Quote Originally Posted by Van
A bit flippant and over-simplified, but the Russians have been on the receiving end of a lot of invaders for 2,000 years.
That is not over-simplified but simply wrong - it is astonishing where this myth comes from in the first place.

For Christ's sake, take out a map. Russia, that is this huge thing covering a good part of Eurasia - and it is still, after all what the evil West did to it, the largest country in the world. It reaches from the Finnish border (in Tsarist times it included Finland) to the Pacific and encompasses countless people of non Russian ethnicity. And just to mention it, it wasn't always like that. Actually the Russians started out in a region somewhere between what is today Kiev and Moscow, the rest was "acquired" later. Amazing what you can achieve when you are only "defending" yourself against evil invaders, isn't it?

Actually, the truth is simply that Russia has been consistently, for hundreds of years, been one of the most expansionist, imperialist and most militarist nations in the world. And while the stories about it being invaded are a perfect justification (and a tune that Soviet propaganda harped constantly), it has been far more often in the role of the invader itself - that is the solution to the mystery of how it ended up as large as it is. Russia is and was for centuries an empire in the truest sense of the word, and Russians took and take pride in the size of this empire and the number of peoples they dominate.

I cannot help but to wonder where this odd sympathy with Russia, that one encounters so often in America, comes from - here in Germany it is just the same. Speaking of Germany and just out of interest...was there ever any similiar sympathy for this country in America? I can't remember that there was overly much worry about how the Germans being humiliated after, let's say WWI (Germany lost all its colonies and a sixth of its territory after that one, not to speak of the right to maintain an army with which it could defend itself - how the Russians would scream if anyone would do that to them). And there was certainly not the slightest bit of compassion for Germany after WWII, no thought was wasted in America that the German people has a right to have some power or only a basic national souvereignity. After WWII, Germany lost another quarter of its territory, around 15 million Germans were ethnically cleansed from Eastern Europe, with somewhere between 1 and 2 million of them being killed (while America, the alleged eternal defender of the oppressed and the only nation with nuclear bombs at the time, stood idly by), the rest was divided up between the victors and even those parts were not allowed full souvereignity until reunification in the early nineties. And yet no one was worried that the Germans could feel offended. Why is that?

Ah yes. It was because of Hitler and the Nazis, right? Well, was Stalin and the Soviets really so much better? Otherwise Americans should actually feel more sympathetic to Germany than to Russia, or so one should assume. Germany is a West European country, after all, and more Americans are from German heritage than from any other single nation. But, out of some reason, a Germany being crushed and humiliated to the bone causes less compassion than when Russia has to accept that it isn't a superpower equal to the USA.

Now the Russians have to live with only the bit of land that has been left to them after the collapse of the Sovietunion (which is only more than any other country in the world has, oh my). No, it is perfectly understandable that they are angry. Come to think of it, the whole thing in Georgia is actually the West's fault. The Russian Army had every right to invade the country to protect the minorities of South Ossetia and Abchasia, then to advance further into Georgian territory, occupy the vital S-1 road, plunder a bit, and then, with Moscow's recognition of the two provinces as souvereign states, make it clear that they do not intend to leave. All perfectly understandable.

Is it actually known that, when Germany embarked on a similar course of action in 1939, this caused the Second World War? (Naturally there were differences, two of them being that the minorities in question back then were ethnical Germans, while South Ossetians and Abchasians are not ethnical Russians, another being that back then Russia aka the Sovietunion supported the German invasion after having made a deal that it would get the eastern half of invaded Poland). Sure, there is this obvious parallel of what the West did with Kosovo and one can say that the Russians are just in the role of NATO in Georgia. But then there is also a certain parallel between this crisis and the situation in Chechenia - and here the Russians are in the role of the Georgians and Putin has far more ruthlessly beaten the wishes for independence out of the Chechens, than Sakashvili ever did with regards to the South Ossetians.


That all is not to say that the West could not have done some things better with reagrds to Russia after the break-up of the Sovietunion. Especially America did behave very arrogantly with all the talk about "we won the Cold War". Also, the whole Kosovo matter was gravely mishandled and a far-reaching autonomy of that province would have been a fairer solution with regards to the Serbians (and the Russians in so far they have to do something with it) than a complete independence. The Iraq invasion was an act of hubris and the missile shield program in Eastern Europe a completely senseless provocation.

However, that all does not mean that Moscows behaviour with regards to Georgia was "okay", understandable or justified. It was not, it went way, way too far. And it also does not mean that the West "lost" an essentially well-meaning Russia, a country ready and open for democracy. It did not.
I do not want to imply that Russia is an eternal "Empire of Evil". But fact is simply that Russia has its continous history of imperialism, expansionism and militarism. It is also a country that has virtually no democratic tradition whatsoever. To honestly believe that this state would simply become a friend after the implosion of the Sovietunion was simply naive. Russia was nice and peaceful in the nineties for mostly one reason: it was weak. The more it recovers, the more assertive it will become. Western humiliations may have enhanced this behaviour a bit, but they have not caused it.

How to cope with Russia in the future? It is nice and certainly politically correct to be "open for dialogue". It is also prudent to avoid needless provocations (which is always good advice). But above all things, Russia has to be shown determination and resolution. And as tough as it may be, it must be clear to everyone in Moscow, but also in Europe and the US, that Russia stepping over a certain, well-marked line (running for example between the Baltic states and Russia) has to mean war - Total War if necessary.

Medvedev said recently that Russia did not want a new Cold War, but that it would not fear it, either. This is exactly the attitude, which Europe and the US should have. After all, we know how the first one ended.