I guess Lockheed needs more drone sales

I've been watching the U.S. and the main stream media keep pushing harder and harder to create a reason to get sucked into a land war in Europe. Cynic (realist?) that I am, it seems obvious that since the high tech arms market in south Asia dried up when the Forever War in Afghanistan ended Lockheed, Raytheon, et al. need a new market for their high tech weaponry. We've been hearing about supplying the Ukrainians with Tomahawk missiles for awhile now. Each missile has a price tag of not quite $2 million, which makes them definitely a more lucrative item to peddle than bullets for the infantry to use. There is a reason why the U.S. isn't real interested in reviving the diplomatic efforts promoted by France, Germany, and other European countries.

Naturally there is, of course, an almost feverish rush to put all the blame on Vladimir Putin. Not only do politicians and the media love to have a villain they can point at, focusing on Putin and his imperialistic designs on a former Soviet republic means no one is asking the really important question: cui bono? Who benefits? Who has the most to gain if the U.S. gets entangled int he Ukrainian mess? 

Other than the arms manufacturers, though, I'm not sure anyone does. Putin doesn't really want to invade Ukraine. He's fine with just encouraging the pro-Russian insurgents in the Donbas region to continue trying to break away from Ukraine as a whole.If he can manage to sucker the American government into doing something stupid that'd be an added bonus.

There has been a low key civil war happening in the Donbas region of Ukraine for years, the area where the majority of the population are Russian speakers and where many people still get nostalgic for (believe it or not) the good old days of the Soviet Union. Or maybe an even earlier time period, the good old days when the Russian aristocracy spoke French. The imperial government may have been incompetent and corrupt, but it was consistently incompetent and corrupt, not to mention supposedly having God on its side. Given the choice between a predictable autocracy and an unpredictable democracy, a lot of people prefer the former.

And, speaking of that imperial government, a glance at the maps predating World War I provides a pretty clear reason why Russians, Putin included, might feel like they're justified in changing a few borders. Russia used to extend significantly farther west than it does now. Regions that are independent countries now were duchies in 1913. Some regions had a fair amount of autonomy, but they were all part of Russia.It's unlikely Putin actually believes he's going to be able to get any of that back, but you know he's got to be fantasizing about it.

I'm not sure what Biden and other American policy makers are fantasizing about. I do, however, find it interesting that the two governments talking the loudest about getting tough with Putin -- Great Britain and the United States -- are the two whose countries aren't part of the same continent as Ukraine. There's nothing quite like being the farthest removed physically from a potential mess to inspire hubris in a person or a government.