SIGNS OF THE TIMES

(Women Are Mad)

The fate of the Equal Right Amendment is symptomatic of the American women’s struggle to get an equal political footing with men in the U.S.

The campaign to get an amendment to the Constitution, the ERA, to recognize women’s rights as equal to men’s started in 1921. American men no doubt loved their grandmothers, mothers, sisters, wives, and daughters. What would be wrong to acknowledge that their rights were the same as theirs? Something must have been wrong because it took 51 years for Congress, which was made up of mostly men, to pass a resolution to approve it. Everyone, at least everyone who favored equal rights for men and women, breathed a sigh of relief: men finally came to their sense. But not for long.

Congress set the deadline for at least three fourths or 38 of the States, to ratify the amendment by 1979. Even though it was supported by the House, the Senate, and three presidents of both parties, the Amendment was ratified by only 35 States by 1977.

Something strange was happening: conservative women did not want it; they did not want to be equal to men. Led by Phyllis Schlafly, a conservative activist who proudly and publicly thanked her husband for PERMITTING her to come to a political gathering, they launched a strong campaign opposing the ERA. Their opposition led to five States revoking their ratification even though many legal experts questioned the States’ power to revoke a constitutional amendment. It has been believed that Schlafly’s strongest argument against the IRA was the draft issue. She successfully convinced women to oppose the ERA for fear of getting drafted into the military, which was of great concern to a lot of women.

As of now, the ERA has not become what would have been the 28^th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. Men are still in charge and Republican women have dutifully supported, obeyed their men, and enthusiastically sung Tammy Wynette’s chorus “stand by your man”.

But here is the contemporary American political paradox. Since 2016, the Republican men have been on top with sweeping power. And with sweeping power, they have dug a hole, a deep political hole: the imminent loss of women’s support.

The Republican men have not just supported a man uninhibited by moral constraints but behaved as if he is their ideal model of manhood: sleeping with other women while being married to another; lying with a straight face to serve his own interest without regard for the truth but demanding women to be faithful, loyal and truthful; making demands without anything meritorious to show for them except “I want it”; publicly using vulgar and abusive language to talk about women. Women have seen the cowardice of their men who don’t know what is right or wrong anymore but only what is beneficial for them.

Then came the Supreme Court’s decision of Dobbs v. Jackson overturning Roe v. Wade.

It turned out two judges, Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh lied without qualm to a U.S. senator from Maine, Susan Collins, so that they could get to be U.S. Supreme Court justices. They told her that they would respect Roe v. Wade precedent, no doubt a precedent highly valued by Senator Collins (or she would not have asked them about it) as it recognized the right of a woman to control her body.

Watching the drama, Republican women would no doubt ask themselves, they have no respect for such accomplished and powerful woman as Susan Collins, how do we expect them to have any respect for us? Are we naïve to the point of trusting that Republican men would not lie to us, our mother, sisters, friends?

They are mad.

Men value their rights, the right to have guns or to play golf on Sunday etc. above all else, and no one can take it from them. But here is the right attached to the women’s own body, their happiness, and their freedom, and the men take upon themselves to debate and decide whether women should have it or not.

Men have sex, unprotected sex, with women all over town without a slightest thought about anything else but their orgasm. But if a woman gets pregnant, men reserve for themselves the right to judge if the woman has or has not the right to carry or not carry their seed.

Republican women got frustrated and felt impotent.

The January 6 saga heightens women’s awareness of the character of Republican men, which has been going downhill. They lie outright or dodge the truth, simple and obvious truth, no longer being ramrod straight standing up against any falsehood or bad behavior, no longer a reliable, good example for their children. So arrogant and macho in public, at the same time stealthily seeking a presidential pardon? What is going on?

Republican women’s concern grows.

Watching Fox News and the women in the Trump administration and around Trump, they worry about another aspect of the current political and social climate. They not only feel shame when their sisters were forced, or worse willing, to lie in public to comply with their men’s demand, but their sisters may have suffered the Stockholm syndrome, blindly obeying their controllers.

They decide to speak up and the House’s January 6 Hearings present an excellent opportunity. They look honest, trustworthy at the witness table. Their testimonies are totally believable. They only state the truth.

But they are savagely attacked by THEIR Republican men, at one time or another their bosses and colleagues, men they loved and obeyed.

They remember another fight, a fight between a Republican woman who ran one of the best and biggest companies on earth and a man who has run everything to the ground including the presidency. The man broke the taboo and ridiculed the woman’s face. And Republican men laughed, applauded, pumped fists and were outright drunk with exhilaration.

A trial balloon has been floating out there in Washington that women should not have been allowed to vote. (The balloon definitely comes out of a sharp Republican brain, not from the lower part of their body that might probably demand secession, that sees the danger of a woman vote when, just like now, women are mad at them).

Is there a choreographed undertaking to abolish the 19^th Amendment? Do Republican men see the women’s vote a potential threat to their dominance in the future and plot to pre-empt the threat while they have a majority of six votes on SCOTUS (Supreme Court of the United States)? Should women trust Justice Amy Barrett to be their ally, or would she just be a Phyllis Schlafly reincarnate, a possible trojan horse sabotaging the women’s causes once again?

There is no doubt that the January 6 Hearings are not the only occasions for the Republican women to speak out. They will speak out again in a more organized fashion. They will be joined by other women to become an effective, and probably decisive voice.

The sign of the times: the era of women’s power and leadership has begun.

JOHN P. LE PHONG, ESQ.

Roe v. Wade is such an important Supreme Court decision that even if it were reversed, it should be a good reading for anyone who is concerned about abortion because the issue is and will be with us for a long time. The case contains an excellent summary of the law throughout civilized societies, and the arguments of both sides of the issue.

Regardless of how the current Supreme Court will decide, completely reversing Roe v. Wade, reversing some parts of it, or in the unlikely scenario affirming it, abortion has given every thinking man and woman a headache and will continue to arouse strong emotion and heated arguments because in this environment of polarization, neither side is ready to compromise.

The Roe v. Wade decision is a tremendous effort to reach a sensible compromise of the two conflicting principles, a moral commandment and women’s rights.

 

For most women, it is unthinkable to abandon their children let alone aborting them. For most people, they would get sick to their stomach thinking that they had done something harmful to a child, any child. And it is not just loving life. We are created with a biological and psychological makeup that we feel mellow and soft in the presence of a child. And life is the emotional thrust of the anti-abortion movement. Their position is that abortion is immoral, equivalent to the termination of life, or more graphically the killing of a child. Their position is therefore straightforward, easy to understand and easy to identify with.

The argument of the abortion right advocates is less emotional but no less valid, because a prohibition of abortion is in fact the taking of a woman’s right, a fundamental right over her own body, and on close scrutiny, her liberty and happiness as well.

The copulation resulting in pregnancy needs two partners, a man and a woman. But pregnancy shines a light on the unfairness against the woman and the tremendous burden imposed on her from the time she is pregnant until, in many cases, the child reaches 18 years of age. She has to endure many hardships including physical discomfort and sicknesses, if her pregnancy and the fetus must be protected. Her male counterpart suffers no such hardship. The college boy just jauntily walks to his class and continues his education fully focused on achieving his dream. The male partner just goes to play golf after sex, nonchalantly whistling without a care in the world. She on the other hand, may have to quit school or her job and lose all hope of a bright future or promotion. The women deeply feel unfair. And they are mad. They are alone making the sacrifice and the people who decide that they make sacrifice are the ones sowing the seeds.

Anti-abortion means demanding that women abandon their rights to control their body and their life. But, if the women insist on such rights, argue the anti-abortionists, they infringe on the life of the fetus.

Faced with such fierce battle seemingly un-compromisable, the Supreme Court stepped in.

 

In Rose v. Wade, the Court did an amazing and thorough review of the history of laws prohibiting abortion, from antiquity to the early American law and found the following:

1. The Roman and Greek eras: their laws afforded little protection to the unborn.
2. Common Law: Common law scholars discussed in depth the question of when life began or the concept of “quickening” that is when the embryo first moves. Christian theology and the canon law, until the 19^th century, fixed it at 40 days for a male and 80 days for a female. Under common law, abortion performed before life begins- 16th to the 18th week of pregnancy – was not an indictable offense (not criminal) because the fetus was regarded as a part of the mother therefore its destruction was not homicide.
3. English Statutory Law: English statutes preserved the “quickening” threshold and introduced the exception that abortion of a quickening embryo was not a crime if it was necessary to preserve the life of the pregnant woman including a serious and permanent threat to the mother’s health. The Abortion Act of 1967 permits abortion, on the conditions that three physicians agree that:

(a) “the continuance of the pregnancy would involve risk to the life of the pregnant woman, or of injury to the physical or mental health of the pregnant woman or any existing children of her family, greater than if the pregnancy were terminated,” or

(b) “there is a substantial risk that if the child were born it would suffer from such physical or mental abnormalities as to be seriously handicapped.”

The Act also permits a physician, without the concurrence of others, to terminate a pregnancy where he is of the good-faith opinion that the abortion “is immediately necessary to save the life or to prevent grave permanent injury to the physical or mental health of the pregnant woman.”

4. American Law: Until mid-19th century American law followed the English common law. In the middle and late 19th century the quickening distinction disappeared from the statutory law of’ most States and the degree of the offense and the penalties were increased. By the end of the 1950’s, most States banned abortion with the exception, with different wordings in each State, to save or preserve the life of the mother.

The Court noted that at common law and up to the middle of the 19th century in this country, “abortion was viewed with less disfavor than under most American statutes currently in effect. Phrasing it another way, a woman enjoyed a substantially broader right to terminate a pregnancy than she does in most States today. At least with respect to the early stage of pregnancy, and very possibly without such a limitation, the opportunity to make this choice was present in this country well into the 19th century.”

That means “the restrictive criminal abortion laws in effect in a majority of States today are of relatively recent vintage. Those laws, generally proscribing abortion, or its attempt at any time during pregnancy except when necessary to preserve the pregnant woman’s life, are not of ancient or even of common-law origin.”

Why so?  – The answer was the influence of the Hippocratic Oath, the oath taken by medical doctors, and the Christian teachings.

5. The Hippocratic Oath. The Oath states that “I will not give to a woman a pessary to produce abortion.” It was written by one man, Hippocrates, and according to Dr. Ludwig Edelstein, the German foremost authority on the Oath, only one school of philosophers, the Pythagoreans stuck to the Oath and opposed abortion of a fetus from inception. Most Greek thinkers, Dr. Eldelstein said, commended abortion at least before viability, or “quickening” (when the pregnant woman feels the movement of the fetus).

Then, the emerging Christian (Catholic) teachings agreed with the Pythagorean doctrine, which made the Oath popular and “became the nucleus of all medical ethics” and “was applauded as the embodiment of truth.”

In Dr. Edelstein’s opinion, it was a “manifesto and not the expression of an absolute standard of medical conduct.”

6. The Position of the American Medical Association. The AMA Committee on Criminal Abortion indicated in its report to the Association that it “deplored” abortion calling it a “general demoralization”. That position had great influence on the enactment of stringent criminal abortion legislation in the late 19th Century.

And the causes of “this general demoralization”? The report found three:

a. The first was a wide-spread popular ignorance, according to the Committee, that the fetus was not alive until after the period of quickening.

b. Second, the (medical) profession was frequently careless of fetal life.

c. The third reason was “the grave defects of our laws, both common and statute, as regards the independent and actual existence of the child before birth, as a living being”

In 1871, the Association adopted a resolution, recommending legislation to outlaw abortion “without the concurrent opinion of at least one respectable consulting physician, and then always with a view to the safety of the child if that be possible…”. It called “the attention of the clergy of all denominations to the perverted views of morality entertained by a large class of females -aye, and men also, on this important question.”

But the Association took no other action until 1967, when it publicly opposed abortion with the exception of a threat to the health or life of the mother, or that the child “may be born with incapacitating physical deformity or mental deficiency,” or that a pregnancy “resulting from legally established statutory or forcible rape or incest may constitute a threat to the mental or physical health of patient…”

In 1970, a reference committee of the AMA noted the polarization of the medical profession, division of opinions among doctors as well as among AMA councils and committees, the changes in state laws and in judicial decisions that made abortion more freely available. The AMA’s House of Delegates then adopted resolutions emphasizing “the best interests of the patient,” “sound clinical judgment,” and “informed patient consent,” as opposed to “mere acquiescence to the patient’s demand.”

It further recommended that abortion be performed by a licensed physician in an accredited hospital only after consultation with two other physicians, and that no party to the procedure be required to violate personally held moral principles.

7. Then, the Court reviewed the position of the American Public Health Association and its five Standards for Abortion Services.
8. Finally, the Court discussed the position of the American Bar Association and its approval of the Uniform Abortion Act.

 

It was an exhausting examination of not just the history of the abortion laws in the Western civilization but also the emotional and religious aspects of the issue. In such polarized environment, especially in the U.S., like the two faces of a coin inseparably bound by fate but the two sides were unable to see eye to eye, the Court must let the nation know what it thought about the opposite arguments and how it would decide Roe v. Wade, a case by a pregnant woman against Texas claiming its criminal abortion laws were unconstitutional.

The anti-abortionists cited three reasons to justify prohibition of abortion:

a. To discourage illicit sexual conduct.

-The Court noted that this reason was not considered seriously by any other court and commentators.  Texas did not use this argument.

b. The medical procedure used in abortion was dangerous for the woman.

-Modern medical advances had changed the situation. But, the Court noted, the State had a legitimate interest in seeing to it that abortion would be safe for the woman especially when an abortion would be performed at a late stage of pregnancy.

c. The State’s interest or duty to protect prenatal life.

-It was argued that that a new human life was present from the moment of conception. So, the State was obligated to protect prenatal life. Only when the life of the pregnant mother herself is at stake, balanced against the life she carries within her, should the interest of the embryo or fetus not prevail.

The pro-abortion advocates strongly disputed this contention that anti-abortion laws were to protect prenatal life, because there was no legislative history to support it. They pointed out that most state laws were designed solely to protect the woman. Furthermore, they argued, the adoption of the “quickening” distinction “tacitly recognizes the greater health hazards inherent in late abortion and impliedly repudiates the theory that life begins at conception”.

 

In the midst of such fierce debate, Roe, the pregnant woman Plaintiff in this case, brought forth a remarkable argument in her lawsuit against Texas that its laws prohibiting abortion except when the mother’s health was at risk, were unconstitutional. In other words, she asserted that her right to abortion was protected by the Constitution.

The case landed in the Supreme Court, which agreed to take the case and must now decide if she was right. But the task of the Court was much more than answering with a simple yes or no. Because of the charged political climate and the high emotion involved in the issue of abortion, it was difficult for the Court to take side. And each side expected a total vindication.

As a matter of case laws, the Court recognized that a right of personal privacy encompassing the right of a woman to decide if she wanted an abortion, did exist under the Constitution, either in the Fourteenth Amendment or the Ninth Amendment. It was the law.

But here was the problem: The issue of abortion was such a heated issue that both sides were fierce, emotional, uncompromising, and willing to resort to violence.

The abortionists adamantly maintained that a woman’s right to decide whether or not to have an abortion could not be interfered by the State. The anti-abortionists represented by Texas were no less adamant in pulling the other way that the State had a compelling interest to protect the health of the mother and the prenatal life from and after conception, because, according to Texas, life began at conception and was present throughout pregnancy.

Each side wanted the whole enchilada.

The Court’s solution was to give a little to each side.

It rejected the abortionists’ argument, stating that the right of abortion decision was not unqualified and must be considered against important state interests in regulation.  “It is reasonable and appropriate for a State to decide that at some point in time another interest, that of health of the mother or that of potential human life, becomes significantly involved. The woman’s privacy is no longer sole and any right of privacy she possesses must be measured accordingly.”

The Court also rejected Texas’ position because regulation limiting “fundamental rights” (including right to abortion decision) might be justified only by a “compelling state interest,” and that legislative enactments must be narrowly drawn to express only the legitimate state interests at stake.

That ruling of “narrowly drawn” centered on the most sensitive and crucial issue of when the State’s interest became “compelling”, that is when a fetus became viable or a “person”.

After noting that the Constitution did not define a fetus as a “person”, the Court went through several theories on “viability” that varied widely from Aristotle’s theory of “mediate animation” (a male fetus obtained a soul – ensoulment – after 40 days, a female after 90 days) to the position of the Catholic Church, which is now its official position, that life began at conception, the Court made two determinations:

a. Viability was when a fetus could survive on its own outside a woman’s body after 28 weeks, or earlier 24 weeks with the help of medical technology.

b. The “compelling point” (based on “the now established medical facts”) was the end of the first trimester.

And the Court ruled as follows:

a. After the compelling point, “a State may regulate the abortion procedure to the extent that the regulation reasonably relates to the preservation and protection of maternal health”.

b. Before this “compelling” point, “the attending physician, in consultation with his patient, is free to determine, without regulation by the State, that, in his medical judgment, the patient’s pregnancy should be terminated. If that decision is reached, the judgment may be effectuated by an abortion free of interference by the State.”

c. “With respect to the State’s important and legitimate interest in potential life (life of a fetus), the ‘compelling’ point is at viability.” “If the State is interested in protecting fetal life after viability, it may go so far as to proscribe abortion during that period, except when it is necessary to preserve the life or health of the mother.”

One could not help empathizing with the Court’s incredibly difficult situation and reluctance to come down on one side or the other. The case was not purely legal but heavily involved or dominated, by emotion and political pressure. One side wanted to protect life, the other, especially women, fought hard for their right of privacy, the right to absolute control of their body. It was a tug of war, a deeply emotional war.

For an issue such as the women’s right to vote, it would be easy for the Court to come out and announce the winner or Congress to vote yes (it did vote yes to pass the 19th Amendment).  But Roe v. Wade was not that simple. So, the Court’s decision was obviously a compromise, a sensible political compromise.

Because both sides were equally unyielding in their conviction and fierce in their tactic, no compromise would be possible, and the fight was bound to move back and forth. The abortionists seemed to have won with Roe v. Wade. Sooner or later, the issue would come to the fore again. This time, in the year 2022, the anti-abortionists may have their winning chance with Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization.

AMERICA VERSUS RUSSIA

(And Other Bullies)

On May 3, 2022, the New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman took issue with U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin for saying in public that “We want to see Russia weakened to the degree that it can’t do the kinds of things that it has done in invading Ukraine”. Mr. Friedman complains that that was talking too much. He also cautions the U.S. to be careful in allying with “a country you could not find on a map with 10 tries a year ago”.

Few people would disagree with Mr. Friedman that talking too much is not good. Speech is silver, silence is gold. So, talking less falls somewhere in between silver and gold, or even moves closer to gold if the talking is not done publicly.

But, in the case of Russia invading Ukraine, I dare venture a different opinion.

Russia’s attacking Ukraine was unthinkable to the world because there was no justification. It should now realize that it is bullying on a large scale pure and simple, and worse blackmail, when Mr. Putin introduced the element of nuclear weapons into his threat.

For a country 600,000 square miles BIGGER than Europe, 28 times the size of Ukraine to talk about gaining more land to preserve its security is pervert and fake, hiding in plain sight its prehistoric insatiable desire of gobbling more land. That desire was hidden after the unraveling of the Soviet Union, but not controlled or abated, until oil and gas money started pouring into its treasury. For a time, the world thought of Mr. Vladimir Putin as someone reasonable and enlightened. He turned out to have come from the same Russian cookie cutter having tried to talk the civilized language without being transformed, or he probably succumbed to the Russian collective greediness.

Self-conscious with the false pretext of national security, Russia stopped talking about it and invented a new and strange excuse: denazification. The president of Russia declared that the goal of invading Ukraine was “to protect the people that are subjected to abuse, genocide from the Kiev regime” and to “demilitarize and denazify Ukraine.” Then, it started accusing the U.S. of working with Ukrainian laboratories to develop biological weapons. Such lame excuses show clearly Russia’s true desire and intention: when it sees weakness, the bully pounces, right or wrong, and the world, be damned.

The U.S. must consider its own interest in acting in the international theater.  It is true as Mr. Friedman points out, that the U.S., in backing small countries, should not raise their expectations too high lest they get intoxicated. But even if they should not tie their fate to small countries, it is imperative that big powerful countries must strive toward the goal of standing on the side of small countries and defend them against big bullies. Fighting bullies of the world to let smaller people live their full life without being bullied or suffering should always be the same mission as fighting for Democracy.

It is always good advice that you don’t lose your strength while helping others. But if a bully is historically incorrigible, it must be weakened, and the club must be taken off its hand. It is not just a small country being attacked and the U.S. should not take a public stand. The Domino Theory is applicable here as well. If the U.S. and the West let Ukraine go today, tomorrow another small country and another after that, would be subsumed into Russia on some absurd pretext.

That is no longer a theory. With the invasion of Ukraine, it is a reality. Therefore, Russia needs to be weakened and the time is now to trim its claws.

And do it publicly. It is time to tell the bullies of the world that the U.S. is not retreating but re-strategizing, re-organizing, and leading the international community to fight them. The time is perfect to declare a variant of the Monroe Doctrine to warn the bullies to keep their hands in their pockets and never touch another country.

The Biden Administration’s message is also addressed to the rest of the world, countries such as India, which have for decades pursued a non-aligned policy to reap the benefits from both sides and at the same time conveniently sit on the sideline when the world needs to choose between right and wrong. Now that the U.S. and Western Europe have thrown down the gauntlet, they must come down from their illusionary high road and make their choice.

The Biden Administration’s message is also not just a declaration of a new strategy in a new world order but an assertion of leadership. By going public, the U.S. shows its willingness to commit itself to what it declares, to correct the zig zag approach of the past. In doing so, it will restore the prestige and trustworthiness of American policies and strategies, and the reliability of its leadership.

This is how the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons says about nuclear weapons:

“Nuclear weapons are the most destructive, inhumane, and indiscriminate weapons ever created. Both in the scale of the devastation they cause, and in their uniquely persistent, spreading, genetically damaging radioactive fallout, they are unlike any other weapons. A single nuclear bomb detonated over a large city could kill millions of people. The use of tens or hundreds of nuclear bombs would disrupt the global climate, causing widespread famine.”

After Hiroshima and Nagasaki, they are universally considered defensive weapons and used by a nation only to deter potential adversaries from attacking it or its vital interests. No nation has publicly threatened to attack another with nuclear weapons because first, using them is not for idle, casual talk. Second, if one nation has nuclear weapons, others must understand without a slightest doubt that it will use them if it or its vital interests are attacked. There is no need to remind them of that certainty.

Three days after his invasion of Ukraine, Mr. Putin announced on television that he ordered Russia’s nuclear forces on special combat readiness. Then his state-run media repeated his message, announcing that Russia’s entire nuclear triad had been placed on special alert, “Don’t try to frighten Russia.”

Is it a profound tactical move to inform his potential adversaries in advance that he would use his nuclear arsenal in a limited local conflict if he doesn’t get his way? That seems to imply that Mr. Putin had some thought that his military power might not be strong enough to subdue Ukraine with Russia’s conventional forces. For the leader of such a huge and powerful country as Russia, it is too careless to be true.

Or did he just issue a warning to the U.S. and NATO not to interfere with his military adventure? This must be Mr. Putin’s intention.

And it sounds like blackmail. Don’t come to Ukraine’s rescue, or I will drop a nuclear bomb (somewhere). That means Mr. Putin uses his nuclear arsenal not to deter attack on Russia but to blackmail the world.

A blackmailer sniffs his targets for vulnerability. If Ukraine fell because the world did not help for fear of Russia’s nuclear threat, you can imagine Mr. Putin sitting in his chair in his office, feet on his desk, pointing his laser pointer at a large map of Europe on a wall, and shouting orders to his underlings twenty feet away, to take Poland, the Baltic nations, Finland, Sweden, and so on, after having his threat of using nuclear weapons propagated on his media network.

It sounds lighthearted but that is the modus operandi of a blackmailer. Mr. Putin has proved it. He invaded Ukraine in 2022 without concern because in 2014 he took Crimea, and the world was quiet and timid. In 2022, the stake is bigger and in a moment of ebullience or probably cold calculation, he yelled “nuclear weapons” to make sure that the world would continue to stay quiet and timid.

Yes, he should.

The Ukraine invasion is no doubt a horrific blunder. But it is difficult to think that it was his decision alone.

Before the invasion, Vladimir Putin was considered a brilliant Russian leader. His talks and acts were reasoned. He did restructure Russia away from democratization but many, including some American officials, agreed that he did so to strengthen the Russian government to deal with terrorism. They also believed that such restructuring was compatible with Russia’s democratization process. In other words, he had reasons, good reasons, to do so. That means he was a man who could be reasoned with, not driven by emotion.

Our president George W. Bush even found him to be a good man: “I looked the man in the eye. I found him to be straightforward and trustworthy…I was able to get a sense of his soul. The man’s deeply committed to his country and the best interest of his country.”

One good result out of the Ukraine fiasco is that Mr. Putin is weakened. The Russian power structure is no longer a one man show. The disappearance from the public and reappearance of his Defense Secretary Sergey Shoygu reveals such change. Mr. Shoygu’s disappearance was no doubt Mr. Putin’s decision. But his reappearance was clearly not. He, or any leader, cannot reverse his decision by himself in a matter of days without damaging his authority.

It is better for the West to continue dealing with him than a new Russian leader, a still unknown guy who probably is also a member of the cabal deeply involved in the decision to invade Ukraine who would not have the brain and, strange enough, the temper of Mr. Putin.

The news briefing by the U.S. intelligence that Mr. Putin was deceived, or at least not given full information, by his security apparatus including his generals, is the right approach to buttress Mr. Putin’s standing with the Russian people, which is the sine qua non to keep him the leader of Russia.

But calling the invasion of Ukraine Mr. Putin’s smart move or that he is a genius or asserting (on Fox News) that our government is lying about the Ukraine invasion or lapping up (Fox News again) the Russian propaganda (fake news) that the U.S. has helped Ukraine develop bioweapons in laboratories located on the Ukraine’s soil, does not help to shore up Mr. Putin’s status. It is dangerous, weirdly pervert, unpatriotic and pathetic. It smacks of a personal agenda looking for personal benefits in blatant disregard of the U.S.’s interest and national security, and even the world’s, if Fox ever thinks about it.

Mr. Putin has not demanded to annex Ukraine to make it a province of Russia. He does not even demand territory more than what he already has under his firm control, Crimea and some territory in the Donbass. That means, he has had no plan to take Ukraine and hold it. The 15 divisions, tanks, artillery, and air power are intended for show to scare the victim to get what he wants without actually using force. Just like a parade in Red Square with the colossal missiles which are probably empty metal tubes meant to impress an audience, Mr. Putin’s invasion prefaced with divisions of Russian draftee soldiers surrounding Ukraine was to impress Kyiv and the Ukrainian leadership. In a show, he does not have to deploy the real power.

He is stalled by the fierce resistance of the Ukrainians and unprepared to take Ukraine and hold it. He now realizes that he has underestimated the resolve of the Ukrainian people and miscalculated the reaction of the West. His threat has not achieved the intended goal. Things have turned around and suddenly he and his military have become a laughingstock. They are on the defensive. They are faced with the possibility that their military reputation is damaged, and its might is questioned.

Taking and occupying Ukraine may now be Mr. Putin’s objective. That presents real danger to Ukraine, and probably the world.

To do that, he would have to move some divisions from his elite military forces, the real fighters (the units that have a history of real combats including fighting Mao Zedong’s hard bitten Red Army) from the borders with China, to Ukraine. If he felt humiliated (and he may have), he would certainly do more with Russia’s considerable military power to prove that he meant business. He might be pushed to go through with it. The conflict would escalade and the danger to the world multiplies.

What unnerves everyone is the opaque policy of the West. We are still living in a world where the bully with physical power is given too much leeway. For a bully such as Russia, would a few Javelin and Stinger missiles do the job? Hardly. They are more symbolic than a real blow to the head of the bully. If Mr. Putin thinks that he can do Ukraine, the rest of the world should make him believe that we could do Vladivostok. Well, just a thought.

Russia must be made to understand that it has more real estate on earth than any other country that is extremely rich with undeveloped wealth. Tend to it, make it productive to elevate your people’s standard of living above the starving level.

In the 21^st Century, it is pervert and a crooked thinking for a country spanning 11 time zones to invade a small country to take a little bit of its land here and there for “national security” reason, a phony pretext for naked invasion. It has been more busy spending its resources to build weapons and engage in skirmishes along its long borders than developing the land it already has and improve the life of its people.

Unlike sending the parade show soldiers into Ukraine, Mr. Putin must be very careful sending in his elite, no-nonsense divisions. This time, things might get out of control, his or the West’s.

(PART 6)

In a battle, if one side abandons a strategy without another strategy to replace it, it is called defeat. That happened to Napoleon in Moscow and to Hitler in Stalingrad. They decided to stop the siege without knowing exactly what else to do next.

That experience was studied well by the Americans. Before the U.S. left Viet Nam, it was making sure that another strategy was under way and successfully carried out before it disengaged from Viet Nam. It had secretly negotiated with the Chinese and formed a working relationship with China. So, when it left Viet Nam, it was a brilliant move, a triumph, not a retreat or defeat.

So, when the U.S. withdrew from Syria and abruptly left Afghanistan, the world had to assume that before abandoning the use of military forces with the attending waste of economic resources, costs of human lives, and the possibility of triggering a nuclear war, the U.S.  had devised a new strategy. It turned out it was not a new one but a revised and much improved one: sanctioning.

Sanctions had been used before against a few countries by the U.S.  such as North Korea, Iran and even China. Mr. Putin probably calculated that the sanctions against Russia would not be really severe and the damage a price he was willing to pay for the grand prize of forcing Ukraine to be a vassal of Russia. Considering Europe’s heavy reliance on Russia energy, Russia being one of the world’s most prolific producers of oil, the democratic countries averse to war, and billions of dollars invested in Russia by European and American investors, he bet that Europe and the U.S. could not go far to punish Russia. In the past, U.S.’s sanctions, in many instances, did not receive unanimous support from its allies, especially Germany, which, in addition to the possible disruption of the current supplies of oil and gas by Russia, would not want to jeopardize the Nord Stream 2 Pipeline.

Mr. Putin was probably unprepared for the all-out sanctions against every aspect of life in Russia led by U.S. with the unanimous support of its allies. The costs to Russia are humongous. If the sanctions continued, there would be no doubt that the Russian campaign against Ukraine would stop, and Mr. Putin would lose his big gamble.

But the sanctions do cost the Allies also, albeit of a smaller scale and bearable. The outcome of Mr. Zelensky’s war against Mr. Putin’s aggression will depend on how far and how long the West is willing to go. As mentioned in an earlier article, if the West started pulling out their spreadsheet and balancing the pros and cons, there might be a compromised solution. But one thing is for sure, Ukraine would not be completely independent as Mr. Zelensky and his partners would want, and its territories might not be intact. Crimea and the Donbass might probably be officialized as Russia’s territories.

Let’s wish Mr. Zelensky and his people success and good luck. Let’s hope that the Democratic World led by the U.S. does not lose its principles and its will. Let’s hope that they do not impose an artificial and expedient solution on the Ukrainian people.

END.

Part 5:

It has been repeated, by Mr. Putin no less, that Ukrainians are Russians, the same, like brothers. One thing about brothers is they know one another well. Since 2004, with the loss of Crimea, the Ukrainians must have anticipated that their “brothers” would not let them alone. They, possibly at the prodding of NATO and the U.S., have learned the Russian strategies, their weaknesses, and their strengths.

Mr. Putin’s FSB and SVR must have done extensive research on Ukraine, its people and especially its leaders. They know quite a lot about the Ukraine and the Ukrainian people (they are “brothers”, remember?). But they did not know and could not have known well one person that counted. Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

One aspect of the Ukrainian political system is it is democratic. When, from nowhere, a candidate named Volodymyr Zelenskyy was elected president of Ukraine, the Russian intelligent agencies did not know much about Mr. Zelenskyy except that he had been a comedian. Even if they had in-depth research on him, they would not have discovered his remarkable characteristics crucial for fighting a long battle against Russia: his unbelievable courage, energy, stamina, persistence and obviously he has the support of his people. These virtues would not appear in normal time but only under special and threatening circumstances like when a grandmother fighting off, successfully a lion with a broom when it tried to climb onto her trailer while her grandchild was sleeping. His strengths showed when Russia started bullying Ukraine. His brave efforts have inspired his people and people around the world.

Mr. Zelenskyy and his staff could not have forgotten Crimea. They had eight years to prepare for this invasion.

The Russians were very good at defending their own country against invading armies from Napoleon to Hitler. Their successes relied much on their deep knowledge of their local territories (and weather) and the support from the rear, which abundantly provided supplies and people for the Russian armed forces. They also succeeded in attacking small countries with no defense force. The Ukraine invasion is not a defense on their own territory, and Ukraine is not a small country, which also has received tremendous support all over the world, political, materials and weapons. The situation looks good for a Ukraine’s victory.

The question is whether the world will help Ukraine to fight until they get their independence and freedom back, or the big nations will take their spreadsheets out and start making decisions based on the balance sheet of the costs and profits affecting their economies.

Ukraine’s hope is also boosted by a historical fact: Russia cannot be trusted to get rid of their bullying nature and learn to adopt democratic institutions and deal with other nations in a civilized manner. Therefore, the U.S. and Western Europe must have seen the need to devise and have devised and perfected an effective post-Afghanistan strategy to deal with it.

(Next, Part 6)

PART 4

The images (in one, Mr. Putin sat at one end of a very long table and all his aides lumped together at the other end, in the other picture, he sat alone at a table in a huge room and everybody else was standing against the opposite wall far away from him) seem to support the speculation that Mr. Putin has increasingly acted in a dictatorial manner, not consulting with anyone in a meaningful manner. The huge spaces between Mr. Putin and his aides shown in the pictures give the impression of his being aloof and alone.

It is difficult to think that the Russians, among the most intelligent people on earth, did not see that an invasion of Ukraine would be a terrible and unforgivable decision. Mr. Putin’s aides, or some of them who had the courage, must have advised against such move. Obviously, if that was the case, Mr. did not listen.

Why there are people who still think that their thinking or actions are perfect needing no improvement? That is the belief of dictators of the world, people with power. They don’t listen to others, ignoring Confucius’s saying that if I walk with three other people, one of them can be my teacher. It’s regrettable that Mr. Putin has fallen into that crack as he had shown a tremendous ability to think rationally and reasonably.

He probably is the victim of the Russian political tradition restraining him and everyone else who wants to move up the Russian leadership: fighting ferociously and preemptively, giving your opponent no chance to raise its head. If your opponent emerges through your no mercy strike, you just resign to the fact that it is just a game, albeit a deadly game. You must just constantly look over your shoulder. You trust anyone, even your closest aide, at your peril. Mr. Putin at one time seemed to disagree with that tradition and try to embrace Democracy [people in a Democracy do stab others in their back too but with finesse, more humanly, fairly and artistically (here again in need of a better word)]. He saw that Democracy made political sense. But the Russian system is never a good soil for Democracy to grow. Even after Glasnost, it has made no progress on the ability to listen to different opinions without getting into a rage. It did not allow Mr. Putin to pursue Democracy without endangering himself.

It is not farfetched to speculate that Mr. Putin did not have a free give and take discussion before ordering the attack on Ukraine. That is his mission and the mission of other Russian likeminded politicians. They felt incumbent on themselves to make the decision to attack and let no one present an alternative. That passionate sense of mission has caused them to lose patience and commit a huge misstep.

He overlooked two crucial and possibly decisive factors: the will of the Ukrainians to resist his quest to dominate them and the U.S. and Western Europe’s strategy to deal with his country post-Afghanistan.

(Next, Part 5)

PART 3:

In making the decision to invade Ukraine, Mr. Putin seems to have been carried away, away from rationality, away from a correct reading of history and current events. His passion and hubris overcame his heretofore caution, deliberateness and patience.

There had been examples of Mr. Putin’s political and military aggressiveness, which were of limited scope and purpose. The Chechen war was more a Russian internal affair pacifying an Islamic insurrection and terrorism than a part of a grand scheme. Up until the invasion of Ukraine in 2022, his talks and speeches were measured, indicating a man of careful thoughts and consideration.

However, his public statements and deeds indicated early that he had a plan, a grandiose plan and he has pursued it deliberately and determinedly. It also shows a man having a Napoleon (short man) complex wanting to do big things for big glory and to bully at any chance he gets.

A small man, he has tried to project a macho image riding a horse bare chested, unleashing his large Labrador in a small room where he received former German chancellor Angela Merkel who had been known to be scared of dogs. Reading unfavorable comments in the German media, he of course said that he did not mean to scare her. But the picture of a clear smirk on his face belies his explanation.

He advocated the aggression doctrine of striking your opponent first if a fight was inevitable. As if to publicize it, at least 10 of his political opponents were killed very publicly. One may argue that he just followed the Russian tradition of killing his enemies wherever they could be found. Joseph Stalin pursued his nemesis Leon Trotsky 11 years until he had him killed in Mexico.

His speech after Crimea was taken by Russia shows him to be a passionate and angry man:
“They have lied to us many times, made decisions behind our backs, placed us before an accomplished fact. This happened with NATO’s expansion to the East, as well as the deployment of military infrastructure at our borders. They kept telling us the same thing: ‘Well, this does not concern you.’ That’s easy to say.’”

He is resentful and his resentment had probably simmered for a long time. He has felt the indignity of his country and took it upon himself to do something about it such as restoring if not all then at least some territories of the former Soviet Union. He wants to bring back the glory and respect that he believes Russia deserves.

He closely followed the U.S.’s military and political ventures in Afghanistan and Syria with deep interest. He went into Crimea because he saw that the U.S. was bogged down in the Middle East and Afghanistan. In 2022, when the U.S. decided to withdraw from Afghanistan, he saw his golden opportunity and made his move on Ukraine on the wrong assumption that the U.S. and its allies had lost their will to confront Russia.

Contrary to what he said in his After-Crimea speech, he followed the same old bully strategy. There was no referendum by the Ukrainians, there was no freedom of choice. In his speech he asked us, the American people: “Isn’t the desire of Crimea’s residents to freely choose their fate such a value?” When it comes to the desire of the Ukrainians, he just ignored it and bullied through Ukraine’s borders with divisions of infantry, artilleries, and air power, without asking the Ukrainians for their free choice, the same bully strategy he had used in Georgia and Chechnya.

To make the desire of the Ukrainians even much less significant, he got his nuclear weapons ready and publicly announced it.
(Next, Part 4)