This is No Time
to Ease Up on Putin (Gazeta Wyborcza, Poland)
"The West can liaise with an authoritarian Russia, but not at the expense of the independence and territorial integrity of the countries of Europe. Tightening the screws on Putin is for now less risky to us than consenting to a watering down of these principles. Moscow has already shown how painful it is when she takes advantage of our weaknesses."
After the Russian president's address one is appalled to ask:
if Putin won't start to bite harder now, when will sanctions and economic trouble
drive him into a corner? Won't someone worse come to power after him?
Putin menaces Russians, mainly Kremlin elites - telling them
that the West is not only after Ukraine but a change of power in Moscow. Putin's
false image of reality creates involuntary spokesmen in the West who ask,
"Is it wise to bait a madman?”
None
of this true, though. The West will withdraw economic sanctions when Moscow once
and for all halts its transfer of weapons and troops to Donbass
and honestly supports the ceasefire. The West doesn't covet Crimea nor does it
need an upheaval in the Kremlin. Moreover, this thesis about the crisis, which
would quickly trigger turmoil in Moscow, stinks of exaggeration. The crisis
isn't so deep, Putin is not insane, and his power is not so shaky.
Posted By Worldmeets.US Dec. 19
War in Ukraine sealed the end of the post-Cold War era when
Russia opened up to integration with the Western world, although often on
speciously conceived principles. The West's pliancy and gullibility in offering
Putin a "second chance" accelerated the erosion of post-Cold War
rules. Russia torpedoed Kiev's rapprochement with the E.U. because for too long,
the West consented to the post-Soviet sphere of influence. When the war began
in Ukraine, Europe refrained from economic sanctions - even after the
annexation of Crimea. It only reacted when Putin sent his army into Donbass.
The West can liaise with an authoritarian Russia, but not at
the expense of the independence and territorial integrity of the countries of
Europe. Tightening the screws on Putin is for now less risky to us than consenting
to a watering down of these principles. Moscow has already shown how painful it
is when she takes advantage of our weaknesses.
None
of this true, though. The West will withdraw economic sanctions when Moscow once
and for all halts its transfer of weapons and troops to 
