The Soviet Union was often described as having huge muscles but a small puny head. Nonetheless, it did have a big mouth: "The emancipation of peoples, assisting nations to build socialism, defending peace on earth, etc…”
With these slogans and others, which were always accompanied by generous weapons shipments, Soviet Moscow spoke to many of the peoples of the world. Some believed its sloganeering, and others pretended to believe it because they needed its help. What is certain, however, is only that only the power of its tongue could compete with the USSR’s armaments.
Conversely, Putin’s Russia has no tongue. Its adventures around the world are not supplemented by any emancipatory claims or attempts to appeal to others with ambitious promises. Russia’s claim is simple: I want to defend my security and eliminate looming threats. Nothing Russia says creates common ground with foreigners, even allies. Its discourse never goes beyond security concerns to address politics, culture, and nation-building. It finds a leader disliked by his people here or there and supports him, making use of his need for this support to build a security outpost in his country.
Putin’s “literature,” or whatever can be extracted from his speeches and statements, indicates admiration for some tyrants in Russia’s history, as well as disdain for people’s attempts to be free. And, of course, Putin’s position on dissidents and the opposition in Russia is the pillar of the ideal model he is promoting.
The scarcity of Russia’s emancipatory promises of all sorts and interpretations and deep ties with others are compensated for with an abundance of tools of death, which range from warplanes to poison tablets, as well as its many operations to distort and falsify reality, hacking and cyber-adventurism, the Wagner Group and other examples of contemporary vanguards of Russian enlightenment. Undermining democratic societies and processes, as well as promoting populist and far-right nationalist leaders are Moscow’s two fixed objectives.
Syrians, from their wretched experience, know this all too well. Beginning seven years ago, Russia began sending their warplanes to Syria, where they established military bases. Among its positive contributions to Syrians’ lives was the wholesale destruction of cities and towns, the killing and displacement of countless civilians and, of course, propping up the Assad regime, which had been crumbling at the time. Despite all of this, are there today any “Putinists” among Assad loyalists? Is there anything Russian that Syrians could identify with or be proud to have obtained? Besides war and weapons, are there any Russian products, technical, cultural or artistic, that Syrians can boast about having encountered or received from Russia?
In attempting to praise Russia’s intervention in Syria, some supporters of the Assad regime cannot conjure any justification but that Moscow is “less dangerous” than Tehran or the “lesser evil” in this case, and its intervention balances Iran’s influence and checks its power. In reality, however, competing with Iran is not a difficult task, and defeating it in such a contest is nothing to brag about.
In this regard, Iran is a very easy opponent.
Russia has amassed a hundred thousand soldiers on its borders with Ukraine. Many politicians and political observers anticipate an invasion of its smaller neighbor and that such a step could ignite a third World War. Moscow claims it will not invade (nor impose Yevhen Murayev as president of Ukraine). However, Russia will not back down from its prohibition on Ukraine joining NATO and claims that this is the “defensive” purpose of its military mobilization.
For a moment, one could suggest that NATO should have been disbanded and replaced by the United States after the Cold War had ended and the Warsaw Alliance was abolished. However, this seemingly valid and fair argument does not answer the central question: What if Russia’s neighbors remain afraid of it, as they always have been, and what if these threatened nations need protection?
In other words, the core issue here is not whether NATO should be sustained (after being weakened by Obama then nearly upended by Trump). At the center of this is Russia itself: its desire to avoid a democratic transition, which renders its “security concern” an intractable phobia that can only be assuaged by depriving its neighbors of any freedom. As for Russia’s neighbors, recently emerging from the colossal prison that was the USSR, their fear and antagonism towards Russia have become a staple of their sense of patriotism, freedom and sovereignty.
Regardless of what will ensue from this ongoing standoff, Russia, in the end, cannot win this war. What Putin’s Moscow is attempting, depriving neighboring peoples of their freedom and will, is the impossible - making it even more impossible is that it has lost its tongue, as well as everything else that goes beyond its muscles.
