I was once moaning about an old man who visited my workshop as being particularly stupid in a self-inflicted kind of way, and my assistant at the time said, "Oh, don't be too hard on him. You'll be like that one day".
"Not unless suffer a catastrophic brain injury!", was my carefully considered response.
Talking about bad news is not very good for one's comment rates, but whenever I talk about things like the Ukraine it is because I have no way of explaining it. I need to compare the way I see it with how others see it, but the only thing we could usefully do to understand how something like this could come about would be to climb into Putin's head for a while, and who would want to do that even if they could?
Reality is staring us in the face and all we can do is stare blankly back. Some people become obsessed with the Nazis of WW2 - collecting memorabilia etc. - as a way of trying to understand it. When I was a kid I always wanted to play the bad Nazi in war games. Not because I had tendencies in that direction, but because I was trying to understand what turned people into monsters, and by climbing into their shoes I thought I could figure it out. It doesn't work like that, of course, but people still try. It's a dangerous game.
I once heard a very sound piece of advice which also doubles-up as a warning: If you pretend to be something for long enough, you become it in reality.
I have spent most of my life pretending to be a well-balanced, kind and caring human being. I'm not quite there yet, but it takes time.
There are some quite simple reasons for what is happening in Ukraine and I was thinking of listing them on my blog but then changed my mind because I don't think people are open to the simple reasons that I might see. I have spent my life being well-balanced, kind and caring but it hasn't always been recognised.
ReplyDeleteI am not talking about strategy and geo-politics, I am talking about something even more personal than psychology. The mind of one person, but not yours in this case. As the old saying goes, no good deed goes unpunished.
DeleteI just said the first thing that came into my head. I understood the post.
DeleteIf you understood the post, why did you say the first thing that came into your head?
DeleteBecause I am stupid and left you a comment because I thought we were friends. I do know of simple reasons why Putin is doing what he is doing but I don't think anybody else would want to know my views. I was not thinking about strategy or geo-politics whatever they are. . It would have been better if I had not commented at all with hindsight.
DeleteWell then why don’t you tell me what you think the simple reasons are? If we are friends what reason is there to allude to them but not actually say? I really don’t understand.
DeleteI know you are not stupid. You are one of the well informed people around here. If I treated you as anything else than that, it would be an insult wouldn’t it?
DeleteOk, now you've said that, and I am not feeling so lazy as yesterday, I will tell you one simple reason, very briefly. Putin's hero is Peter the Great who made the great Russian Empire to match France, Britain, Germany (Prussia at the time) and Austria in military and economic terms. He defeated Charles X11 in the Battle of Poltava (200 miles east of Kiev) (1709) he who was one of the great powers of the time. Ukraine was then a crucial victory in the rise of Russia as a European power and still is.
DeleteThat’s interesting.
DeleteYou may wish to read Niall Ferguson’s piece of 26 Feb in the Spectator.
Delete“ What was Peter’s cause? In essence, to make Russia a European great power, capable of matching the likes of Austria, Britain, Prussia and France in both military might and the economic and bureaucratic foundations on which it is based. No historian would dispute that he achieved that. At the Battle of Poltava (8 July 1709), Tsar Peter won the most important victory of his reign, defeating the army of Charles XII of Sweden, which had been one of the great powers during the 17th century. Poltava lies about 200 miles east of Kiev, not far from Luhansk and Donetsk.
This is the history that inspires today’s Tsar Vladimir, much more than the dark chapters of Stalin’s reign of terror, which will forever be associated in Ukrainian minds with the Holodomor, the genocidal manmade famine inflicted on Ukraine in the name of agricultural collectivisation. It is a history that reminds us how crucial victory in the territory that is now Ukraine was for the rise of Russia as a European great power. It also reminds us that this territory was as contested in the early 18th century as it is today.”
Rachel: if you are going to plagiarise,
Deletehave the good grace to acknowledge your source.
So difficult. In a household of young people who have never experienced such things as shortages or war, what to say? Listening whilst I drunk my coffee this morning to Women's Hour, and the tearful Ukrainian woman with her 6 year old reduces you to tears on an individual scale, the man driving to the border with his three children to escape. What the hell is war all about except disruption. And at the moment in the hands of another mad man. So yes Rachel we will listen but sadly all the words at the moment are sinking into fear for those poor people. Also, yes I know it is part of Europe but why are we not so sad for all those other refugees caught up in wars all over the world?
ReplyDeleteIn this post I have been trying to understand what makes people like Putin tick. We all know the consequences of his actions.
DeleteUkraine is rich in resources of every kind.
ReplyDeleteSometimes awful things start with something so simple
Putin does not care about the resources right now, other than his ability to turn off the gas tap. He has a £600 billion war chest, and that will keep his ambition going for as long as it takes to overwhelm Ukraine. It is definitely not as simple as the quest for resources.
DeleteVP wants world power. If he succeeds in U, what will be next? Also, China watches.
ReplyDeleteYes, of course, but WHY does he want unlimited power? It is because of a small thing which has grown out of proportion during the last 20 - 60 years, and all the psychologists in MI6, CIA and Mossad are doing everything they can to get the upper edge on the knowledge. This is the point of this post. We all know the rest.
DeleteEurope has not been so weak since 1940. The USA - together with the UK - has weakened its moral influence by the way the retreat from Afghanistan was conducted. London has been laundering Russian money for about 30 years. We have been turning a blind eye for the sake of short term money for a few decades, making a few people very rich indeed. Shit stinks.
ReplyDeleteBut this has nothing to do with one man’s mind, only the opportunities made available to him.
DeleteMy blog feed is a bit fucked up right now, and all I can get is Cup on the Bus. As much as I like Joanne, I need a wider choice, so if you don't here from me for a while this is the reason.
ReplyDeleteA good post Tom. Apart from myriad other reasons for the invasion, I think it basically boils dow to Russia not wanting Ukraine to be part of Nato, and America installing nuclear weapons right on the doorstep of central Russiah
ReplyDeletePeople have been comparing it to the Cuban Missile crisis.
DeleteSomeone needs to assinate the bastard. I have heard that most Russians abhor him. I think he is afraid that, once he steps down from being president, "they" will get him. I hope he can pay for good body guards around the clock.
ReplyDeleteEven his ministers have to keep 20 feet away from him.
DeleteI was looking on astrotheme.com about Putin's astrological chart and found this about it: With a prominent 10th house, your destiny's achievement may be very notable: the 10th house represents your career, your public life, and your ambitions. A good deal of your energy may thus be used to successfully implement what you have in mind. Instinctively, you are very keen to make your dreams come true. Sooner or later, you will deal with the public, and your personal achievement will go through trials and ordeals: other people and visible actions.
ReplyDelete