I’ve read that the United States never celebrated our victory at the end of the Cold War, when communism collapsed with an almost miraculous suddenness. George Bush the Elder certainly did not want to crow over the ruins of the Berlin Wall, but the United States threw a hell of a party. It lasted 20 years.
     The party is over.
     With the mortal threat to mankind’s very existence removed with the end of the nuclear rivalry, our politics instantly began to trivialize. It’s hardly a coincidence that the first post-Cold War President was a man of highly questionable character who claimed that, “I feel your pain.”
     What pain? For the poor (and the Bible tells us the poor will always be with us) there is always pain but for most Americans, things were pretty good in the 1990s and 2000s. We were, and are, riven by domestic issues, which boil down to how our tax revenues are raised and spent, and the meaning of human life. Not trivial issues, but they don’t carry the weight for the average citizen that national survival and nuclear war do.
     No matter, we learned to talk our political concerns to death and back again, endlessly repeating our arguments to people who had already made up their minds, and to whose arguments we turned a deaf ear. Our politics was charmed by the sound of our own voices, our own “talking points.” We judged our leaders not so much by the message but by their ability to “stay on message.” And the message was sold, like soap, through endless mind-numbing repetition of slogans and bromides.
     At length politics gave way in the public’s awareness to the celebrity culture. More than ever we consume volumes of news and images about actors, singers, fashion models and socialites who are famous for being famous.
     We have obviously had a lot of time on our hands. But all of that is drawing to a close.
     Samuel Johnson once said "Depend upon it, sir, when a man knows he is to be hanged in a fortnight, it concentrates his mind wonderfully." I hope by concentrating wonderfully we might avoid economic or military blackmail by the Russians.

     Russia is applying its great wealth... acquired by selling Western Europe its natural gas, to the rebuilding and reorganization of its armed forces. Little noted here, a few years ago the Russians publicly committed to rebuilding their Ground Forces back to the 600,000-troop level and raising the complete armed strength of Russia to that of the former Soviet Union.
     That means an army as large or larger than our own and comparably equipped with the latest in weaponry. Accordingly Russia is investing heavily in weapons technology (GlobalSecurity.org). One of the first fruits will be the debut sometime this year, of an advanced “fifth generation” fighter.
     We still have the advantage over the Russians in the sophistication of all of our arms, especially main battle tanks and fighter aircraft. Whether or not the advantage remains comfortable in the years to come is going to be a policy question on the mind of the next President, whomever he may be.

     It is obvious as we fight two theatres of a war on terror...  that we are light on troop strength. The Army and the Marine Corps need to be expanded in size significantly so that levels of commitment like those of Iraq do not mean that other fighting fronts are shortchanged in troop strength. We need two Armies, in essence: One is a light army of light infantry, airborne and air-mobile troops that moves fast in helicopters and armored personnel carriers like the M1126 Stryker and the Bradley fighting vehicle, and can handle wars like Iraq and Afghanistan.
     The other is a heavy army based around heavy infantry, conventional and rocket artillery, tank-killer helicopters and armored divisions trained to fight set-piece battles with heavy enemy forces. That will be our insurance policy for the Russians…and the Chinese if it comes to that.
     We have other work to do. We should tear a page from fiction and develop another subsonic aerial weapons platform like the B-52, but loaded with standoff weapons, the latest in electronic counter measures and electronic warfare equipment. A big all-purpose heavy bomber that can orbit outside of enemy airspace while dealing death blows from a distance.
      We need to inspect, update and/or replace and expand our arsenal of nuclear warheads. We cannot let the Russia or China think that a nuclear war is winnable. We will need to expand the fleet of submarines capable of launching nuclear-tipped ballistic missiles or cruise missiles. As the Russians expand their fleet, we will need more Virginia-class attack submarines to contain the threat. New surface ship acquisitions for the Navy need to be stealthy and fast. Unfortunately, last month, the Navy canceled development of the DD-1000 Zumwalt-class destroyer, that perfectly fits this requirement. Only seven examples will be built. The number should be expanded back to at least 24.

     And there is much else to do. It will be expensive and it will call for sacrifices from projected future social programs. Europe is in no condition to defend itself, however. Once again history has chosen our country to be the guarantor of freedom and independence for other nations. One only hopes that the man we elect President this year is up to the enormous task of leadership ahead…or that he at least realizes there is such a task.

There is no reason on God’s green earth why Russia and the United States should ever come to blows.
     On the other hand, in 1914 there was no reason why Russia, France and England should have to have gone to war with Germany and Austria-Hungary. No reason except the insanity of power politics as practiced before the Great War.

     Russia has grievances against us that won’t go away. We blocked the Soviet expansion into Afghanistan by arming the Mujahideen. Once they learned how to shoot down Hind helicopters with Sparrow air-to-air missiles it was only a matter of time. We lured the Soviets into an arms race in the 1980’s they didn’t need to pursue. They didn’t have the cash to make it happen. When we tossed in the Star Wars chip, they had a breakdown of national will because they totally believed we could build a system that would negate their intercontinental rocket forces.
     Fooled ya! We’re still trying to make the damn thing work 20 years later. It was Ronald Reagan’s coup de grace to the back of the head of communism.

     Instead of propping up the USSR in gratitude...  for being liberated 60 years earlier, the ungrateful eastern European satellite nations gleefully quit the Warsaw Pact. Now they are mostly members of NATO and the European Union and out of Moscow’s grasp. The fact that the presidents of Poland and the Balkan nations dared travel to Tiblisi in the middle of the war, to proclaim solidarity in public with Georgia indicates enormous moral courage –and the knowledge that their security is America’s direct concern.
     Except for recently, with the fighting in Georgia, the Russian public regards the United States the Number One Enemy. Russians, from the man in the street to the ex-KGB operative who manipulates the president of Russia like a marionette—they all long for the days when Russia said “boo” and the United States and the West at large trembled.

     They long for the days when... in what they call the “near abroad” the leaders of nations on the Soviet periphery phoned Moscow to check before making a rest room visit. They don’t miss the respect the mighty Soviet Union generated; they miss the fear the USSR inspired. Bullying is a part of Russian life, families, neighborhoods, schools, even the armed forces, are riddled with bullies.
      Putin believes in the power of the bully. Disgusted after the terrorist attack on a grade school and subsequent massacre, Putin noted darkly that in this world, “The weak are to be beaten.”
      Georgia was made an example of because it was weak. Weakness inspires contempt in Russia. More than the so-called provocations in South Ossetia (really stirred up by the Russians themselves), more than “Pan-Slavic solidarity” with the Russian speakers in Georgia, Georgia’s major crime was to be weak. The Russian instinct, presented with the face of a homeless, weeping civilian, is to smash that contemptible face in with the heel of a jackboot, as Orwell said, forever and ever.

      Having beaten Georgia on the battlefield, Russia now wishes to humiliate her. Again and again. Today the Kremlin announced, “Georgian territorial integrity is a dead issue.”
     There are too many helpless people left uncrushed. Russia reserves the right to cross the border any time to smash them.
    We are flying in humanitarian supplies and, I hope weapons to rearm Georgian soldiers and militia. We are going to have to stand beside our friends when their noses are bloodied because they are our friends, and especially because they are weak. In this world, we Americans believe, the strong help the weak, whatever the risk.
     Russia is richer than ever in its history thanks to energy revenues. It has all the land it can use and all the raw materials. They simply aspire to smash a few faces from time to time as their God-given right and to scare the rest of the world.

     Which leads me to a question. Of the two, who is best suited to deal with Fascist Russia? Barack Obama, or John McClain? This is turning out to be much more important a presidential election than we had dreamed just 14 days ago.

There is a very good reason why, over the centuries, Russia has been symbolized by the bear. A bear can appear to be a big, clumsy furry thing, almost cute, until it gets angry. Then it takes your head off with one swipe of its razor-sharp claws and tears you apart and eats you.
     The Russian bear apparently is also a cunning creature.
     Vladimir Putin, the Prime Minister of Russia, does not like the independent nations on the border of Russia, especially when they resist the regional influence of Russia and especially if they align themselves with NATO and the West. The republic of Georgia is a prime example.
     Lately Georgia’s behavior has been intolerable to Putin and to the Kremlin clique that wants to firmly re-establish a Russian zone of influence around the borders of the country. Georgia’s application to join NATO –thus far refused—was the final straw.

     The Russians set an elaborate trap for the Georgians, using Georgia’s breakaway region of South Ossetia as bait. Most of the people in South Ossetia are ethnic Russians and have Russian passports. More to the point, they had Russian Army peacekeepers in South Ossetia keeping the Ossetians separte from the Georgians. South Ossetians have been trying to break away from Georgia since 1990. The region has its own government and constitution, but it has asked in the past to be incorporated into the Russian Federation.  
     It’s unclear who fired the first shots back on August 1, but soon the sides were exchanging shellfire and a terrible idea occurred to President Mikheil Saakashvili of Georgia: Why not put this South Ossetia problem behind us once and for all and invade the province while the rest of the world is focused on the Olympics?
     Saakashvili gambled that the Russians were bluffing in the past when they said they would react with force against any Georgian move into South Ossetia. Saakashvili may have counted on U.S. intervention if the Russian’s weren’t bluffing.
     Early Friday morning, Georgia attacked South Ossetia, quickly seizing Tskhinvali, the capital city of the 70,000-person region. There was a great deal of bombing and shellfire and Ossetian civilians and military were killed and injured…and perhaps, also some Russians.

     Putin had the provocation he was hoping for. On that very same Friday (August 8) the Russian 58^th Army began to pour tanks across the border into South Ossetia and Russian jets began to hit Georgian forces in Tskhinvali. The attacks soon widened to include the two military airbases outside the Georgia capital city of Tiblisi. The Georgian cities of Gori and Kareli and the port cities of Poti and Batumi were also struck.
     Today, Russian armor is said to have severed the country’s only east-west highway by taking the city of Gori. Meanwhile, other Russian forces have driven deep into the west of the country, apparently in support of the breakaway region of Abkhazia.
     The Georgians have reportedly lost 30 tanks in the fighting and 150 combat dead. There are no reliable statistics for Russia’s losses although Georgia claims at least 10 jets were shot down. Russia admits two have been lost.
     The Russians are making an example of Georgia.

     The whole idea of this trap, into which the Georgians fell, was to punish Georgia and to demonstrate to other neighboring countries how ruthlessly Russia is prepared to act when provoked. Putin will carve up Georgia like a Christmas goose and there will be very little the Georgians can do about it. The United States will not intervene.

      The war will end in the next few days with Georgia agreeing to a signed cease-fire and withdrawal from South Ossetia without preconditions. If the Russians want to carve an independent Republic of Abkhazia off the western end of Georgia, they’ll do it.
     What’s left of Georgia will still be independent, --President Saakashvili might even keep his job-- but “guided” by the brotherly Russians, who will then be in effective control of the only Caspian Sea-Black Sea oil pipeline to Europe not running through Russian territory. This will give Putin enhanced energy blackmail power over Western Europe.
    Of course, “guided” by the fraternal advice of Moscow, Georgia will drop its bid to join NATO. The American advisors will probably be sent home –to be replaced by Russians.

Like 1962 All Over Again? The Russians have denied that they plan to base their Tupolev 160 bombers in Cuba, in retaliation for our construction of anti missile defenses in Eastern Europe to counter a possible Iranian threat. Whew! Crisis averted….
     Do you remember the Cuban Missile Crisis of October 1962? CIA recon aircraft spotted the Soviets building launch bases for medium-range ballistic missile on Cuba. The news was leaked from Senator Kenneth Keating’s (R-New York) office and was shortly confirmed by the U.S. government.
     President Kennedy addressed the nation to underscore how serious a threat the missiles were and it began to look like the United States would have to use force –air strikes or perhaps a ground invasion—to neutralize those bases. JFK ordered a naval quarantine of Cuba. For a few tense days lit looked like the crisis would grow into a full-scale nuclear war between the United States and the USSR. College students came home to die with their families. People stocked up canned goods in the basements of their homes.
     Suddenly, behind the scenes, a deal was struck. Nikita Khrushchev, then the Chairman of the Soviet Communist Party, backed down. He ordered his missile and nuclear weapons back home, and we secretly withdrew our own medium range missiles from Turkey.

     It won’t happen again and here’s why: The United States and Russia have no conflicting interests to fight over.
     Until 1991, you’ll remember, it wasn’t Russia, it was the Soviet Union we faced as an adversary –an ideological adversary. The government in Moscow not only had the usual nationalistic motives driving policy, but it had motives of political ideology that dictated policy. The governing class had a positive duty (they believed) to advance the cause of communism and the eventual worldwide proletarian revolution –the patrimony given to them by Lenin.
     Therefore if some emerging country in West Africa declared itself the socials brothers of the Soviet Union, the Soviets would flood that nation with arms, advisors and economic aid. Our side might up the ante with aid to the democratically inclined people of the next country over, or our side would assist the freedom-loving anti-government rebels. In another region the opposite may be true, with the central government enjoying U.S. backing, while the rebels and socialist brothers in the neighboring country benefited from Soviet largesse. Vietnam springs to mind. Win or lose, back in the USSR Moscow housewives still had to stand in lines to buy bread and meat (when available). As for us, we always had guns and butter…
     The bottom line was that it was too expensive for the USSR to prop up regimes in Eastern Europe, Africa, Cuba and Asia with economic and military aid. When Ronald Reagan opened an arms race with the Soviets in the 1980’s, the Soviet economy collapsed. The Soviets pulled out of all their international adventures and even out of some of the USSR’s federated republics like Kazakhstan, Georgia, Belarus and Ukraine.
      Communism fell around the world. The government in Moscow now thought of itself as Russian, not communist.
      And as Russians, what strategic interests do they have that conflict with the United States? Our systems do not prevent either country from competing in any regional marketplace; there are no barriers to trade. We are not competing for the hearts and minds of the Vietnamese, the Angolans or the El Salvidorans, which saves Russia and the United States a lot of money in military aid. For the great powers of the world, the issues in the Third World are poverty, food and public health, especially AIDS prevention and treatment –not whether the economy is centrally planned or free market.
     As for the traditional reasons for aggression, what do the Russians have that we would go to war to obtain? Before you say “oil,” please remember that it would be much, much less expensive to buy Russian energy than to fight for it.
     In other words, any dispute between Russia and the United States has to be contrived, because there is no natural or logical point of conflict between the two countries.
     So why are the Russians so upset about missile defense in Poland?
     It is part of the Russian national character to be paranoid about the intentions of its neighbors. When you consider the Crimean War, the invasion by Germany in World War I and the devastatingly close call the Russians had with Nazi Germany in World War II, you can better appreciate Russia’s paranoia.
     It is also important to remember that the Russians have not been exactly giddy with joy over losing their status as a superpower. The Russians feel humiliated, even at this late date, and blame the Americans, who were the “main enemy” since the days of Lenin. Telling the people that the United States is the author of all their problems is just good old-fashioned domestic politics in Russia.
     Thus, even a solely defensive system is seen as “aimed” at Russia. Our job is to convince them that it is not a threat, by any and all diplomatic means. We don’t want the Russian government actually believing its own propaganda
    There may be other friction points in the future, but none of them will amount to a logical reason for Russians to shoot at Americans.