Merkel and the 'Mogherini's' of the EU buckling under Putin's threats

Putin's propaganda mouthpiece, RT, informs us that,

“The European Union today is extremely realistic about developments in Russia. But we will never be trapped or forced or pushed or pulled into a confrontative [sic] attitude,” the EU’s Foreign Policy Chief Federica Mogherini (left) told the media on Friday, following an informal meeting of EU foreign ministers in Riga, Latvia."(RT : March 07, 2015)

In this the 'fragrant' Mogherini is supported, of course, by Austrian Foreign Minister Sebastian Kurz and the  German FM Frank-Walter Steinmeier. To which we can also add Matteo Renzi, Italian PM, Francoise Hollande, President of France, Angela Merkel, and the Hungarian PM, Victor Orban, amongst others.

                         (top) Hollande, Steinheimer, Orban (bottom) Merkel, Kurz, Renzi

However, what is interesting in RT's report is that,

"The German Spiegel magazine reported on Saturday that Chancellor Angela Merkel’s government suspects the US and NATO of trying to derail the EU’s mediation effort in Ukraine." (ibid RT) (my emphasis)

Maybe, just maybe, they are the 'unwitting victims' of Putin's threatening bellicosity to retaliate if,

" .... the United States [sends] ....... just under a battalion of soldiers to Ukraine to train troops from the Ukrainian National Guard by the end of the week.

Russian officials denounced the anticipated arrival of U.S. troops for a training mission in Ukraine a “provocation” that could result in serious consequences for “Kiev authorities and the Ukrainian people.” ( Jack Kenny : The New American : Sunday, 08 March 2015) (my emphasis)

This 'muscle flexing' of Putin should be viewed against the following facts:

(i) The training exercise, first announced last August (i.e August 2014!), was
      scheduled to begin this month.

(ii) On the 24 Feb 2015, David Cameron, British PM, announced that,
      "Over the course of the next month we are going to be deploying British service
       personnel to provide advice and a range of training, from tactical intelligence to
       logistics to medical care, which is something else they have asked for.

      "We will also be developing an infantry training programme with Ukraine to
      improve the durability of their forces" (Peter Dominiczak : Daily Telegraph : 24 Feb
      2015) (my emphasis)

Why now, suddenly, does

“U.S.-Ukrainian military drills in the western Ukrainian Lviv region threaten Russia's security,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Alexander Lukashevich (left) said in a statement carried by Tass, Moscow’s official news agency. “It is evident that they are not trying to bring peace to the country,” Lukashevich said. “Kiev authorities and all the Ukrainian people should think about the possible consequences of such steps.” Deteriorating U.S.-Russian relations, he added, will be further damaged if “the citizens of Donbas start being killed with the use of the U.S. weapons.” Donbas is a region near the Ukrainian-Russian border where separatists fighting the Kiev government have captured territory and declared autonomous “people’s republics.” (ibid Jack Kenny) (my emphasis)

Why did Putin not make these threats last August when the US training exercises were first mooted, or even when David Cameron recently announced that the UK, " ..... will also be developing an infantry training programme with Ukraine to improve the durability of [the Ukrainian] forces"?

But most critically, notice that he is publicly stating Putin's perception that,

" separatists fighting the Kiev government have captured territory and declared autonomous “people’s republics.”. 

This simple fact, more than anything else, really belies the fact that Merkel is trying to restore the territorial integrity of Ukraine. Like so many Germans, Merkel too is trapped within the "Russland Versteher" mentality that stretches from the left to the right of the German political spectrum.

As reported in the Economist, as long ago as May 10th 2014,

           Heinrich Winkler                        Karl Schlogel

"One German historian of Eastern Europe, Karl Schlögel, calls German Russophilia a “mixture of sentimentality, nostalgia, cowardice and kitsch.” 

Another historian, Heinrich August Winkler, has attacked the Russlandversteher for standing in a long and nasty tradition of Russo-German co-operation (most egregiously seen in the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact of 1939), given that what they are excusing in Mr Putin is a mixture of neo-tsarist aggression and ethnic nationalism."(my emphasis)

What is most disconcerting about the implications of this "Russlandversteher" mental trap that many Germans simply cannot seem to extricate themselves from has rather presciently been stated by Ulrich Speck (left) in May of last year viz.

“The more America confronts Russia to defend the principles of international order,” he says, “the more Germany will distance itself from America.” For Europe, as for Germany itself, any such shift would be disastrous." (ibid The Economist) (my emphasis)

And this is precisely what we see happening now over the Ukrainian issue.

Embattled Putin

If there is anything to confirm the "hand in glove" relationship between German business and Putin's kleptocratic circle, then it is the sale by German RWE, one of Europe’s five leading electricity and gas companies, of its stake in oil and gas fields in the North Sea to one of Putin's oligarchs,  Mikhail Fridman (right).

As reported by Reuters,

"RWE on Monday finalized the sale of its oil and gas production unit DEA UK to Fridman's investment vehicle LetterOne, ending months of uncertainty over whether the 5.1 billion euro ($5.7 billion) deal would go ahead." (published in the Moscow Times : Mar. 05 2015)

The British Government, however,

" .... told Russian oligarch Mikhail Fridman he had seven days to explain why he should be allowed to retain ownership of newly acquired oil and gas fields in the North Sea or face being forced to sell them." (Andrew Osborn and William James : Reuters : Wed Mar 4, 2015) (my emphasis)

Meanwhile, Angela Merkel (right),

" .... is warning Russia to live up to the Ukraine peace agreement it backed in Minsk last month or face tougher European Union sanctions .... ...

Merkel said that “if Minsk doesn’t work, then the member states and the European Commission are quite prepared to take tougher sanctions.” (Associated Press : March 4 : as reported inWashington Post) (my emphasis)

And whilst Merkel is threatening Putin with more sanctions, Matteo Renzi, Italian PM, is cosying up to Putin in Moscow.

As reported by Vladimir Isachenkov (Associated Press),

"Italy's prime minister visited Moscow on Thursday in a bid to repair ties that have been hurt by Russia-West tensions over Ukraine.
Most Western leaders have shunned Moscow as relations have plunged to their lowest point since the Cold War. Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi's (left) trip reflects his desire to improve bilateral economic ties, which have suffered because of the EU sanctions against Russia and Moscow's retaliatory moves." (Seattle Pi : Thursday, March 5, 2015) (my emphasis)

 Putin's beaming smile may, however, be rather short-lived.

 Gulgiz Dadashova, writes that,

“As part of a revitalized European energy and climate diplomacy, the EU will use all its foreign policy instruments to establish strategic energy partnerships with increasingly important producing and transit countries or regions such as Algeria and Turkey; Azerbaijan and Turkmenistan; the Middle East; Africa and other potential suppliers, ” new Union Energy Package said." (Eurasia Review : March 5, 2015) (my emphasis)

And as demand for Russian gas from the EU begins to drop now that winter is over, and as the Russian economy is teetering on the edge of a disastrous downward spiral if new sanctions against it are put into place; 

the Russian military informs us that,

" ...... 2,000 servicemen are taking part in "large-scale" air-defense exercises in southern Russia, Crimea, and the breakaway Georgian regions of Abkhazia and South Ossetia. .....

In a statement, it said drills were taking place at 12 training grounds in Russia's Southern, North Caucasus, and Crimean federal districts, as well as at bases in Abkhazia and South Ossetia." (RFERL : Friday, March 06, 2015) (my emphasis)

To consolidate monitoring of the Minsk2 ceasefire, the US and Britain proposed, at a closed door meeting of the UN Security Council (UNSC) (Sat Feb 28, 2015) on the situation in eastern Ukraine, that the OSCE,

" ...  extend its monitoring to include the entire Russia-Ukraine border and was asked what resources they needed for effective work." (PressTV : Sat Feb 28, 2015)

At which Putin's mouthpiece at the UN, Vitaly Churkin, (right) started spitting nails, arguing that,

“There are Minsk agreements in place, where the question of borders is explained. Why would this question be brought up at the UNSC? ” (RT : February 28, 2015)

The central reason for Churkin's apopletic rage lies in the fact that,


"Russia had deployed "thousands and thousands" of troops to neighboring Ukraine" and that, ""since December, Russia has transferred hundreds of pieces of military equipment, including tanks, armored vehicles, rocket systems, heavy artillery,", according to Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland. (Yahoo News (Agence France Presse) : March 4, 2015)
Furthermore,

"Alexander Vershbow (right), Nato's deputy secretary general, told a conference in Latvia: "Russian leaders are less and less able to conceal the fact that Russian soldiers are fighting - and dying - in large numbers in eastern Ukraine." (BBC News : 5 March 2015) (my emphasis)

Is this why Churkin spat nails at the US-UK proposal at the UN Security Council on the 28th Feb., that the Russian-Ukrainian border be monitored by the OSCE?

Our attention should again be drawn to the strategic town of Mariupol as,

"Rebels battled government troops in the village of Shyrokyne, east of Mariupol, in the early hours (5 March 2015), Ukrainian interior ministry adviser Zoryan Shkiryak said. But he added that there had been no other serious fighting in the area." (ibid BBC News)

Putin, being the single-minded and driven person that he is, will simply not accept that his Alexander Dukin inspired dreams of "Novorossiya" are on the verge of beginning to evaporate.

• With an economy that is collapsing,
• assasinations taking place within spitting distance of the Kremlin, 
• the body-bag count of Russian soldiers from Ukraine increasing, 
• the US now openly advocating sending lethal arms to Ukraine, 
• and yet more sanctions against Russia hanging like a sword of Damocles over his head; 

is it any wonder that he is trying to intimidate the world by holding, ".... large-scale" air-defense exercises in southern Russia, Crimea, and the breakaway Georgian regions of Abkhazia and South Ossetia. ..?"

(to be continued)

Putin using the 'ceasefire' to prepare for his offensive against Mariupol

We have to ask ourselves the following questions viz.

(1) "Is this current lull in the attacks of Putin's proxies and his Russian soldiers in eastern Ukraine a sign that the Minsk2 'ceasfire' is beginning to hold, and that the heavy weaponry of the rebel forces is, in fact, being pulled back?

Or is it, as Maria Tsvetkova (left) reports,

(2) "Kiev says the rebels are using the truce to regroup and pulling out heavy weaponry to prepare for more attacks on other areas of eastern Ukraine outside their area of control, including the government-held port city of Mariupol.


"There are signs the enemy is preparing for further offensives," military spokesman Andriy Lysenko (right) said on Sunday. "Everywhere where the militants show that they are withdrawing heavy weaponry, it is either simply to relocate (the armaments) where they are planning attacks or remove them only to put them back in place the next night," he told a briefing." (Reuters : Mon Mar 2, 2015) (my emphasis)

Without a doubt, Putin's supporters in the EU (and around the globe) will answer "yes" to question (1), and simply "ignore" question (2). 

Let us remind ourselves that the 'fragrant' Mogherini (left), in a paper she presented to the EU foreign ministers in mid January 2015, noted,

" .... a common, long-term aim of free trade from "Lisbon to Vladivostok" and said the EU might study expanding trade with Russia and its Eurasian Economic Union of ex-Soviet states. It was Ukraine's preference of free trade with the EU rather than with the EEU that sparked the confrontation." (Jan Strupczewski and Alastair Macdonald : Reuters : Wed Jan 14, 2015) (my emphasis)

However, one diplomat, from an eastern European country,

" ...  which counsels against the EU showing weakness toward Moscow, said the paper appeared to reflect an eagerness on the part of countries such as France and Mogherini's native Italy to set aside the dispute over Ukraine in order to revive profitable business with Russia." (ibid Jan Strupczewski and Alastair Macdonald) (my emphasis) 
 
In light of the international outcry over the assasination of Boris Nemtsov (right), and the near-death situation of the hunger-striking Ukrainian, Nadiya Savchenko, incarcerated in a Moscow jail; what do those Putin supporters in the EU now have to say about increasing pressure on Putin to stop his war with Ukraine? 

Added to which Kiyoshi Takenaka, reporting from Japan, states that, 

"No normalization of ties between Ukraine and Russia is likely unless the region of Crimea, now under Russian control, is returned to Kiev's sovereignty, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Pavlo Klimkin said on Tuesday.

Klimkin (left), on the second day of his two-day trip to Japan, also said the border between Ukraine and Russia needed to be completely closed to achieve any settlement to the armed conflict between Kiev and pro-Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine." (Reuters : Tue Mar 3, 2015) (my emphasis)

Furthermore, in light of Andriy Lysenko, Ukrainian military spokesman, reporting on Sunday that,

"There are signs the enemy is preparing for further offensives,"

the US military’s top-ranking officer, General Martin Dempsey (right), has called for Washington to arm Ukraine.

“I think we should absolutely consider lethal aid and it ought to be in the context of Nato allies because [Russian President Vladimir] Putin’s ultimate objective is to fracture Nato,” Dempsey told the Senate armed services committee." (Agence France-Presse in Washington :Tuesday 3 March 2015)

And now President Obama is,

"..... weighing a possible move to provide weapons to Kiev but some Nato members – including France and Germany – are opposed to arming Ukraine over fears it could further escalate the conflict in eastern Ukraine." (ibid Agence France-Presse in Washington) (my emphasis)

 Alexander Motyl (right) rather neatly sums up the 'false' assumptions of Merkel, Hollande, and those other EU states opposed to supplying Ukraine with arms.

" .... the argument against arms deliveries to Ukraine assumes that Putin will escalate regardless of the costs involved. [Putin's] .. . relentless, single-minded pursuit of ....... [trying to destroy Ukraine for the primary reason of protecting himself and his 'siloviki' from being correctly identified as the criminals that they are, under the propaganda umbrella of 'Novorossiya'] ......, regardless of the costs and benefits involved, is what we generally characterize as fanaticism or, possibly, as a psychological disorder.

In any case, such behavior is anything but rational in the realist sense of the term.Merkel and Hollande, together with the  Mogherini's and Putin supporters in the EU, 

" ... want to have it both ways - arguing for and against rationality in general and in the Russian context in particular." (Washington Post : March 3, 2015) (my emphasis)

In other words, they view Putin's as:

(1) 'rational', by invoking Russia’s close historical, cultural, and religious ties to Ukraine" but
(2) 'irrational', because they fear that arming Ukraine will make him escalate his war with Ukraine, regardless of the costs and benefits involved.

What they do not see is Putin as the criminal that he is, sitting at the apex of a pyramid of corruption and criminality that he has built up from his earlier days in the 1990's in St. Petersburg, as Karen Dawisha in her book, "Putin's Kleptocracy", has fully exposed.

For a more detailed presentation of "Putin's Kleptocracy by Karen Dawisha go to:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AGXAY0BxEV4 

(to be continued)