In 1991, Ukraine chose to leave a union with Russia; she chose to go it alone.
A few short years later, in 1994, the US, UK and Russia acknowledged Ukraine’s new sovereign and independent status (the Budapest Memorandum) after she chose to voluntarily transfer her 1,900 nuclear warheads to Moscow.
At this time, Crimea had legally been Ukrainian for forty years, since 1954, when transferred in a ‘goodwill gesture’ by Russia, which doubled as an incentive to keep Ukraine within Russia’s orbit of influence, just as the USA forevermore wishes for Texas to remain within her orbit of influence—because no one wishes to fight their neighbours. No one wishes for their neighbours to suddenly join foreign military alliances and import foreign militaries to their doorstep.
Many, understandably, see the conflict in Ukraine as a battle between David and Goliath, due to the Russian Federation being infinitely more powerful than Ukraine due to her weapons of mass destruction, due to her greater numbers and near infinite resources and due to her substantial landmass.
Yet, to fully understand the situation on the ground, it is helpful, perhaps essential even, to imagine for a moment that Texas is David, the independent and sovereign nation fighting for freedom against Goliath.
Imagine, for a moment, that Texas chose to leave the USA in 1991, just as Ukraine chose to leave the Soviet Union in 1991. This would make Texas David and the USA Goliath, just as Ukraine choosing to stand alone made her David and Russia Goliath.
Then imagine that in 1994, Texas surrendered any nuclear weapons she possessed in her territory in exchange for recognition of her sovereignty and independence and territorial integrity and that she chose to retain, rather than return, a large peninsula, which was near identical to Crimea, which was transferred to Texas in 1954 by the USA.
In the 1990s, this new nation, this new country Texas would be in many ways the same as Ukraine, defined by her former collaboration with the union next door, in the shadow of the union that remained next door and plagued by crime and corruption as all young nations are as they find their feet and character and identity.
As the years pass by in now sovereign Texas, there are some Texans who desire for Texas to become a standalone world power—the USA won’t like this, the USA would do anything and everything possible to prevent this from occurring, why? Because they would not desire any chance of discord or conflict or war on their doorstep, which is why the USA would seek to ever contain newly independent Texas, just as Russia has long sought to contain Ukraine, which has multiplied nationalism and national socialism in that former socialist republic.
Fast-forward to 2014.
Imagine now that non-Texans living in Texas comprised 17% of the population in the same way that 17% of folk living in Ukraine prior to the Russian invasion of Ukraine were ethnic Russians, Russian Ukrainians.
And of these 17%, a majority of them did not desire for Texas to become aligned with foreign military alliances or to become a world power as they shared common blood and history and culture with the USA, as the 17% of non-Texans were of two worlds, of Texas but also of the USA, just as most folk in the Donbas are of Ukraine but also of Russia.
Next, these 17% (let’s call it a fifth) of people witness foreign powers coming to Texas, offering money and gifts and incentives to join with their foreign military alliances and foreign trade organisations, which terrifies them because they wish to retain their USA identity and culture and language and do not wish to fight for foreign powers or be absorbed by alien cultures or ways of life—just as one fifth of Ukrainians felt terrified in 2014 when observing the EU and NATO making continual overtures to Ukraine to join with them.
Before you know it, the Maidan protests of 2014 erupt in Austin, Texas, with the newly independent and sovereign nation torn apart due to a minority desiring for Texas to join with China (for instance) and another sizeable minority (the one fifth who identify as Americans as well as Texans) desiring for Texas to instead rejoin with the USA as their clear preference to becoming changed, absorbed and a proxy or pawn of foreign superpowers.
The fifth of Texans who suddenly became very pro-USA prior to 2014 complained about suffering discrimination and felt ‘left out’ despite being citizens of Texas, complaining they felt unwanted and unloved; yet few of them desired to take up arms and fewer still prior to 2014 ever thought about reunification with the USA.
The majority of Texans desire stability and calm, only a minority are extreme one way or another, as it is everywhere; yet the folk desiring for Texas and Texans to ‘become Chinese’ ASAP as the promise of billions of Yen dangles in the air like a gold-plated carrot are too ardent, too vocal and too well-supported by China to be ignored, as their Maidan protests in Austin cause democracy to be ended, causes their elected leaders to flee for their lives and causes those who identify as American-Texans in the east of Texas to become separatists and latterly establish USA-friendly republics in the hope of the old union coming back together as a remedy to the current conflict, discord and importing of foreign powers, foreign nuclear powers.
It is around this time, as the few Texans drag all of Texas towards a union with China, that the USA annexes the peninsula previously gifted to Texas back in 1954. The USA also attempts to reassure those in Texas who identify as Americans living in newly independent and sovereign Texas that the USA will not allow them to be unnecessarily targeted, bullied or killed due to their ethnic or cultural identity.
For a period of years, China floods Texas with huge amounts of money and weapons, and the EU does the same, attempting to ‘win the hearts and minds of Texans’ as they also desire new citizens.
As democracy restarts in Texas, as calm in most of Texas is achieved despite the Texan military attacking the separatist pro-USA regions in the east, politicians in Texas are adamant that she needs to join a union, be it the global military union with China (think NATO) or the trade and military union with the EU, or both, which leaves many wondering, What was the point in achieving independence from the union of the American states if you want to immediately join a foreign union, which has long hated the USA? Don’t you realise this will cause problems, massive problems, for everybody concurrently?
Warnings are ignored, foreign money and foreign weapons are accepted by Texas as it seems ever more likely that at any moment the might of the Chinese military and the might of the EU will be imported wholesale into Texas, which would be deeply satisfying for those who scapegoat the USA for any domestic problems in Austin, from Texan crime to Texan corruption; but it intrinsically and fundamentally terrifies one fifth of Texans who are pro-USA as they fear being imminently occupied by the invader, the enemy, just as Californians and New Yorkers would react badly to suddenly seeing Chinese soldiers policing their streets following a Maidan-esque revolution.
In this climate, who among us doesn’t think the USA would replicate identically, absolutely identically, the actions of Russia by invading Texas and launching a special military operation?
There is consensus on this issue, it is known; it is felt. It is obvious that the USA wouldn’t have allowed the situation to reach that stage. They would have (as it was in the case of the US Civil War) taken back not only their version of Crimea but absorbed also all of Texas, citing national security as justification. The USA would seek to prevent another intolerable Cuban Missile Crisis situation from taking place; the USA would move mountains in order to prevent nuclear annihilation, even if that meant launching an ugly pre-emptive invasion of Texas, which to a fifth of Texans (as it was with a fifth of Ukrainians) would very much feel like a liberation and joyous reunion.
If the USA could never tolerate Texas joining a Russian or Chinese military alliance, why should anyone expect Russia to tolerate Ukraine joining a USA military alliance?
If the USA would invade Texas to prevent Chinese troops coming to guard Austin in the way US troops currently guard Japan, South Korea and Germany, can we not understand why the Russians invaded Ukraine?
The Russians have fears and anxieties, they are not all fatalists and nihilists, they want to survive, and they know that if Ukraine joins with the USA, it will be the Cuban Missile Crisis all over again, but in reverse, and in a strained time of pandemics, recessions, overpopulation and migrant crises, the stress and fear it would cause to the Russians, having a foreign military imported next door, would likely be too much to bear, with nuclear war being the only recourse left after the balance of power was disturbed, as change was sought to be ushered in far too swiftly and against the majority will. Most Texans want to guard themselves because they are real men, just as most Ukrainians and most Germans want to guard themselves because they are real men. No nation should be guarded by others; no nations should be dependent upon foreign unions. This is not freedom; it is inglorious, shame-inducing servitude.
If Russia did not exist, if it had magically disappeared in 1990, Ukraine would not be seeking to join the EU nor NATO in this hour, just as Texas wouldn’t be seeking foreign partnerships with China or the EU or Russia if the USA magically disappeared.
Joining a union (a gang), or applying to, sends a clear message, it means you wish to be a competitor. So in the example of Texas applying to join a military alliance with China and a trade alliance with the EU (which does have universal ambitions) the USA would certainly interpret their actions as hostile.
Not wishing to at some future point become less influential or less powerful than ‘New Texas’ after she has been raised up as a result of the injection of foreign gold and missiles and training and expertise, the USA would do what she has always done, she would reach for the M16.
Hypocrisy is a terrible thing, a real bugbear of mine, which is why I call upon Americans to refrain from stoking the fires of war in Ukraine as you throw your full support and weight behind Ukraine, as if the situation was occurring in reverse, if Texas were trying to join with China or Russia or Mexico or Venezuela or the DPRK you would not care about the ‘democratic right’ of Texans to ‘choose her own destiny’ by being able to join foreign military alliances (foreign gangs) even if that guaranteed the importation of foreign tactical nuclear weapons, which would be hastily installed in Austin and pointed at Washington DC, Los Angeles and New York City. No. Americans, all Americans, would side with the one fifth of Texans who were pro-USA, who created the separatist republics.
Is the solution to the ongoing catastrophic conflict in Ukraine, which shows no signs of ending any time soon a reinstallation of the USSR? Is that what I’m advocating? No.
What I am advocating is empathy, understanding and mutual respect, which is the message that runs through the entirety of How We Will Create Peace in Ukraine and the World. There can be no peace without honesty and equality—we cannot expect Russians to tolerate that which Americans would never tolerate.
How We Will Create Peace in Ukraine and the World is available in paperback and Kindle on Amazon worldwide and in the brucemasters.org eBook shop.
Sample Chapters:
Post-War, Orthodox Church and Comrade Gapon
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