Putin's mad and I'm glad
 

http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/2...n_x.htm?csp=24


Putin: USA acting on its own has made world more chaotic

Quote:

By Tom Vanden Brook, USA TODAY MUNICH, Germany — Russian President Vladimir Putin blasted the United States on Saturday for acting unilaterally in foreign affairs and accused America of destabilizing the world. Putin's criticism was harsh and wide-ranging — from U.S. missile defense efforts to Russia's support for Iran. They came during remarks and a question-and-answer session at a security confernence attended by world leaders and military officials, including U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates and members of Congress.

This can only mean one thing, Russia is afraid of America going to war against Iran over the latest round of;
"they can and they can't have nukes",
because Mr Putin has a lot of time and money invested in Iran.

Remember before Bush went to Iraq (right or wrong is not the problem)
this country and just about every country in the world protested Bush
going to war against Iraq.


Yep! War is on the way ... I'm not glad about that of course just the fact that it
is so easy to see. :yep:

:rotfl: :rotfl: Tootin' Putin:rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl:

:hmm: yeah ...I spelled it right...:rotfl:

I'm glad he said it. As much as you might disagree I think he's very much right on unilateralism. Come on America, no need for the messianic attitude. Take some criticism for once :hmm:

Yep maybe "Team America - World Police" will have to stop strutting around the playground picking on the little kids now:up:

Problem is, (for CCIP and robbo) what can Putin do? The EU is going along with the US, China ain't ready yet (not India) Chavez well .... hot air from him. If only the Martians would attack. :rotfl:

Oh of course nothing. That's why he's talking :roll:

The US, of course, is in a position to act unilaterally for exactly that reason.
By the way, Putin's speech, I think, is aimed more at raising his and his government's profile at home. Just as in the US you have people starting to talk themselves off more strongly as the election year draws nearer, no surprise there...

:gulp:

Where are the Carriers?

Putin did surprise me however ... notice at the end of the article, Putin becomes a gentleman when he says;

Surprised? I think it was said repeatedly by both men that they liked each other, and I'm quite certain they genuinely do. They do have a number of things in common; though I consider Putin to be a far superior politician (it's not so much a compliment as an acknowledgement of his combination of image control and strategic pragmatism, in both of which Bush suffers).

What impresses me about Putin (and don't get me wrong, I'm no fan and view his government critically at best) is that he is a very hard politician to attack. Though the West has been making digs at his 'undemocratization', at home he's been making those attacks look like a joke and in fact using them to enchance his standing. Practically for every criticism made of him, he's been able to respond in a way that makes him look better.

My favorite Putin moment: at the G8 summit, his retort to Bush's speech on Iraq and spreading democracy - "I don't think we want the same kind of democracy as in Iraq". I was rolling when I heard that :p

Already been done. Khrushchev called it a "Cult of Personality".

If Russia did not kick up a stink now again we would all be wondering if Russia has gone off the world stage.

They are doing a 190 billion dollar military facelift so I figure he's planning on becoming a world player with teeth.
Now is this because of China, the U.S., or both?:hmm:

Makes you wonder doesnt it :hmm:

We are seeing the shaping of the new world now.... Looks like if things continue the way they are we are going to be seeing 3 Superpowers, Russia, China and the US

I dont think the US is too happy about China though... I mean not only does it have the man power and wallet to topple the US, its recent military tests have shown its got america by the balls in the event of a war :-?

my money is that he's more concerned about china than the US. Whats the US gonna do... invade russia??:rotfl:

I think not.

China however, well there is purportedly a shipload of natural resources just over the border from china, and who is getting to be the most energy-hungry nation??:hmm:

Now this diplomatic move was overdue. Although it is aimed at the europeans as well as the russian public opinion, it nevertheless is a highly substantial warning. Russia necessarily must feel surrounded, pushed back and strategically outplayed since NATO started it'S foolish attempt to push it's sphere of influence as far as directly to the Russian borders. Additionally it is under pressure by chinese migration into it'S empty eastern territories, and unrest in it's Islamic southern provinces. NATO's policy necessarily must be seen as provocations, and strategically threatening, and since years so.

I said this for years now.

It is time to ask if it really is clever to seek confrontation that way. The US as well as NATO needs to realize that they have no monopole on defining what is in the interest of mutual relations (like the NATO expansions often is sold as). Some iditots who are drunk of their own magnificient egos even want to see the Ukraine joining NATO: iIf you want to see a second cold war with Russia, go ahead with that. For Russian interests that is as unacceptable as were Russian ICBMs in Cuba unacceptable for the US. Uklraine is their sphere of infoluence. period.

The American insensitivity to the views of others is dangerous, and has triggered a lot of additonal and unneeded destabilisation on the globe, and when Putin labels that as "dangerous", then he is right on the mark. Like it or not, but Russia is a global major player again, economically the West partially depends on it (energy), while militarily they are pressing hard to step back into the first line of global players, and I think they are successful in that, judging by the financial investements of the last five years. They had military equipement that partially is en par with modern Wetsern euqipment, partially surpasses it in quality. But since some years they also have the money again not build such equipment in limited numbers, but to distribute it to their armed forces in higher quantities.

You may be tempted to claim after the cold war that the self-declared winner of that has the right to take it all. But Russia seem to disagree on that. Today's Russia is not that kind of threat like the Soviet union may have been. I see a good basis (founded on mutual supportive or even identical interests) for cooperation. NATO's infantile "mine is longer than yours" attitude is not helpful. such confrontative style also makes it more and more diofficult to get Russian cooperation on issue like Iran - as if that divergence in interests isn't already difficult enough.

And those who are now surprised by Putin's outburst, only illustrate that they have not watched russia close enough during the last five years and since Putin took over. The message was on many walls, and bright and clearly.

One thing is for sure. Russia is no warmonger. But it will defend it's interests, nobody has the right to demand them act stupidly and self-hurting, and having cooperative relations with them is far vbetter than icy silence.

Putin just took the right to point this out, indirectly.

I do not care if Westerners accuse him of being not democratic. He raised the stability of russia, and that is what makes Russia more predictable. He strenghtend national structures, and stabilized the military. All that is good. He also managed to fight back the criminal oligarchs that corrupted the economy after the initial anarchy when the soviet Union broke down and western capitalism sold them economical exploitation as "democracy" and freedom. He send clear messages that all have understood: "do your businesses, and if they are a little bit dirty, I do not care, but when you mess with the interests of the Russian state and try to translate wealth into political power, I'll take your head." I see myself unable to criticise him for that, when looking at the desolate condition russia has been in just ten years ago. And as my journalistic idol Peter Scholl-Latour once said on TV: "Putin a dicator? I've seen many far, far worse dictators in the past fourty years." when Putin does things the way he does - then maybe this is because he knows that in that big country other governmental styles (like the EU madness for example) simply does not work. How well total liberalism works in Russia we have seen when the oligarchs and self-made millionaires threatened to take over the whole state. I think Russia has learned that lesson.