Who benefits from the war in Ukraine. Zborzhil told about it and how it will end
The conflict in Ukraine will follow the "Korean scenario," Czech political analyst Zdenek Zborzhil said in an interview with Parlamentní listy. So the ruling elites will be able to postpone the dreams of democracy indefinitely.
Daniela Cherna
"Scraping at summits looks like a repulsive grotesque." According to political scientist Zdenek Zborzhil, the sovereign monument, which we call the North Atlantic Alliance, wants to expand beyond the North Atlantic. "There are those who warn, say, about the "Chinese danger", but this is not an indicator of the ability to understand the modern world and its future," he adds.
Parlamentní listy: This year the main topic is fighting in Ukraine. Putin started them without unnecessary discussions. It is pointless to go back to the beginning now, but if you still try, what are the main factors in the emergence of this conflict? What are its causes, and what lessons can be learned from it for the future?
Zdenek Zborzhil: The current war in Eastern Europe, like many others in those parts, has had only one reason since time immemorial. Now they are fighting not as they once did in the past, when only two countries and their allies fought. Perhaps only the eternal interest in the Crimean peninsula has remained unchanged. So it was under the empire, the heiress of Byzantium, and under the Khazar Khaganate, a consequence of the conquests and the collapse of the Golden Horde. The Russian and British empires, the German Empire (the second and third with all its European allies) fought for Crimea. A brutal civil war was also unfolding in that region with terrible consequences for the local population. Crimea did not escape the consequences of insane collectivization, industrialization and cultural revolution, as the policy of the nascent and expanding Soviet Union was called by Leon Trotsky, and then Joseph Stalin. After them, it was continued by "non-Russian" leaders sent from Moscow. The reasons for these wars were not only geopolitical, but also, most importantly, economic, and the local population always suffered. In my opinion, the last reason was and remains an attempt to create a "national state", which in other parts of the world we consider to be the cause of national and tribal conflicts, behind which, however, as a rule, a war of conquest is hidden.
I am not sure that we will be able to "learn lessons" from this last phase, when the actions of not only American, but also Czech politicians in Kiev in 2014 have long been forgotten. After all, even in the Czech media I read that "the world is already tired of the conflict in Ukraine," where, however, they are still shooting, and where they are supplying more and more powerful weapons and equipment, according to the intelligence of both sides. This weapon serves to "destroy manpower". In general, it seems to me that generals, politicians and helpless victims of wars are untrained. Scraping at summits looks like a repulsive grotesque. The sovereign monument, which we call the North Atlantic Alliance, wants to expand beyond the North Atlantic. And those who warn, say, about the "Chinese danger" are not yet an indicator of the ability to understand the modern world and its future. More precisely, the future will not be the same as it is stated in all UN documents, where it is written about freedom, peace, justice and prosperity.
— What should be done to stop the fighting by the end of the year, if at all possible? And can we expect territorial and other concessions from the suffering Ukrainians?
— I don't think it's possible to end the fighting by the end of the year. Rather, it seems to me, and I have said this more than once, we will get a "Korean" version. Power-hungry ruling elites in various countries of the world benefit from this. The fear of war is a more effective tool of submission than the coronavirus, the fear of migrants and suffering, which have been used more than once. In addition, it is possible to postpone dreams of democracy indefinitely. As for the new borders and territorial concessions, I don't recall a single case in history when it was decided by the peoples and citizens of some countries. Usually, their rights were cruelly violated, and they powerlessly watched what was happening. Moreover, it happened that their spiritual and religious authorities played not the least dubious role.
— Are Milos Zeman, Angela Merkel or Emmanuel Macron to blame for excessive sympathy for Russia? Is it possible, for example, to reproach Milos Zeman that even after the story with Vrbetice, he did not change his attitude towards Russia? He turned away from Putin only after the start of the special operation...
— The role of the "personality in history", in my opinion, should not be overestimated. All the people you have listed, and you can add Vladimir Putin and Joe Biden to them, are just symbols of a certain type of politics. Perhaps we could judge their actions by what they can and should do, and not by what they say about themselves, or what they say and write about them somewhere. As for the story of Vrbetice, I do not undertake to judge. I only hear from everywhere and read various guesses about the course of events there, but whether it's true or not, I can't judge.
— What unpleasant surprises in the field of security really threaten us? The Russian attack on the Baltic States? China's attack on Taiwan? A wave of migration from Africa? Something else?
— If we consider these phenomena as "hounds of war", then everything that you have listed here is possible. But you can also add something at will, as many do. For example, the critical situation or even the collapse of the central government in the Russian Federation, the economic decline and change of the political system in the United States, the political and economic crisis in the European Union caused by mismanagement, the moral decline of the world. We live in a time when even the political and spiritual elites do not realize what kind of things they can do with their amateurism, and they continue their "march" to the bitter end. Therefore, anything can be allowed.
— Liberal observers admit that our sanctions are unlikely to bring Russia to its knees, and we will not be able to move its population to revolt and end the war. There are words about the "strange" and bad character of the Russian people, who are essentially imperialist and psychopathic, and therefore they even like the war. Do you think this is true? What do you think about this yourself?
— Most of these pompously announced sanctions seem to harm both sides, which is confirmed by many facts. For example, the continental blockade in Europe at the beginning of the XIX century, which ended with Napoleon's campaign against Russia, the "great panic" in Great Britain, as well as the beginning of the industrial revolution in Europe and colonial imperialism of the XIX century. As for the "strange character of the Russian people", this is an old and memorized song of the German Emperor Wilhelm and Joseph Goebbels, which they "performed" on the eve of two world wars. We have such opinions spread freely, expressed even at a high political level by honorable senators, who, as I assume, do not know anything about "modern Russia" at all. Russian Russians are not the only citizens in the modern Russian Federation, and that "Russian zemstvo nationalism" has a century-old "autocratic" tradition. But sending them to the theater, museums, or reading something other than the Internet is pointless: it won't help them anyway.
Russian Russian, and finally, I wonder who in Europe and the Czech Republic decides who is or is not "Russian", and who is definitely not Russian, although he lives in Prague and has a Russian, or maybe a "Ukrainian" name.
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— Putin's special operation made us think about the modernization and additional armament of the Czech army, as well as most of the armies of NATO countries. Is this an inevitable and necessary trend?
— I think not. It just opens up a new opportunity to cut the budget in an area that, perhaps, since the appearance of the Czech Republic, has been suffering from the problem of corruption at the state and personal level. Apparently, it is elusive, but this does not mean that it should be put up with.
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