{"id":7371,"date":"2022-03-03T12:47:24","date_gmt":"2022-03-03T12:47:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lonecandle.com\/?p=7371"},"modified":"2022-03-03T12:47:24","modified_gmt":"2022-03-03T12:47:24","slug":"yes-he-would-fiona-hill-on-putin-and-nukes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/?p=7371","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Yes, He Would\u2019: Fiona Hill on Putin and Nukes"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\n\n“I think there\u2019s been a logical, methodical plan that goes back a very long way, at least to 2007 when he put the world, and certainly Europe, on notice that Moscow would not accept the further expansion of NATO<\/a>. And then within a year in 2008 NATO gave an open door to Georgia and Ukraine. It absolutely goes back to that juncture.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Back then I was a national intelligence officer, and the National Intelligence Council was analyzing what Russia was likely to do in response to the NATO Open Door declaration<\/a>. One of our assessments was that there was a real, genuine risk of some kind of preemptive Russian military action, not just confined to the annexation of Crimea, but some much larger action taken against Ukraine along with Georgia. And of course, four months after NATO\u2019s Bucharest Summit, there was the invasion of Georgia. There wasn\u2019t an invasion of Ukraine then because the Ukrainian government pulled back from seeking NATO membership. But we should have seriously addressed how we were going to deal with this potential outcome and our relations with Russia.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

…<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“It\u2019s reestablishing Russian dominance of what Russia sees as the Russian \u201cImperium.\u201d I\u2019m saying this very specifically because the lands of the Soviet Union didn\u2019t cover all of the territories that were once part of the Russian Empire. So that should give us pause.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Putin has articulated an idea of there being a \u201cRussky Mir<\/a>\u201d or a \u201cRussian World.\u201d The recent essay<\/a> he published about Ukraine and Russia states the Ukrainian and Russian people are \u201cone people,\u201d a \u201cyedinyi narod.\u201d He\u2019s saying Ukrainians and Russians are one and the same. This idea of a Russian World means re-gathering all the Russian-speakers in different places that belonged at some point to the Russian tsardom.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

…<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“The thing about Putin is, if he has an instrument, he wants to use it. Why have it if you can\u2019t? He\u2019s already used a nuclear weapon in some respects. Russian operatives poisoned Alexander Litvinenko<\/a> with radioactive polonium and turned him into a human dirty bomb and polonium was spread all around London at every spot that poor man visited. He died a horrible death as a result.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Russians have already used a weapons-grade nerve agent, Novichok<\/a>. They\u2019ve used it possibly several times, but for certain twice. Once in Salisbury, England, where it was rubbed all over the doorknob of Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia, who actually didn\u2019t die; but the nerve agent contaminated the city of Salisbury, and anybody else who came into contact with it got sickened. Novichok killed a British citizen, Dawn Sturgess, because the assassins stored it in a perfume bottle which was discarded into a charity donation box where it was found by Sturgess and her partner. There was enough nerve agent in that bottle to kill several thousand people. The second time was in Alexander Navalny\u2019s underpants.<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

So if anybody thinks that Putin wouldn\u2019t use something that he\u2019s got that is unusual and cruel, think again. Every time you think, \u201cNo, he wouldn\u2019t, would he?\u201d Well, yes, he would. And he wants us to know that, of course.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s not that we should be intimidated and scared. That\u2019s exactly what he wants us to be. We have to prepare for those contingencies and figure out what is it that we\u2019re going to do to head them off.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

…<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“similar to Hitler, he\u2019s using a sense of massive historical grievance combined with a veneer of protecting Russians and a dismissal of the rights of minorities and other nations to have independent countries in order to fuel territorial ambitions”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

…<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Every country in the world should be paying close attention to this. Yes, there may be countries like China and others who might think that this is permissible, but overall, most countries have benefited from the current international system in terms of trade and economic growth, from investment and an interdependent globalized world. This is pretty much the end of this. That\u2019s what Russia has done.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

https:\/\/www.politico.com\/news\/magazine\/2022\/02\/28\/world-war-iii-already-there-00012340<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“I think there\u2019s been a logical, methodical plan that goes back a very long way, at least to 2007 when he put the world, and certainly Europe, on notice that Moscow would not accept the further expansion of NATO. And then within a year in 2008 NATO gave an open door to Georgia and Ukraine. It absolutely goes back to that juncture.<\/p>\n

Back then I was a national intelligence officer, and the National Intelligence Council was analyzing what Russia was likely to do in response to the NATO Open Door declaration. One of our assessments was that there was a real, genuine risk of some kind of preemptive Russian military action, not just confined to the annexation of Crimea, but some much larger action taken against Ukraine along with Georgia. And of course, four months after NATO\u2019s Bucharest Summit, there was the invasion of Georgia. There wasn\u2019t an invasion of Ukraine then because the Ukrainian government pulled back from seeking NATO membership. But we should have seriously addressed how we were going to deal with this potential outcome and our relations with Russia.”<\/p>\n

…<\/p>\n

“It\u2019s reestablishing Russian dominance of what Russia sees as the Russian \u201cImperium.\u201d I\u2019m saying this very specifically because the lands of the Soviet Union didn\u2019t cover all of the territories that were once part of the Russian Empire. So that should give us pause.<\/p>\n

Putin has articulated an idea of there being a \u201cRussky Mir\u201d or a \u201cRussian World.\u201d The recent essay he published about Ukraine and Russia states the Ukrainian and Russian people are \u201cone people,\u201d a \u201cyedinyi narod.\u201d He\u2019s saying Ukrainians and Russians are one and the same. This idea of a Russian World means re-gathering all the Russian-speakers in different places that belonged at some point to the Russian tsardom.”<\/p>\n

…<\/p>\n

“The thing about Putin is, if he has an instrument, he wants to use it. Why have it if you can\u2019t? He\u2019s already used a nuclear weapon in some respects. Russian operatives poisoned Alexander Litvinenko with radioactive polonium and turned him into a human dirty bomb and polonium was spread all around London at every spot that poor man visited. He died a horrible death as a result.<\/p>\n

The Russians have already used a weapons-grade nerve agent, Novichok. They\u2019ve used it possibly several times, but for certain twice. Once in Salisbury, England, where it was rubbed all over the doorknob of Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia, who actually didn\u2019t die; but the nerve agent contaminated the city of Salisbury, and anybody else who came into contact with it got sickened. Novichok killed a British citizen, Dawn Sturgess, because the assassins stored it in a perfume bottle which was discarded into a charity donation box where it was found by Sturgess and her partner. There was enough nerve agent in that bottle to kill several thousand people. The second time was in Alexander Navalny\u2019s underpants.<\/p>\n

So if anybody thinks that Putin wouldn\u2019t use something that he\u2019s got that is unusual and cruel, think again. Every time you think, \u201cNo, he wouldn\u2019t, would he?\u201d Well, yes, he would. And he wants us to know that, of course.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s not that we should be intimidated and scared. That\u2019s exactly what he wants us to be. We have to prepare for those contingencies and figure out what is it that we\u2019re going to do to head them off.”<\/p>\n

…<\/p>\n

“similar to Hitler, he\u2019s using a sense of massive historical grievance combined with a veneer of protecting Russians and a dismissal of the rights of minorities and other nations to have independent countries in order to fuel territorial ambitions”<\/p>\n

…<\/p>\n

“Every country in the world should be paying close attention to this. Yes, there may be countries like China and others who might think that this is permissible, but overall, most countries have benefited from the current international system in terms of trade and economic growth, from investment and an interdependent globalized world. This is pretty much the end of this. That\u2019s what Russia has done.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[552,1545,994,273,316,315,311,158],"class_list":["post-7371","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-article-share","tag-conflict","tag-invasion","tag-nuclear-weapons","tag-nukes","tag-putin","tag-russia","tag-ukraine","tag-war"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7371","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7371"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7371\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7372,"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7371\/revisions\/7372"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7371"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7371"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7371"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}