Being There A few observations about the Russian Invasion of the Ukraine 03-06-2022 It is remarkable how the invasion of the Ukraine by Russia is observable at very close quarters. We are living amidst the invasion, safely of course across the ocean, probably with food or coffee nearby, but emotionally, psychologically, visually and aurally much within it. We are within it via social media and the video streams and photographs leaving the country almost as soon as they are taken. One can contrast this situation with our experience and understanding of past wars of historical moment—we can read of the Crimean or Boer war, or WWII, but we don't experience them with the same up to date, modernistic intimacy we know of this ongoing conflict, a sort of historical sensory-surround. Social media, an ally of the Ukraine, is that same social media which has fragmented the West, its politics as well as individual citizens, and probably emboldened, in the first place, Putin to be so adventuresome, anticipating that the internal struggles of the US due to the mayhem associated with social media, would weaken it. That same social media now is the hand grenade dropped into Putin’s plans. Vietnam was the first living room war, so to speak, with the daily tabulation of US, South Vietnamese and “Communist” dead, but that was a far more filtered experience, through a conduit of the media. And one could never really believe the media at that point, with its exaggerated body counts and politicized misrepresentations of US military actions. Now seeing is believing. A default belief is that Russia’s entrance into the Ukraine represents massive risk to the rest of Europe. Most likely, to be contrarian here, that is not necessarily so, particularly if fierce resistence remains consistent. The Ukraine will indeed suffer. However, there is still a reminiscence of the “MAD” doctrine, that is, mutually assured destruction, that will create pause. Internationally, that doctrine still holds sway. But the underlying acceptance of MAD is not foolproof. The same doctrine, one of restraint to avoid holocaust, could paradoxically increase risk and recklessness by providing artificial sense of restraint, or a safety net that is more apparent than real. The Russian plant--it probably would be some sort of turnip or mottled ground cover that thrives under any circumstance, is an invasive species. That is a repetitive theme. Syria, Afghanistan, the countries of the eventual iron curtain, attest to that, From whence does this Eurasian sense of "manifest destiny" arise—Putin or his cronies may look back to writers of the old Russian nation, who regarded Russia as the country who would give order to a lawless world. A strong country led by a strong man. There is hostility directed outward to the rest of the world. Tolstoy, of all writers, stands peculiarly the only writer I can think of who destested Shakespeare. Meanwhile, the invasion evokes past nightmares---the murderous excesses of Stalin, the genocidal starvation of the Ukrainians in the twenties, the titanically deadly battles between the Soviets and Germans in WWII, the grim realities of the cold war. And so, I read that things have very much changed in a few weeks, so startling has this invasion been. Germany has decided to arm, something the US has been encouraging for decades. Russian suddenly seems weaker, and Putin vulnerable in a way that he hasn’t before. Whether an actor emerges to create the coup is another matter. I am surprised there is less allusion to the iniquities of the Spanish Civil War when discussing the invasion. However, I understand that as a fan of George Orwell that epoch may be more on my mind than say, 99.9 per cent of the population who do not read 1930s British writers so much. Spain had elected a government, left-wing, in the thirties. A coup or rebellion by the right was supported by Hitler and Mussolini. Against these fascists, volunteers formed the Lincoln brigade—a compilation of sympathizers from many lands. A greater esprit de corps is hard to imagine. Eventually the Fascists won (some say because of Russian internal divisions) and there followed decades of governance by Franco. Of somber consolation is that great art that arose from the Spanish Civil War-the work of George Orwell, Pablo Picasso’s "Guernica" (a place bombed by Fascists) and the photography of Robert Capra, without whom we might not have the movie Saving Private Ryan. The Ukraine is full of writerly and literate people and possibly we may see, in the midst of this tragedy, some transcendental work. A Lincoln Brigade type arrangement seems to be taking hold of some military types who want to fight for the Ukraine. Why not send actual military aid and advisers, is my thought. Roosevelt was very passive, and could have solved enormous problems if he had acted back then. Staying power is essential. Wars can become spectator sports for those not involved in the actual suffering, enjoying a vicarious war movie from far off. There is the pageantry of the military, the drama of combat, of bravery, and a righteous sense of supporting a “cause celebre”, all the dynamics of watching a sporting event with a favorite team. But maintaining the support is hard, especially when conflict drags on and on and is replaced by other national or internations events A prurient fascination with public interest stories should not supplant policy leveled support to helping the Ukraine. We have been listelss with Soviet invasions in the past. In the fifties, we recall ticonic photos of Polish and Hungarian citizens, depending on the year, hurling Molotov cocktails at invading tanks. The US was passive, and our subsequent sense of regret and guilt, is largely forgotten. I have heard little mention of these very signal examples of historical Soviet aggression in the recent commentary. The Ukrainian crisis also is peculiar in the particular juxtaposition of events happening of the global economy. The US stock market was flirting with correction, and now certainly has entered that zone, with the invasion as significant, in the minds of traders, with the plans of the federal reserve to raise interest rates. Traders are looking back and forth at the two. The market briefly fluttered upward when one pundit surmised that the events in the Ukraine might dampen the Federal Reserve’s appetite for rate hike. The reality, though, is that the invasion of the Ukraine likely will foment further inflationary pressures, and the instability that the market so abhors, as well as the certainty of ongoing inflation will yet be another destabilizing force in market recovery. However, once the market stabilizes, the Ukraine should not be relegated to a less important eventl As a psychologist, these events spark my interest in what might be, if there is any such thing, or can be any such thing, a Russian “temperament”. Do those things exist? Well, there is a certain commonality in the country’s politics—always there seems to be a kind of imperturbable aggression. How is this the country that produced such works as Brothers Karamazov, Crime and Punishment, or even the emigree works of Vladimir Nabokov. Add to them works of Chekov, Tolstoy, Pushkin, and even the pop writer Pasternack. What can be gleaned from these authors.? The commonality is that it is a harsh world. I recall the first paragraph of Death of Ivan Ilyich—learning of the death of this barrister his friends, after claiming sympathy and sorry, begin to ruminate on how that death will benefit them, in their machinations to move up in the world. This is calculated materialism at its worst. Our leaders at the moment unfortunately seem more like Neville Chamberlains than Winston Churchills. Still my overall sense is that what we have is history trying to repeat itself but being unable to because of changes in the modern world.