Putin is simply not ready to commit political suicide (9th Feb. 2015)

Last week's flurry of diplomatic activity culminated yesterday (8/2/2015) in Poroshenko, Merkel, Hollande, and Putin himself, having a 'Skype-type' internet conference, after the inconclusive meeting between the latter three last Friday. This 'internet' conference ended with all four participants agreeing on a face-to-face conference to take place, once again in Minsk, this coming Wednesday (11/2/2015), to try to revive the dead Minsk protocols of September last year.

Merkel arriving in Washington

 After this 'Skype-conference' yesterday, Merkel then jetted over to Washington to meet today with President Obama, and to fill him in on what transpired at the meeting last Friday, and the 'Skype-conference' yesterday.

Sergei Lavrov

As we recall, that dyed-in-the-wool Soviet foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, stood in front of the assembled delegates at the Munich Security Conference on Saturday (7/2/2015) and delivered a 45 minute speech, during which he was booed and heckled as he tried to rewrite history in favour of Putin's current mind-set of events past and present. 

As Julian Borger reported,

"The mood at a meeting of leaders and foreign ministers at the annual Munich Security Conference was acrimonious. The Russian foreign minister, Sergey Lavrov, was jeered and booed, when he denied Moscow was providing military support to the rebels." (The Guardian : Sunday 8 February 2015) (my emphasis)

Almost immediately after his speech, RT scrambled to 'weaponise' it  by ensuring that the jeers and booes were eliminated from their in-house interpreting of the full speech, which they almost immediately televised. In this RT TV production, Lavrov's voice was powerfully overlaid by that of the 'interpreter', to the extent that one could practically not make out what Lavrov was saying. Even more disconcerting, at the beginning of this excerpt the 'interpreter' says,

" ... and the leaders of Russia, France, and Germany ...."

and yet Lavrov DOES NOT mention these countries. But see and listen for yourselves.

The complete RT version of his speech can be found at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YWsR_nkxfAY : This is what Putin's propaganda mouthpiece is spreading all over the world.

Contrast this RT propaganda with an excerpt of Merkel speaking at this conference, with at conference simultaneous interpreting. 

 

Following on from the Munich Security Conference, President Obama and Angela Merkel will today be meeting in Washington. This meeting has, as its backdrop, what was said by both US Secretary of State John Kerry and US Vice-President John Biden at the Munich Security Conference. Both were forceful in proclaiming their support for Ukraine, and in confronting head-on what Putin is really doing in eastern Ukraine, as well as his trampling over international law when he annexed Ukarinian Crimea.

 US Vice-president John Biden at the Munich Security Conference

  

 US Secretary of State John Kerry at the Munich Security Conference

The stand taken by these two men could not have been lost on Putin and his Kremlin cohorts.

More importantly, whilst Obama and Merkel may both agree on not arming Ukraine with defensive weapons against those that Russia has flooded into the areas controlled by his proxies and his Russian soldiers, the words of Biden and Kerry cannot be undone. 

This is Obama's "Kennedy moment". For Obama the clock is rapidly ticking down towards,

" ... the deadline ..  for the Ukraine Freedom Support Act of 2014 to come into FULL effect on the 16th February 2015. This Act mandates Obama into making a decision on sending military hardware to Ukraine since the Act includes the following:

(i) Provisions for training, defense articles, anti-tank weapons, anti-armor weapons, crew weapons, ammunition, counter-artillery radar, fire control, range diner, tactical troop-operated surveillance drones, and other equipment pursuant to the provisions of the Arms Export Control Act – Total of $350,000,000 over three years" (blog entry: 3rd Feb. 2015)

US Secretary of Defence, Chuck Hagel, rather neatly expressed the predicament that Obama now finds himself in. Increase sanctions against Russia, or bite the bullet and supply Ukraine with defensive weaponry.

US Secretary of Defence Chuck Hagel

No doubt Obama is fervently hoping that the forthcoming meeting on Wednesday between Merkel, Poroshenko, Hollande, and Putin, will pull this chesnut out of the fire for him.

But for this to be done, Putin will have to be appeased with concessions that, under the circumstances, Poroshenko simply will not agree with.

Again, I draw the reader's attention to the geopolitical mind-set of Putin. Putin cannot simply scupper the idea of "Novorossiya", the very backbone of his annexation of Ukrainian Crimea and his invasion of eastern Ukraine. The 'airwaves of Russia' have been saturated with this geopolitical aim for months on end.

For Putin, even the mere thought of abandoning this aim of his must seem to him like committing suicide. And Putin is simply not ready to commit 'political' suicide.

(to be continued)