On Historical Analogies And Their Application To Current Affairs

[danieldwilliam]

I’ve been mulling over what’s happening in the Ukraine and trying to find a suitable and familiar historical analogy to use as a starting point to get my head around what’s going on.

I’ve considered Cypress and the Glorious Revolution of 1688.

It kinda feels a bit more like the Sudetenland about now.

Comments

[andrewducker]

Which would mean that a Russian invasion of Ukraine would lead directly into WWIII.

Let's hope not :->

[danieldwilliam.livejournal.com]

Well, indeed, let’s hope not.

It’s more about the patchwork ethnic and political make up of the Ukraine and parts of it, the relative powers of the state actors, the existance or otherwise of guarantees than it necessarilly leading a large war.

But part of the analogy is that in ’38 we decided not to threaten to intervene and less than a year later we were left with no choice but to.

[andrewducker]

Oh yes. Russian can make _some_ claim to Crimea being full of native Russians, and thus Russian-enough to envelop in a protective manner.

Whether it then says "In order for us to secure it properly we need to grab the rest of the country, which provides its water/electricity/etc." is another matter.

[danieldwilliam.livejournal.com]

It’s perhaps less the reason than the need.

If there is a parallel between Hitler and Putin it’s that they have used a combination of nationalism and external threat to bolster their domestic position.

No matter how reasonable Hitler’s position sounded at first (and I don’t think it unreasonable that German speaking Germans who want to be German citizens should be allowed to become Germans or that Russian speaking Russians who want to be Russian citizens should be allowed to be Russians) and no matter how accomodating of that position one is willing or able to be the demands continue. Not because the new demands are reasonable, or logical or even real but because it is only the feeling that They are thwarting Our Reasonble Demands that keeps domestic opinion in line.


So I fear that we’ll do some perfectly reasonable deal now about the Crimea and then find in a few years time that, because Putin’s position at home is looking a bit shuggly he turns up with another set of concerns about oppressed Russians living in Belarus or God help us, Lithuania. Not because anyone much in Russia thinks it important that Russians in Lithuania should be in Russia but because angst about that sort of thing makes it difficult to challenge Putin Saviour of Our Nation.

Of course, we spent the time between the annexation of the Sudentenland and the invasion of Poland building Spitfires.

Anyway, the thing looks a little like the Sudetenland and I’m trying to think of ways in which the analogy fails in order not to have to follow the analogy through to its historical conclusion.