Adolf Hitler and Vladimir Putin are light years apart in terms of doggedness and daredevilry, but still see what became of the former
By Tiko Okoye
Reactions to last week’s piece were fast and furious. A few correspondents countered that I got it wrong and that it was really me who’s out of touch with reality. Another sought to ‘remind’ me that “Russia is neither Libya nor Iraq and America has met its match in Putin and cannot defeat the combined forces of Russia and China.”
I had indicted the West (including America) in the ninth paragraph of the referenced article, by saying that “the Western world coalesces to (hypocritically) confront any perceived ‘evil’ only when it threatens their existence or their interests.”
My indictment still didn’t dissuade another correspondent from posting a comment that got me madder than the Mad Hatter in “Alice in Wonderland.” Wondered he: “Why has your bias and prejudice garnered from Western media stopped you from seeing things from Putin’s angle? Why vilify him for invading Ukraine to preclude a situation that threatens Russia’s security when America threatened to go to war against the old Soviet Union when it sited a missile base in Cuba in 1961, blah, blah, blah, does the world only belong to America?”
I was considerably equally shaken up to read a correspondent smugly noting that “Russia is busy making more territorial gains on UKRAINIAN soil (caps mine for emphasis) while Ukraine only ‘wins’ in the Western media, hoping on America and NATO to act against their true wishes.”
I seriously wonder how reasonable persons can spew forth such hubris in good conscience. It beggars belief how whatever America did in the past justifies the wanton pummelling and indiscriminate destruction of innocent lives and property of law-abiding, ordinary Ukrainians who are not in the policy-making organ of government and are mainly preoccupied with eking out a living.
Is Irish playwright and social reformer George Bernard Shaw correct when he posits that “There is in man a specific lust for cruelty which infects even his passion of pity and makes it savage”?
Yes, it is true that Ukraine is bleeding very badly, and the haemorrhaging is bound to get much worse. The remarkable resistance of the Ukrainians notwithstanding, this is still a one-sided war. Hundreds, if not yet thousands, of Ukrainian civilians have been reportedly killed, many more wounded and unable to receive appropriate medical care and nearly 1.5 million civilians have fled so far to neighbouring countries, in what is set to be the worst refugee crisis in Europe since WWII. Still, the myth of the unbeatable and almighty Russian army is already dented.
But one comment was loaded with great irony. Posted the correspondent: “It is better to die than to live like a slave, when one has reached a certain level of enlightenment.” The contributor believed he was making a solid argument to ‘justify’ Russia’s invasion of Ukraine against an imagined American ‘oppression,’ without realizing that he was actually arguing the case for the Ukrainians to persevere in their heroic resistance! I was immediately reminded of a narrative told by one Jessica Uchechi Nwanguma.
It was a gripping tale about what became of the the first set of Igbo slaves sold to slave merchants by the Aro Confederacy when they arrived in Savannah, Glynn County, Georgia, USA – along with other enslaved West Africans – on a slave ship aptly named ‘The Wanderer’ in May 1803. They were bought by two slave merchants who resold them to plantation owners on nearby St. Simon’s Island. They were then chained and packed under very unhygienic conditions like sardines under the deck of the coastal vessel named ‘The York’ that was ferrying them to the island.
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But while other slaves timidly accepted their fate, the 75 Igbo slaves – in consonance with their famed resilience, strong will, self-pride and republicanism – revolted. They took control of the ship and sank it, drowning their captors in Dunbar Creek in the process. Legend has it that the ‘Eboes’ preferred death and a marshy grave to a life in captivity, as they stoically marched into the creek singing: “Mmuo mmiri du anyi bia, mmuo mmiri ga-edu anyi laghachi,” which in English language means: “The water spirit that led us all the way here will lead us back home.”
So much so for those gloatingly calling on President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to resign in order to prevent a Russian-induced collective suicide, even as the Ukrainian leader has surprised everyone, including Putin, by rising to the occasion from a stand-up comedian to a Churchillian colossus.
At the risk of sounding pedantic, let me say without fear or favour that the principal reason why Russia invaded Ukraine has nothing to do with the encroachment of the NATO military alliance, but everything to do with confiscating its abundant natural resources. Were it otherwise, Russia would’ve started by invading relatively tiny and more vulnerable ex-Soviet neighbours, now-NATO members – Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania – that contiguously sit on its western border.
America meeting its match in Putin? NATO not being able to defeat the combined force of Russia and China? No disrespect intended, Adolf Hitler and Vladimir Putin are light years apart in terms of doggedness and daredevilry, but still see what became of the former. And while China might seem to condone the Ukrainian invasion without demur, as it similarly has its gun sights on Taiwan, President Xi Jinping is a very smart Alec who knows only too well the enormous sacrifices China made to move from an impoverished, shit-hole third-world to becoming the second largest economy in the world within 50 years. He most definitely has no appetite to plunge China back to Stone Age by engaging in someone else’s military misadventures.
I hardly knew whether to cry or guffaw when some critics interpreted what they saw as America’s decision to “shout from the distance” and “refusal to send troops to Ukraine and declare (the Ukrainian air space) a no-fly zone as it (imperiously) did in Libya and Iraq” as ‘incontrovertible’ evidence that “America is afraid of Putin.” Unfortunately, it seems that Putin himself believes these obvious falsehoods hence he has rebuffed all the climb-downs the NATO military alliance has made as signs of ‘weakness.’
Don’t we consider it strange that the same mad people who engage in all sorts of crazy stuff are not brain-fried enough to leap into the path of a fast-moving locomotive train or trailer? The way things currently stand, it would be suicidal for Putin to pick a fight with the NATO military alliance. The latter reportedly outspends Russia 15:1 in a conventional conflict; has a 4:1 advantage in ground troops; 5:1 advantage in combat aircraft; and 6:1 advantage of warships. Don’t just take my word for it; fact-check publications by the widely renowned Jane’s Information Group.
Let no one threaten the rest of us with nuclear armament that will be “the end of humanity and all civilisation.” Russia doesn’t have a monopoly of warheads. Besides, who has more to lose – the developed world, including Russia, Europe and America or the third-world shit-hole countries in Africa? Humanity once ended in the time of Noah through flooding, and God raised another set of mankind – just as He’s bound to do should ours end by way of a nuclear cataclysm.
Now this: The US is reportedly working out a deal with Poland to donate its 28 Russia-made MiG-29 military aircraft to Ukraine in exchange for a fresh set of American-built F-16s. What if an imperious Putin judges this as an act of war and attacks Poland? Suppose further that some American troops stationed there as part of NATO contingent are killed. This would definitely be a game changer as it is bound to trigger a turnaround in the American public opinion – just as in 1941 – and those who mealy-mouthed WWIII would have their wish graciously granted.
Let me end with a post I espied on a friend’s Facebook wall. The post starts with a question: “What is War?” It then goes on to say: “Bombs That Cost $100,000 Dropping From A Plane That Costs $100,000,000 Flying At A Cost Of $40,000 Per Hour To Kill People Living Under $10 A Day.” A sad, silly and tragic reality, won’t you agree?
