Note to Putin: Don’t Read Obama’s Inexperience as American Weakness

            Dear Vladimir, I am an American.  I am very proud of my country and all the good it has done for the world.  It was America that won both World Wars I and II.  You Russians quit during World War I to have your revolution.  Without America joining the war, that would not have been possible.  America’s presence required the Germans to give up the Eastern front – and you were able to have your revolution.  Russia helped during World War II but rather than being liberators of the people that the Nazis had conquered; you just transposed the occupation by the Germans to the occupation by the Soviets.  Had America not entered either of the World Wars, you would be speaking German.

While you occupied Eastern Europe following World War II, America implemented the Marshall Plan to rebuild Western Europe and assure their freedom from Soviet totalitarianism.  After America won the second World War, we gave to those in need.  On the other hand, Russia imposed Soviet style communism/totalitarianism on the Eastern European countries in need.  When you tried to starve West Berlin into submission, it was the American air force that air lifted the supplies necessary for the West Berliners to survive your brutal tactics and to maintain their freedoms.  Thus began the cold war.

America won the cold war too.  Upon that victory, there was no gloating.  Instead, America was grateful that the freedoms enjoyed by the West could now be bestowed to the many peoples of the Soviet Union.  Mikhail Gorbachev’s perestroika and glasnost was the beginning of such freedoms.  As momentum for freedom gathered, many of the former occupied countries of the Soviet Union seceded.  After decades of Soviet style totalitarianism, they wanted their own identities, national pride, and self-destinies restored.  Americans were overjoyed to see such a change in the world.  We wished all this for Poland, Latvia, Estonia, Romania, Ukraine and all satellite states of the former Soviet Union.  We also wished this for Russia itself.  We realized that the loss of an empire diminishes one’s self-image as a world power.  However, it was apparent at the time the Soviet Union was disassembled that the Russian people wanted more personal freedom and less government corruption than they wanted an empire.  Americans also wanted these freedoms and opportunities for the Russian people.

Unfortunately, democracy is not an easy task.  It is made more difficult when vestiges of power remain in place that focus on personal greed rather than the wealth and freedoms of their people – and so Russia has struggled.  Economic struggles cause unease among the people of any country.  When criticism of the Putin regime started to simmer, severe crackdowns on the right to free speech became the norm and elections became a farce.  Then to attempt to make Russia appear to be a semblance of a free democracy (just before the Sochi Olympics) hundreds of political prisoners were released from Russian jails.  The mere fact that there were hundreds of such prisoners is a statement on its own.  Personal freedoms in Russia have been curtailed and the economy is struggling – both causing uneasiness of the Russian people.

Mr. Putin, you are now following the tactics of all tyrants before you – create an enemy outside your regime for the troubled people of your nation to cast their frustrations upon.  You have selected America for good reason.  America has a totally inexperienced leader who probably has never been in a street fight.  He does not realize when it is time to show power, let alone when to use it.  He has lived a charmed life and has altruistic views that everyone in the world will respond to his goodness.  President Obama has very good intentions but he is an easy target for you to bully.  Unlike President Obama, you, Mr. Putin, know that evil does exist in this world.  You know this well because you are evil.  What you do not know is that the majority of Americans have been in street fights.  The majority of Americans utilizes its right to free speech and communicates with their representatives in Congress.  The majority of Americans have no fear of an impotent Russia that cannot govern its people in a manner that promotes economic growth and personal freedoms.  President Obama’s inexperience will slow America’s response to your evil - but the American people will force a reaction.  The Obama caused delay in our response will require our actions to be much mightier than you can imagine. 

I am an American that knows that the American military can annihilate the Russian military both in conventional and in nuclear war.  I am an American that is telling my Congressman to push for ground troops and war planes in Poland, Latvia, Romania and Turkey – and for a strong naval presence in the Black Sea.  I am an American that does not want war with Russia but one that realizes that a show of might is what is necessary to prevent that war.  I also realize that once a show of might is made, there is an increased chance of actual war.  But: I am proud of what America has done for the world and I believe that it is now our time to continue such good for the people of Ukraine.  So if war is needed, then war it shall be.  Think long and hard Mr. Putin, I am voicing the sentiments of Americans – not President Obama.  You may not be aware of this, but in a free democracy, those in power eventually follow the course its people demand.  I do not believe that you would be so stupid as to use nuclear weapons – but I am not naïve enough to completely dismiss this opportunity.  I know you are evil and that evil has no limits.  Just remember that although our missile defense system is not all encompassing – it is something you do not have.  By the way, I am also telling my Congressman that I want missile defense systems built inside the countries of every one of our NATO allies.  You must have known that this would be the minimum response to your provocations to this point in time.

The world knows that if war breaks out – it will be Russia’s fault.  The national pride you are calling on from your people by conquering Crimea will turn to shame if you start a war in Ukraine.  Can you imagine the pictures of defenseless Ukrainian soldiers lying dead on their homeland?  And if that happens, America will not let free people become subjects to a totalitarian dictator.  I am also telling my Congressman that our government must start building a coalition of our NATO allies NOW – to be ready to join America in defending Ukraine.

America is war-weary but not without a conscience of right and wrong.  Our NATO allies will be there with us because the very creation of NATO was to prevent the spread of Soviet totalitarianism.

By the way, your phone call to President Obama yesterday may fool the President, but it does not fool many other Americans.  We know an evil person such as you cannot be trusted and that the phone call was only a ploy for President Obama to continue to believe through his naivety that you are responding to his goodness – and thus buy you more time to ready your ground troops along the Ukraine border.

Another thing you should consider: America has the ability to shut down your entire economy.  America and Canada has the energy that Europe buys from you and we can build the infrastructure to get it there.  Act provocatively enough, and the Europeans will cut you off regardless of the short term damage their economies will suffer.  They will do so with assurances from America that we will help them through the tough times and establish the infrastructure needed to meet their energy needs.

To the Russian people, we Americans do not want war with you.  We want all the people of the world to enjoy freedom of speech, freedom of assembly, freedom of the press, the right to choose their own destinies through fair elections, and the opportunity to pursue happiness.  Russia is a great country that has for far too long suffered from evil and corrupt leaders.  Please do not allow the sense of national pride the conquering of Crimea has created distract you from your basic problem: a corrupt government that prevents you from the freedoms enjoyed by the peoples of true democracies.  As always, we Americans wish the best for you.

Strong Energy Policy Can Be Strong Foreign Policy (Crimean Crisis Solution)

Coal is not as clean as natural gas nor is it as economical.  However, we have a lot of it and it has been very successful at powering America for a very long time.  Absent the Crimean peninsula crisis, I would be an advocate for more gas and less coal.  With sanctions being considered as our only response to the Crimean crisis, I think we should reconsider coal.  Not as a long term strategy, but as an intermediate strategy to help defeat the Russians economically.  That way we can avoid the need to defeat them militarily if they invade one of our NATO allies like Poland, Latvia or Estonia.

By the way, in an earlier blog entry I proposed that America conduct military exercised in some of our NATO allies’ countries near the Black Sea.  I am not a war monger, but I believe that if America does not show that it has the will and the might to fight if needed, we will be viewed as weak.  Our signal of weakness is giving Vladimir the green light to take more of the Ukraine and possibly some territory of our NATO allies.

The Environmental Protection Agency is close to implementing new air pollution regulations that make it near impossible to burn coal.  We need strong regulations to protect our environment.  However, before the most recent round of regulations, we burned coal more cleanly than any other large user in the world.  Coal burning power plants have been closing at a high rate due to both the new regulations and the economies of natural gas.  America is now the world’s largest producer of natural gas.  We are the Saudi Arabia of natural gas.  Why don’t we get rich off the stuff just like the Saudi’s got rich off of oil?  In the near term, our goal should just to be able to sell it inexpensively to the Europeans.  Economic sanctions against Russia may cause some economic pain in Europe.  Cheap natural gas will help mitigate some of this pain.  After the economic turmoil is mitigated – then we can get rich from our natural gas.

This should be taken up as an urgent matter.  We can build pipelines, tank filling terminals at our ports, and hundreds of tank ships to get the gas to Europe.  All of which mean JOBS.  Then we can sell our natural gas to Europe and cut off their dependency on the Russians.  We should work with the Canadians to build two pipelines: the currently planed XL pipeline to the Gulf of Mexico, and a second pipeline to the east coast of Canada to export their oil to Europe.  This will eliminate Europe’s dependency on Russian oil.

Eventually we will build up our natural gas producing capacity to supply both Europe and have enough left over to close those "not as clean as gas" coal burning plants.  But, do not shutter those plants when they can be used as a peaceful means of settling geopolitical conflicts.  America won the cold war by beating down the Russian economy.  President Reagan spent so much money on defense that the Russians had to increase its spending just to keep up.  Unfortunately for the Russians, their economy was not strong enough to maintain the necessary military without eliminating the bread and butter its people rightfully demanded. 

Do you remember the Iron Curtain being torn down in Berlin?  We won the cold war but have allowed our enemy to regroup.  Our enemy now believes that they are stronger than we are.  Could they be right?  They would only be correct if we do not stand up to the challenge they are presenting us with.

Russia’s economy is again on shaky grounds.  If they lose their trade with Europe and America, they will be severely impaired.  The Russians will sell their fossil fuels to the Chinese but the Chinese are not stupid.  They know they will be able to purchase that fuel at bargain basement prices.  Furthermore, the Chinese will not be able to purchase the full quantity of fossil fuel that Russia sells to Europe.  If the West cuts off trade with the Russians, the Russians will suffer much more than the West.  America will hardly feel the effect.  On the other hand, European countries will be impacted, but not as severely as the Russians.  Note to the EU; start building natural gas cars and the infrastructure to refuel them.  That will help your economy.  America may be willing to strike a deal with you for those cars (to help you in your time of need).  That is if we have the sense to build our own refueling infrastructure.

All of the natural gas that comes from federally owned land should be taxed to pay for the construction necessary to build the exporting infrastructure.  And, we should encourage more drilling on federal land to raise more revenue. The taxes should be limited to only pay for the infrastructure.  The increased pricing from these temporary taxes will also make coal viable for the intermediate period of time needed to force the Russians to behave as civilized people.  For the time being, we need to keep energy prices cheap so that the Europeans can manage their way through the economic difficulties that reduced trade with Russia will bring.  In the future, only exported gas should be taxed (and at higher rates) and the revenue from those taxes should be used to pay off our national debt.

If we continue to use coal for an intermediate time period, we will have enough natural gas to tax it and still sell it to the Europeans at a lower price than they are paying the Russians.  In the interim, the currently projected reductions in America’s energy prices will not be realized.  This will cause some economic pain to America.  Some Europeans are hesitant to follow America’s lead on sanctions against Russia because they will be more impacted than America.  With this plan, that argument is minimized.

America should help Europe finance its importing infrastructure (port terminals and pipelines).  The jobs created in Europe will also be good for their struggling economies.  Think of this plan and the Marshal Plan Part II.  Part I was intended to rebuild Europe and prevent another World War.  Part II is intended to render the largest threat to world peace impotent.

Along with the EU, America should negotiate trade pacts (or revise existing trade pacts) that give advantages to countries that sign onto the sanctions against Russia.  This discussion is not going to lay out the complete set of economic sanctions that the West needs to impose on Russia.  Banning the purchase of Russian fossil fuel if a suitable replacement can be provided by America, Canada, Mexico, or other oil producing, stable democracies is the obvious one discussed here.  Fossil fuels are Russia’s life line.  Without its revenues, the Russian economy collapses.  Without money you cannot maintain a military and conduct land grabs.  Without money, people get very angry and demand better of their government.  Most times they demand a new government.

At the end of the cold war, the Russian people demanded a new government – and they got one.  We should have done more to help it succeed when it was struggling to become a true democracy.  This is a lesson learned that can be applied if we win the new cold war.

To repeat the earlier statement: This is an urgent matter that should be taken up with the same vigor that America exercised after being attacked by Japan at Pearl Harbor.  This is not war preparations.  This is war prevention.  If we fail at this, we may need to conduct real war preparations.  Even if the doves believe that there is no chance of war with Russia, can we not convince them of the economic advantage to America being an exporter of natural gas and Canada selling oil to Europe?

If we truly demonstrate the resolve to urgently build the proposed infrastructure, America will be viewed as strong.  Currently America is viewed as very weak.  The world needs a strong America.  Strong energy policy can be strong foreign policy.

Flight 370 – Look in Yemen and Somalia

The Malaysian military did not want to share its radar information on Flight 370 and at least two passengers boarded the flight with stolen passports.  Why should we believe anything coming from Malaysian officials?  For instance, should we believe that they knew how much fuel the plane had when it left Kuala Lumpur?  Does the Malaysian government or Air Malaysia even know how much fuel was on board?  If this was a hijacking (terrorist or just grand larceny) couldn’t the hijackers have had the plane fueled more than the pilots reported (assuming that the pilots were involved).  Or more dastardly, could the perpetrators have broken into the planes computer system and programed the fuel indicator to require a full tank to indicate just the amount needed for the planned flight?  Could the fuel truck operator be in on the plot?

What was in the cargo bay of that plane and how much was it worth?  Could the plane itself be of value to terrorists who like to use planes as weapons of mass destruction?

I am only speculating here but shouldn’t we be looking in Yemen and Somalia?  There are terrorist groups there that would love to have their own 777.  Is Yemen and Somalia on the GPS cone?  If so, don’t rule these areas out based on the Malaysian’s reported fuel level.

The Cold War is Back and America Is Shrinking

We won the Cold War but lost the peace.  We lost by abandoning our position as the world’s unchallenged leader.  First we apologized for all the good we have done in the past – in the apology, we stated that we had no right to impose our view of democracy on other nations.  Later we drew red lines that we allowed Syria to cross without any response.  (The red line was intended to stop the mass slaughter of the Syrian people; not to eliminate one means of conducting the mass slaughter.)  Then we gave concessions to the Iranians for the mere promise of later promises.  Then we told the world that we are going to shrink our military to a size not seen since before World War II.

In effect, we have rented advertising space on every billboard in the world that says “America is weak.  America knows it is weak.  America prefers weakness.  Tyrants of the world- do as you wish.  And, because of all of the above, there is no need to criticize us anymore.”

Once upon a time, when America was the unchallenged leader, there was a lot of criticism of America.  It was the natural bashing that leaders receive because to be a true leader, you have to make the tough decisions and you have to take some hard positions.  American bashing went hand-in-hand with American greatness.  In the past, we and our leaders let this American bashing run off our backs.  We knew our intentions were not only to keep the world safe but also to make it a better place.  When America bashing morphed into radical-Muslim terrorism, we shrank from our position of the world’s leader.  We humbled ourselves through apologies and concessions.  Our worst act of conciliation was announcing that we will no longer maintain the military that has, for seventy-plus years, kept the world safe.

Now the modern day Stalin (Vladimir Putin) has invaded the Crimean peninsula and is threatening to take over other parts of Ukraine.  What has the former world leader’s response been - condemnation with nothing more than the threat of possible economic sanctions (if we can get the Europeans to go along)?  Oh, I almost forgot, we will probably not attend the G-8 meeting in Sochi in June.  I’m sure Mr. Putin is shaking in his boots.

The Ukrainian people are rallying to the call of its interim government and volunteering to join the Ukrainian army.  These people desperately want freedom and they know that the definition of freedom is the democracy that America used to preach (before the apologies).   They also know that freedom is the exact opposite of what Russia will impose on them.  The people of the Ukraine had their Arab Spring to rid themselves of the corrupt, Russian-styled, and Russian-linked government of Mr. Yanukovych.  These brave people have not seen the American billboards.  They believe that the West (meaning America) will support them and even fight for them.  Unfortunately, we have already apologized for such actions in the past and we are now in a period of penance where in order to be forgiven for our past sins, we must not repeat them.  In other words, those brave Ukrainians are toast.

Thus, the evil empire will expand.  I never thought I would say that I miss George W. Bush – but I do.  I believed in his policies but became a little worn by his brashness.  Now, I miss his brashness – and his policies.

Can someone explain to me why there are no American military maneuvers in the NATO nations that border Ukraine and the Black Sea (Poland, Romania, Turkey)?  The sad commentary I have heard is that we do not want to ratchet the situation up.  Is the entire world afraid to call Mr. Putin’s bluff?  Has the American military deteriorated to the point that we cannot beat the Russians in a conventional battle?  How would the Cuban missile crises be handled today?  Yes, ratcheting the tension up steps the world closer to the nuclear brink.  Isn’t that why we have the nuclear brink?  Does anyone think that unlike Khrushchev, Putin will pull the trigger?

How about a little saber-rattling to show that America still has a back bone?  Darn, I keep forgetting, we gave the back bone up.  Please accept my apology for mentioning a tactic that may garner criticism of America.

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Of course you can never tell if some rogue idiot soldier may start shooting at the other side (either a Ukrainian shooting at the Russians or a Russian shooting at a Ukrainian).   That is the case with or without an American military presence.  However, if there were an American military presence in the area I am sure the Russians would be instructed to exercise restraint at all costs.