Putin is an asshole, part 2

In the Russia-Ukraine conflict, there’s no argument about who the biggest asshole is.  It’s Putin, undeniably, no question about it.

Invading a country unprovoked is a big fucking deal.  It’s an even bigger deal when it’s a neighboring country.  And an even bigger deal when you are a nuclear power, and just before the invasion you conduct very public tests of missiles capable of carrying nuclear warheads, and then announce to the entire world that anybody who stands in your way will suffer consequences that they have never seen before.

For those things alone, Putin should be arrested, tried for war crimes, and locked up forever.

And so far, it’s been pretty interesting to see how united the rest of the world has been in their response.  Almost immediately, the international community banned Russia from the system used for international financial transactions.  The entire European Union banned Russian flights from their air space.  Trillions of dollars of Russian assets, both government-owned and privately held, have been frozen.  At least a dozen countries have stepped up to deliver military supplies to Ukraine.  All of that will have an impact.

And then there’s the public opinion around the globe that quickly coalesced against Putin.  Regular citizens from countries all over the world have expressed their solidarity and support for the Ukrainian people.  Even countries that don’t give a shit about Russia invading Ukraine – like China, Iran, and North Korea – have been, at least, pretty quiet. 

And you know who else doesn’t seem too keen on what Putin is doing?  The Russian people.  A pretty large majority of them disapprove of the invasion of Ukraine.  That is likely to get worse.  The Russian stock market crashed by 35% overnight after the invasion, and the Russian currency lost close to half its value.  Imagine if that happened here in the U.S.  Your Subaru Outback now costs you $65,000, your iPhone is now $2,000, and if you were two years away from retirement, now you’re 10 years away, assuming your 401(k) was invested in the stock market.  There would be a lot of really pissed off people, and, in a democracy, that would be the end of that presidency.  Russia isn’t exactly a democracy, so I can’t imagine Putin faces the same kind of dilemma, but perhaps he’s more sensitive to domestic public opinion than I think.

It will be interesting to see how much time he can buy before he starts to feel that pressure.  The western media is making a big deal out of the fact that, thanks to the brave resistance of the Ukrainian army, Putin didn’t get the quick victory he expected.  Didn’t get a quick victory?  It’s been less than a week.  If he gets a victory in two weeks, or three weeks, isn’t that still pretty quick?  It took the U.S. 43 days to wrap up Desert Storm in Iraq in 1991, and everyone thought that was quick.  Personally, I think Putin still has some time before any of us can argue that it’s taking too damn long.

Back to the “Putin is an asshole” thing.  For those of you who don’t know, I served in the American embassy in Moscow for two years, from 2002 – 2004, during the early years of Putin’s presidency.  My role there was more managerial than political, but as you can imagine, every role is political to some degree when you work for the U.S. government in Moscow.

Let me say this… Russians take being an asshole to a whole new level.  Yes, there are exceptions to that rule – I had Russian friends there who are good people.  But when Russians want to be assholes, they have a talent for it that surpasses any group of people I’ve ever encountered, anywhere in the world.  It infuses every aspect of their culture and their identity.  I recall early in my Russian language training in Washington, DC an incident where I gently bumped elbows with my teacher as I was entering the classroom.  I casually said “Sorry” and she responded, in her thick Russian accent, “Why sorry?  You did not kill my cat.”  And she was a sweet lady.  But Russians literally don’t have a concept for being sorry for small things.  Interestingly, they also don’t have a concept for fun.  The word “fun” has no translation into the Russian language.  Think about that the next time you see Putin with that permanent scowl on his face.

So yeah, Russians have mastered the artform of assholery. And Putin is the biggest asshole of them all.  If you walk away from this column with nothing else, get crystal clear on at least one thing.  Putin didn’t decide to invade Ukraine a week ago.  He decided months ago, perhaps years ago.  When he was amassing troops on the Ukraine border last week, but saying that he wasn’t planning to invade, it was a big fucking lie -- just one of the many lies he has told.  Planning an invasion of this magnitude takes months, not days or weeks.  Having the troops in place is not the only thing you need.  Strategies and battle plans have to be drawn up – where you’re going to attack, what cities you’re going to take first, what infrastructure you’re going to destroy.  Supplies have to be prepped – everything from missiles, bombs, and ammo to fuel and food.  More importantly, resupply logistics have to be in place for when you run out of all those things in a hostile country.  So you can’t just put 150,000 troops on your neighbor’s border on Monday and tell the world that you have no intention of invading, and then invade on Friday.  It’s simply not credible.  There’s too much shit that needs to happen, and it doesn’t happen in a week.

Russia and Ukraine are meeting, as I write this, to discuss a possible resolution to this conflict.  I have no insights into what the outcome will be, but knowing what an asshole Putin is, I’m certainly not optimistic that it will result in a quick and lasting peace.  So here’s my advice to the president of Ukraine.  Go in with two demands.  One – get your fucking army out of my fucking country, you fucking asshole.  And two – suck my balls.  Literally.  This shit isn’t over, motherfucker, until my big Ukrainian balls are in your Russian mouth.