Such weakness is tantamount to an invitation for the Russian president, emboldened by high popularity fueled by his jingoistic and lying propaganda, to keep Crimea and to take by force southeastern Ukraine, which he claims is historically Russian land as well.
No, we are not calling for a NATO invasion or Western troops. We are calling for the West and Ukraine to stop pretending the situation is anything other than the reality: war. Western military aid should be forthcoming to help Ukraine defend itself.
Putin needs to be stopped by the Western and civilized world through isolating and crushing diplomatic and economic sanctions. His massive paranoia and insecurities, along with the immorality of his KGB mentality, mean that he will continue to be a destructive force as long as the dictator remains in power. The longer he stays, the longer he will drive up military spending that could go to better uses, were it not for the threat that Putin’s military might poses. At a minimum, the West needs to vastly ramp up the defense capabilities of Poland and the Baltic states, the most threatened of NATO allies.
Putin’s main aim is to undermine the West, instigate global instability and bully his neighbors into submission to keep alive his oil-and-gas fueled kleptocracy. He had the temerity to threaten the United States with nuclear weapons, via his minister of propaganda, Dmitry Kiselov.
All who do business with the Putin regime should be ashamed enough to cut their ties, from Western countries who continue to buy gas from him or sell weapons to fuel his military ambitions. Companies should disinvest from Russia as a show to the civilized world that prosperity and morality are not only compatible, but inextricably linked as ways of doing business. The sanctions erected so far are meager and ineffective.
Some reports show that Putin has amassed up to 100,000 soldiers on Ukraine’s borders, surrounding a beleaguered nation from all sides.
And yet, despite the obvious threat, Ukraine’s political leaders still have not officially recognized a state of war even as they, nonetheless, try to rouse the nation around self-defense. In fact, many people are going about their business as if a military invasion of the mainland might not be imminent and nearly 5 percent of their nation has not been lopped off.
It was Russia that declared war on Ukraine, not the other way around. Yet Ukraine’s industries and factories still, shockingly, supply military equipment to Russia. This is trading with the enemy. The borders remain open between the two nations, although Ukraine’s security services have stopped more than 8,000 people suspected of trying to violently destabilize the country. The border should be closed to Russia until the military threat has passed. The two nations have a complicated and intertwining history, for sure, economically, culturally, historically, linguistically and in many other ways.
However, the time has come for mainland Ukraine to break West – and adopt its own institutions that protect democracy, human rights, economic freedom and justice. Most Ukrainians want no part of Putin’s goal of resurrecting the Soviet Union.
If it comes to a military battle, Ukraine will lose. But Russia will not win. The nation is largely united against Putin and will prevail through non-violent resistance and other forms of sabotage to undermine Kremlin rule in mainland Ukraine. As for Crimea, plenty of people are unhappy with the turn of events, but suffer in silence or are preparing to leave.
The West must help by staging a new cold war against Putin, who is much weaker than he looks, and embark on Iran-style sanctions. Ukraine, however, must do more to defend itself. Nobody from the West is going to come to the rescue of a nation that seems in denial of the threat of forcible dismemberment and that is pretending that war has not been declared against it.
If Crimea is lost, then the political leaders of Ukraine need to save the rest of the nation. This will mean a complete overhaul of all institutions and many of the people who run them, from civilian to military. It will also require its Western friends to continue extending helping hands, not as a form of charity, but as required help for breaking free from Putinism, autocracy and neo-Soviet thinking – none of which are healthy for any nation or people, as Russians will eventually learn.
Let the new West-East border run from Chernihiv to Donetsk oblasts in the east. It will represent progress, albeit progress that came at a high price.
