How To Approach Putin As A Hostage Taker

Last week, this blog described part of what Putin has done with his invasion of the Ukraine was using the whole world as a hostage (click here for last week's blog article ). He did that by implying a possible use of nuclear weapons on anyone helping the Ukraine by putting his nuclear forces on high alert. 

Last week's article went on to discuss the growing lack of self-restraint that we see in the world today along with the questioning of our government's knowledge of Putin's mental state. I mention all of these things because they should play a role in how the world respond to Putin but seems to be significantly absent.

Fortunately, President Biden has directed aid to the Ukraine without making probable direct confrontations between  the U.S. and Russian forces. In fact the same could be said for all NATO forces. But despite the caution exercised, I have fears of a nuclear exchange occurring. And like the old commercial for Lays Potato Chips, my fear is that once nuclear weapons are used, leaders will not be satisfied with just one nuclear exchange. That fear caused me to watch the British version of the American movie The Day After (click here for a brief description ) called Threads (click here for a brief description ). I picked the movie Threads because I could watch it for free. In that movie, what started as a confrontation between Soviet and American forces in Iran over oil led to a limited nuclear exchange and that exchange led to other exchanges until there was a full scale nuclear war. 

In any event, despite the wisdom of lowering the probability of direct confrontation between American or even NATO forces with those of Russia, we need to further revise our current approach to the Russian invasion of the Ukraine. And the reason for that is precisely because of what was written last week: Putin has made the whole world his hostage. And thus, the world's leaders should include hostage negotiation tactics and strategies in its approach to the Russian invasion of the Ukraine. It's not that the world's approach to Putin  should be reduced to that of some kind of hostage negotiation. But it is that hostage negotiation approaches should be a major part of how the world's leaders approach him.

Having said that, we should realize that calling Putin a war criminal, though true, doesn't help. It doesn't help because for America to complain about other nations committing war crimes and breaking International Law is like the pot calling the kettle black. For though we Americans like to tell ourselves that we, unlike many other nations, practice the Rule of Law, the fact is that it is the nations with the strongest militaries that try to enforce the Rule of Law on the rest of the world while they themselves practice the Rule of Force. Thus, the hypocrisy of nations like America accusing Putin of war crimes and not abiding by the Rule of Law can only unnecessarily irritate the hostage taker, Putin, and that is not what one should want to do when engaging in hostage negotiations.

If we didn't live in the nuclear age, we could better afford to use our military to stop the Russian invasion even though it still might not be the wisest choice. But we live in the nuclear age. And our top priority right now must be to avoid a nuclear exchange. That doesn't mean that we should sit idly by while a tyrant with imperial dreams dancing in his head has his way with nations that he feels entitled to invade. But it does mean that we need, along with providing support for the Ukraine and some sanctions that target Russia, constant communication between Western leaders and Putin. We need open lines of communication between all of those leaders. We also need to employ the services of leaders of those nations that either continue to choose to business with Russia or those who side with Russia, none of whom want to see a nuclear exchange. It is the leaders of those nations who can provide a reality check for Putin should he be considering using nuclear weapons at all during the invasion of the Ukraine.

Perhaps, the worst approach is to make Putin seem like the target. What Biden said about how Putin should not be the leader of Russia had already been said in the economic sanctions that have been applied against Russia. For it seems that the replacing of Putin as the leader of Russia is a strategic goal  at least for Biden. Here we should note that we should not feel safe from a nuclear war because we are employing  economic sanctions rather than using military confrontation. Why? WW II, especially its European theater, should provide a sufficient reason not to. That is because wars have started over economic sanctions. Yes, we should use some economic sanctions; but we can go too far with them.

Despite the fact that Putin doesn't deserve to be a leader, he should not be the target of our actions. Rather, the invasion of the Ukraine itself should be. And we need to keep in mind that what we absolutely cannot afford to have is even the possibility of a nuclear exchange over the invasion. Yes, it would be preferable for Putin to get what he deserves. But again, the Rule of Law is applied only to the weak, not the strong. And that is our reality in the nuclear age.

We Are All Hostages In Putin's War

 The moment that Putin responded to the West's support for the Ukraine because of Russia's invasion by putting his nuclear forces on high alert, he implied that he would use nuclear weapons on anyone who would help the Ukraine too much. And with that implied threat, Putin was not just threatening other nations from interfering with his goal, he made us all, which is everyone in the whole world, hostages.

The definition of a hostage is below (click here for the source)

someone who is taken as a prisoner by an enemy in order to force the other people involved to do what the enemy wants

It is true that we have not been physically taken prisoner and held against our will. But in this age of nuclear warheads and ballistic missiles, one doesn't have to be taken prisoner to qualify as a hostage or be used as a shield by those who are trying to avoid resistance and/or escape the just consequences of their actions. Putin has implied that he will use nuclear weapons if the West tries too hard to rescue the Ukraine. And we know that if he does use nuclear weapons, there will be a response with nuclear weapons. And then where that ends, nobody knows. But once the use of nuclear weapons have been used on a nuclear power, even if what is first used is a low-yield tactical weapon, the risk for a full scale nuclear war has sharply and dramatically increased.

So all of us might be killed if the world does too much to help the Ukraine fend off Russia's invasion. But nobody knows just what that too much is. Is Putin bluffing? We don't know. But if he isn't bluffing, then we have an extremely tough balance to meet. For if he isn't bluffing, then questions must be raised about his mental health and state of mind. He does seem to be returning Russia back to the days of Stalin when calling Russians who oppose the war, 'traitors.' And when we combine that with the Ukrainian civilian targets and nuclear power plants having already been hit, one wonders about Putin's ability to exercise self-restraint in the face of an effective resistance to his invasion.

Putin's actions and rhetoric helps make it seem that we have just entered an age where there is a marked loss in people's ability to exercise self-restraint. We certainly saw the loss in people's self-restraint during the whole Trump Presidency. And a large part of that was the lack of adequate self-restraint exercised by Trump himself. The willingness of people to eagerly embrace conspiracy theories regarding Covid and the vaccines also demonstrated a decrease in the exercise of self-restraint by people. But there has been even a sharper global increase in the lack of self-restraint ever since the world has been emerging from the pandemic. And the loss of self-restraint is just what we don't need in this nuclear age.

And so we need to consider Putin's possible mental state and his using the world as a hostage in responding to his invasion. That we should support the Ukraine fend off the revolution and put sanctions on Russia that would persuade its influencers to get Putin to relent. But perhaps our strategic response to him should include a hostage negotiation perspective.

Finally, as Putin embarks on a path so many have tread before him with his invasion of the Ukraine, he will, if he hasn't already, come to a fork in the road where he must choose between military defeat or moral suicide. And in a nuclear age, his choosing of the latter option could take the whole world down with him.

Russia Is At The Center Of World Politics

 Even before Biden was elected, Russia has been at the center. Even if Russia didn't have troops at the Ukraine border and was not planning to invade, Russia is at the center of world politics. In 2024, Russia will be at the center of world politics.

How is it that Russia  has been, is, and will be at the center of world politics? For one thing, thanks to its nuclear arsenal, Russia never stopped being a superpower. For another thing, Russian society is even more authoritarian than American society. Religion in general, and Christianity in particular, is the reason why American society is authoritarian. That is not to say that we still have a religiously conscious society that we use to have. But American Christianity's authoritarianism rubbed off on liberals and leftists just as it did on unbelieving conservatives. In contrast to us, Russia owes its authoritarianism to its past of autocratic leaders. What set the stage were the Tsars and their authoritarianism rubbed off on the leaders of the Bolshevik revolution.

Of course there is an obvious difference between Russia's authoritarianism and that of the US. That difference is that Russian society has been, at various levels, ok with overtly authoritarian leaders. In contrast to that, American authoritarianism has to wear the veneer of democracy and reason. After all, how can an authoritarian society be the champion of democracy in the world? Tribalism is the answer. Even before the second President Bush, those who were not with us were treated as being against us. That is what tribalism does to a society. For one possible summary for tribalism is that of group authoritarianism.

Back at the ranch, Russia has been the center of world politics because of its influence on the US. Earlier in this century, despite Russian laws the prohibit churches other than the Russian Orthodox Church from openly evangelizing in Russia, many conservative evangelicals lust for the relationship between Church and state that Putin has with the Russian Orthodox Church. They openly applaud, and are jealous of, Russia's stance and policies against its own LGBT community. That is because many of my fellow religiously conservative Christians have reduced democracy in America to that of voting and a 51% dictatorship--something they would not do with some other nations like Iran or Iraq under Saddam Hussein. 

Like many of my fellow religiously conservative Christians, Putin is not fan of democracy. This isn't my opinion alone, but it seems to be the view of Mikhail Gorbachev who at first approved of Putin's authoritarianism in order to accomplish certain tasks. But Gorbachev, who was looking to remake Russia in the image of the Scandinavian nations when he was Russia's leader, also believed that those days of authoritarianism were to be short. That those days were to be followed allowing for opposing political parties to form and give Russians real choices during elections. But Putin has not allowed real political freedom of choice in Russia. And Putin seems to have added to his authoritarian leadership style a Russian version of Latin America machismo to his personal image.

Now, Russia seems to be commanding center stage attention from the world because of its possible invasion of the Ukraine. But regardless of what happens there, Russia's efforts to destabilize American society and to install a kind of proxy leader in 2024 like it did in 2016 will keep Russia at the center of world politics. Our society's own authoritarianism makes Putin's efforts in America somewhat easy. And the only way to resist Russia's gravitational pull on the nations that are circling its orbit is to replace authoritarian confrontations between our opposing political parties and those who passionately embrace their pet ideologies with rational debates and to replace authoritarian attempts to put minority groups "in their place" with real democracy where the equality of these groups is vigorously defended by all. The failure to replace our own authoritarianism with rational dialogues and real democracy is to ensure that today's Russia will be America's future

Killer Vlad

 Being publicly called a killer by the leader of the free world is not an honor sought by many people. And perhaps that is why it was not very much appreciated by this year's recipient, Vladimir Putin. By all of the reports I've seen, Vladimir Putin, leader of Russia, was upset with Biden when he called him a killer. Here, we might want to think of how Steve Urkel's trademark comment, 'Did I do that?' would sound like in a thick Russian accent. So Putin's reaction, though understandable because who wants to be called that in public, did not match the facts on the ground.   Whether via assassination directives or policies, Vlad is a killer.

But why was Putin surprised at Biden's accusation? Was he surprised because, though true, making such a public accusation was considered to be 'bad form.' If so, did Putin consider it bad form because Biden's claim about Putin was like the pot calling the kettle black?

After all, does Putin order the assassination of individuals? Does the US has a drone strike assassination program? Certainly the targets are chosen for different reasons, but the end result of murder is shared.

Has Putin's policies led to the indiscriminate killing of people? Guess who can join him in doing the same? At least every American President I lived under and that goes back to Ike. As for Ike, we really don't think that innocent people were indiscriminately killed in American aided or directed regime changes that brought brutal dictators to both Iran (1953) and Guatemala (1954)?

Though the name 'Killer Vlad' does not have the ring to it for Putin that  'Killer Joe' would have for President Biden, and that might be partially due to the Benny Golson composition (click here for the music), those names would be accurate, real world descriptive monikers for both men. And perhaps that is why to be publicly called out for his killings by Biden seems to have struck a nerve for Vlad.