Next?

“I will work with anyone and everyone…to stop sending money to Ukraine…”

Tweet from Congressman Matt Gaetz (R-FL), January 30th.

“Zelenskyy is not a hero. He’s an antihero. He’s a destroyer.” 

Fox News’ Tucker Carlson tweet, February 24th. 

As the MAGA radical right continues to admire Vladimir Putin and call for the cessation of American military aid to Ukraine, Russia has been less than subtle about their political aspirations to annex more sovereign states and push borders well into NATO countries. Russia is infamous for “false flag” operations, disinformation and brutal censorship within their own mass and social media. Unfortunately, Putin still has the hearts and minds of a majority of Russians in his effort to “de-Nazify” Ukraine and oppose the US-led coalition (read: NATO) in their “hybrid/proxy war” to unseat him and tame powerful Russia seeking to restore its rightful place in the world.

In late February, Putin announced the suspension of Moscow’s participation in the last nuclear weapons agreement with us, the Treaty between the United States of America and the Russian Federation on Measures for the Further Reduction and Limitation of Strategic Offensive Arms (START). He then hinted that the use of tactical nukes (smaller, targeted warheads), hypersonic missiles (a recent Russian test of this “too fast to shoot down” weapon failed) and other upgraded and enhanced weapon systems could soon be deployed against Ukraine. But even China and India, still doing business with Moscow, have told Putin that Russia would be extremely isolated if he did in fact deploy nuclear weapons at any level. That Putin has no intention of stopping his aggression to annex additional territories is hardly a secret, however.

Last year, a month before Russia invaded Ukraine, British Member of Parliament and chair of its Commons Defence Committee, Tobias Ellwood, had a stark warning for his fellow parliamentarians. Following a series of meetings in Geneva, Vienna and Brussels between senior government officials from Western powers and Russia, simply, Ellwood noted that Russia claimed territorial rights, based on a scattering of Russian speakers, over the former Soviet Baltic Republics – Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia, now staunch members of NATO and supporters of Ukraine’s defense. Indeed, the detached-from-Mother-Russia Baltic Kaliningrad Oblast, is completely surrounded by NATO countries (the above three Baltic states and Poland). Interesting. Add that to the list of Putin’s announced target annexations.

After Ukraine, the most obvious “next” is that small nation – Moldova – wedged between eastern Ukraine and NATO member state, Romania. Unfortunately, Romania’s location makes it an area poorly linked to the rest of Europe and one from which it and other European member states can easily be attacked by Russia. As is typical, Russia has already begun justifying its potential move to take over Moldova with its standard false flag and disinformation strategy: 

“Russia's defence ministry alleged, with no evidence, that Ukrainian saboteurs dressed as Russian troops would attack from Transnistria, to provide a pretext for a Ukrainian invasion… Moldova has warned for weeks that Russia is plotting to seize power… And officials rejected Russia's claims as ‘psy-ops’ as part of the war… ‘The [Moldovan] defence ministry believes it is an element of a psychological operation rather than a real plan," said state [Moldovan] secretary Valeriu Mija… Leading [local] MP Doina Gherman told Moldovan media that the Russian allegations were ‘aggressive disinformation"’. There was no imminent threat, and she urged the public to trust the government.” BBC.com, February 24th. However, from a military perspective, Moldova is all but defenseless. But wait, there’s so much more.

A half-dozen European mainstream media sources, summarized by the February 21st Yahoo!News.com, reported on a leaked Putin administration internal memo (entitled in English: "Strategic Goals of the Russian Federation on the Belarusian Direction") that suggests Moscow will slowly change the internal structure of its Ukraine-war ally, Belarus. Relying heavily on cooperation from Belarus’ unpopular autocrat, Alexander Lukashenko, Russia intends to implement a de facto takeover around 2030 by slowly transitioning Belarus to blend seamlessly with Russia. Working with Lukashenko, Moscow intends “to establish the dominance of the Russian language over the Belarusian language, to adjust the Belarusian legislation to the Russian one, to subjugate the socio-political, trade, scientific and cultural life of Belarus, increase military presence on the territory of Belarus and to grant Russian citizenship to Belarusians.”

But Russian aspirations also extend into at least one former Warsaw Bloc country, Poland, that was never a part of the Soviet Union. Reporting on a message to Russian social media from Russia’s former President and current deputy chairman of Russia’s Security Council, Dmitry Medvedev, Yahoo!News.com, February 21st summarizes his statement as “the only way for Moscow to ensure a lasting peace with Ukraine was to push back the borders of hostile states as far as possible, even if that meant the frontiers of NATO member Poland.” Ah, Putin.

Funny how notwithstanding all these unsubtle revelations about Putin’s unabashed ambitions, given the austere precedents of the consequences of appeasement – thank you Neville Chamberlain for your introduction to Adolph Hitler – that conservative Congresspeople forget why the United States actually fought WWII. I will close this blog with a list of GOP House representatives who have co-sponsored a bill to halt US aid to Ukraine: Andy Biggs of Arizona, Lauren Boebert of Colorado, Paul Gosar of Arizona, Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia, Anna Paulina Luna of Florida, Thomas Massie of Kentucky, Mary Miller of Illinois, Barry Moore of Alabama, Ralph Norman of South Carolina and Matt Rosendale of Montana. Are they among the growing horde of MAGA legislators who have not studied history and are trying to repeat its mistakes?

I’m Peter Dekom, and that these GOP politicians dare to call themselves “patriots” is deeply offensive to me; our soldiers did not die in vain fighting to protect democracy from autocrats.