Hi Felix,
there is a problem in your analysis: your framing is only one amongst
many others, equally possible.
For example, from the viewpoint of the realist school (Mearsheimer) or
the geo-economic perspective (M. Hudson) the situation looks very
different. Let me sketch it briefly:
Well, in autocracies, autocrats matters.
what matters in liberal democratic oligarchies?
Did fossil-dependent Russia have to invade Ukraine because of that?
did Russia have to invade because of the NATO-expansion and subsequent
weaponization of Ukraine? (for comparison: think of a russian-supported
Ottawa-Maidan followed by a hypothetical weaponization of Canada. How
would the US react?)
Was he walking into a trap > that NATO created and he was too stupid to
see?
Was he clever enough to see that he could turn the Nato-trap into
reverse by invading at a moment of choice, with diplomatic relations
(very little support for Western sanctions around the globe, stable
alignment with China & India), economic conditions (ability to bypass
financial and trade sanctions), and military conditions (war of
attrition overstretching NATO) in his favor?
In the reading of
the US (and Europe), the conflicts of 2008 (Donbas) and 2014 (Crimea)
were regional conflicts, while the 2022 invasion had a clear
geopolitical dimension, with power in Europe and control over the global
food supply at stake.
In the reading of Mearsheimer 2008 and 2014 were mere defensive steps
against an ongoing NATO-expansion that made it clear to Moscow, that the
US wanted to overextend Russia (cf Rand-Paper from 2019) and that a
bigger war was unfortunately the only defense against the slow-motion
assault.
That veiw follows more or less the reading of Mearsheimer (just to say,
before I am accused of Putinism...)
I guess the Ukrainians understood quickly that
aligning themselves with this reading and portraying themselves as
defenders of freedom is their only chance for survival.
Or, the Ukrainians will have to understand that sacrificing their lives
following a deeply miscalculated plan of the Neocons in charge at the
State Dept in Washington they will be doomed.
Just to give another perspective that leads to very different conlusions.
Most likely we can agree, when it comes to Climate Change. But given the
turn of even the Green party from preserving nature to deliver weapons,
one may as well take the coming Climate catastrophe as a given and
prepare for the worst.
s
On 15.02.23 13:44, d.gar...@new-tactical-research.co.uk wrote:
It may not offer us much, but it just seemed that Clarkâs approach
might help us guard against us so over-regarding the explanatory power
of large-scale historical forces that we underestimate the importance
of amplifying our own collective and individual agency in confronting
the power wielded by key (or elite) political actors. It might
mitigate against the overwhelming feeling of impotence that sometimes
seems to turn the least and the best us all into sleepwalkers.
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