This is just one example of millions. Some fêted liberal author. He is getting a some airtime in the Guardian to express his worries about Trump.
In this interview the author presents an argument that Trump “just by existing has prolonged the war”. The argument seems to be that the Kremlin has been hanging on for Trump to get into power because they think he is going to end the war. Had there been no prospect of Trump coming to power the Kremlin would have thrown in the towel. Let’s leave aside the rather horrible attack on Trump’s actual existence. Those of us who thought that liberal politics implied a debate rather than saying the world would be a better place if your opponent did not exist were being somewhat naïve, it seems.
The reason this struck me is it just shows such a total lack of understanding. Firstly; as with most liberals there has been no attempt to understand this from Russia’s point of view. Thus he does not understand that this is existential for Russia. (You could even potentially argue that Russia is mistaken in believing that this is existential for them but this author has not even got to the point where he understands that this is the perception in Moscow). Given that this is existential for Russia, that is their perception, of course they would not give up – short of a victory which removes the existential threat. It has no connection to Trump. Not everything revolves around the US! Beyond that it is just stupid. The Kremlin had no way of knowing that Trump was going to win the Presidential election; so why would they hang on on the off-chance? And, just as blind as the first point; if the author had any idea of the current political situation he would be aware that there is no guarantee at all that Trump is going to be able to end this. The terms that he might be able to offer may fall well short of what the Kremlin needs. Finally; his argument suggests that Russia is just hanging on in the fight by the skin of their teeth. This is observably wrong. It is Kiev which is just hanging on as Russia advances….. It is hard to imagine such stupidity.
The author, blindly, is the one who has been prolonging this war – with his idiotic fund-raising to buy drones for Ukraine. Surely anyone can understand that giving arms to someone who has no way of winning the fight is just going to cause them to bleed more?
The author says: “And they’ve been saying for a year in their [Russian] media that they need Trump to win. ” Hmm. I read mainstream Russian media – the official feed on Russian Yandex. Nope. I have seen nothing like that. Not once. It would be out of character for Russian media to say anything like that. Possibly by “media” he means TV talk shows. I don’t watch talk shows. Maybe some guests have speculated on this theme. But, it certainly is not some kind of official position.
In a tired old way the author tries to link Trump to Russia – he invents a term “Muskotrumpovia” to describe Trump’s Presidency, ostensibly something to do with his relationship with “oligarchs”, but, obviously, a replay of the old smear that Trump is some kind or Kremlin stooge.
On another Guardian article, also providing press for Snyder, by the same journalist he, (the journalist), writes:
Trump’s view of Russia has been a controversial subject ever since he entered presidential politics in 2015; won the White House in 2016 with Russian interference on his behalf; spent two years having his links to Moscow investigated by the special counsel Robert Mueller; and was widely criticized in office for appearing to defer to Vladimir Putin. [1]
This is so cheap! Their two year investigation failed to turn up any evidence of Trump-Russia collusion. So, no worry, we’ll just talk about the “two year investigation” and smear him by inference. As for “defer” – another liberal falsehood which fails when tested against reality. In reality it was under Trump, in about 2018, that the US started supplying arms to Ukraine. Liberal Obama had declined to do so, because he, quite rightly, was worried about what extreme elements in Ukraine could do with them. Trump put just as many, I think more, sanctions on Russia than his predecessor: “Under President Donald Trump, new U.S. sanctions against Russia have been adopted on a nearly monthly basis on the most diverse pretexts, from purely political reasons to considerations of economic competition.”. 2020. [2] The idea of Trump as some kind of Russia buddy is just false. He does, it is true, have a certain style where he likes to believe that he can negotiate based on personal relationships – and the liberals have taken advantage this to invent the “defer to Putin” fake.
The reason I wrote this post was because I was just struck by the level of idiocy which passes for serious comment as evidenced by this “bestselling” liberal author who, amazingly enough is a Yale Professor and an expert in Eastern Europe. The mind simply boggles. The janitors at Yale almost certainly have a better grasp of International Affairs than this man.
Notes