THE RUSSIAN CHALLENGE AND THE NATO MANTRA

Dissecting the international upheaval is a challenge. In truth, whether Putin will attack Ukraine I do not really know. I suspect he will push forward because what I do know and have said often is that Russia in the end wants a reemergence under its power the Russian Eastern European block nations before the fall of the Soviet Union. Crimea was first, now it is Ukraine, soon I suspect Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania will be in his sights as is Bulgaria. The Nazi horror Hitler is Putin's teacher. Little by little Hitler emerged as a potent force for the annexation of German hegemony through the appropriation of nations one by one on the pretext of protecting German speaking people. Chamberlain got it wrong. Hitler wanted the whole of Europe and would stop at nothing. The Sudetenland land was first, then Poland, Czechoslovakia and beyond were under German authoritarian aegis. He did not stop at the Sudetenland. Hitler was stopped by Russia because the Russian winter was a prohibitive factor. Make no mistake Hitler wanted Russia too. Hitler wanted the world. The allies and the Russian winter ultimately defeated him before Hitler could have won it all and now our allies must remain united and not repeat the Chamberlain debacle by allowing Putin to gain little by little what he wants by invasion. NATO was designed in the face of Nazi defeat to never let another power reach for global domination. Putin does not want NATO to stop him now. It must not be sanctioned that one nation by merely overpowering other nations surrounding its borders can again do the same just because it wants to. Our NATO allies must hold fast stopping Russian aggression or the west will see a reemergence of the attempt at world domination and authoritarian leadership. We are now at an inflection point. Domestic right wing extremism in our midst makes for a very dangerous situation with a nuclear power flexing its Russian muscle saying do not let NATO or anything else threaten Russian power. The US can play that game too and should flex its own threatening muscle in response. Perhaps extreme sanctions can stop the Russian state. My first inclination is to say no it will not but the NATO powers should remain together saying as NATO's mantra said that an attack on one nation is an attack on all.