Guest Post by Pat Buchanan
After Putin’s speech, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy asked for the accelerated admission of Ukraine to the NATO alliance… This could mean a U.S.-Russia war, which could escalate to World War III and nuclear war, and was something that every U.S. president from Harry Truman to Ronald Reagan saw as his highest priority to avoid.
In a Kremlin speech last week, President Vladimir Putin identified Russia’s real “enemy” in Ukraine as “the ruling circles of the so-called West” whose “hegemony has a pronounced character of totalitarianism, despotism and apartheid.”
In the West, Putin declaimed, “The repression of freedom is taking on the outlines of a reverse religion, of real Satanism,” which, on issues like gender identity, amounts to a “denial of man.”
Putin then formally annexed the occupied Ukrainian regions of Luhansk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson and pledged to defend these new Russian territories with “all the forces and means at our disposal.”
He suggested that those means included nuclear weapons, for which the Americans “created a precedent” at Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Reading Putin’s excoriation, it is hard to recall, in four decades of Cold War, or the three decades since, a speech of such relentless vitriol and hostility toward the West.
Beyond the rhetoric, though, what does this tell us about Putin’s policy?
Putin is drawing a red line at Russia’s annexation and absorption of the four occupied oblasts in the south and east of Ukraine, roughly 15% of that country, and declaring it to be sacred Russian soil.
He intends to conscript and commit thousands of fresh troops to defend these new Russian territories. He will not rule out the use of nuclear weapons to repel any who attack and attempt to detach these new lands from Mother Russia. While open to negotiations, he will fight it out on this line if it takes all winter.
This leaves Ukraine, NATO and the U.S. with some difficult calculations and hard decisions.
Are they willing to engage the Russian army in the four oblasts to drive them out, if the Russians, rather than quit these territories, use a tactical nuclear weapon to repel the attacking Ukrainians?
After Putin’s speech, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy asked for the accelerated admission of Ukraine to the NATO alliance.
Were such an accession process to be expedited and Ukraine admitted to NATO, the U.S. would be obligated under Article 5 to go to war against Russia in Ukraine, on Kyiv’s side.
This could mean a U.S.-Russia war, which could escalate to World War III and nuclear war, and was something that every U.S. president from Harry Truman to Ronald Reagan saw as his highest priority to avoid.
Fortunately, membership in NATO, and extension of an Article 5 war guarantee for the new member, requires a unanimous vote of all 30 member nations in the alliance.
And the requisite enthusiasm, inside NATO, to fight the world’s largest nuclear power over who rules Luhansk is nonexistent.
Which brings us to the sabotage of the Nord Stream I and Nord Stream II pipelines built to carry Russian natural gas across the Baltic Sea to Germany, and from there on to Central and Western Europe.
Late last month, explosions blew holes in both pipelines, preventing any renewal of Russian gas exports to Germany through the pipelines, even if Moscow decided to turn on the taps.
NATO Europe is blaming the Russians for blowing up their own pipelines. But these pipelines are a strategic asset that gives Moscow leverage over the economies of much of NATO Europe.
Putin blames the Americans and Brits for the sabotage and has called for the UN Security Council to investigate the act of “terrorism.”
Said Putin, “The sanctions were not enough for the Anglo-Saxons: They moved onto sabotage.”
But, again, though Europeans are pointing the finger at Moscow, why would Russia sabotage two pipelines it helped to construct, which give it lasting leverage over the prosperity of NATO Europe?
Why would Putin sabotage his own strategic assets?
What sense would that make?
As of today, the respective goals of the principal participants in the Ukraine war are becoming as clear as they are irreconcilable.
Putin has annexed and seeks to hold Luhansk, Donetsk, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia, attach them to Crimea, declare victory, and end a war he is not winning. This weekend, Russian forces were driven out of the city of Lyman they captured in the early days of this war.
Zelenskyy wants to defeat the Russian invaders, drive them out of his country, humiliate Putin and achieve a victory for Ukraine that would put him in its history books as the Winston Churchill of his nation.
However, it appears today that Ukraine will not be allowed to achieve these goals by Putin’s regime, even if preventing it requires the use of tactical nuclear weapons.
And the Americans, what do they want?
Given the Russian losses of troops, tanks, aircraft, armor, artillery, along with the perception that Putin and the Russian army launched a war of aggression against a smaller power and were defeated, America, which provided the weaponry to produce this outcome, is already perceived as a winner.
America should be looking to ending this war before it expands into a nuclear war, which this country has sought to avoid since the atomic age began.
It is my sincere desire to provide readers of this site with the best unbiased information available, and a forum where it can be discussed openly, as our Founders intended. But it is not easy nor inexpensive to do so, especially when those who wish to prevent us from making the truth known, attack us without mercy on all fronts on a daily basis. So each time you visit the site, I would ask that you consider the value that you receive and have received from The Burning Platform and the community of which you are a vital part. I can't do it all alone, and I need your help and support to keep it alive. Please consider contributing an amount commensurate to the value that you receive from this site and community, or even by becoming a sustaining supporter through periodic contributions. [Burning Platform LLC - PO Box 1520 Kulpsville, PA 19443] or Paypal
-----------------------------------------------------
To donate via Stripe, click here.
-----------------------------------------------------
Use promo code ILMF2, and save up to 66% on all MyPillow purchases. (The Burning Platform benefits when you use this promo code.)
Bad analysis, basic facts ignored.
-Russians wouldn’t use nukes on their own soil. The tac nuke scenario is media spin (repeat a lie enough times to speak it in to existence)
-NATO can’t accept new members in active conflict. The request is pure narrative shaping.
-Zelensky doesn’t want anything but to please his masters. He is an actor and a puppet.
-Russia wouldn’t quit in UKR after a ‘land grab’ that doesn’t resolve unstable mess right on it’s front porch.
-Putin’s reference to precedent in the use of nuclear weapons was referring to the US being the only power to have ever used one. Demonstrating the capacity for the US to use them offensively again. Russians doctrine only allows for the defensive use of nukes.
Pat should stop watching CNN. Luckily Russia hasn’t taken the bait, but all this ‘Russia bad, Putin deranged’ nonsense is aimed at starting WW3 and making the people who would be fighting believe it was someone’s fault other than that of their own masters.
“Reading Putin’s excoriation, it is hard to recall, in four decades of Cold War, or the three decades since, a speech of such relentless vitriol and hostility toward the West.”
I stopped reading after this… Chip
Go Home Pat!…….yer done…..
Really Stupid!
The problem with Pat is he always uses the MSM talking points as religious facts. Pat’s a beltway kind of guy, basic neocon. None of them ever offer the basic question, why are we there and how does it concern the average everyday American, what is our benefit? This should always be our default question.
https://www.worthpoint.com/worthopedia/s-military-aircraft-armor-recognition-410657174
Between 1980 and 1984 every single bit of training we received in the 82nd was focused on the singular threat of a Soviet mass armor attack through the Fulda Gap. We were told that they possessed 80 armored divisions and that we would be thrown in to hold the line for 18 hours, at which point we would be completely annihilated, until we were able to deliver enough armored asset into the theater to counter the thrust. Anyone who served during that time will be able to back this up. I personally carried a pack of these cards in my LBE the entire time I served and can to this day, almost 40 years later ID ZSU-211, BMP’s, BRDM’s, T062, T-72, etc., etc.
Then in 1989 the Soviet Union collapsed and within days the Evil Empire was no more.
It turns out that they didn’t actually possess 80 armored divisions, they couldn’t have mustered even 8. Ditto all the rest of their alleged military might. It was all broken, no one was getting paid, troops weren’t receiving adequate rations, etc. All of the focus was on what a backwater the Soviet Union was, what a pathetic and decrepit relic they actually were and how they had posed no real threat at all.
A lot of people were relieved by that and the distraction of them falling so quickly and us coming out on top of a unipolar world overshadowed the fact that everything we’d been rehearsing for for the entirety of the Cold War was based on bullshit. All of our intelligence agencies, and spies, and electronic surveillance, and infiltration was nothing but an enormous pack of lies and assessed by even a mid-wit a complete and total failure on our part not to mention a waste of trillions of dollars. We’d been getting ready for nothing. No one ever explained how a bankrupt communist country could outproduce us in military strength of 10:1, or why we’d need to fly the 82nd in from Ft. Bragg instead of maintaining a permanent defense at the Gap, etc. The strategy- even if it had been true- was retarded in retrospect. And yet all those men who served would have willingly given their lives to fight in defense of Europe against a communist threat that seems like a paradise compared to the collectivist panopticon we now live in.
Did anyone take responsibility? Was anyone demoted or thrown out of their positions? Were there trials and convictions of those who stole that money and defrauded the people of the USA by creating a complete fantasy about a threat that not only failed to materialize, but never existed in the first place?
You know the answer to that question.
You’ll forgive me if I believe none of this twaddle.
Pat is mired in his Boomerism and can only view the world through the porthole of American exceptionalism that was dead and buried when he was still wearing short pants.
When I say that there are no nuclear weapons I mean it in the same way that I say we never went to the Moon. These are stories told to keep people in a perpetual state of submission to the State as a powerful force of good when it is clear that its only role is that of extortionists and slave masters. If they tell you something it is most likely a lie. You can choose to believe it and live in fear or you can ignore them and get on with your life and the far more important tasks of looking out for your own and keeping your small piece of the world healthy, honest, and free.
Loved your comment right up until the last paragraph. Disinformation though also works through one’s perspective.
This comment… “or why we’d need to fly the 82nd in from Ft. Bragg instead of maintaining a permanent defense at the Gap”… is completely untrue. I was there and had tons of secret target folders of bridges and other critical infrastructure to be blown in the event the Ruskies made their move through the gap.
The 8th ID was there as well as portions of the 1st Armored. Air Force was there in depth as well as air defense forces and other force multipliers, engineers (I was one), maintenance and logistics units at all levels from battalion to theater level. In all there were well over 200,000 troops in Germany alone not to mention troops in the UK, Spain, Italy and others.
So it may have been your mission and your perspective gained from your training with the 82nd, but that was not the truth on the ground in Germany as I experienced it… Chip
I agree with your comment and you give some good advice with your last sentence. Moon shot, I highly doubt it. Nuclear weapons, I know a little bit about this one and you would have to reveal some really strong evidence to convince me on that one.
I laugh at the idiots that think nationalism is wrong think. It’s not America first, it’s the American people first and foremost. Getting tangled up in foreign interest and global initiatives will only end in our demise. The facts don’t lie, we are there right now. A sea change in American thinking is all that will save this country and I’m not holding my breath. We have been conditioned to fear the boogeyman under our beds by nefarious Globalist. The American people in mass don’t realize this, we will pay an exacted price for our willful ignorance.
The majority of my time in the Army I was stationed dead smack in the middle of the Fulda gap (3/12 Cav Armstrong Kaserne in Budingen). We were told that we would be dead within 9 minutes of the start of combat and that we were basically speed bumps to slow the Russians.
I was a good trooper but I spent most of my free time trying to drink all the beer in Germany. Never could accomplish my mission.
“These are stories told to keep people in a perpetual state of submission to the State as a powerful force of good when it is clear that its only role is that of extortionists and slave masters. If they tell you something it is most likely a lie.”
That becomes projection when applied mindlessly and without strong proof, to nations outside the US and it’s vassals.
Pop another quaalude, Patty.
Back to the nursing home, Pat, you’ve lost track of reality…
Sorry Pat, time to put down the pen, settle for words of wisdom with your family.
Just goes to show how far we all are down the rabbit hole, Biden won the election with 82 million votes, there is no inflation, the border is secure, we landed on the moon, the nukes will work, the check is in the mail (well, the one to Burning Platform at least), Obama is a citizen, I love you all.
Russia has a “weak hand”, eh?
Chef Ramsey after reading a Buchanan article …..
.
.
Somebody must derive great pleasure torturing us with articles by this has-been washed-up brain-dead DDD sucking buffoon.
I may be mistaken but I don’t think that is allowed. IIRC parties engaged in conflict are not allowed to join during hostilities.
Not that the West gives a singular fuck about their own rules, or any others.
ETA: I see another Anon mentioned this.
Pat seemed to have left out the part about Uncle Stasi drawing down our supply of weapons to keep Ukraine in the fight. From a report I read, our supply of munitions is at a low not seen since the days of Peanut. Too bad we left a few billion in weaponry for the camel jockeys in the land where empires go to die.