In every age and in every culture governments are contrived to steal from the country people in order to give the plunder to the city people. City people usually outnumber the country people but are not as productive. They imagine that they are, of course. The rich always think that it is they who hold civilization together. But aside from those few instances in which gang labor is necessary for manufacturing, most of the industrial support for society comes from the craftsmanship performed in the small village. The cities remain as places of congregation for parasites, but because they outnumber the country folk, they can field the larger army for purposes of plunder.
Consequently, since biblical times as we are told in the story of Gideon (Judges 6), country folk either hide their harvest or leave it in the fields to be harvested as needed. Tubers, such as carrots, turnips, potatoes, Jerusalem Artichokes – there are many – can be left in the field unharmed by the cold of winter, especially if they are mulched. Pits can be dug and cleverly covered to camouflage the storage of grains. Thieves are too lazy to dig it up for themselves.
It is usually wise for the peasant to have some produce stored in the barn, so that the plunderer will take some and leave thinking that he got it all. A peasant can gauge the justness of the ruler if he only confiscates what he needs and uses care to leave some for the peasant. If he does not leave any, then the peasants know they must raise an army because they will not survive the next season of confiscation.
Ukrainian famine survivors learned this the hard way during the Stalin-era purges. Soviet Commissars wondered why the peasants still remained plump after the repeated pillaging. Stalin had a spy network and figured out what was happening. A true famine set in when the Ukrainians were not allowed to work the fields for a new growing cycle; they were taken over by the collectivist farms.. In other words, the Ukrainian famines were the result of a state-sponsored genocide. Had they not been rescued by the Germans, they would have perished from the face of the earth.
[The famine did not end in 1933, except in Soviet propaganda. The eastern provinces were depopulated because of the famine and then repopulated by the Soviets with ethnic Russians. I realize that the Nazi component complicates the representation of that period and contaminates our understanding that the oppressions and retributions before, during, and after World War 2 are no different than that of any other war. Young, impressionable American soldiers who liberated the camps were not able to understand the historical context. If a justification for genocide is lacking, one will be invented. That is why the naïveté (or perhaps hubris) of American Jews has put them and the State of Israel in danger. Nazism has been replaced by other ideologies that will vilify them.]
The current Russian War of Aggression against the Ukraine has placed its people into a desperate struggle for survival. Western pundits do not know this. They think it is a nice little war to generate profits for the military/industrial complex and that peace can be declared at anytime.
Anti-war pundits point to the pre-war provocations against the eastern Russian-speaking provinces as justification for the Russian invasion. And it is true that the Atlanticists inflamed ethnic animosities between the eastern and western provinces by its ill-conceived coup in 2014 against the legitimately elected pro-Russian government.
But it is a myopic misreading of the situation not to take into account the atrocities committed by the Russians against the Ukrainian people before, during and after World War 2. The bitterness of that cruelty is within the living memory of many of its people and cannot be dismissed as irrelevant. Without the coup, democratic means could have been used to balance the situation, and failing that, a regional coalition between Poland, Romania and the Balkan States could have provided sufficient counter-measures. The State Department inspired coup has forced the issue into a situation which can only be resolved by force-of-arms.
So, now, here we are.
The early years of every conflict create a sorting-out process to identify and remove the incompetent leadership and then to learn a winning strategy. Information from the front has now gone dark because officers in the field realize that the political leadership is playing both sides in a quest to prolong the war – never to win it – in order to maximize profits and graft.
Ukrainian generals are contesting the Crimea. Ultimately, it is the only prize of the war. Once Russia is forced to defend it, local militias can contest its control of the other eastern provinces. Currently, Ukrainian troops have secured a southern position on the eastern banks of the Dnieper. It is the only area with high ground sufficient to provide tactical advantage. The New York Times has bewailed the maneuver as a “Russian trap.” Either they are stupid or do not really want Ukraine to win. Why else is Putin suddenly interested in peace negotiations? The Russians are slowly losing their control of the battlefield.
There will probably be over a million Ukrainian casualties before this is done. The blood will drip from the hands of the U.S. State Department. But they will get what they want: Putin will be “retired” from power and the Kremlin will be captured by the hardliners and Communists.
Then, the escalation and expansion of the war will be pursued in earnest.
Measure this process in months, not years.
— JWS, Christmas Eve, 2023
P.S. Below is a picture of my 1/8 acre carrot patch in North Idaho. I live above the 44th Parallel in the high country. It looks like a field of weeds, doesn’t it? But beneath its surface are thousands of yummy carrots that I harvest throughout the winter during intermittent thawing periods. I’ve done the same with my Jerusalem Artichokes and beets. My potato crop was a failure this year.
“Bowser” is the name of the dog in the picture. He is my happy escort every time I go out to work in the gardens.
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