[Skybird]

There is nothing the West can do.

1. Boycott the football WM. Symbolic act only, and anyway: unlikely to happen. The tournament was pulled ashore by Russia with great effort and underlines its desire to score big in prestige and reputation, but if such a boycott by Western nations would happen, however unlikely that is, it would be only symbolical anyway, causing no substantial harm to Russia. It would get a bit less applaus on the international stage for that tournament - so what...?

2. Strenghtening NATO combat capacity in Eastern European nations. Sorry, where should these reinforcments come from, and how should they reach a level that is a.) sustainable in the longterm so that they really change the game, and b.) how should they be sufficient in real combat strength so that the Russians could really feel the sting of their presence? They are already superior at NATO'S Eastern front, that simple it is. Also, many European states with small military will be reluctant to "provoke" Russia by increasing military presence in the East. Who should take the lead in Poland and the Baltic states? Germany...? Dont make me laugh.

3. Russia delivers gas to Europe. Plenty of it. And Europe depends on it currently. The word to focus on in this is: dependency. When you are dependent, you hardly are in a position to start a seriosu rumble with the side you are dependent of.

4. Russia ia practically economically autark. Nobody in the West wants to hear that, everybody seems to expect their economic and financial collapse. I have come to the conclusion that this is a Western opportunistic self-deception. A country the size of Russia covering so many climate zones and economic regions of the globe, will always find ways to sit out economic pressure form outside its borders as long as they do not turn to diemnsions like at the end of the USSR. And from that we are still far away.

5. Freezing of Russian assets by some key personnel, and banning some persons to travel. Well. Somebody cannot go skiing in St Moritz, no shopping tour in London this weekend. Big deal.

What they announce, plan and do now, is nothign else but pointless theatre stage thunder. But the noise of a balking dog means just this: a dog that balks, cannot bite.

Stoltenberg'S appearance at NATO was a pityful sight. I almost cried when seeing the obvious truth in his theatralic moral indignation. He spends a lot of effort in sendign and illustrating just this message: we are helpless to react, we are too weak to mee the Russian challenge on equal terms, we do not know what to really do - and we make a lot of words to decoeve the world over this helplessness of ours. Somebody whistles while walking alone in the dark forest.

Meanwhile Russia keeps on playing its game the way this kind of game needs to be played. It creates facts in Syria the West cannot counter. It keeps the Crimean. It builds threats in the West's flank in the Middle East. It widens the gap betwene Europe and the US, opushes the US away from Europe. It buys gold with money Westerners claim it does not have. It spends no time on sentimentality but acts as ruthless and determined as needed to see its objectives through. Its not nice how they play. But its successful. Damn successful. Efficient.

What many already forgot is that Putin, when he took over from Yeltzin, has ended the chaos of the era after the Sovjet Union's fall. Initially, Putin worked for and tried to bring Russia closer to Europe, on equal eye levels. But then the West betrayed him two times. First the Western predators tried to extract as much loot from the weak new-Russian economic environment as possible and tried to keep the new Russian state and its adminsutraiton out of stable control, and second the West promised to not move up towards Russia'S borders, and naive as they were at that time, the Russians believed that. They got betrayed, and Putin learned to lessons. First, give the West the opportunity to erode and abuse Russia'S wealth and economy, and it will do so, and second: Western promises and verbal agreements do mean nothign and are not worth the air it takes to speak them out.

Putin delivers on the Russian desire for national pride. He sorted out the hostile economic sell-out of Russian property and ecnomy at the cost of allowing oligarchic crime and corruption taking control of parts of the economy again while making it clear by setting several examples that these oligarchs are tolerated, but better do not take on the state itself in their greed, else they, individually, have to pay the highest price. All the revitalising of the Sovjet cult and Stalin cult needs to be seen in the light of all these factors that the West allowed to form and that the West even supported. The Wets is not as innocent as it claims in creating the situation as it is today. Putin initally did not start to go this way - he reacted to the bitter lessons he got taught by the West - by fallign back to proven Sovjet controlling schemes and reactions.

I sometimes wonder how it would be today if the chapter of this drunken idiot Yeltzin would have been skipped by history and Putin or somebody like him would have taken control of Russia immediately after the collapse of Gorbatchev's Sovjet Union. It must not have been necessarily so: but there maybe would have been a chance that thigns would be a bit better today, since I see a chance that the west from all start on would have been stopped from raiding Russia economically and trying to push onto Russia'S borders militarily.

I do not take a moral side with any faction in this, and I do not "love" Russia. I just try to see things at times through the eyes of Russia, how Russia must perceive it, and by taking into account Russian vital key interests that the West all the time demands the Russians to ignore, implying that way that the Russians are stupid. The bullying behaviour of Putin and Russia in recent years, for quite some share is a consequence of that.

Idiotic arrogant rightous politicians - in the West.