Saturday 16 August 2008

Is the world going mad?

I went over to the local supermarket today and was really surprised by the newspaper headlines stating that Russia was about to nuke Poland. Now, my geography is not the best, but I was sure that Poland was nowhere near Georgia, I was unaware that they were involved in that conflict and anyway, the news last night was reporting that a ceasefire had been agreed. However, on closer inspection I discovered that it was nothing to do with Russia's Georgian holiday. It’s all to do with the former Soviet satellite state, Poland, joining NATO and having US missiles on its territory.

It seems that the Russians are a little unhappy with this as it makes them feel threatened. Or do they feel threatened because they are concerned that if they invade another country in the way that they have with Georgia, there is now a potential military response nearby.

It has been said on various news programmes today that it looks as if the Cold War is back, and with all the rhetoric that is being used, it does. Although the 'Warsaw Pact' broke up in the early 1990s with the coming down of the Berlin Wall, it seems that democracy has not infected all Russians, particularly those in power.

Is it possible that the Russians are concerned about internal security, particularly the fact that the South Ossetians may want unification with the (Russian) North Ossetians, or is it, as some believe, that the Russians are using this to send veiled threats to the former Warsaw Pact nations to say that if they look to the West, rather than the East, they (the Russians) will not be happy.

But what do they expect. Bear in mind that the Warsaw Pact countries were puppet states of the Russians/Soviet Union. Poland, for example, was invaded from the East by the Soviets at the same time that they were fighting the Germans in the West in 1939. And as for Ukraine (another of the countries that has annoyed Russia by wanting to join NATO), look at what happened when the Soviet Army re-occupied the country after it had been under German control during World War 2. At the end of the War, there was no democratically elected Government in an of the Warsaw Pact countries, they were all appointed by the Soviets.

The biggest problem is that Russia is using the playground bully tactics that it has used since the days of the Tsars, which in this day and age tend not to work. Perhaps they think that as most of the 'old' NATO countries are too busy in the warmer, sandier climes, they can get away with it. Maybe they will, as the USA appears to be going soft, or at least some of its publishers are.

It was also in the news last week that an author has been told by her publishers that they are not going to publish her latest book, about Muhammad's wife, because it may upset Muslims. So much for the Americans' freedom of speech. It seems to me ridiculous that people are so worried about upsetting people of any religion. We live in a world that, to a large extent, has freedom of thought and expression. This means that if I wish to believe that the Supreme Being is a one-eyed, six-eared purple munchkin, I can. But it also means that anyone who disagrees with me can do so with impunity.

A good example is the Catholic Church, which was unhappy about the Da Vinci Code, but they put forward their objections in a civilised manner (after all, they abolished the Inquisition in 1834). Did it stop the publishers from distributing the book? Or the film makers from releasing the film? No. But then the Catholic Church wasn't likely to send suicide bombers to the offices of the publishers in the way that the extremists of the 'Religion of Peace' would.

Maybe that's what Russia should do. If it became the Islamic Republic of Russistan, no-one would annoy it!

No comments: