Bringing Words to a Gun Fight

Regardless of when and where Putin stops - the West has lost the war. To put this in perspective we need only look at a past war that was in every sense raging as early as 1931, even if it only made its formal debut as a World War in 1939. The Allies may  have won the Second World War, but by ceding Eastern Europe and  North Korea to the USSR they lost peace and brought about several more wars and years of societal misery in numerous countries.

The victory for Putin in Crimea allowed him to sew the seeds of dissention in the Donbass

The two cessions in the Far East were the root causes of the Korean and Vietnam Wars, both of which the United States and the West lost.   In those wars, victory was defined as a return to the status quo, and defining victory as a return to the status quo is not victory when one considers the cost in blood and treasure, and the ultimate strategic defeat that accompanies such a loss. We are seeing that today after the ignominious American pullout from Afghanistan. But, in the post World War Two world, it was not only in the Far East that the enemy was being accommodated with a status quo situation. The West abandoned European Hungary in 1956 when the USSR violently crushed a rebellion the Hungarians bravely attempted against Soviet control. Much more recently, in 2008 Putin took parts of Georgia, and the West looked the other way. He took Crimea in 2014 and the West once again looked the other way; and the taking of Crimea was done in spite of a territorial security agreement the West signed with Ukraine in exchange for their relinquishment of Nuclear weapons—the same type of weapons that Putin is now threatening to use against nuclear disarmed Ukraine.   The victory for Putin in Crimea allowed him to sew the seeds of dissention in the Donbass, which now serves as his justification for his current invasion of Ukraine.

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All the while as Putin massed his Army, even as the West looked on—the West talked a good deal, but effectively looked away

For a full month the world looked on as Putin massed an army surrounding Ukraine; even utilizing his ally in Belarus to act as a staging area, and ultimately to serve as a military component in the invasion. One has to ask, "If the West is supplying Ukraine with weapons after the invasion, why didn't they do it sooner? Did they not have an idea of what a fully mechanized  invasion by 190,000 soldiers and a massive air force and navy could do, and the destruction it could rain on Ukraine?" Seeing the West initially sit on its hands, and then only make half hearted gestures of giving military supplies, but denying Ukraine the weaponry it truly needs to stop Russia, it is not difficult to look upon NATO as a political debating organization rather than a military force demanding an adversary's respect. All the while as Putin massed his Army, even as the West looked on—the West talked a good deal, but effectively looked away. At some point the fighting will stop in Ukraine, either with a complete defeat of Ukrainian ground forces all the way to the Polish Border, or with Putin pulling back to an enlarged Crimea, which will include land connecting it to the Donetsk and Luhansk "People's Republics," or more probably to the Dnieper River, effectively taking the Eastern part of the Dnieper River Valley, which would yield Russia a complete unencumbered North / South  border from the Crimea to Belarus. In either event, will NATO ever mass an attack to help Ukraine reclaim its territorial borders?  Will they conquer part of Russia and take recompense for the damage Putin did to Ukraine? If the past serves as future —the answer will be 'No."

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In the end, the West will be satisfied with a cease fire —similar to what exists on the Korean Peninsula

In the end, the West will be satisfied with a cease fire —similar to what exists on the Korean Peninsula; and if we go back to early twentieth century, similar to what the West did with Finland in 1939, during an actual World War in which the West was involved. At that time our eventual Russian ally had just taken half of Poland and committed horrendous war crimes during and after their invasion. In the end, Putin will have a bad reputation and more territory. But, as we have seen, the events transpiring in Ukraine are not new to Europe. It may be Zelensky who has captured the hearts and minds of the West in 2022, but in 1935 it was Haile Selassie that appealed to the League of Nations and begged for help. In response to the Ethiopian's  appeals, the League of Nations condemned the Italian invasion and voted to impose economic sanctions on the aggressor, and Time Magazine  named him Man of the Year because of his resistance to the Italian invasion. Ultimately, Europe left Ethiopia to die. But, that was only after Europe had earlier left Manchuria to die in 1931, would leave Spain to die in 1936, and China in 1937. And, continuing its pattern of appeasement and preventing a major war, Europe left Austria to disappear in 1938. Europe actually participated in Czechoslovakia's dissolution in 1938, several European countries joining Hitler in taking parts of Czechoslovakia they wanted. Finally Europe was dragged into action and admitted they were at war when  Hitler and Stalin split Poland in two in 1939— killing a multitude of people in the process.  But,  Europe chose to ignore the atrocities that Russia committed in Poland and only declared war on Germany, which soon effectively annexed Alsace-Lorraine when France surrendered in 1940. Germany was considered the larger threat, but, just two months after the Polish invasion,  Russia invaded Finland, and once again the West chose to ignore Russia's actions. This time, though, the West wasn't silent. They loudly commiserated and sympathized with Finland.

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Regardless of the outcome in Ukraine, Europe has left the Ukrainians to die

Like Ethiopia, Europe commented on the bravery of the Finns and how astonishingly well they did against an army and air force ten times its size. But, although Europe cried about the Finns and praised their heroism, it ultimately left Finland to be carved up by Stalin's army. So, when Finland had the opportunity to take revenge and attack the Russians two years later, they allied with Germany who was attacking Russia. But, after Germany's defeat, not only did the Finns not get back the territory stolen from them by the Russians several years earlier, the West sat by as Russia demanded reparations from Finland for the attack against them. Ultimately, Germany was defeated—but the world was left with Russia, which is once again doing very much the same thing it did not so many years ago. The West is now praising the ferocity and braveness of the Ukrainians in opposing the monster sized Russian military, but offering Ukraine nothing more than enough war materials to allow them to prolong their terrible agony before the inevitable defeat. Regardless of the outcome in Ukraine, Europe has left the Ukrainians to die. Europe is about 80 years too late to the freedom party, regardless of how many prettily colored flags fly at the NATO and the European Union headquarters.