So says Russia’s ambassador to Germany. In the context of Russia’s continuing response to the recent Ramstein meeting—which heralded an escalation of the West’s war against Russia, amid much hate-Russia rhetoric—I find the ambassador’s statements highly significant. The ambassador makes clear references to Germany’s genocidal assault on Russia in WW2—his words are red meat for the Russian public and clearly enunciate Russia’s view that it is engaged in a struggle for its national survival. Well, that’s clear enough from the very words of Western leaders (Cruising Towards WW3?) calling for the “dismemberment” of Russia:
The fact that the escalation of the US led war on Russia was aired in public on German soil at Ramstein could not have provided worse optics.
Further, the ambassador’s reference to “Nazi crimes” plays directly into the stated goals of the Russian Special Military Operation—which includes “De-Nazification.” Historically it was Germany that was the great enabler of Ukro-Nazism. The Red Army fought its way across Ukraine in the Great Patriotic War, ultimately to Berlin, amid unimaginable suffering—unimaginable for Americans—inflicted by the Nazis. The Russian ambassador’s invocation of this history and his statement that Germany has crossed the Rubicon is a clear warning. Germany will not be cut any slack in the coming months:
Germany has ‘crossed red line’ – Russia
There will be no turning back after Berlin supplied arms to kill Russians, Moscow’s envoy says
Germany has crossed a red line with Russia by sending arms to Ukraine, Moscow’s ambassador in Berlin said on Monday. The decision undermined decades of reconciliation since the end of World War II and the Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union, the diplomat added.
“The very fact that the Ukrainian regime is being supplied with German-made lethal weapons, which are used not only against Russian military service members, but also the civilian population of Donbass, crosses the red line,” Ambassador Sergey Nechaev said in an interview with Izvestia newspaper.
He added that Berlin should have known better, “considering the moral and historic responsibility that Germany has before our people for the Nazi crimes.”
“They have crossed the Rubicon,” Nechaev stated, using an idiom for passing the point of no return.
Berlin discarded its longstanding policy of not sending weapons into zones of armed conflict to join the US and other NATO allies in providing weapons to Ukraine. The German government says it has a moral responsibility to back Kiev so it can defend itself against Russia.
Germany also joined an effort by the EU to decouple the economies of member states from Russia’s. German businesses have been relying on cheap Russian natural gas for five decades, since before the Soviet Union collapsed.
The German government “has unilaterally acted to destroy bilateral relations [with Russia] that were unique in scale and depth and had been built over decades,” the Russian ambassador noted. “In essence, the post-war reconciliation of our nations and peoples is being eroded,” Nechaev said.
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Tough to figure out what’s really happening
Mark, my predilection is to agree with your analysis on the war in Ukraine, tactically and strategically. I certainly think the global struggle breaks down around a few big cultural/economic blocs vying for global control, as described by Luoungo et al. But I do hedge my bets. Have the Ukrainians delivered a credible counter offensive as described via battleswarmblog? https://www.battleswarmblog.com/