Today is February 20, which is one of the dates National Security Handler Jake Sullivan proposed as a perhaps-as-early-as for Russian tanks to appear in the streets of Kyiv. The logic here appears to have been that the Olympics would seize the world's attention, giving Putin the opening to invade while everyone was distracted. The problem was that the Olympics turned out to be the most boring and uneventful in history, and they provided no distraction. They weren't even worth a yawn.
The distraction throughout this period has been in Canada. I'll get to that, but let's get to the more imnmediate problem of bad looks. Russian tanks in the streets of European capitals are a bad look. Always have been. Let's face it, they would immediately drown out figure skaters, no matter how good the figure skaters. The guy who's figured this out is Vladimir Putin, who in fact seems to be a world leader who learned something from the 20th century. I get the sense that he, if anyone, understands that if he can get what he wants without tanks in the streets, he'll do it. My take is that so far, he's succeeding.
In fact, he's doing so well that he's making President Biden look hysterical. Biden's been predicting tanks in the streets any day now since late last year, and his predictions keep not coming true. A growing part of the problm is that Biden's been reassuring us that his predictions are based on our intelligence:
“We have reason to believe the Russian forces are planning and intend to attack Ukraine in the coming week ... in the coming days,” Biden said, citing the “significant intelligence capability” of the United States.
These remarks were from Friday, as today's deadline of February 20 edged ever closer without tanks in the streets. It's getting more and more like the guys who predict the end of the world and have to keep moving the date forward, with lamer and lamer excuses each time. I'm not sasying this won't eventually happen, but if it does, it's going to be on Putin's schedule, not Biden's, and for the foreseeable future, it looks like Putin will get what he wants without a direct invasion.
Indeed, if Putin appears to have learned a thing or two from 20th century history class, Biden and US intelligence have not -- consider what they failed to predict, from Pearl Harbor to the Chinese intervention in Korea to the collapse of the Warsaw Pact to Al-Qaida. They aren't much good at all, something Truman and Reagan at least understood. No coincidence that they helped write 20th century history.
So let's move to Canada. It sounds like Prime Minister Trudeau skipped 20th century history class the day they covered how police running down peaceful demonstrators -- with horses, dogs, fire hoses, clubs, gas, whatever -- isn't a good look. You don't even need to shoot them, although Kent Sate teaches that's a bad look, too. There are far too many examples, St Petersburg 1905, Birmingham 1963, Chicago 1968, Kent State 1970, Tienanmen 1989, and so forth -- that there was an awful lot for Trudeau to ignore. And it seems to me that the lesson has been the same every time, the demonstrators are playing a long game, and as the victors, they eventually get to write the history. A few cracked heads, a few dog bites, a few put in jail for hooliganism or whatever, a few knocked down, even a few, or more than a few, shot dead -- they eventually come out on top.
I hate to say this, but the guy who paid attention in 20th century history class is Putin.
