Begin by reading Michael Hudson’s explanation that the sanctions actually fall on Germany and serve the interests of the three interest groups who rule in Washington. The sanctions do far more to serve Washington’s interest than to hurt Russia’s.  For Russia the main burden of the sanctions is the insult.

Russia is in position to issue crippling sanctions against the US and Europe, but so far has not done so.  The Russians seem determined to prevail with as little force as possible. The Kremlin has not paralyzed Germany by turning off the gas. The Russians have not nationalized US and European assets.  The Russians have not disrupted global supply chains by refusing to sell minerals. The Russians have not stopped the export of wheat. The Russians have not issued international arrest orders for American and European war criminals for their crimes against humanity in Serbia, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, Libya, Syria and for their various assassinations.

On the military front, the Ukrainian forces are essentially surrounded and incapable of counterattack or effective resistance except for some Nazi militias that have ensconced their heavy weapons among concentrations of civilians.  Under the Kremlin’s current rules, the Russian forces are prohibited from firing heavy weapons into civilian areas.  The Russians, of course, get no credit for this.  The Western presstitutes continue to repeat fake news of indiscriminate Russian attacks on civilians.

It demonstrates the stupidity of Western people that they believe Russia would waste military resources on non-military targets.  As Putin said, the West “is an empire of lies.” Soon we will be reading in the New York Times and hearing on NPR and CNN that Russian troops are throwing premature babies out of incubators and bayonetting children.

The West yells and screams threats and accusations because it can’t do anything else.  Western morons threaten to send ISIS jihadists into Ukraine to fight Russians, to send in US veterans as volunteers, of raising a mercenary force in Poland.  At the same time we hear Ukraine has stopped the Russian advance and is winning.  So why are all of the fanciful outside forces needed?

The Ukrainian foreign minister, Dmytro Kuleba, calls for the UN to “disarm Russia,” an unimaginable feat. One wonders how Kuleba is a foreign minister when the Ukraine government does not control Ukraine. The French finance minister, Bruno Le Maire, declares “total economic and financial war on Russia,” and is told by Russian Security Council deputy chairman Dmitry Medvedev to “watch his words” or he will end up with a real war.  The idiotic European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen announced that the EU is going to send the Ukrainians jet fighters via Poland, and was promptly contradicted by Poland’s president, Andrej Duda:  “We are not sending any jets to Ukraine because that would open a military interference in the Ukrainian conflict. We are not joining that conflict. NATO is not a party to that conflict.”

Putin has warned NATO countries about supplying arms.  Any such arms shipments would be destroyed in transit.  Russia controls Ukrainian air space. The Ukrainian forces are surrounded.  How are arms to reach them?  Why is the idiot West trying to prolong a lost war?  Why hasn’t the White House told Zelensky to surrender and negotiate the best deal he can get with Russia?

Nowhere in the West’s impotent bluster is there any talk of putting Ukraine in NATO.  Instead, there is talk of putting Ukraine in the EU.  The EU is an economic alliance, not a military one, and it is unclear what it means for a government in exile to be a member.  Ukraine’s future depends on Russia pulling out after she achieves her aims.  

For years I have written that Russia’s patience with the West would not last forever, and unless the West quit pushing, Russia would push back. I said that the longer Russia waited the more forcibly she would have to push.  I said that considering the utter stupidity of the entire Western world, the situation would become dangerous.  With Russia and the US on nuclear alert, the situation is dangerous.  If the US puppets in Europe who rule their countries in Washington’s interest ignore Putin’s warning not to interfere in the Ukrainian house cleaning operation, they could find themselves under attack, and then impotent NATO would have to put up or shut up.  Watch now as the total stupidity of the West–“the empire of lies”– takes it to that point.

The Best of Paul Craig Roberts