World Affairs

So the Russians are going to invade and take over the eastern one third of Ukraine. It is roughly the third of the population of that country and they speak the Russian language. Obviously that aggressive takeover is in Russian Dictator Putin’s plan to expand his influence back into all the territory that Joe Stalin took over after WWII. We knew that country as the USSR and your columnist was a participant in the cold war with them for a lot of years. I served in Strategic Air Command (SAC) and we proudly proclaimed that “Peace is our Profession”.

What will our President Biden and his woke team of military leaders do about the takeover of Ukraine? I fear their plan will follow the blueprint of the Obama/Biden crew that happened after Putin’s conquest of the Crimean Peninsula; absolutely nothing. Still the upcoming Russian conquest of Ukraine has the attention of the NATO alliance of countries who can now see that Putin’s dream may be directly threatening their future. I’ll be watching with rapt attention.

Propaganda! You may have noticed the endless stream of military vehicles poised on the border of Ukraine, their firepower exercises and airborne pictures of their Air Force are all Russian. Those pictures are repeated night after night on our television screens. For sure the American people don’t want to be involved in a war against such a force. Is it then an effort to justify the huge amounts of money that our government is spending to send comparable aid to our “friend” Ukraine? Pure propaganda being fed to the American people.

Why not explain what President’s purported sanctions and other, yet unannounced, counter Russian efforts would do to the Russian population? During WWII we and the British bombed city after German city in hopes that the non-Nazi Germans would rise up and stop Hitler and his Nazi fanatics but that never happened. I suspect that the ordinary civilians in Russia who will suffer under such sanctions would also have no influence against Putin’s government.

So aspiring dictator Justin Trudeau has finally beaten down the Canadian Trucker Freedom Convoy. It was a peaceful demonstration that in my own opinion went a little too long. The truckers, and the majority who supported them, only wanted the freedom to operate business as usual with the Covid mandates lifted. For Trudeau though it was an ego thing. In his own mind he was only doing those things that he felt would “protect” all his people from the spread of Covid. How could anyone not understand that his mandates were only for their own good. Disobey him and he just had to crush them to show that he was right. Arrest them, drag their trucks off the streets and prove that he is in charge. Seize their bank accounts and all those who have supported them in Canada and the United States. He might have gone a step (or many) too far.

It is now over. I predict that Trudeau will be removed from power and eventually the truckers will have won. It might be wise that the progressive elites in our own government pay attention.

The winter Olympics in Beijing are finished and done. So sad to see our athletes competing, just performing their hearts out, and a huge faction of our country flat out not supporting them or even watching. From what I could see on television the Chinese had gone to great expense to create fabulous facilities and the events seemed to run like clockwork. In my opinion our TV coverage was rather poorly done but still I have sympathy for our athletes who were out there competing their hearts out. The dissent started with President Joe Biden, playing politics, in refusing to have any US official attend to support our Olympians. Any other President, Jimmy Carter (Democrat) excepted, would have been there to show what a great country this is due to the strength and freedom of our people. Bad show on our part--opportunity missed.

What’s next? This proud old military guy thinks Chinese strongman Xi will turn his forces loose to capture Taiwan. Two simultaneous wars a world apart will stretch our military beyond its means. The Chinese military is the near peer of our military, yet I think we could prevent them from taking over our friend Taiwan. I fear that with our woke leadership that Taiwan may just go down the road that Hong Kong recently traveled. Sorry to share such a sad outlook on world affairs but still I have the satisfaction of knowing that I didn’t vote for Biden.

Friday our Nebraska governor Ricketts will be hosting a Townhall Meeting in McCook. Come and support him in his stance on reducing our taxes and his defense of our natural resources from the grasp of our Federal Government. Keep Nebraska strong.

That is the way I saw it. Dick Trail