Berlin – Donald Trump has recently presented his ideas on how the Ukraine crisis and – in one go – the whole world could be reorganized: He suggested painting American F22 aircraft with Chinese flags, which would then “the shit out.” of Russia” (the shit out of Russia). The most brilliant man who just called Vladimir Putin “brilliant” joked that he was entertaining the Republican guests at a fundraising gala in New Orleans. The man is collecting for the next election campaign, and his chances of being back in the White House in three years are not small – many American voters like what he says.
At the moment, however, he is not the first person to be sent to hell, but Putin. Incidentally, he too can (still) count on the approval of the population of his country with his outrageous words and deeds. Experts reckon with a 75 percent silent majority. It is not known how many people clench their fists in their pockets. In view of the terror caused by new gag laws and police violence, too few dare open resistance.
Trump’s dream: Russia and China fight
After the F22 bombing, one could say, according to Trump, that it was the Chinese, after which Russia and China would then attack each other – and “we sit back and watch”. Trump’s mockery hit the “paper tiger NATO”.
Yes, it is important to remember Donald Trump’s America in these days of war in our neighborhood, unprovoked barbaric attacks by Russian troops on Ukrainian cities. It’s not gone just because more thoughtful gentlemen are now speaking for the United States. After all, this superpower is currently more predictable than Russia. Nobody knows how far Putin will go.
Geopolitics: what the great empires want
He too wants to rebuild the world, back to old imperial conditions: make Russia great again. Make America great, make China great: That is the sound of the times, which heralds major changes that have been in the making for a long time. Brecht summarized the sound in 1943 in a few verses: “At the bottom of the Vltava, there the stones roll./ There are three emperors buried in Prague./ The big doesn’t stay big/ and the small doesn’t stay small./ The night has twelve hours, then the day will come.”
Geopolitics is back in fashion now, the great empires are showing themselves. And the little ones in between have reason to be afraid. Europe stands together for a moment. Will this hold up for decades to come? And the war has a history – in Russia, in Ukraine, in NATO, in the USA.
Today we see tanks, bombs and the misery of civilians. It is difficult to imagine what a newly balanced, stable peace order should look like. One thing is clear: nothing works without Russia. And the Russians themselves are the only ones who can overthrow Putin. Who else? With a palace revolution because the tsar does not deliver, or on the streets when the force of the sanctions hits so hard that mass misery drives the population by the millions to rebel.
In any case, Western civil society, feeling elated at being able to do good for the moment, is being carried away to cutting ties to Russia. Woke universities are canceling cooperation with Russian institutes, even though thousands of Russian scientists have signed an appeal urging Putin to stop. Museums, theatres, and orchestras break off contact with people because they are Russians, regardless of whether they belong to Putin’s power apparatus or not.
Shouldn’t all contacts be used to inundate Russian colleagues with information, offers of talks, requests and pleas? Make your own point of view understandable, hear the people with whom you have gotten along well up to now and who may soon be needed. If not who? Anyone who cancels Russian civil society can feel a brief sense of satisfaction, but in the long term they lose their most important partners.
Despite the strong feeling of solidarity with Ukraine and the anger at Putin-Russia: The German-Russian friendship, that of the people with each other, must not become a victim of the Putin war. The hostility towards Russia, which is traditionally strong in Germany, must not have a chance to raise its head. That’s another reason why the visit to Soviet memorials on May 8 is firmly on schedule: 7,000 Russians, Ukrainians, Belarusians, Kazakhs, Uzbeks, Georgians, Balts and others who fell for the freedom of the Germans are in Treptow.