When major newspapers begin pre-emptively to self-censor you can no longer trust their content.

My parents saw this when the Sovs occupied Estonia. Friends from a number of once liberal democracies have seen it.

We always see it in the dimming crepuscular light before a country goes dark.
1/n It's why I suggested earlier to read Noberl Laureate Czeslaw Milosz's "Captive Minds".

Or for a more historical account, @anneapplebaum's "Iron Curtain: the Crushing of Eastern Europe"

Already now we need alternative sources of trustworthy information. @nytimes' coverage 2/n

85 years ago today, Germany and Russia signed a pact with a secret protocol dividing up Europe between them.

The invasions and slaughter that began 8 days later left tens of millions dead. The reverberations of the war and death they unleashed echo through generations of survivors and their children and childrens children.(1/n) The children of the perpetrators of these horrors show little remorse. One, Russia, revels in its bloodlust to this day, glorifies its cold-blooded murderers from then and today in Ukraine, threatening the same for the rest of us.

For the other, Germany, the crimes of its (2/n)

If Russia wins in Ukraine, Europe will have 35 million refugees -- people who don't want to suffer the genocide we all know takes place in Russian occupied areas.

Europe is not ready for that. Its leaders worry instead about sending Tauruses and the cost of producing shells. 1/n After Russia wins, Europe will have 3-4 years to get ready as Russia recovers. Perhaps less given they've ramped military production up to war levels.

Will anyone lead Europe in the next 4-5 years so we'll be ready?

The current crop has shown they are completely unfit.

2/n

To people who have no experience with spies:

I had a lot but two stand out: my number two in the RFE Estonian service and my immediate boss in its Research Dept

The latter was a shock when it came out he had worked for the Czech KGV, the StB, but knew as only my superior
1/n The first. though, I had known for almost a decade and considered not only a colleague but also a friend and confidant. He told the best Soviet and anti-Soviet jokes and was a genuinely talented published writer.

One day in July 1991 the RFE director called me at 7 am.
2/n

32 aastat tagasi, tollal *de jure* 73 aastavanune Eesti Vabariik ärkas, tärkas ja jätkas elu *de facto*.

Ent Eesti ei jätkanud sealt, kust meilt iseseisvus rööviti, vaid pidime 50 aastat füüsilisest, materiaalsest ja vaimsest taagast lahti ka saama. 1/n Ja de novo looma ja ehitama midagi, millest eestlased olid pool sajandit unistanud ja selle nimel teinud rasket tööd. Ja mille nimel ka kohutavalt kannatanud.

Me ei saa aga minna ajas tagasi sellesse paljuski tagantjärel romantiseeritud idülli, milles me elasime 1939 a. ... 2/n

So at the bottom of the freak-out by the whining Russian loser in fencing was the lack of "respect" or "esteem" shown to her.

"уважение", in Russian is, in addition to envy or зависть, the driving need of Russian behavior, of the rapes, the torture, the looted toilets and 1/n and washing machines, the stolen art and destroyed libraries.

It is a cultural cleavage, a chasm far greater than we in the West understand. It's what separates us from them,
it's what drives them nuts when they can't get visas to Europe.

-- failing to understand that it is 2/n

The missile attacks on civilians, the assassination threats, the promise to ethnically cleanse Ukraine, all on my twitter feed this AM:

Russians say these things because they believe in impunity, that they will never be held responsible, that Russia will never give them up. 1/ The problem is, they don't know that they had better hope for trials. The legal system ultimately is to prevent the беспредел of vigilante-ism.

When you don't have rule of law, even internationally, and justice is denied and people will take it in their own hands. 2/

With an impoverished, post-war Russia flooded with brutal returning, still armed mercenaries and other blatnoi thug-trash, the early 1990s will seem like Andy of Mayberry.

Who's nominally in charge won't matter, it will be anarchic chaos.Dig the moat. 1/2
foreignaffairs.com/russian-federa… A "Marshall Plan" assumes someone in in charge to whom to offer a plan.

Russia OTOH will be 1990s Somalia, not a Germany under UK, FR and US military occupation -- in a country that already had a strong, albeit temporarily interrupted, centuries-old Rechtstaat tradition. 2/n

Some PR advice for Russian liberals: (a thread)

1. Stop being so self-absorbed. Don’t talk about a “Marshall Plan” for Russia when those who would pay for it read daily accounts of new atrocities in Ukraine

2. Don’t call Westerners Nazis when they do want Russians to travel 1/n …to their countries. We’ve seen enough bad behavior, harassment of — and even violence — against Ukrainian women refugees and “Z”s spray painted on 1000 year old cathedrals to tolerate this.

3. Don’t threaten us with dire scenarios of what will happen to us if we don’t 2/n

A little thread on visas, Germany and its role in Europe: Germany’s behavior since even before the Ukraine war has been to do as little as possible, promise as little as possible and delay what it’s promised as long as possible. 1/n

A longer thread on Russian visas, taxes and how we Estonians are: Ever since independence 31 years ago, the Baltic States and occasionally Poland as well have been continuously threatened by Russia, both officially as well as in the state-controlled media.

1/n

Estonia is not the place to boast about cheating on your taxes. Take that into account before you move here:

https://twitter.com/EconomyInformal/status/1545028999184777218?s=20&t=uSFzpi4GI0RPA5pRSPk57Q

https://twitter.com/ErikDebra/status/1554190282463248386

Here is the ranking:

https://twitter.com/EconomyInformal/status/1545028999184777218?s=20&t=uSFzpi4GI0RPA5pRSPk57Q

It took a long time for younger East Europeans to get over the stories by grandmothers and parents of the Russians' indiscriminate killing of civilians, the deportations, looting, rapes and arrests where some were found dead with horrendous torture and others never found. 1/n

https://twitter.com/KremlinTrolls/status/1502352486102933504

In the past 15 days, all this has come back. On video. Some 100 million East Europeans now understand the stories were not exaggerated.

It may be unfair but that is once again the dominant image of Russians. The bombing of evacuation corridors, maternity hospitals,

2/n

We are amidst the greatest security crisis in Europe since the Cuban Missile crisis in 1962. Of I/Os, the UN and CoE have been utterly irrelevant, a feeble attempt was made with the OSCE, and the EU's main contribution has been to whine about being ignored by Russia, US & NATO. In the future we need a rethink of which legacy I/Os are fit for purpose. The UN for development assistance and refugees, fine. Security? Hardly, especially with an octagenarian SC legacy P5. CoE long ago lost any legitimacy as a normative human rights org by re-instating Russia.

My predictions on with what Russia's manufactured crisis will end up with:

1. Putin doesn't invade but as a Parthian shot initiates a serious of nasty cyber attacks on Ukraine that will be hard to prove but clear to everyone.

2. No one, will be any closer to joining NATO. 1/n 3. In Sweden less and Finland more, the Overton Window on NATO membership will have moved significantly with a once taboo topic now comme il faut.

4. Having been ignored for so long by the EU, CEE concerns will be taken slightly more seriously by soi-disant "Old Members" 2/n

The EU alas has botched two Russian invasions already: Georgia in 2008 and Ukraine in 2014.

France held the EU Presidency in 2008 as well so in 2022 will be under special scrutiny, at least this side of the EU and should be everywhere.

Back then (1/x)
ft.com/content/bb00f1… Sarkozy flew about, announced a "Peace Plan", that froze the EU-Russia "Partnership and Co-operation agreement" until Russia withdrew its troops from Georgia.

A month later, with no troops gone, Sarkozy instead assailed Eastern members, threw out the troop withdrawal part (2/x)

@steven_pifer Minus the hipsterisms, "Everyone wants to avoid a major war in Europe, right?" is a restatement of classic appeasement of an aggressor at the expense of the victim. All one needs to add is a "quarrel in a far away country, between people of whom we know nothing", especially: @steven_pifer "there's no plausible amount of whacking (or threatened whacking) that would fundamentally alter Russia's calculus unless...there's a negotiation in which they get some of what they want."

I.e., we get "Peace in our time", if we give the Russians/Nazis, some of what they want.