Good evening editor, I have been attending Defense Online with pleasure for at least a year and I feel like saying that, in the panorama of national and foreign journalism, having regard to the topic of the war in Ukraine (and also the other topics, even if I spend more time on this), you have so far been the most lucid, cold, impartial and attentive to this topic which, to define it as thorny, does not convey the idea: as you rightly said during the last two lessons, we Italians "cheer" as if it were a football match, although I fear that this attitude characterizes us all, not just here in Italy.
Having said this, I am pleased to share some reflections with you after a brief introduction.
I have been working as a lawyer since 2006 and I am an officer of the G. di F. on leave with the rank of captain, I am passionate about weapons and history and, for these reasons, I really like the technical approach given by you and, to quote a 'another header, from Aeronautics & Defense.
In my "old job", dealing with investigations into organized crime and in my new one, having to defend my clients, I am used to a meticulous analysis of facts, of evidence, in order to determine (in the past) the direction of the investigations, assisting the Public Prosecutor in this effort and, in the present, to best defend my clients.
Having frequented (criminal) courtrooms for almost 18 years, I am used to detecting contradictions and highlighting them, putting "he who lies" or "he who has worked in a superficial and careless way" against the wall.
For this reason I found unprofessional, to say the least, the way in which Italian journalists, spontaneously (therefore, I daresay, out of ignorance) or "spontaneously" (and here I am wondering about the state of health of Western democracies and, among these, of ours) have provided a narrative of the facts that goes against objective data and at times imaginative (I think of when in 2022 ANSA proclaimed the end of Tank production in Russia, putting the photo of a glorious T- 34. I have the screenshots if you don't believe me).
The issue is complex and the effort to summarize risks losing concreteness to the reflections that I am pleased to share with you, who to date have proven, to follow your example, to be a lover of good football rather than a die-hard fan.
Did you have the opportunity to see Carlson's recent interview with Putin?
Now, no matter how much the president of Russia is grist for his own mill, he has cited historical facts that no Western journalist has had the good taste to address on the merits, limiting himself to mocking a head of state: anyone who does not align with the thinking that dominates today, starting with Trump, he is the object of ridicule and insults.
Now, having considered the merits, I have been saying the things that Putin said a few weeks ago (arguing ferociously) to friends for years, so I exclude being influenced by "Russian propaganda": it is NATO that caused this war, not Putin, not Russia. Russia is an actor in a formal sense where NATO is in a substantial sense, borrowing some phrases from the world of law.
I ask her: Is it true that Russia has asked to join NATO, if I'm not mistaken, since 2008 and was rejected? It is true (in the sense of whether the video is true or is it a deepfake) that the current occupant of the White House, in an interview in 1997 when he was certainly more lucid than today, stated that NATO's expansions to the East would sooner or later cause a conflict with Russia?
And the questions don't end here, because lies have short legs: I read yesterday that the CIA has had bases where it has been training forces in Ukraine for 10 years! But if this is true, then Putin is absolutely right when he says that the West has been plotting against Russia for years.
Still staying on topic, I find it interesting when Putin states that, if the West declares a state as terrorist, the West is legitimized to carry out "peace operations" (and God forbid we call them by their name!) and this it complies with international law, while if Russia does it, this is not acceptable and must be fought.
As a man and citizen of Italy and the West, I obviously root for our team, but if I am called to analyze facts, despite being a lawyer, the reality is so harsh that I struggle to defend my side.
As a man of the law, for example, I do not understand on the basis of which principle Kosovo, a Serbian region, had the military support of NATO for a referendum which is illegal (because it is not foreseen by the Serbian constitution, as it is not in our ), while the Catalans did not have this support (and came to a bad end), just as the elusive "Padani of Bossi's first era" did not have it (and those 4 thugs who assembled the "Tanko" were put on trial and condemned): if there is a principle, this should always be applicable, otherwise the conclusion is that the USA, NATO and the West acted with the Marquis del Grillo: I am me and you are not…
Kosovo was predominantly inhabited by an ethnic group of Albanian origin, Serbia intervened with weapons, NATO disintegrated Serbia; Crimea and Donbas are almost exclusively inhabited by Russians, Ukraine has been killing them since 2014 without restraint with the army, Russia has intervened: if I don't wear a fan's shirt, dear Director, frankly I don't see any differences. The only difference is the delirium of omnipotence that has characterized US foreign policy since they found themselves "alone in command" after the collapse of the USSR and before China raised its head: it is they who establish, at their sole discretion, who has the right to hold a referendum and who doesn't. If they like it it's legitimate, if they don't like it it's illegal. I find it a singular expression of democracy.
War etiquette.
If up to this point I find the arguments nauseating, when I hear the United States touch on the themes of wartime etiquette, war crimes and the invocation of the mythical International Criminal Court, the level of disgust reaches unprecedented heights.
Let me start by saying that I think that the USA was right to "behave like war criminals" in every "real war" fought, because etiquette is nonsense; only one thing counts: vae victis. Everything else is rubbish. But then don't be moralistic!
The USA used the atomic bomb twice, disintegrating, more women, less children, over 2 defenseless civilians. Let's take it for granted that the detonation of the first atomic bomb in the desert left doubts about how deadly it was, and therefore let's give up Uncle Sam Hiroshima. How do you justify Nagasaki? Did they want to see if the second bang was better than the first?
Among other things, if the Chinese had dropped the atomic bombs, who suffered war crimes at the hands of the Japanese (I am thinking of the rape of Nanjing), I would have understood: but the Japanese, in the war with the Americans, including the attack on Pearl Harbor, they only hit military targets, therefore, the Americans had no right to massacre defenseless civilians.
You will tell me that the ICTY did not exist at the time and that not even war crimes and genocide were considered punishable: true. But if you make this statement to me, then I'll start again and ask you on what legal basis we give value to the Nuremberg Tribunal and the sentences carried out. Stalin was right to say that were they just killed? He was already a dictator, it was the democracies that needed to disguise revenge as justice. I am convinced that they were right to do so, but that they "dirtied" the law by carrying out a process that is not based on legal bases but only on force, regardless of what anyone says. So much so that Putin laughs today and will laugh if Russia is strong; Saddam died only after we suppressed Iraq.
The only plausible justification is once again vae victis, without too many turns of phrase.
Again, I mention the thermite bombing of Dresden in 1945 on a day in which the American squadron commander himself noted the absence of anti-aircraft fire (so the target was once again civilians), with the firestorm and tens of thousands of defenseless civilians burned alive by hurricane-force winds at 2.000 degrees centigrade. Was it necessary in March 1945 to end the war in Europe, with Germany collapsing, to exterminate defenseless civilians or was it a retaliation for London and Coventry?
So, dear director, you will understand well, I smiled a lot when in 2022 I saw the Americans worried that the Russians could use phosphorus bombs or a tactical atomic bomb (that is, kiloton more, kiloton less, the Fat Boy that the Americans used 2 times).
I close with the photo of the Vietnamese girl running naked with her back burned by the use of napalm, noting that the convention that established the ICTY was not signed by the United States and Ukraine among those who would like to try and kill Putin .
Since they are asking for intervention, let the United States join, making their politicians available (I am still waiting with faith to see Saddam's chemical weapons). I mention Guantanamo with people detained for years without trial and the practice of water boarding, that is, torture for which no one has been punished not even by an internal court. For goodness sake, Islam, if it depended on me, I would wipe it off the face of the earth with a snap of my fingers (and therefore I think that the USA did very well with Guantanamo and with the border line practices), but then I wouldn't go around saying that I am a Saint or that I deserve the Nobel Peace Prize, nor to teach others the etiquette of war, but I would limit myself to saying, if asked, that it had to be done for the safety of the world and of all civilizations. Madness, certainly, however, history books in hand, unfortunately this is what I think and I don't see any other way, other than succumbing to them, who have no benevolent intention towards any reality that is not Islamic and sharia oriented.
Who wins the war?
Well, from what I have read from you, and I think of Hitler's conversation overheard in Finland in 1942 (if I remember correctly), I would say Russia: yes, as you said a few days ago, we have angered the Russian bear.
Every day I also read (with the translator) Ria Novosti and there, very often, when they refer tospecial operation with the same tenacity with which we have talked about "peace missions" for years (I think it is more to make fun of us than out of their genuine conviction), they say that the United States and the West are fighting by proxy "until the 'last Ukrainian'.
How can you blame him?
Director, right from the history books, given the tens of thousands of armored vehicles and the millions of German soldiers thrown in to cover a huge front in the Barbarossa operation, our journalists (who I believe have a literary background, so who more than them knows history?) they should have drawn the conclusion that 20 tanks, even with very advanced technology, are laughable, to say the least.
I Leopard 2 A4, 6, etc… is the best tank: even the Tiger i and Tiger II they were, even theElephant, also it Hunting tiger, the Panther... yet history hasn't gone very well for the Germans and the Russians often write that they should return to Berlin and, this time, to stay there much longer.
Il Tiger II Wittmann's was certainly better than Sherman Americans, yet the war was won by tens of thousands of terrible tanks that even used sandbags to protect themselves, supported by impeccable logistics that crushed Germany.
Don't misjudge me, I'm trying to simplify because my email is already huge and I still hope that if and when he reads it, he won't hate me for it!
The issue is that Russia has circumvented the sanctions (for an old and new profession, I tell you that it was a rather easy thing; if you come to the Brescia area they will explain to you how to triangulate to avoid taxation and, if necessary, I think it is also good for the sanctions ), the population lives as badly as before (and, above all, loves the oligarchs as we love Chiara Ferragni), the economy has been reconverted to war and, if it is true that they have suffered 400.000 dead soldiers, I wonder how many veterans they have on the line .
Because in the West we only have talkers and no veterans of a real war; not even Israel against Hamas is fighting an adversary worthy of the name. No Western country has fought a war since 1945 (and fortunately!).
Now, the USSR suffered 25 million deaths, of which approximately 8.000.000 soldiers, during the Second World War, so that 400.000 (i.e. approximately the American deaths in that conflict) are a trifle, yet I read that they were “collapse”. Putin has already died of cancer, syphilis, he is crazy, he is diabetic, the Russians are in revolt, the coup d'état and the collapse due to the deaths on the front. Come on!
These are the parameters to read to understand how the world moves, in my opinion.
Still keeping in mind history, family relations between Russians and Ukrainians are so widespread that Russia has no interest in "pushing" and I am inclined to believe what Putin says, also because in two and a half months, when they fought heatedly from true hatred, 2.500.000 people died in Stalingrad... with that technology.
So, when I read the news... 2 deaths, 3 deaths, 7 deaths, with all respect for the immense pain of those who happen to be there, I "smile" when I think of the horror of a war that has caused an average (in spades) of 50.000 deaths per day from September 1, 1939 to the end of Japan's surrender.
The real problem, which I would have liked to hear from your illustrious guests (but perhaps they can't even if they are on leave) is that the West has disintegrated the Armies, the Armed Forces and the war industry, so when the Ukrainians have run out, not just the petrol, but the ammunition, they will head towards Kiev and then towards Poland like the Germans did when the Ardennes counter-offensive failed: no petrol and no ammunition, equal armored vehicles and abandoned artillery and retreat on foot home while the enemy kicks you.
Now, if here we have a war of position like the First World War, with a sprinkling of missiles, drones in quantity and a situation awareness worthy of the best video games, if and when this happens we will have a Caporetto, with the collapse of the front and the end of the games.
The Americans are no longer giving weapons because their arsenals are empty, rather than due to political struggle: their industrial apparatus has also been streamlined and Trump's MAGA policy is aimed at remedying this too (in his first mandate he forced all the large American companies to return to producing in the United States).
This is not typhoid, but the analysis of the objective facts available, with the benefit of inventory, like everyone else, due to the most appropriate fog of war.
The Russians have certainly learned from the mistakes they paid for at a high price (400.000 thousand casualties are not few, even if 25.000.000 are an enormity that they have shown they can tolerate, taking into account that 17.000.000 civilians died; they did not give in to siege of Leningrad!), they have changed generals and leaders who made mistakes (we never see this in us), they are producing less than what they expected, but 10 times what we are able to produce today in the West, they are motivated and they have tens of thousands of veterans from a real war, not from American films Iraq 1, Iraq 2, Serbia, Afghanistan, Syria and so on.
We no longer have barracks, our people Ram I would send them directly to the museum (they will be newer than the T80 BVM but I believe that in a direct comparison the 20, 30 examples that work would succumb in half a day), our young people, if you take away Tik Tok from them, die on the spot (I smile when I think that the biggest porn sites, to spite Russia in 2022, have blocked the broadcasts of porn in Russia, to the great detriment of citizens and troops on the front!), our Navy and Air Force are miniature: what are we screaming?
We are a toy Chihuahua and we are enormously scary!
Our European business partners (because the EU, alas, is not yet a state) are no better off: The Bundeswehr it is the stunted shadow of the Wehrmacht, France has not won a war on the battlefield since 1870 on its own merits, but only thanks to the allies, for having been on the right side (for the glories they have to go back to Bonaparte, as we do to Caesar, Augustus and Trajan), the Royal Navy is making a terrible impression with the most modern units brought online. I'm honest, I don't see how it's possible to scream in these conditions. Decades of rearmament policies are needed to return to competitiveness and to have conventional deterrence.
I don't think the Russians will reach Poland but, if so, bloodless as we are, How would we defend ourselves? Using Minuteman I and II in the heart of Europe? Would we stop the hypothetical advance on Berlin by wiping out the Russian army and with it Poland and the Poles, making Europe an inhospitable land for thousands of years?
Putin and Russia have rearmed themselves in 24 years in which they have drunk some bitter drinks (and they still have many steps to take in this field to become fearsome again), among which the destruction of Serbia stands out without title. We have crossed the red line, we have done like Hitler, who, not satisfied with Austria and Czechoslovakia, entered Poland.
We "took" in NATO: Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Poland, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, Czech Rep., Slovakia, Slovenia, Croatia, now Finland and Sweden and we also wanted Ukraine! We have nothing against Russia, but we do not want Russia in NATO, much less in the EU. If we didn't talk about states and foreign policy, it would seem like we were in kindergarten.
I'm closing. Expecting serious, in-depth analyses, which take into account, in order to draw acceptable conclusions, historical precedents (I am thinking of the US reaction during the Cuban missile crisis and I understand the Russian state of mind today, for example), I realize is asking too much, having to be fans of our team, but the fact that the journalists were all united on the same line is something new, a surprise, something that didn't even happen during the First World War, when we were involved, so I wonder whether, in fact, our democracies are healthy.
Finally, acknowledging the problem is the first step towards healing and studying history helps to avoid making the same mistakes (the French thought that the Maginot Line would have allowed them to win the First World War, we believed that this would have been the Second War Second World Cup and we were waiting for it Blitzkrieg with panzers).
Best regards and thanks for your attention.
MM
Dear lawyer, I share your reflections and confirm what you asked: until 2008, NATO-Russia collaboration was particularly intense. Remembering the Pratica di Mare Summit by Silvio Berlusconi in 2002 we cannot exclude that Russian entry into the Alliance was desired by many (European) leaders. Then, Moscow's military intervention in South Ossetia froze every possibility.
It is also true that Joe Biden, in a speech at Atlantic Council in 1997, he admitted that NATO's eastward expansion, particularly into the Baltic states, could result in a "vigorous and hostile reaction" by Russia. There was therefore already an awareness at the time that this expansion could have serious consequences.
I have a personal opinion on the behavior of the media: fake news and propaganda are a must during war. Is their presence a symptom of a reality (behind the scenes of the theater) already underway? Evidently yes. The important thing is that the "sheep" don't get too scared.
As we then wrote the 24 February of the 2022, Putin seems to have fallen into a trap. And he's right...prepared for at least a decade. Typical mistake of someone - an intelligence agent who has become a "master" - who is too sure of himself!
Perhaps, since it is useless to observe the present, we should try to understand the future: Russia, with its "peace mission", has effectively ended up in the mouth of the Chinese Dragon. China is destined, at the end of real war that is about to break out, to lose. Who will write the new political structure of the planet? Only USA and India, winners together with friends and allies? Or even those countries that - in due course and in the "Cesarini zone" (speaking to the Italians so that the Russians understand), will prefer a new world order in which points of view ("not necessarily radioactive"?) will be useful?
Andrea Cucco
Photo: Kremlin
