Once he drives a taxi, today Vladimir Putin directs soldiers in the direction of Ukraine. But how can the West pacify the head of the Kremlin again? In any case, says Vladimir Kaminer, Olaf Schulz should not save on phone costs.
One column is not enough Vladimir Putin Being able to understand, says internet columnist Vladimir Kaminer. Because the phenomenon of the Russian president is like a successful TV series. The first season now follows the sequel to the popular Russian film „President Putin”. Please sit down …
Brief summary of last season’s events:
after drowning Soviet Union The leadership of Russia will be handed over by the former deputy head of the State Construction Service, Boris Yeltsin, accepted. He cannot rule the country in the long run, mainly due to his lack of drinking discipline.
(Coyle: dpa/Frank May) Vladimir Kaminer Writer and columnist. He was born in Moscow in 1967 and has lived in Germany for more than 30 years. Among his most famous booksRussian discoHis latest book was recently published.Surfer. Stories from the new Germany„.
His health is deteriorating. In the Kremlin A desperate search for a successor is underway, and the various interest groups, also known as the „Kremlin towers”, are unable to come to an agreement. Collective leadership is out of the question, and the unity of the Russian Federation is in danger. At a secret meeting, the warring parties agreed that Yeltsin’s successor should be a man of the people, someone whom no one knew, who could not take sides and could not rely on any interest group.
Preferably a former Security Officer with a high level of drinking, discipline and experience abroad. With the collapse of the Soviet Union, many state security officers became unemployed, and had great difficulty finding a job in the new. Russia to find your way. Major Putin, a German-speaking intelligence officer who was responsible for foreign espionage, is trying to do business in Saint Petersburg, and in the evening he drives a taxi in his private car.
One evening, a strange guest got into his car and proposed to become the successor to the ailing president. At first, Putin did not believe in his luck, but accepted the offer. He sees his mission as establishing the state in the new capitalist world. But the US-dominated world does not want to see Russia as an equal partner. After several unsuccessful attempts at rapprochement, the chief decides to go his way – and searches for a shortcut to ancient glory. He gets the old taxi out of the garage and takes people on an adventurous ride. The slogan is „Back to the future”.
Season Two: War and Peace
For the sake of truth, something must be said at this point: since the Russian president was taking on this new dangerous role, focusing on the confrontation with the West, interest in Russia, Putin himself and his ambiguous Russian spirit increased significantly. . Suddenly, American opinion-forming magazines voted him the most powerful man in the world, the Prince of Darkness, someone who holds the reins everywhere.
Whether the presidential election in United States of AmericaPolitical unrest in Nigeria, unrest in Venezuela or rising gas prices in Europe: Moscow’s „invisible hand” is seen everywhere, sowing fear and confusion. This is how things work suddenly with the West. The more honest you show yourself, the better.
Putin wants to prevent NATO from recruiting new members, regards Russia’s neighbors as its vassals, doesn’t take Europe’s borders seriously, and has sometimes dropped one or two American satellites from orbit. – Not bad to start with.
Who is the man with the iron fist? This was the headline in the newspapers of the free world. What does he want? Is it the new Russian tsar, who is helping a crumbling empire get on its feet, or is an outdated despot trying to cling to power with his last ounce of power? How dangerous are his threats and who can calm him down? Joe BidenAnd Emmanuel MacronAnd Boris Johnson? or even Olaf Schulze?
Unfortunately, Merkel is gone
Mrs. Merkel could understand him better, but she is no longer in office, she retired early, although she is two years younger than Putin. For Putin, retirement is not an option. And 2022 seemed to be a hot year for him, a year of success. On New Year’s Eve, Putin almost went to war with them Ukraine seem. Experts agreed that there were already more than 100,000 soldiers stationed on the border with Ukraine, and that things were about to begin.
The war in eastern Ukraine since the annexation Generous Russian army units did not actually stop in 2014, but it was a quiet, almost silent war for the West. One could easily dismiss it as an internal conflict between the two brotherly peoples, a small civil war, so to speak.
Sergey Lavrov and Annalina Barbuk: Germany and Russia should talk, talk and talk, recommends Vladimir Kaminer. (Source: Alexei Mashev)
Now he is threatening to raise his voice. NATO promises to help the Ukrainians, but everyone knows that NATO is a paper tiger, perhaps suitable for humanitarian missions but not for combat missions. A superficial comparison shows how asymmetric forces are: Russia has 150 tactical battalions, NATO has four, one in each of the three Baltic republics and one in Poland.
To do this, NATO has a developed plan 30 + 30 + 30 + 30, which means that it can move 30 battalions east within 30 days. On the other hand, the Russian army is able to mobilize more than 100 units in a very short time. The West is on the phone with the Russian President, the plan is most likely to delay hostilities as much as possible, because the end of January is actually the deadline for the start of the winter campaign.
„Continuation of diplomacy by other means”
He also sits Climate change For a lasting peace, temperature fluctuations do not actually lead to the freezing of fields and lakes, and artillery and tanks cannot be used. Meanwhile, Putin’s units were on a peacekeeping mission Kazakhstan Busy, but soon it can become hot again on the Ukrainian border.
On schedule at the start of the new year, the five „official” nuclear powers promised never to wage nuclear war, such a war would mean the end of the planet. Has our world become more peaceful as a result? number. At the same time, such a decision justifies all other non-nuclear wars as legitimate, as „the continuation of diplomacy by other means,” as the Prussian military strategist Karl von Clausewitz once said.
Russian taxi driver Putin realized the weakness of the West: the price of human life is non-negotiable here, every life is the highest value in our society and every dignity is inviolable. But sometimes the unconditional continuation of life is associated with a loss of dignity, a secret that everyone knows. This makes the West easy to blackmail.
According to the predictions of the Chinese zodiac, 2022 is the year of the water tiger. Self-confidence, a thirst for adventure and a willingness to take risks are required, not exactly qualities that the West excels at.
So what do you do? We have to call Putin more, have longer conversations, in English, French and German, and not have to worry about phone costs. The topic does not matter, the main thing is to keep talking. Because next year will be the year of the rabbit, then we’ll be someone else again.
The opinions expressed in guest contributions reflect the opinion of the authors and do not necessarily align with those of the online editorial team.
