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Author : Armen Oganesyan
Editor-in-Chief of International Affairs
July 5.
As could be expected, Zbigniew Brzezinski could
not ignore what is going on in Ukraine. He offered his
opinion in The Washington Post ("Putin's Three Choices
on Ukraine"). On closer investigation, his three choices
boil down to one more aptly called "Brzezinski's corridor".
The U.S. and the European Union know that otherwise
they would be burdened with Ukraine's insolvency, the
price of the "Project Poroshenko" becoming prohibitively
high: no guarantees against the project's collapse. Brzezin-
ski, however, has sugared the pill: there is light at the end
of this very narrow tunnel. "At the same time, it should be made clear that Ukraine does not seek, and the
West does not contemplate, Ukrainian membership in NATO. It is reasonable for Russia to feel uncom-
fortable about that prospect." We all know, however, that these promises come cheap; Brzezinski also knows
this. On another occasion, he admitted that Gorbachev had been promised no eastward NATO expansion
in exchange of unification of Germany and added: "Yes, we cheated him."
A free country is free to join any alliances is the favorite dictum of the EU and NATO; we all know that
this will happen and will happen soon. Brzezinski, however, leaves the Kremlin an alternative: either "con-
tinue to sponsor a thinly veiled military intervention designed to disrupt life in portions of Ukraine" or
"invade Ukraine, exploiting Russia's much larger military potential" and threatens: "Such an action, however,
would not only prompt retaliation by the West but also could provoke Ukrainian resistance." Sanctions and
retributions of all sorts will follow, says the "mentor."
July 13.
Very much in line with the current fashion which prescribes to quote Ivan Ilyin in and out of
season let me turn to his rarely quoted Resistance to Evil by Force, a very clear objection to Tolstovstvo
(the Tolstoyan movement).
Ilyin wrote that even if the Gospels said "Whoever hits you on the cheek, offer him the other also" (Luke
6:29) no one had the right to offer a cheek of another person. Acceptance of evil through non-resistance
to evil or the evil which threatens your neighbor becomes evil.
July 21.
The events in Ukraine are a civilizational challenge. They are an attempt to reformat the matrix of
the East Slavonic and East Christian world responsible for the psychology of the Russians, Ukrainians and
Byelorussians.
I find it very interesting that a Finnish journalist in his article published in Izvestia identified the price of
the issue in the clearest of terms: the West launched a crusade against the Russian World and the Orthodox
Christian Civilization.
The other day, I asked Dugin in a radio interview about the apprehensions that the West, the U.S. in the
first place, was pushing Russia into a war with Ukraine. He said that Crimea, which had become Russian,
was an obvious pretext. The war, however, might begin only when Donbass had been ironed out and the
Ukrainian army reformed. In other words, even if there is determination it will not be realized in haste.
This will confront the West with the alternative outlined by Brzezinski for Putin: either sponsoring a "thinly
veiled military intervention" with military equipment and military advisors or an invasion. The latter looks
improbable, yet future, very much like history, does not tolerate subjunctive mood.
Notes From the Diary