fact that he is now nothing more than a Putin puppet, he will be allowed to stay a figurehead president of a client state as long as he can clamp down on anti-Russian dissent—which if it becomes a “problem” will likely lead to a Russian invasion of Belarus. Lukashenko still has delusions of grandeur, clearly intending his rule to be the beginning of a family “dynasty” akin to North Korea, since as Oliver notes, his son always seems to be by his side, apparently to learn how to be a corrupt authoritarian like his old man.

In order for this “dynasty” to survive, Lukashenko needs  the threat of Russian power to keep the people in line to bolster his own repressive activities (Oliver shows a man demonstrating torture techniques on a Belarusian journalist that included stripping him naked in a warehouse freezer). The assumption now is that Putin will likely call in his marker and order Lukashenko to enter the war, which he is also likely to comply with, if reluctantly; the joint military exercises in Belarus can now be seen as an effort to prepare the Belarusian military for such an eventuality. 

In in its three decades of existence, it took but two short years for Belarus to change from a neutral buttress against Russian aggression in Europe, to now being Putin’s partner in it. If in fact Lukashenko does decide to send forces into Ukraine, then this must be seen both as an escalation in the conflict and a new danger to the European “order,” since Belarus will have seeded its “sovereignty” to Russia and put adversarial Russian forces directly on the eastern European frontier yet again.