Two months on, Putin’s plan is still nonsensical
AFTER more than two months of conflict in Ukraine, it is time to make some balanced considerations. It is known that Putin wants us to understand that he invaded Ukraine to free it from the ‘Nazi oppressors’, referring to the Zelensky government.
On the question of the name Nazis used, Russia continues to employ a propaganda language intended to create juxtapositions that make one think of Hitler, to whom, however, his Foreign Minister Lavrov, in an interview with Italian channel Media 7, even attributed a Jewish origin, triggering, as it was to be expected, a diplomatic incident with Israel. And all to keep alive a narrative that really makes no sense.
But let’s put aside the Russian narrative and examine well what lies behind this war. Before the invasion on February 24, Ukraine enjoyed a certain stability apart from the south-south-east of the country torn apart by years of war between Ukrainians and Russian separatists.
Putin, who is immediately credited with the ambition to reconstitute the old Soviet empire, mobilises an army of 100,000 men and invades Ukraine. He starts bombing various towns in the country from north to south, Russian troops, with Putin’s approval or not, commit war crimes but, in the so-called second phase of its declared ‘special military operation’, focuses on the south-southeast region of Donbas.
Since the beginning of the conflict, Nato and the United States, in order not to intervene directly in war territory, decide to send weapons to the Ukrainians to fight, for all intents and purposes, a proxy war against Russia.
But the critical point is that in doing so they have fuelled and continue to feed the expectations of Zelensky – who now has confidence that he can defeat the Russians – into thinking of driving them out of the territory of the Donbas which Putin, they know perfectly well, will never give up.
We all wish that these expectations materialise, but the policy of the Western powers and especially of the United States is being unrealistic, in providing military aid, rather than more pragmatically convincing the Ukrainians to seek a compromise with Russia.
As things stand, once any will for and possibility of a compromise has been precluded, this war conflict can have only two outcomes: either it will last for a long time, with a conclusion that is difficult to predict, or degenerate into a real-world conflict in which Putin will play all his cards, with all the consequences we can imagine. CONCETTO LA MALFA,
Dublin 4.
Rein in this earache
ANOTHER Punchestown Racing festival has come and gone and followers of the event unable to attend are indebted to RTÉ for the extensive coverage.
I was especially pleased with the expert contribution of Ruby Walsh and Jane Mangan who provided so much interesting information and analysis.
However, some of the others, irritatingly, used the word ‘absolutely’ far too much. Hopefully, they can be ‘toned down’ before the next live horse racing on the station. CATHAL HUGHES, Greystones, Co. Wicklow.
Strong leaders
I WAS rather taken aback by Anthony Later’s (Letters, Tuesday) rather selective memory of John F. Kennedy being the last leader in the West who knew how to treat bullies.
Did not Lyndon B Johnson and Richard Nixon stand up to the North Vietnamese communists who had been brutalising South Vietnam?
Did Ronald Reagan not stand against Muammar Gaddafi,
the Sandinistas and the Soviet Union?
Did Margaret Thatcher not take back the Falkland Islands from the Argentine Junta by military force? Did both George HW Bush and later his son and Tony Blair not take on Saddam Hussein when confronted by him?
JOHN CAREY, via email.
Becker deserves better
SOMEHOW too many media commentators and writers, will not allow someone well known to suffer without comment for their mistakes made as human beings and in circumstances which can find them before the courts.
We all struggle to get through life at different stages, not enduring over-exposure by the public at large.
From their bottomless collection of unkind remarks, detractors now attack the great Boris Becker, who has fallen on hard times.
Unhappy events happen to everyone, but not all become ridiculed and judged by people who do not know them, or the real personal details of their unfortunate fall from grace.
In the case of Mr Becker, it is only a matter of business and money. Many are guilty of far worse crimes, yet are lucky enough never to read or hear of themselves in the world media, and are not imprisoned, more to the point. Let us not forget that:
‘The quality of mercy is not strain’d;
It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven, Upon the place beneath. It is twice blessed – it blesseth him that gives and him that takes.’
We can do this in our thoughts so that nobody needs to know.