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GEORGIA CAN BE PUTIN'S AFGHANISTAN |
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Written by Dr. Jack Wheeler
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Monday, 11 August 2008 |
Time to stop the hand-wringing about Russia's re-igniting
the Cold War by invading Georgia. Time
to start thinking of what a golden opportunity this presents.
First the reality.
Russia, before, during, and after the Soviet Union was and remains a
brutal imperialist dictatorship. The
Soviet Union was simply the same old Czarist Russian imperialism with
Marxism-Leninism as an ideological rationale.
The fall of the USSR only meant the fall of the rationale.
So Russia is back to where it has always been, with the
Russian compulsion for brute force bullying as its way of dealing with the
world. It is no accident, comrades,
that Russians were the Soviets, and it
is no surprise whatever that they are behaving like Soviets in Georgia today.
Thus the fundamental reality of how to conduct foreign
policy with Russia, however distasteful it may be to the squishes at the State
Department chronically afflicted with terminal testicular atrophy:
The only thing Russians in the Kremlin understand and
respect is superior force and the willingness to use it against them. If you don't give them a punch in the mouth
and a bloody nose the moment they start to bully you, they will keep bullying
you until you start fighting back hard - or you capitulate and obey their
orders.
It's either-or, win-lose.
Those are their rules. As Lenin
expressed, Kto-kovo?, Who-whom?
For Lenin, this was the only question that mattered, who conquers
whom? Just as Lenin was the perfect
Communist, so was he the perfect Russian.
Ronald Reagan won the Cold War by understanding that if
those are the Russians' rules, then we had to play by them. Which is why he announced at his first
cabinet meeting as president in January 1981:
"Here's my strategy on the Cold War:
We win, they lose."
The golden opportunity Putin is giving us by invading
Georgia is that it gives us the perfect excuse to play by his rules. The way you play is this: identify Russian weaknesses and
vulnerabilities, then exploit them to the hilt.
Putin, has, for example, some $40 billion (yes, with a ‘b')
in personal hidden bank accounts in Switzerland and elsewhere in the name of
various third-party cut-outs.
Arrangements could be made to seize or attach them. Putin needs to be personally wiped out
financially.
Russians are conducting a cyber-war upon Georgia. Pentagon hacker teams should be unleashed to
conduct cyber-war upon Russian computer systems.
Every bit of intel and SIGINT (electronic or signal
intelligence) we can get should be given to the Georgians.
But most important, the Georgians need Stinger anti-aircraft
missiles and Javelin anti-tank missiles.
As explained by Col. Ralph Peters in The Phony, Brutal,
Sloppy, and Inept Invasion of Georgia, the most striking feature of this
war so far has been the incredibly incompetent performance of the Russian
pilots. They've missed more targets
than they've hit.
The Russians' mighty Red Army was defeated in Afghanistan by
disorganized tribesmen armed with Stinger missiles. As the Afghans learned, take the Russians out of the air and they
can be beaten on the ground. And the
Afghans only had RPGs (rocket propelled grenade launchers) against Russian
armor. They didn't have any Javelins.
The Georgians are better fighters, are far better trained
and organized than the Afghan Mujahaddin.
2,000 Georgian soldiers have been fighting hard, battle-trained, in Iraq
with Coalition forces - and are being flown back to Georgia.
Putin is serving himself up on a platter. Give the Georgians Stingers and Javelins,
give them additional material and intel support, and they can make Georgia
Putin's Afghanistan.
It is absolutely necessary for this to happen. Georgia is where Russian barbaric
imperialism must be stopped. It can be
stopped, but the action to do so must be now, before Russia's seizure of
Georgia is consolidated. Then Ukraine
is next.
I am calling upon every conservative leader to support
freedom fighters in Georgia as they did in Afghanistan, Angola, and Nicaragua
25 years ago, and demand that President Bush provide that support as did
President Reagan.
That's what defeated Soviet imperialism then, that's what
can defeat Russian imperialism now. The
Russian bear must be put back in its cage.
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