Russian President Vladimir Putin may hope to punish NATO by destroying Ukraine’s military infrastructure or to install a puppet government in the country. But his real reason for invading Ukraine is far less pragmatic and even more alarming.
NEW YORK – Russian President Vladimir Putin’s decision to order a full-scale invasion of Ukraine defies any and all political logic, even his own hardened authoritarian reasoning. With his unprovoked assault, Putin joins a long line of irrational tyrants, not least Joseph Stalin, who believed that sustaining his power required a constant expansion of it. That logic led Stalin to commit horrific atrocities against his own people, including causing a famine that starved millions of Ukrainians to death.
Another twentieth-century mass murderer, Mao Zedong, famously declared that political power grows out of the barrel of a gun – or, it seemed, a nuclear missile. Mao demanded that my great-grandfather, Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev, provide China with nuclear weapons, so that Mao could effectively hold his adversaries, foreign and domestic, hostage.
Read more: https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/putin-irrational-invasion-of-ukraine-by-nina-l-khrushcheva-2022-02?utm_source=Project%20Syndicate%20Newsletter&utm_campaign=77ddb1b92b-sunday_newsletter_02_27_2022&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_73bad5b7d8-77ddb1b92b-105619693&mc_cid=77ddb1b92b&mc_eid=d1555471f3&barrier=accesspaylog
NEW YORK – Russian President Vladimir Putin’s decision to order a full-scale invasion of Ukraine defies any and all political logic, even his own hardened authoritarian reasoning. With his unprovoked assault, Putin joins a long line of irrational tyrants, not least Joseph Stalin, who believed that sustaining his power required a constant expansion of it. That logic led Stalin to commit horrific atrocities against his own people, including causing a famine that starved millions of Ukrainians to death.
Another twentieth-century mass murderer, Mao Zedong, famously declared that political power grows out of the barrel of a gun – or, it seemed, a nuclear missile. Mao demanded that my great-grandfather, Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev, provide China with nuclear weapons, so that Mao could effectively hold his adversaries, foreign and domestic, hostage.
Read more: https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/putin-irrational-invasion-of-ukraine-by-nina-l-khrushcheva-2022-02?utm_source=Project%20Syndicate%20Newsletter&utm_campaign=77ddb1b92b-sunday_newsletter_02_27_2022&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_73bad5b7d8-77ddb1b92b-105619693&mc_cid=77ddb1b92b&mc_eid=d1555471f3&barrier=accesspaylog