[goldstategop]

A normal Russia is not a threat to the world order.

We had a lot to fear from the Soviet Union. We face no such threat from Russia.

[Magnatron]

goldstategop wrote:

"We had a lot to fear from the Soviet Union. We face no such threat from Russia."

I'm not so sure. In hindsight, I think we may have jointly hyper-ventalated ourselves into some ridiculous standoffs and imaginary threats. In the end, they didn't want to fight any more than we did. That's not to say that Stalin wasn't an a**hole to his people, but unfortunately, that's not our business.

Prior to the communist takeover, the United States and Russia were great friends. Hell, Buffalo Bill Cody even escorted the Russian prince on a wild west excursion. I think our peoples have a lot more in common than we don't, and I say again, it's idiotic that we're enemies.

[nathanbedford]

Russia, along with China and aggressive Islam constitutes an existential threat to the United States not because of its conventional weapons but because it is a superpower possessed of nuclear weapons and is strategically situated to upset the world balance of power and America's strategic alliances.

We see Russia expanding its aggressions from Georgia to the Crimea to Eastern Ukraine into the Black Sea and along an Islamic crescent to Syria and a port on the Mediterranean. In the polar regions Russia is claiming sole rights to minerals, mimicking the Chinese in the South China Sea. In the polar regions and in Europe generally, the Russians are testing NATO out with provocative incidents in the air.

Russia is aiding and abetting Iran even more than Obama. In return, Russia gains participation in a new axis consisting of Iran, portions of Iraq, Syria and naval elements described above. This axis is already armed with intercontinental ballistic missiles and nuclear warheads owned by the Russians and soon to be duplicated by the Iranians. Thus, the entire balance of power in the Middle East will be altered, indeed already turned on its head in the critical oil-producing regions of the world.

Generally, Putin's game in the West is the same as Stalin's, to cut a deal with Germany as that mass murderer did in the Hitler/Stalin pact which precipitated World War II. He seeks to intimidate weak Western consumers of energy into positions of neutrality thus wrecking NATO and leaving the way open to exerting pressure individually against weak, unaligned but rich Western countries.

Looking eastward, Putin has striven to cut a deal with the Chinese who are already cooperating in some respects with the new axis in Syria but who, if combined with Russia, would constitute a terribly dangerous threat to the United States indeed.

In advancing all of these ploys, Putin has shown himself willing to murder and plunder his own country, he is a thug who has enriched himself even as he has empowered himself. He has murdered his way to power.

The United States of America has very much indeed to fear from present-day Russia. The reality does not change simply because someone without any hands-on experience who has yet to demonstrate any serious understanding of world affairs applauds Putin. When it comes to national security, genuflecting is not smart.