The sooner the geniuses of the Washington Swamp get it through their ivy-mantled brains that driving a wedge between Russia and China is not going to happen, the better the chances the world can survive the fallout (figurative and literal) from the war in Ukraine.

Russians have long debated whether their country should adopt the Western model or go its own way. The latter have won the day

In the early months of 2003, I was in the Kurdish capital Erbil in northern Iraq, an area outside Iraqi government control, waiting for the start of the US-led invasion. The Kurds were all too accustomed to conventional warfare, but what truly terrified them was the prospect of Saddam Hussein’s forces using chemical weapons.

Being lectured to by the West on the evils of staging military interventions is like being told to sit up straight by the Hunchback of Notre Dame.

The world’s best efforts to manage the environment and economy in the far north have become collateral damage of the invasion of Ukraine.

The Russia-led Eurasia Economic Union and China just agreed to design the mechanism for an independent financial and monetary system that would bypass dollar transactions.

Recent events suggest that Putin’s response was not calibrated to avoid a larger action in Ukraine. It is an unfortunate choice. Wherever responsibility lies for the events that have led to this crisis, war is always the wrong answer. It is unfortunate that thirty-one years of American broken promises and broken diplomacy led to this event; it is unfortunate that Russian broken diplomacy launched it. All wars must be criticized: no matter who launches them.

Bear baiting was long ago banned as inhumane. Yet today, a version is being practiced every day against whole nations on a gigantic international scale.

The upshot of the Russian response, transmitted to Washington on Thursday, regarding security guarantees may look as if the stalemate is heading toward a war. Moscow has rejected the US’ call for ‘de-escalation’ by pointing out that the Russian troops are deployed on Russian territories; it also rejects the threat of sanctions, which it says is a contrived attempt to “exert pressure and devalue Russia’s proposals on security guarantees.”

Like it or not, the Russian president is doubling down on his crusade against American hegemony