Thread by @shaunjlawson

At this time of global tension, time for a re-airing of this I think.

https://twitter.com/shaunjlawson/status/1088664536847171586

It is quite extraordinary how consistently Russian or Soviet foreign policy has always been based on protecting its western (in this case, south-western) frontier.

It's equally extraordinary how often this has been based on utterly disingenuous bullshit.

Whenever students study the origins of the Cold War, given most students are left-leaning and more than aware of the awful history of American and British imperialism, they invariably end up blaming the West and excusing the USSR.

As though it annexing half of bloody Europe was a perfectly reasonable and peaceable thing for it to do. 🙄🙄🙄

These observers seem utterly oblivious about how terrified Eastern Europe remains of Russia - and how much it prizes its only recently won independence.

Naturally, all these states look to NATO - which in practice, means the US - to protect them.

Putin uses that as an excuse to justify his behaviour.

Gotta give all those unemployed young Russian men something to do, haven't we Vlad? Gotta distract your people from the awful job you've done domestically too. It's just so utterly cynical.

Will there be a war? Of course there bloody won't.

We can't go to war with a country with nukes. And of course, Russia has a huge amount of leverage over Europe thanks to Gazprom.

The extent to which people don't seem to understand that we're not in a position to 'get tough with Russia' is what concerns me.

In the US, this may translate in the following way:

- Hardcore Trump supporters, who continue to dominate the Republican base and are the reason why the GOP´has embraced his 'election fraud' bullshit (it's because Republican politicians are all terrified), will support Russia 🤡

- Loyal Biden supporters on the centre-left will support his moderate approach.

- Plenty on the further left will blame the US and swallow Putin's BS

- Those in the middle, especially independents and Republican-identified Biden voters (Never Trumpers), will be FURIOUS.

The latter will rail against his 'weakness', 'letting Putin get away with it' yada yada yada, while ignoring the basic reality.

WORLD WAR THREE IS NOT A GOOD IDEA.

But those in the middle decide elections.

They've already turned against Biden thanks mostly to what happened in Afghanistan.

They'll likely be even angrier now. None of which is good for the Democrats in this mid-term election year.

A substantial proportion of Never Trumpers are essentially neo-conservatives.

They still believe in an economic ideology which DOES NOT WORK and is a gigantic scam which funnels wealth upwards at everyone else's expense.

They still believe a nation of 330m can somehow remain the most powerful in the world despite China having a population of 1.4 billion.

They learned no lessons from Iraq, Afghanistan or come to think of it, Vietnam at all.

And so they still believe Uncle Sam can say 'jump' and everyone else will respond 'how high?'

It doesn't work like that any more, folks.

Very, very gradual managed decline is what the US, like Western Europe, faces in the twenty-first century. In geopolitical terms at least, as power shifts eastwards to Asia.

Too many of its people can't cope with that idea. And have a view of 'American greatness' which is so laughably out of date, it practically died when Eisenhower left office.

Remember: these are people who exalt Ronald Reagan. Whose policies were more responsible than anyone else for the grotesque inequality, poverty and social dislocation across the US.

These are people who look back to George W Bush like he was a decent, normal, even good President

In different ways, both of them laid the roots for where the US finds itself now. In massive trouble - more trouble than at any time since the Civil War.

So whatever Biden does, he can't win. He'll be tough in rhetoric, relatively soft in action.

And if Russia does invade, I will watch in wearied disgust as those who rightly go completely mental if the US invades a sovereign state fall over themselves to justify Russia doing the same thing... and blame NATO, not the aggressors here.

The standards I expect of both are the same. Imperialism is not magically OK if it's someone other than the US doing it.

Anyone who now starts cheerleading Russian behaviour is telling on themselves in a big, big way.

My thoughts are with the terrified people of Ukraine.