Not everything is about US: Shocking as it may seem, sometimes countries take actions based on how they view their interests, irrespective of who the US did or did not bomb. . . . this crisis is Putin’s Waterloo, not ours. . . Perhaps the most bizarre element of watching the Crimean situation unfold through a US-centric lens: the iron-clad certainty of the pundit class that Putin is winning and Obama is losing. The exact opposite is true. Putin has initiated a conflict that will, quite obviously, result in greater diplomatic and political isolation as well as the potential for economic sanction. He’s compounded his loss of a key ally in Kiev by further enflaming Ukrainian nationalism, and his provocations could have a cascading effect in Europe by pushing countries that rely on Russia’s natural gas exports to look elsewhere for their energy needs. Putin is the leader of a country with a weak military, an under-performing economy and a host of social, environmental and health-related challenges. Seizing the Crimea will only make the problems facing Russia that much greater. You don’t have to listen to the do something crowd. These are the same people who brought you the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, among other greatest hits. These are armchair experts convinced that every international problem is a vital interest of the US; that the maintenance of credibility and strength is essential, and that any demonstration of weakness is a slippery slope to global anarchy and American obsolescence; and that being wrong and/or needlessly alarmist never loses one a seat at the table. theguardian/commentisfree/2014/mar/03/obama-ukraine-russia-critics-credibility
Posted on: Tue, 04 Mar 2014 00:52:23 +0000
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