Article by J.R. Dunn in The American Thinker
Why Would Anybody Back Putin?
We’ve been assured repeatedly lately that nobody on the right supports Vlad the Invader and his inept, ill-planned, and ill-fated invasion of Ukraine. I’ve handled several submissions here at AT saying exactly that in recent days. Would that it were so… but it ain’t.
In truth, there are numerous people, nominally on the right, who are praising, egging on, and making excuses for Putin in his war of conquest against Ukraine. I won’t bother to link to any of them. You’ve no doubt seen them and can provide your own examples.
There seem to be three major elements to the pro-Putin platform.
Putin is defending western civilization. This argument arises from the claim that Putin is a good Christian and has been effectively defending Christendom since his advent as tsar of Russia. Well… all I can say to that is smashing cities, shooting down civilian airliners in times of peace, and nerve-gassing innocent parties doesn’t fit any reading of the Gospels I can think of. Maybe I should take a bible-study course.
The notion of Putin’s “Christianity” seems to arise from his close relationship with the upper ranks of the Russian Orthodox Church. The problem here is that, since it was revived in 1941 in order to aid the war effort, the Orthodox Church has been a wholly-owned subsidiary of the KGB. Those prelates so close to Putin are actually colleagues, members of the worst system for human oppression ever devised. That’s the “Christianity” that Vlad is defending.
Apart from that, unless things have changed drastically, Ukraine is also Christian.
Ukraine is anti-Trump. Many individuals whose knowledge of Ukraine is less than comprehensive labor under the belief that the country is a part of the Clinton and/or Biden crime empires and as such does not deserve support. Now, the Ukrainian government is corrupt in the same way that every former Soviet state is corrupt. But we need to make a distinction – the same as we do in the U.S. – between the government and the people. Because Ukraine has largely been ruled by corrupt ex-Soviet oligarchs, many in cahoots with western would-be oligarchs, is no reason that they should be crushed under Russian tanks. (Quite apart from the fact that Russian corruption makes the Ukrainian variety look like rifling the petty cash drawer.)
There’s another aspect here as well, namely that Volodymyr Zelensky is, on current evidence, not one of these oligarchs, and in fact can be seen as an ally of Donald Trump. Recall that it was a phone call between the two that prompted the first bogus impeachment effort. Recall that Zelensky agreed with Trump and promised to help him out in the Hunter Biden investigation. Recall that Zelensky came to Trump’s defense when the thing blew up.
Secret Bond-villain death labs. The claim here is that Putin started this little war in a humanitarian effort to destroy a series of biolabs of unknown number – QAnon says ten, the China Daily says a lot more -- existing in Ukraine and up to no good, the same way he attacked China to destroy the biolabs there. This has wound down over the past week, largely because there is next to no concrete info on it -- the main sources are Russia, China, and QAnon -- and a more reliable trio cannot be found. (Over to you, Tucker.)
So far, it can be said that labs of some sort may well
exist, but where they are, what they’re doing, and who for is still up
in the air. But if there are any such things, they are without a doubt
relics left over from the Cold War. That is, if Vlad is out to destroy
them, he’s destroying installations constructed by his former bosses.
Again we have another proviso: if you set out to destroy potentially dangerous bioweapons labs, you would of course invade the country with a 190,000-man army spearheaded by helicopter gunships and main battle tank regiments. You would for a full month besiege irrelevant cities, destroy children’s hospitals, massacre helpless old people, and fire missiles at every other possible target but these phantom labs. I mean, wouldn’t you?
No you would not. You would, if you possessed something like, say, the Spetznaz – which I understand that Putin does -- send them in on simultaneous helicopter raids similar in nature to the SEAL attack on Osama bin-Laden’s hideout. You would secure these places, arrest everybody in sight, confiscate all files and electronic gear, and then burn the place out with thermite.
Nothing like this has happened. Because, clearly enough, Putin is not interested.
Ya know what I think? I think all this is just so much cockywocky. I think that twenty years as effective dictator has gone to Vlad’s head. I think that like all such, including Mussolini, Hitler, Stalin, Mao, and Castro, he became convinced that the national stage was too small for him, and just had to strike out. I think he fancied himself as a new Peter the Great, and acted on it. I think he bit off more than he can chew and he’s starting to realize it.
I think that explains all of it. And I don’t think any other justifications, excuses, or fairy tales are necessary.
https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2022/03/why_would_emanybodyem_back_putin.html
