East-West love affairs often hide western expansionist intentions

It was over 200 years ago that a French Emperor led his Grand Army across the Neman, a river now located in Belarus, its significance was as epoch-defining as Caesar crossing the Rubicon. The young Russian Tzar Alexander I was attending social engagements in Saint Petersburg at the time the French emperor led his army eastward. Tzar Alexander I was attending a celebration where young Russian aristocrats were dancing wearing the latest French fashions to the strains of the latest European music written by German and Italian composers. Russia admired all things European. 

Napoleon I and Alexander I, a short-lived romance

Confident that Napoleon I would not invade his country over a simple matter of trade and that the Treaty of Tilsit he signed with the French Emperor on a raft on the very same Neman river would hold, Tzar Alexander I wasn't worried, but he should have been.

Often conflicting interests are what turn friendly countries into adversaries. Napoleon wanted to enforce a strict blockade of the British Isles via his treaty with Russia, but Russia kept trading with British merchants via proxies. Napoleon's response to what he saw as Russia's breach of the treaty was to invade the whole country.

This was the first of many spats between East and West, and in all Russia was caught off guard, betrayed and often underestimated by the haughty West. Whether it was Napoleon or Adolf Hitler, in both cases, major treaty breaches by the West was followed by an all out invasion. Russia never had ambition to occupy Paris in 1807, nor did the Soviet Union have any ambition to invade Berlin in 1939. In both cases, Russia wanted peace and to be kept out of Europe's problems. 

But Russia has learned from those bitter lessons to never let its guard down and never trust the West not to invade and march Eastward. Today, NATO is another Western threat on Russia's Western border that poses a serious threat to its security. If a limited military operation in Ukraine is needed to demonstrate Russia's seriousness and determination to the West, so be it. 

One is always sorry for the lives lost on both sides, but it is NATO and its member countries that are at fault here, they ignored Russia's legitimate security concerns and goaded the Russian President at their own peril. One only hopes the war ends soon with the least casualties. As for Western sanctions, shit happens!


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Adultery and the western media's attitude towards Dubai

Here we go again... another British woman charged with adultery in Dubai and the whole of the British and UAE press jump all over it as if its the scoop of the season. I wonder what readers think and in particular British readers? Do they feel ashamed that a compatriot is behind bars because she could not control her animal urges? Well they should be, because this is far from a crime she committed against her husband, with whom she exchanged marital vows, it is a crime against the laws of the UAE. It shows a total lack of regard and respect for the traditions of this conservative Muslim country and it is a slap in the face of every Emirati. Why does the press seem compelled to give such people extensive coverage? One hopes to enlighten the British public as to the pitfalls of sleeping around and its legal repercussions, but in truth its all about money, headlines and a public hungry to devour such shameful scandal. The press are complicit with the mob in elevating such individuals, who
Read more

Orosdi-Back: A lost Beyrouth department store from an elegant age

Image
My mother told me it was located on ‘ Banks Street ’ in Down Town Beirut , the road that leads up to Riad el Solh Square . On most maps the street is also named after Riad el Solh. The store was located opposite Bank Intra, or so I was told. Presumably the location of the store was indicative of the high end goodies on sale inside. The closest comparison to Orosdi Back is the old Allied’s department store in Dubai , for those who remember Dubai in the 1980s. But Orosdi Back was a store from a different age, an age of elegance as opposed to the vulgar modern excesses of the nouveau-riche, something Beirut ’s Down Town is synonymous with! A wonderful blog dubbed ‘language hat’ published some information about the founders of this chain of department stores. According to the blog the chain of stores came about as a result of a partnership between Adolf Orosdi, a Hungarian army officer and his sons who opened a clothing store in Galata in 1855, and the Back family, who were Austro-H
Read more

Lebanon searching for deliverance from the wolves of war, chaos and collapse

Image
There is little to do in Lebanon, little paid work to be done, and what work there is, is pointless and poorly paid. Here we live in the hope that we shall eventually be delivered from the monsters, the wolves of our Lebanese government, Cabinet and Parliament and all the power-brokers that manipulate our lives. I once asked a political science professor “why do politicians always wear suits and ties?” He answered jokingly: “so you don’t see their snake’s skin”, I guess if they wore hats it would be so we don’t see their devil’s horns, or is that meant only for men of the cloth…?   Regardless of which political side you ask about our country’s future, the answer would likely be the same, that things are looking bleak and the blame is always laid at the door of the “other side”, because your interlocutor will never make the mistake of accepting that his/her side shares any of the blame for catastrophe. Lebanese society remains highly polarized politically and ideologically. Archaic reli
Read more