Now the Long Knives are poised right in the back of Ukraine:

[underlankers.livejournal.com]

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-26400035

Fucking brilliant approach, this. First the attempt to play divide and conquer in Ukraine pretty transparently crashed and burned with the retun of Ukraine's Benazir Bhutto to political influence. Then, the Russians decide evidently that they really did move in Russian Army soldiers into the Crimea. Because the proper instinct when a risky gamble fails is to raise the stakes. This is not going to end well by any means. Now I'm wondering how long Lucashenko will have a country to rule as dictator, and what might happen with Round II with Georgia. If Tsar Vladimir I of the House of Putin succeeds in this kind of thing, that will only encourage him to expand his wars of aggression further because Ukraine is rather larger than Georgia, and this would permit Russia to begin aspiring to regain aspects of the old Tsarist boundaries. I sincerely expected Russia would use Central Asia for this kind of thing, not Ukraine.

The EU wouldn't give a damn about invading Muslims in Kazakhstan, but invading an EU state? That's not going to lead Russia to do anything but decide to engage in still-larger wars of aggression in the long term.

http://www.cnn.com/2014/03/01/world/europe/ukraine-politics/

And one of the chambers of the Russian legislature just approved this request. Hoo, boy.

Shit got real-er:

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-26403996

The Ukrainian Army is now on full combat alert. The prospect that the centennial year of the First World War will see the first large-scale conventional European war in decades has risen exponentially.

Comments

[malasadas.livejournal.com]

I'm aware it was from 2008.

I am also aware that Palin is currently crowing that she was "right".

I also know that Russia invaded a neighbor in 2008, when Bush was in office and they didn't fear us getting in their way then either.

No American President and no EU leader is going to risk direct confrontation with Russia based on Russia carving out enclaves from their former vassals. Obama won't. Bush didn't. Clinton wouldn't have.

So it is just partisan tongue wagging.

[sandwichwarrior.livejournal.com]

So it is just partisan tongue wagging.

It is but not in the way that you seem to think.

The point is not that a GOP President would prevented this. The point is that once again "the smart guys" have been caught with their pants down by a situation "nobody" saw coming. There are quite a few pundits that owe Palin an apology right now but somehow I don't think she's going to get em.

[underlankers.livejournal.com]

Palin in this case is technically right, but a stopped watch can be right twice a day.

[sandwichwarrior.livejournal.com]

Which still gives a slightly better average than your typical Democrat who is right only once per day.

Now ^ that ^ is some partisan tongue wagging. ;)

[fizzyland.livejournal.com]

Why does anyone owe Palin an apology? Really.

[sandwichwarrior.livejournal.com]

Case in point.

[badlydrawnjeff.livejournal.com]

I can think of dozens of reasons, this issue just being one of them.

[fizzyland.livejournal.com]

This issue? What issue is that?

[badlydrawnjeff.livejournal.com]

Of Palin, Russia, and Ukraine.

[underlankers.livejournal.com]

Reasons that are as usual neither spelled out nor described in any fashion indicating familiarity with either Russia, Ukraine, or Tina Fey-er the woman from Alaska who won't shut up.

[malasadas.livejournal.com]

"Nobody" expected that Putin would toss aside the attempt to polish his personal turd with a 50 billion dollar Olympics so quickly, but I suppose the opportunity to grab the Crimea was too much to resist.

Palin did not merely say she thought that the attack on Georgia meant that Putin would eventually turn his eye to Ukraine -- she specifically pinned the likelihood to Obama. It is partisan whargarble and nobody owes her an apology except her high school civics teachers and whatever clergy failed to teach her how to not be such a nasty carbuncle.

[sandwichwarrior.livejournal.com]

The specific circumstances/timing are not the point.

as for blaming Obama, i'll point you at Jeff's reply (http://talk-politics.livejournal.com/1831445.html?thread=145101077#t145101077) because he's already explained it better than I would have.

[underlankers.livejournal.com]

Right, because Bush did so much to deter Putin's invasion of Georgia. Oh, right, it's not cowardice when the cocaine addict from Connecticut does it.

[sandwichwarrior.livejournal.com]

*Gestures upward*

The point is not that a GOP President would prevented this. The point is that once again "the smart guys" have been caught with their pants down by a situation "nobody" saw coming. There are quite a few pundits that owe Palin an apology right now but somehow I don't think she's going to get em.

[fizzyland.livejournal.com]

Answer is still no.

[sandwichwarrior.livejournal.com]

Duly noted.

[malasadas.livejournal.com]

Any assessment saying that the west has been "soft" on Russia has pretty much ignored the entire slate of policies for years -- and is yet more partisan whargarble.

So instead of invoking the armchair brigade, here is a better and much clearer view from someone who is actually an expert on such matters:

http://www.bostonglobe.com/opinion/columns/2014/03/03/cold-war-over-russia-isn-zero-sum/Df9VSHeJFpKUz3tRKDjUXJ/story.html