Russia Invades Ukraine. Again
POSTED BY: captaincrunch
UPDATED: Sunday, September 6, 2026 21:09
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Russia’s Cult of Death
By Alexander J. Motyl
Russian Orthodox clergy routinely bless tanks and encourage Russian soldiers to defend Mother Russia with their lives. A holy picture, issued by the Bryansk Eparchy, informed them last year that “Your task [is] to wipe the Ukrainian nation from the face of the earth.”
In early 2023, the Russian propagandist and popular television talk-show host Vladimir Solovyov matter-of-factly informed viewers that “Life is highly overrated.” His two guests nodded in agreement, adding that Russians used to live from day to day, but now they have “nonmaterial dreams” and “lofty goals” — namely, war. Besides, intoned Solovyov, “Why fear what is inevitable? Especially when we’re going to heaven. Death is the end of one earthly path and the beginning of another.”
Russian officialdom is making a virtue of necessity and glorifying war and death. As Solovyov said, why fear death if it’s inevitable — especially for growing numbers of poorly trained and poorly equipped draftees whose role in the war is that of cannon fodder?
There’s a longstanding Russian tradition of employing unrestrained violence and treating its own people as expendable pawns.
Muscovy, as the Russian Empire was called until the early 18th century, expanded into Siberia by destroying the native peoples and their cultures. Imperial Russia did the same in Belarus, Ukraine, the North Caucasus, and Central Asia. The Soviet Union, Imperial Russia’s successor, established the Gulag, engineered a famine-genocide in Ukraine, and slaughtered hundreds of thousands in waves of terror.
Official Russia’s indifference to human life evidently extends to Russians as well. General Mikhail Kutuzov defeated Napoleon Bonaparte in 1812 by pursuing a scorched-earth policy that made large swaths of Russia uninhabitable for both the French and Russians. The Bolsheviks slaughtered millions of Russians in the Civil War of 1918-1920. Joseph Stalin sent millions of soldiers to their deaths in poorly planned assaults on the German Wehrmacht.
Finally, there’s the nature of the regime that Putin has assiduously constructed over the past two decades. Regardless of what his regime is called, there are striking similarities between it and Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany. All three were illiberal, deeply authoritarian polities that were ruled by a charismatic leader with a personality cult and war-making and empire-building agenda.
Not accidentally, all three also glorified violence and death. Only violence could destroy their political opposition, and only violence could guarantee the state’s imperial aspirations. Since war was central to their identities, all three polities logically had to glorify the soldiers and heroes who died for the cause, whether in street battles or on the front.
How many hundreds of thousands of Russians must die on the front before their friends and relatives say “enough”? Putin obviously believes that Russians are cattle, and that Russia is an abattoir. It’s up to them to show him that they aren’t.
Alexander J. Motyl is a professor of political science at Rutgers University-Newark. A specialist on Ukraine, Russia and the USSR, and on nationalism, revolutions, empires and theory, he is the author of 10 books of nonfiction, as well as “Imperial Ends: The Decay, Collapse, and Revival of Empires” and “Why Empires Reemerge: Imperial Collapse and Imperial Revival in Comparative Perspective.”
More at https://thehill.com/opinion/international/3864092-russias-cult-of-deat
h/
The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at
https://www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly
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Time for Russian sanctions with real teeth
The media breathlessly reports on the occasional seizure of a luxury yacht but the hard truth is that the Russian elite have managed to successfully evade the toothless sanctions currently in place.
Just look at London’s Billionaires Row, France’s swankiest shopping districts and ski resorts like Courchevel, or the resorts in Maldives and Dubai. They are all jam-packed with big-spending, Kremlin-connected Russians enjoying legal impunity and living like the gods they think they are. I suspect that nearly every $25,000-a-night hotel room in the world is occupied by a Russian.
Until this changes, these powerful oligarchs will continue to support Putin’s bloody war. They currently aren’t paying any price. Thus, targeting and seizing the wealth of Putin’s many collaborators is an essential part of any real strategy to end his disastrous invasion of Ukraine.
What does that mean specifically? Take Sergei Chemezov, the CEO of the Russian state-owned defense conglomerate Rostec Corp., and a longtime Putin confidante. His $80 million 737 airplane continues to travel around Europe, despite sanctions imposed on Chemezov. How? Last year his plane was re-registered in Serbia, and now it travels freely to Serbia, Switzerland, Croatia and Austria. That plane is ripe for seizure in any number of European jurisdictions.
Or look at Roman Abramovich, the longtime owner of the Chelsea football club. He may have been forced to sell his team, but a new investigation from the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project reveals that he is still getting financing from Credit Suisse, despite sanctions.
Finally, consider Yevgeny Prigozhin, founder of The Wagner Group, a Russlan paramilitary organization whose mercenaries are fighting for Russia in Ukraine. One might assume that Prigozhin is exactly the kind of businessman the West would target most vociferously with sanctions, given his direct role in the war. And yet, the British government apparently issued a special carveout allowing him to hire lawyers in the U.K. to sue a journalist.
These kleptocrats are near the top of any public, let alone classified, list of Putin enablers. And they are prime examples of how weak current sanctions are. If Prigozhin, a potential successor to Putin, gets special treatment from No. 10 Downing Street, imagine the warm welcome the rest of the Russian kleptocracy receives from banks, realtors, top tier schools, and the most exclusive resorts across the world.
The West helped create the elaborate schemes and accounting structures that oligarchs use to maintain and grow their fortunes. That’s why the West must uncover and eradicate them. The U.S. in particular must also insist that its allies cease enabling Russian oligarchs
The United States and its allies must make three major changes quickly to save the lives of tens of thousands of Ukrainians and bring an end to Russia’s bloodshed.
First, they must put meaningful manpower behind sanctions implementation, recruiting the best expertise from the private sector to enforce the sanctions that have been announced and give them real teeth.
Second, expand the list of Russians who are subject to sanctions. The current list only scratches the surface of those who are supporting Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Finally, the West must deny Russian oligarchs the safe harbors around the world where they reside, vacation and invest their ill-gotten wealth. If they want to support Putin, let them sit in Moscow with him.
That kind of crackdown on the Kremlin’s oligarchs will have long-term benefits for the future security of Europe. And for Russia. Putin won’t be in power forever. But whoever comes next will find themselves surrounded by an intelligence service, military, mercenary industry, and economic elites deeply invested in corruption, organized crime and violent nationalism. Unless Europe and the U.S. decide that enough is enough.
The best way to break the current deadly stalemate reminiscent of the trenches in W
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Putin has canceled a decree that recognized Moldova's sovereignty in resolving the dispute over the Moscow-backed breakaway region of Transnistria.
The decree, enacted in 2012 when Russia's relations with the West were less fraught, was annulled to "ensure the national interests of Russia".
Putin's order follows accusations that Russia was seeking to destabilize Moldova. Last week, citing Ukrainian intelligence, its president, Maia Sandu, accused Moscow of plotting to overthrow her government.
Ukrainian President Volodymr Zelensky said that Russia was planning to capture the airport in Chisinau to fly in Russian military reinforcements to open a new front in Ukraine from Transnistria.
Moldova's Prime Minister Dorin Recean confirmed the rumor, but told local media that despite "several scenarios of destabilization....our institutions are prepared to face such challenges."
The Moldovan president met President Joe Biden in Warsaw. The White House confirmed "strong U.S. support for Moldova's sovereignty and territorial integrity."
Sandu tweeted her thanks to Biden "for his unwavering support to Moldova & for standing in solidarity with us," suggesting that Chisinau (the capital and largest city of the Republic of Moldova) may be relying on U.S. backing against the threat from Russia.
https://www.newsweek.com/moldova-russia-ukraine-transnistria-putin-178
2914
The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at
https://www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly
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Quote:Does anyone think that, after making Russian gas exports to the EU impossible, cutting off the Russian Central Bank from the SWIFT (the financial "nuclear option"), attempting to cap the price of Russian oil, and seizing Russian central bank foreign assets that were in western banks, that grabbing a few yachts here and there will ake a difference?
Originally posted by second:
Time for Russian sanctions with real teeth
The media breathlessly reports on the occasional seizure of a luxury yacht but the hard truth is that the Russian elite have managed to successfully evade the toothless sanctions currently in place.
Here's a few hints:
The Russian oiligarchs who parked their money abroad are NOT Putin's friends and don't drive Russian policy, so sanctioning them doesn't weaken Putin.
Making holdings outside of Russia insecure will actually prevent capital flight from Russia, bc the Russian elite will be wary of placing their assets in the west. It's counterproductive
Taking these actions will convince any ordinary Russians who are not yet convinced that "the west" doesn't just hate Putin, it hates Russia and all Russians.
Grabbing yachts, mansions, and bank accounts from Russians is petty piracy. The west thought that it could collapse Russia and steal its national resources. Failing that, it thought it could grab Russian government foreign holdings (just like it stole gold from Libya and Venezuela) and launder that money into its own accounts by pretending that it would be used for Ukrainian rebuilding.
Now its reduced to digging thru pants pockets and looking under couch cushions for spare change. Smacks of desperation.
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Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE someone poor - William Blake
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Quote:The real point is to motivate Russian billionaires to kill Putin before they are either impoverished by war or pushed out a window by an assassin sent by Putin who is displeased at their lack of enthusiasm for his war. Signym, if you claim Putin hasn't isolated himself because he fears assassination, you have not been paying attention.
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
Now its reduced to digging thru pants pockets and looking under couch cushions for spare change. Smacks of desperation.
Full List of Russians to Fall Out of Windows Since Putin Invaded Ukraine
https://www.newsweek.com/full-list-russians-fall-windows-putin-ukraine
-war-1781790
Putin ‘fears for his life’ as ex-KGB spy warns he may be ‘poisoned’ in coup
https://www.express.co.uk/news/world/1736585/ukraine-war-live-russia-v
ladimir-putin-health-volodymyr-zelensky
The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at
https://www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly
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More delusional blah blah blah
US fails to get Middle East allies to take sides one year into the Ukraine war
https://www.cnn.com/2023/02/22/middleeast/us-mideast-allies-ukraine-wa
r-mime-intl/index.html
Putin and China’s top diplomat pledge to strengthen ties ahead of Ukraine war anniversary
https://www.cnn.com/2023/02/22/china/china-wang-yi-moscow-ukraine-intl
-hnk/index.html
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Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE someone poor - William Blake
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GOP attacks on Biden's Ukraine visit are worse than partisanship — they really want Russia to win
Far-right Republicans tied themselves into knots dissing Biden without coming right out and saying they want Ukraine to lose. Some, like the American Nazi supporters of WWII, tried to package their stance as mere isolationism. Rep. Matt Gaetz of Florida, for instance, exploited the Ohio train wreck catastrophe to argue "Biden is ditching America for Ukraine." Others, like Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia, went full incoherence, raving, "It's becoming more like a U.S.- China war through the Ukraine — Russia war." And some went for puerile race-baiting, such as Rep. Greg Murphy yelling about "the war zone [Biden] created at our southern border." (In reality, the refugee crisis at the U.S.-Mexican border was created by Donald Trump's anti-immigration policies that Biden has been prevented from fixing by the GOP-controlled Supreme Court.)
Perhaps the biggest show of pretzel logic came courtesy of Florida's GOP Gov. Ron DeSantis, who tried to leverage the past year's successes against Russia as evidence that the U.S. should drop the support for Ukraine. "I think they've shown themselves to be a third-rate military power," he said of Russia on Fox News, as if that justified rolling over and letting Putin take Ukraine.
Sure, these people would oppose puppies and rainbows if Biden said he liked those things, but there's a deeper reason why so many Republicans are going out of their way to undermine American support for Ukraine. It's because they agree with Putin's anti-democracy cause and share his hopes that defeating Ukraine will demoralize pro-democracy forces around the world.
It's a good thing that so few MAGA Republicans — including Trump himself — feel comfortable expressing direct support for Putin and direct opposition to Ukraine. It means it's still taboo, even in the GOP ranks, to be proudly fascist, much less openly supportive of war crimes. The pretense that MAGA Republicans believe in democracy is still being maintained, even as it's obvious that they would prefer to get to the part of the story where president-for-life Donald Trump cancels all future elections.
The underlying premise of MAGA Republicanism is that abandoning democracy in favor of a Trumpian autocracy will be beneficial for their tribe of white conservative Christians.
Putin, however, is a living reminder of the dangers of putting a nation's fates in the hands of a power-mad sociopath — and how it can come back to haunt even his supporters. That's why the MAGA media prefers to prop up Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orbán as their authoritarian role model, not Putin.
That's where the GOP establishment differs from isolationist anti-Ukraine Republicans, who also happen to be the ones who make the most excuses for the January 6 insurrection. For the hardcore MAGA Republicans, the Ukrainian war is ideological. They're not worried about global stability being wrecked by Putin, so much as advancing the anti-democratic cause. I suspect most of them dislike Ukraine for the same reason the country's independence got under Putin's skin: Because its existence cuts across their cynical arguments against democracy.
Like Putin, the MAGA movement knows better than to argue against democracy on moral grounds. Instead, the argument is one grounded in performative cynicism. "Gosh, democracy sounds nice on paper," goes the reasoning, "but, in practice, it just can't work." Opponents of democracy will portray democracies as hopelessly corrupt or pathetically weak. That's why, for instance, they are so dependent on the Big Lie, which has become an all-purpose tool to portray democracy in a bad light. It's also why Trumpists will toggle back and forth between portraying Biden as an evil mastermind who stole the election, and then arguing the man is too sleepy to handle basi
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RUSSIABOT RUSSIABOT BLAH BLAH BLAH!
/snicker
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Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE someone poor - William Blake
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Quote:Every Texan I know who takes sides with Trump or Putin, I knew them to be untrustworthy before Trump went into politics and Putin invaded Crimea. In their own way, they are mini-versions of Trump and Putin, with the same behavioral defects as the big guys have. Signym, I don't know you and all the twisty turning details of your life as I do of those Trumptards in Texas, but I strongly suspect you are fundamentally as defective as they are.
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
RUSSIABOT RUSSIABOT BLAH BLAH BLAH!
/snicker
The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at
https://www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly
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Putin is very trustworthy... for Russians. Russians can count on him for looking out for their interests while maintaining national sovereignty.
I wish I could say the same for our politicians, who are so much more concerned with small faraway nations and the poor illegal migrants that they forget their own citizens.
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Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE someone poor - William Blake
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