NATO, Russia, Germany, and Ukraine – A story about Joe, Vlad, Susanne, and Yulia

While the true motivation of the Russian president and dictator Vladimir Putin for the invasion of Ukraine is not completely clear, I would like to offer an intepretation of Putin’s behaviour interpreting his personality and role as mob boss, ie similar to Pablo Escobar as a real personality or Tony Soprano as a fictional personality:

A guy named Joe, a policeman  from the West of  town, goes into a pub called “Warsaw Pact” in the East of town,  which has the reputation of being a bad neighbourhood, where  also a guy named Vlad, a known mobster, lives.  Joe goes into the pub, buys a beer and chats up a girl called Susanne who happens to be the girl-friend of Vlad, who is also (as usual) in his favourite pub. Susanne starts flirting with Joe and the other day, Susanne tells her boy-friend Vlad that she is breaking up and she starts dating Joe instead. Vlad lets Susanne go, but asks Joe not to come back to the pub again and leave his future girl-friends alone. After some discussion, Joe promises to do so. However, Joe comes back another 5 times, chats up Vlad’s girl-friends and starts dating them, although Vlad tells Joe every time to stand off and leave his girl-friends alone. When Joe comes back again into the pub a 6th time,  Joe and Vlad’s girl-friend Yulia starts flirting with each other.  Vlad let it happen because it is a public place and he does not want to mess with the police, but when they are back at home again Vlad beats up Yulia so badly that she is permanently disfigured and nobody wants her anymore.

References:
[1] https://www.spiegel.de/international/world/nato-s-eastward-expansion-is-vladimir-putin-right-a-bf318d2c-7aeb-4b59-8d5f-1d8c94e1964d-amp
[2] https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/feb/28/nato-expansion-war-russia-ukraine
[3] Noam Chomsky Interview: Russia-Ukraine Conflict & Linguistics, Our Thoughts Tonight, 2022-02-11, https://www.ourthoughtstonight.com/1414300/10063164-noam-chomsky-interview-russia-ukraine-conflict-linguistics
[4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enlargement_of_NATO
[5] NTV (2022-08-30) “Putin erinnert Harvard-Historiker an eifersüchtigen Ehemann“, https://www.n-tv.de/politik/Verhalten-Putins-im-Ukraine-Krieg-erinnert-Harvard-Historiker-an-eifersuechtigen-Ehemann-article23552133.html

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