They have not suddenly become crazy, they are and have always been crazy.
Had we taken them out after Germany during WWII, all this would have been avoided, but a some point, in perhaps the near future, we will need to take care of long delayed business.
Diplomacy is only a means to exploit for them, and it's about time that we, and the rest of the West accept it, and deal with it.
N. Korea and Iran all already agitating in support, and very soon you will see the players emerge on the field.
They think they’ve got the west over a barrel - of oil. And apparently they do, because the EU response has been, “let’s not do anything to make them mad”.
Its not just Iran. The left in this country, with the media’s complicity, has hamstrung our ability to project a threat to our enemies. What they observe after seeing the trumped up size of groups like Code Pink and ANSWR, is that the Americans are week and are in no mood for confrontation. These idiots have not only emboldened the Islamists, they have emboldened the Bear and other enemies like Venezuela.
People look at me when i call the Dems traitors. They are a significant threat the well being of yourself and your children and family. Part of me wants to do like John Galt, and stop doing anything to assist these morons. Let all the “carriers” watch the “carried” starve to death or be eaten by our advesaries.
Putin is a criminal & cares nothing for the lives of his people or others. He's on the Power & Money trip that most strongmen practice - see Mugabe, Mao, Castro, Hitler, etc.
He knows he has a stalemate re. nuclear weapons. As much as he fears a nuclear war, the West fears it so much more.
He also knows GWB is a very lame duck, rarely even making the news. Condi Rice looks & acts like a disappointed school teacher..., oh, she is. The new President will need several months to assess the situation & react, leaving Putin & others time to do more land grabs.
Add to this the dependency of Europe for Russian oil & gas, plus the Russian Veto in the UNSC, & Putin is holding the winning hand.
The West has once again proved its impotence, & Putin is now free to absorb the Baltic States & Ukraine, while extorting NATO countries to sit by & watch passively, & pay for it, too. Short of attacking a NATO country directly, Putin is free to roam.
If GWB had put the country on high alert & flooded the Georgia airspace with US planes, Putin would have backed off. Instead, the NATO hand wringers have convinced many that NATO is just a bluff!
I used to think the same as you. Why doesn't Russia see the threat to itself from China and Iran? But I think the answer is that Russia is not a part of Europe. It is more Asiatic than European. And to the Slovophiles, Russia is a unique continent to itself, neither a part of Europe nor Asia.
In the 3rd centure AD, the Roman emperor Constantine moved the capital from Rome to Constantinople in the more prosperous east of the empire. Constantinople became the New or Second Rome. That Second Rome converted the Russians to Eastern Orthodox Christianity. When Constantinople fell to the Turks in the 15th century, Moscow thought that it was now the Third Rome. Even the ruling family took the name Romanoff.
Russia has a long history of ruling an empire under a Tsar. (This word Tsar derives from the Latin Caesar via the German Kaiser.) Many Russians still think that it is their destiny to rule a great empire. The Soviet Union was only the last version of that empire. Putin is simply trying to revive the Russian empire.