Umberto Eco - Ur Fascism

[Mark Kohut]

I have read *Putin's Kleptocracy* and everything is clearer.....



On Mon, Jan 3, 2022 at 10:44 AM Martin Dietze <mdietze at gmail.com> wrote:

> On 3. January 2022 at 16:10:30, Joseph Tracy (brook7 at sover.net) wrote:
>
> I think the US and EU Nato countries are playing with dynamite. Russia is
> clearly responding to the threat of Nato missiles right on their border and
> to the US reneging on earlier promises not to advance Nato boundary.
>
> AFAIK countries like Poland and Germany are far more threatened by the
> nuclear missiles Russia has stationed in Kaliningrad [2] (which is in the
> middle of Poland) than of anything the NATO has stationed near Russia’s
> border (see [2] for the geographical context).
>
> To my knowledge the alleged promise of not advancing NATO's boundary
> eastwards is a myth. Then-Soviet-leader Mikhail Gorbachev has later
> labelled this a “myth”, see this interview in [3]:
>
>    - Gorbachev: you need to consider this: At that time there was NATO and
>    the Warsaw Pact. What could have been subject to an agreement if any?
> There
>    was no such question then.
>    - Interviewer: does that mean that the statement that you were deceived
>    by NATO’s expansion to the East is a myth?
>    - Gorbachev: indeed, this is a myth. This is something the press, dear
>    press, was involved.
>
> I can remember the early 1990s quite well, I was in my mid twenties then.
> Russia was not perceived as an opponent, actually politicians and ordinary
> people hoped (and even expected) Russia to eventually join the “free
> world”. Countries like Poland, Czechoslovakia and the three Baltic
> republics were less naive and urged the NATO to accept their membership.
> Looking at what happened to other post soviet countries like Moldova,
> Georgia and Ukraine, one has to acknowledge that the before mentioned where
> right. NATO can refuse accepting a member application (as - then driven by
> Germany and France - done in 2008, just months before Russia invaded
> Georgia), but each country has a right to choose their own allies. Hence
> you are promoting an idea which I consider by itself quite dangerous and
> also disregarding peoples’ rights.
>
>  I also think Ukraine should settle while it can. An armed conflict will
> not go well for them. The US can no longer control the Eurasian continent
> through proxies. Shit, we couldn’t even succeed in whatever the fuck we
> thought we were doing in Afghanistan , Syria, Iraq or Libya. Calling Putin
> names won’t solve the problem. The US should concern itself with our own
> sovereign territory and stop trying to rule the world.
> I read one of Putin’s speeches a couple days ago and wish our leaders were
> as smart, careful and sensible. I don’t like authoritarian structures
> anywhere but acting like our authoritarian crimes are negligible is
> nonsense. De escalate and make justice in your own house.
>
> Words are just words. East Europe’s peoples assess Putin entirely
> differently, and that is based on experience - something we in our
> respective distant and secure countries do not really have.
>
> I have recommended the book Putin’s Kleptocracy by Karen Dawisha [4], and I
> am now doing this again. The book is based on well-documented research with
> an exhaustive list of references according to which one can verify the
> claims made there. For me it was an eye-opener, and I think that knowing
> Putin’s background “name calling” should no longer be an issue.
>
> References:
>
>    1. https://fas.org/blogs/security/2018/06/kaliningrad/
>    2. https://pbs.twimg.com/media/D_16SS2XsAA_rWY.jpg
>    3. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ZES9PVKcks
>    4. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Putin's_Kleptocracy
> --
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>