Vladimir Putin's policies in Ukraine are not part of an attempt to expand Russia's empire westwards. He is simply trying to reduce the chaos caused by the massive incompetence of Ukraine's ruling elite, writes Fyodor Lukyanov, editor of the journal Russia in Global Affairs.

The events in Ukraine look different when seen from Moscow rather than from other European capitals. European TV channels show spirited faces of young people from Maidan and aggressive riot police attacking the demonstrators. Russian TV shows militants from the opposition attacking police, ruined buildings, and piles of garbage in the streets. These are two dimensions of one reality, but each side sees only one.

There is a widespread view in the West that Vladimir Putin is afraid of what is happening in Ukraine because it can serve as an example for the Russian opposition. This is a very simplified view. The Russian president draws parallels between developments in Kiev and the situation in Russia, but he sees them as confirmation that he is right.

In his view, unrest must be suppressed before it turns into a huge fire. Unrest produces nothing but chaos. A weak state drives itself into a trap. Once a state falters, external forces will charge through the breach and start shattering it until it falls. The West is destructive. It is either unable to understand the complexity of the situation and acts in a primitive way, designating "good" and "bad" players, or it deliberately destroys undesirable systems. The result is always the same - things get worse. The desire to limit Russian influence and hinder Moscow's initiatives is the invariable imperative of the Western policy.

However, as in the case of Syria, it is not a personal matter. Yanukovych is a legitimate president of a sovereign state. If external forces are allowed to delegitimise him, let alone remove him from power, this would violate the basic principle of international relations. Therefore, Moscow will not deny Yanukovych (and Syria's Bashar al-Assad) its support - although it is well aware of his weaknesses, the fragility of the situation, and the risk of his removal from power.

Moscow believes that regime change would thrust Ukraine into anarchy and that it may collapse as a state in the end. It considers the Ukrainian political class, regardless of its political views, irresponsible and unprofessional. Ukrainian "peacetime" politics is reduced to endless intrigues of oligarchic groups, which
For the past 20-plus years, the Ukrainian elite has failed to build a capable and firm state, although after the Soviet Union's break-up, Ukraine was considered perhaps the most promising country among the post-Soviet states.

However, the rule of the "Orange" coalition in 2005-2010 was an example of utter incompetence. There is no reason to believe that another "pro-Western" government will be more effective, especially considering the leaders of the protests. They do not control the turmoil of the riot, but are only trying to keep up with it.

The nation has not become a unified whole, and attempts to shake the status quo and force Ukraine to make a final choice in favour of the EU or Russia deepen the division. The west of the country has a clear identity, but it does not have an economy of its own. The east has an economic base, but it lacks a distinct identity.

Today Moscow is not seeking the collapse of Ukraine and is taking no special steps in this direction. But if the internal conflict escalates, Russia may opt to establish closer contacts with pro-Russian regions in eastern and south-eastern Ukraine. Russia is confident that the West's interference and unilateral support for the opposition brings such a scenario closer.

Putin fears chaos. The main driving force behind his policy towards Ukraine will be not a desire for expansion, but a desire to reduce the risk of chaos spilling into Russia. To this end, anything goes - both defensive and offensive means.


----

This seems like an accurate assessment of Putin's position in my view.

Dear Greg,

You should read the following article to inform your perspective on Mr Putin:

http://www.christianorder.com/editorials/editorials_2013/editorials_oct13.html

The unsearching mind could consider Obama sincere, but that is certainly not the case. So it is with Mr Putin. These madmen play power chess with peoples and nations!

Here is another insightful article:

http://www.thenewamerican.com/world-news/europe/item/8778-gorbachev-charm-offensive

God bless!

Also, I have to wonder if Putin fears the Socialists or Communists gaining ground. It could be that the Socialists or Marxists are partly behind the riots in the Ukraine, but that's just a guess based on their ability to foment anarchy rather well; it's difficult to tell who is behind the riots exactly. But I'm pretty sure that the media here will not tell the truth about it.

Putin is himself a Communist par excellence!

Take Andy's advice and read the Christian Order Editorial he recommended, then follow up with Part 2: http://www.christianorder.com/editorials/editorials_2013/editorials_nov13.html

The United States promotes our religion of democracy and forcefully removes governments we do not approve of. Is it any wonder why the world hates us?

Russian Parliament to consider bill for gun rights.

http://rt.com/politics/gun-russian-home-defense-883/

The United States is Babylon.

To Matto:


Herewith a dictation by Our Lord to Maria Valtorta in the "Poem of the Man-God" ("Notebooks for 1943")


"Maria, now I take you by the hand to guide you in the most obscure point of the book of John ch. 5. The commentators of this book have exhausted their capacities with many deductions to explain to themselves and to the people who the "Great Babylon" is. With human vision—to which the shocks of events desired or which happened were not foreign — they have given the name of Babylon to many things.

But how is it they have never thought that the "Great Babylon" is the whole of Earth?
I would be a very little and limited Creator-God if I had created only Earth as an inhabited world! With a throb of My Will I have raised up worlds upon worlds from nothing and cast them forth — luminous fine dust — in the immensity of the firmament.
Earth, of which you are all so proud and so fierce, is but one of the bits of fine dust revolving in that infinity, and not the largest. But She is certainly the most corrupt. Lives and [more] lives teem in the millions of worlds that are the joy of your gaze on serene nights.

Is not Earth perhaps the great Harlot who has fornicated with all the powers of the earth and of hell? And the inhabitants of Earth, have they not prostituted themselves: bodies and souls, to triumph also in the earth's day?

Yes. For it is so. The crimes of Earth have all the names of blasphemy, as has the Beast with whom Earth and Her inhabitants have also allied themselves in order to triumph. The seven sins stand as a horrible ornament on the head of the Beast who transports Earth and the earthly into the pastures of the Evil One. And the ten horns, a metaphorical number, stand to point out the infinite wickedness the Beast accomplishes to obtain, at whatever cost, as much as It wants in Its ferocious lust.

Has not Earth, soaked with the blood of martyrs, been perhaps intoxicated by this holy liqueur which, drunk down with Her sacrilegious mouth, is changed in Her mouth into a potion of accursed drunkenness? The Beast that carries Her: — [Itself] the compendium and synthesis of all the evil wrought from Adam on, just to triumph in the world and in the flesh — draws after It all those who by adoring It will become king for an hour and of an accursed kingdom. You are kings as sons of God, and it is an eternal Kingdom. But you become kings for an hour and of an accursed kingdom when you adore Satan, who cannot give you but an ephemeral triumph, paid for at the price of an eternity of horror.

The Beast — says John — was and is not. At the end of the world it will be so. The Beast was, because It really has been; It is not, because I, the Christ, will have conquered and buried It, because It will no longer be necessary then for the triumphs of the world.

Is not Earth seated upon the waters of Her seas, and has She not made use of these to do harm? What has She not made use of? Peoples, nations, races, borders, interests, food, expansions: She has used all to fornicate and accomplish endless homicides and Iscariot betrayals. Her very own sons, nourished by Her with the blood of sin, will accomplish God's vengeance upon Her by destroying Her, destroying themselves, bringing the sum total of their crimes against God and against man to the perfect number demanded by My thundering: 'ENOUGH!'*

In that hour the blood of the martyrs and the prophets will boil up again, steaming toward My Throne with a pleasing fragrance, and the clods of the earth which had collected the groans of those killed out of hatred for Me and received their last quiverings, will give a loud shout formed of all those holy moans, and will tremble with an anguished convulsion, shaking men's cities and houses where they sin and kill, and filling the vault of Heaven with a voice that asks for Justice.

And Justice there will be. I will come. I will come because I am Faithful and Truthful. I will come to give Peace to the faithful and holy Judgment to those who have lived. I will come with My Name whose meaning is known to Me alone and in whose letters are the main attributes of God of Whom I am Part and Whole.

Write: GESU:Greatness, Eternity, Sanctity,Unity. Write: CHRISTO:Charity, Redemption, Immensity,Sapience, Trinity, Omnipotence (of God compressed into the Name of the Word become human). And if it seems to you that some attributes are lacking, consider that Justice is included in Sanctity, for whoever has sanctity is just; Royalty is included in Greatness; Creation, in Omnipotence. In My Name therefore the praises of God are proclaimed.

O Holy Name, whose sound terrifies the demons. Name of Life, You give Life, Light, strength to him who loves You and invokes You.

Name which is the crown upon My Head as Victor over the Beast and his prophet who will be seized, skewered, submerged, buried in the liquid and eternal fire whose bite is ferocious and inconceivable to human feeling.


PERIOD OF PEACE (MY INSERT)

It will then be the time of My Kingdom on Earth. Thus there will be a rest from the demonic crimes to give man time to hear again the voices of Heaven. With the Force which unchains horror taken away, great spiritual streams will descend like cascades of grace, like rivers of heavenly water, to speak words of Light.

But as, over the centuries, they did not gather up the isolated Voices which speak of the Good, beginning with that of the Word, so men will be deaf, always deaf — except those marked with My Mark, My dearly beloved friends straining to follow Me — men will be deaf to the voices of many spirits, to voices like the noise of many waters which will sing the new song to guide the peoples to meet the Light, and above all to Me: the eternal Word. When the last attempt has been completed, Satan will come for the last time and will find followers at the four corners of the earth, and they will be more numerous than the sands of the sea.

Oh! Christ! Oh! Jesus Who died to save men! Only the patience of a God could have waited so long, done so much, obtained so little without withdrawing His gift from men and letting them perish long before the appointed hour! Only My Patience which is Love could await you all, knowing that like sand filtering through a very fine sieve, some rare souls would come to glory compared to the mass which does not know how, is unwilling to filter through the sieve of the Law, of Love, of Sacrifice to reach Me.

But in the hour of My coming when, in the garment of God, King and Judge, I come to assemble the elect and to curse the reprobate, hurling them there where the Antichrist, the Beast and Satan will already be for eternity, after the supreme victory of Jesus Christ, Son of God, Conqueror of Death and of the Evil One — to those elect who have known how to remain 'a l i v e' in life, a l i v e in their spirit, awaiting the hour of Our triumph, I will give the possession of the Heavenly dwelling, I will Give Myself without ceasing and without measure.

Strain toward that hour, Maria. Call it, and call Me with all the strength of your spirit. Lo, I am already coming when a soul calls Me. Together with the Beloved. who saw from the earth the glory of the Lamb, Son of God, the glory of his and your Jesus, say, with every beat of your heart: 'Come, Lord Jesus'."

Matto is right, America is the misguided nation these days. America is the nation who feels she must use whatever means necessary to continue to rule the world.