EDITORIAL: Annals of Russian Insanity II

EDITORIAL

Annals of Russian Insanity II

Russia is in the process of constructing its largest aquarium in the city of Sochi at a cost of over $25 million. Scheduled to open later this month, Sochi Discovery World is supposed to be one of the chief attactions for visitors to the 2014 Olympic Games.

As if. 

What was on that Ship, Mr. Putin?

Time magazine reports:

In July, the Russian-manned cargo ship the Arctic Sea disappeared on its way to take timber from Finland to Algeria, sparking reports of the first incident of piracy in European waters since the days of the buccaneers. Experts and observers weighed in with their theories: the ship had been snatched in a commercial dispute; it was being used to run drugs; it was carrying something more precious — or dangerous — than timber.

Another Russophile is Disgusted by Russia

Writing in the New York Times, not even rabid Russophile Anatol Lieven, a professor in the War Studies Department of King’s College London and a senior fellow of the New America Foundation, can contain his disgust at the barbaric dishonesty and ignorance of the people of Russia where their own history is concerned.  Russia again and again proves itself totally unable to do what other civilized nations can readily and even proudly do, take responsbility for their past mistakes and work to improve.  Instead, Russia wallows in childish denial, always pointing a finger at other and never, never at itself.  This is why Russia lags so far behind the rest of the world in development and why it seems doomed always to do so.  It’s quite true that other nations made deals with Hitler. What they didn’t do, however, is to attempt to share in Hitler’s illicit gains from imperlist aggression, nor did they make heros out of the men who made the deals, as Russia has done.

The Polish president, Lech Kaczynski, apologized this month for Poland’s role in Hitler’s partition of Czechoslovakia, stating that, “Poland’s participation in the annexation of Czechoslovakia in 1938 was not only an error, but above all a sin.” He should have added that this built on an earlier criminal error, that of Poland’s nonaggression pact with Nazi Germany in 1934, which effectively demolished France’s alliance system in Eastern Europe, and made it much harder to prevent Nazi Germany’s expansion in the mid-1930s.

A Sunday (S&M) Mystery

The Russian cartoonist known as Ellustrator (Sergei Yelkin) posts the above drawing with no caption or explanation.  A number of his Russian readers don’t get it. Do you? Any suggestions for what Putin might be saying?

Friday September 4, 2009 — Contents

FRIDAY SEPTEMBER 4 CONTENTS

(1)  EDITORIAL:  Vladimir Putin, Mass Murderer

(2)  Kadyrov’s “Robespierran” State

(3)  Rancid Russia, Alone in Post-Soviet Space

(4)  Russia’s Frantic French Follies

(5)  Annals of Russian Tennis Failure

EDITORIAL: Vladimir Putin, Mass Murderer

EDITORIAL

Vladimir Putin, Mass Murderer

Last week, we reported the appalling fact that in Vladimir Putin’s Russia the tuberculosis infection rate is ten times higher than in the United States, and the fatality rate from the horrible disease is nearly one hundred times higher.  Russia has been placed on a list of shame next to barbaric third world states like Zimbabwe, Uganda, Bangledesh and Pakistan as one of the 22 most dangerous places in the world for contracting and perishing from the disease, which has been liquidated in civilized countries like the USA and Western Europe.  Make no mistake: If you are a tourist in Russia, you are at risk just like the rest of the population.

What this means in simple terms is that over 100,000 people contract tuberculosis every year in Russia and over 15,000 of them lose their lives to the disease. Let us repeat that: Each and every year fifteen thousand Russians are killed by tuberculosis.  Many Russians called for the impeachment and jailing of Boris Yeltsin for “genocide” because of results like these during his term. Where are those calls in regard to Putin?

Kadyrov’s “Robespierreian” State

Islam Online reports:

When Russia announced an end to its near-decade, long “Counter-Terrorist Operation”(CTO) in Chechnya last April, many observers were taken by surprise. The decision to call an end to this security regime was taken by senior Russian officials at the orders of Chechnya’s President Ramzan Kadyrov.

Over the past several years, Kadyrov has overseen the relative stabilization of the security situation in Chechnya, compared to the increasingly chaotic state of affairs in neighboring republics such as Ingushetia and Dagestan. Kadyrov claims that his militias have all but eliminated militants based in Chechnya. Those who have managed to survive, he claims, have fled to Ingushetia and Dagestan where they have taken advantage of less stringent security regimes to regroup and reorganise.

Rancid Russia, Alone in Post-Soviet Space

Alexander Golts, writing in the Moscow Times:

Imagine a crank who tries to pass himself off as a 19th-century Russian baron. He grows sideburns, wears a long frock coat and carries a walking stick. Anyone who would run into such a character would surely sneer and mock him. Now, suppose that same crank attempted to treat passers-by as if they were his serfs. In that case, he would risk getting a beating, though perhaps a few beggars would indulge his fantasies in the hope of duping him out of his money.

Something of this sort now characterizes relations between Russia and several former Soviet republics. The foreign policy doctrine that guides the Kremlin is a preposterous mix of 19th-century Realpolitik and early 20th-century geopolitics. According to this view, every great power should have a collection of satellite countries in its portfolio. Under such an approach, NATO’s expansion is represented as an extension of the U.S. sphere of influence — to the detriment of Russia, of course.

Russia’s Frantic French Follies

Mikhail Barabanov, editor-in-chief of the Moscow Defense Brief, writing in the Moscow Times, reports on the latest total insanity coming out of the Russian military establishment:

Most people had trouble believing media reports last month that the Russian Navy was planning to buy a $1 billion helicopter carrier from France. First, the Kremlin has always adhered to the sacred principle of producing big-ticket military projects domestically at any cost. After all, it is a given that a superpower must be able to manufacture its own ships, fighter jets and missiles. Second, France is a NATO country. Third, Russia is supposed to be in a deep economic crisis. Where would the military come up with $1 billion to buy a single ship? Fourth, Russian officials themselves denied the reports.

Annals of Russian Tennis Failure

More pain, humiliation and failure to report for the Russian women at last week’s WTA tour event in New Haven, Connecticut.  Russia had two of the top four seeds, including the #1, at the last tune-up event before the final grand slam event of the year in New York City, but neither of them managed to get as far as the semi-finals.  #4 seed Nadia Petrova lost her opening round match to an unseeded opponent, while #1 seed Svetlana Kuzntesova went down in the quarter finals to the #8 seed, who then promtly lost to an unseeded opponent in the semis, taking just three of 15 games played in the final two sets.

And at the U.S. Open, Maria Shamapova’s run of inhuman dumb luck contiunued apace.