In Volodymyr Zelenskyy of Ukraine, the World Finds Hope –

The Big Picture - 
By Glynn Wilson - 

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The fight to save democracy and the planet is coming to a head.

It may very well come down to whether Russia’s dictator-president Vladimir Putin lives or dies. If he lives, within days we could be totally enmeshed in World War III.

The so-called experts on the Sunday morning news talk shows may not be quite ready to admit it yet. NBC’s Chuck Todd came close to going there on “Meet the Press,” but the panel stopped him from going all the way.

But think about it. Unless Putin is deposed or killed by his own people soon, he is the world’s enemy number one. He has shown his hand by the unprovoked invasion of the European democracy of Ukraine.

Putin literally poses the gravest threat to democracy on the world stage and the most dangerous threat to the natural environment and a potential long-term future for humanity on planet Earth.

Russia may only rank eighth in the world in the production of oil and gas, with only 4.8 percent of the world’s total oil reserves, but it has proven reserves equivalent to more than 60 times the country’s annual consumption and enough to keep pumping for 60 more years. Oil is the lynchpin of Russia’s economy, and Putin is the most powerful world leader the least interested in moving away from the production of fossil fuels as an energy source to slow the byproduct greenhouse gas emissions and begin to curb climate change due to global warming.

As the United Nations warned this week, human-induced climate change is causing dangerous and widespread disruption in nature and is already affecting the lives of billions of people around the world, despite all the efforts so far to reduce the risks — which even China has vowed to tackle.

Not Russia.

Related: Deep Cuts in Greenhouse Gas Emissions Required or Humanity Faces Hellish Future

As for the future of democracy and war, Putin warned on Saturday that crippling economic sanctions imposed by the West were “akin to a declaration of war.”

At the same time he totally violated an agreed upon cease fire by ordering the Russian military to pummel civilian targets and continue shelling the routes intended to allow besieged Ukrainians to flee to Poland and other neighboring countries.

Then in his first extended remarks since the start of the war of opportunity he started apparently in his deluded attempt to bring glory back to Russia, Putin made his intentions clear. He threatened to fully absorb Ukraine, the former Soviet republic of nearly 44 million people. Ukraine declared its independence 30 years ago after the Cold War was declared over by U.S. President George H.W. Bush in 1989 as the Berlin Wall fell.

“The current leadership needs to understand that if they continue doing what they are doing, they risk the future of Ukrainian statehood,” Putin said, calling for Ukraine to unilaterally surrender or face massive destruction and death.

Putin made clear that he and his government in Moscow would view any Western attempts to impose a no-fly zone over Ukraine, which Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy called for, as “participating in the armed conflict” against Russia.

U.S. President Joe Biden has vowed to avoid direct armed conflict between United States and Russian troops, saying that would constitute “World War III.”

Related: Russian Forces Pound Civilians, as Putin Likens Sanctions to a ‘Declaration of War’

So let’s face it. Russia is already at war with us — whether we want to admit it or not.

Some experts are already predicting that cyberwar is next. Stay tuned for internet outages and power outages in response to sanctions. Facebook has already been blocked in Russia. When you wake up on Monday morning, it may not be working here.

While trying to figure out what Putin might do next and how far he will go to get what he wants has become something of a parlor game inside the Beltway in Washington and beyond, with the question of “what Putin really wants” the subject of much speculation on cable TV news talk shows, the writings and speeches of Putin reveal growing resentment toward Washington and a longing to restore Russia’s “glory” before the end of the Cold War.

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The moment is etched in the lore of Vladimir Putin: The Berlin Wall had just succumbed to hammers, chisels and history, and a KGB officer still shy of 40 and stationed in Dresden, East Germany, was in a panic, burning documents and requesting military support as a crowd approached.

“We cannot do anything without orders from Moscow,” Putin was told on the phone. “And Moscow is silent.”

In an interview appearing in his 2000 book, “First Person,” Putin recalls that dreadful silence.

“I got the feeling then that the country no longer existed,” he said. “That it had disappeared.”

Two years after the wall went down, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics did, too. A decade after, Putin would ascend to power in Russia, talking about a revival.

The death of the Soviet Union, and Putin’s autopsy of the corpse, helps explain why he has risked a European conflict — and a confrontation with Washington — by launching a brutal assault on Ukraine.

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These are the ravings of a mad man, a psychopath far more dangerous than the copy cat narcissistic blustering of Donald Trump, who admires Putin and wanted to be like him. Even Trump’s loyal following has been fooled into supporting Russia in its war with Ukraine, although there is evidence that Trump’s rhetoric in support of Putin may well be the beginning of the downfall of public support for Trump.

There is even evidence that Biden’s handling of the situation is already resulting in a comeback for his job approval numbers, although we should wait another day or two before reporting a solid rebound to around the 50 percent mark.

I hate to agree with Republican Senator Lindsay Graham of South Carolina, but he may have been onto something before he walked the quote back within 24 hours by changing it to Putin “should be in jail.”

“Is there a Brutus in Russia? Is there a more successful Colonel Stauffenberg in the Russian military? The only way this ends is for somebody in Russia to take this guy out. You would be doing your country – and the world – a great service,” Graham tweeted Thursday evening. “Unless you want to live in darkness for the rest of your life, be isolated from the rest of the world in abject poverty, and live in darkness you need to step up to the plate.”

Is there a Brutus in Russia? Is there a more successful Colonel Stauffenberg in the Russian military?

The only way this ends is for somebody in Russia to take this guy out.

You would be doing your country – and the world – a great service.

— Lindsey Graham (@LindseyGrahamSC) March 4, 2022

How many lives could have been saved if NATO’s coalition forces had been able to reach Hitler sooner and ended the war in Europe much quicker in what became known as World War II?

How much damage will be done to democracy and the planet and its future by allowing Putin to annex Ukraine again?

The good news is like other ambitious dictators in the past hell-bent on world domination, Putin has seriously miscalculated. The entire world is now on the side of Ukraine. Even Russian ally China has been tepid in its support.

If Putin successfully takes down the government of Ukraine and manages to kill Zelenskyy, he will make him a martyr for the cause of democracy the world over.

The problem is Putin is now the human equivalent of a cornered rat.

Is there an ounce of humility left in the ice water that flows in his veins? Does he have it in him to back down?

Or will he throw all his military might at the rest of the world in one final gambit to rule the world, including nuclear weapons, and take the position of the world’s most dangerous rat-fucker?

Either surrender and cede to my demands, he might conclude, or I’ll take you all down with me.

The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists is eying the second hand on the Doomsday Clock as we speak.

It’s already set at 100 seconds to midnight.

How much closer can we get before it all goes awry?

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