A moveable feast

Today is St. Casimir's Day, or Kaziukas as we call it in Lithuania.  An open air market stretches through the streets of Old Town, growing longer every year.  Fires burn in cast iron pots, mostly to help keep shoppers warm.  It is usually shoulder to shoulder, which is why we avoided it last year with COVID at its peak, but are half-tempted to look this year.  All though, the daily rate of infection hasn't gone down. 5,400 new cases reported yesterday, including one of our colleagues.

Daina's thoughts turn mostly to getting our flight packs in order.  I prepared two backpacks with sleeping bags, first aid kits, and other emergency items.  She's thinking of what else we need and what to wear.  Also busy scanning documents and preparing a jump drive of all our important papers.  The fear is that Russia will try to take the Suwalki gap, as they call the narrow strip of land between Kaliningrad and Belarus.  It's been a concern since at least 2015, with the US conducting joint exercises with Lithuania and Poland to defend it.  Of course, Russia says this is just paranoia, but given recent actions in Belarus and Ukraine, it feels very real now.  If Putin were to invade, he would probably take all three Baltic countries as he laid siege to all of Ukraine.

At that point, NATO would have no choice but to respond.  Already, troops pour into Poland, Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia.  Yesterday, the US ambassador to Lithuania greeted the Pennsylvania National Guard Air Force at Šiauliai.  A small contingent but a sign that the US has Lithuania's back.  The worry is that these symbolic efforts aren't enough given that Putin has beefed up Russia's military presence in Kaliningrad, and now has a massive ground force in Belarus.  It seems many in the high command still don't believe Putin would actually go through with it, but there is nothing to suggest he won't anymore.

I've continued to get text messages and calls from my relatives and friends in the US.  I'm more worried about what is going on in Ukraine.  I heard a young Ukrainian couple in the bookstore yesterday.  The husband told the clerk that they are staying at his father's flat in Vilnius, having arrived 3 days ago.  Lithuania is just now starting to get the overflow of refugees from Poland.  We will probably register our empty flat at Čiurlionio St. depending on the situation.  At the moment, there seem to be enough flats to accommodate Ukrainians.

Lithuania has long been a magnet for Ukrainians, mostly construction workers. This past summer we had a crew of three Ukrainians, two brothers and the son of one of the brothers, putting a new roof on the garden house for our son, who is remodeling it into a permanent residence for him and his girlfriend.  Daina was able to communicate with them in Russian.  They returned at one point for a wedding in Ukraine, taking a two-week break, but came back to finish the job in early fall before the cold weather set in.  I imagine they have gone back to fight.  They were very proud of their country.  The brothers had both served in the military before.

The Ukrainian flag flies everywhere in the city.  The television tower lit up each night with Ukrainian colors.  There was even a colored laser image of the flag in the sky last night.  Convoys left for Ukraine this week with clothes, food, medical supplies, and a fleet of off-road trucks to help them in their fight.  Lithuania has also provided weapons, but understandably doesn't want to give too much in this regard, fearing it may soon find itself forced to defend its boundaries.  Ukrainians tell us not to worry, they are fighting for us too.  It sends shivers down my spine.  

There has always been a close bond between the two countries.  Shared history not just from the Medieval ages, but shared oppression under Russia and the Soviet Union.  The Ukrainian embassy occupies a lovely little building next to the Russian drama theater on Teatro St. The drama theater has voiced its support for Ukraine, and is rescheduling its repertoire to include Ukrainian plays.  In fact, most Russians living in Vilnius are sympathetic with Ukraine.  They can't believe what is going on as they have always seen Ukrainians as their brothers and sisters, not their enemies.

I was listening to Andrey Kurkov on CNN this morning.  I read Death and the Penguin long ago.  Can't remember what it was about.  He was saying how the language from the Kremlin changed dramatically in recent months, going from a diplomatic discourse to a coarse talk that you would normally associate with street thugs.  That's when he knew something was up and that Ukraine had to prepare itself for the worst.  I will have to see if I can find that book and reread it, and also find a copy of Grey Bees, his most recent novel.

It is hard to really come to terms with what is going on.  I just can't believe this is happening in this day and age, and don't really see what Putin gains from it.  He was winning the information war.  He had already turned two countries in the EU - Hungary and the Czech Republic - and gained widespread influence throughout the far right political parties in other countries, notably France and Germany.  You would think he would have been content with being a major power broker, but no, he so desperately wanted Ukraine that he was willing to risk everything for it.  As it stands now, he has virtually no support in Europe. Even Viktor Orban, his most stalwart ally, is now seen greeting Ukrainian refugees at the border, promising to take them all in, even those from Africa, who found themselves stranded in the country.

I suppose part of Putin's anger stems from the way Western countries supported the uprising in Belarus over the 2020 presidential election.  There was no way he was going to risk losing his influence in this country, so he sent troops to help Lukashenko beat down protesters in the streets of Minsk and other Belarusian cities. As far as Putin is concerned, the West has overreached and it was time for him to put his foot down.  As a result, many Belarusians fled to Lithuania.  Sviatlana Tsikanouskaja currently resides in Vilnius.  There's a day care exclusively for Belarusian children next to our office.  They all want to stay close to their home country, as they still have loved ones in Belarus.  

The odd thing is that Ukraine did nothing to warrant such an aggressive action.  It had renewed talks on the embattled Donbas region - the so-called Minsk agreements.  They were hoping to put this thorny issue to rest and concentrate on EU ascension.  There was also talk of NATO, but nothing that should have angered Putin.  After all, he was widely seen as a cool, calculating man, a master chess player, surely he could easily counter such moves with a few simple moves of his own.  Instead, he brought his fist down on the chess board and thew a massive temper-tantrum, the likes of which we never heard before.

For Eastern Europeans, this is the real Putin.  He was never really seen as anything more than a hardened criminal who had learned the language of diplomacy and managed to seduce foreign leaders like Gerhard Schroder, his bosom buddy for the past 16 years.  He also became friends with Silvio Berlusconi, leading to a ribald theatrical production entitled Berlusputin that was put on in Moscow no less, with Putin not seeming to bat an eyelash.  He liked to consider himself a man of the theater, often going to productions and offering his critiques afterward.  For those in the West, this was a sign of accommodation, but Eastern Europeans pointed out that Stalin also loved theater.

It was a carefully cultivated image, one meant to win over as many Western leaders as possible, with the condition that Russia would be able to maintain its sphere of influence over former Soviet states.  He had already lost the Baltic states to NATO and the EU.  He wasn't willing to lose anymore states.  This is why he invaded Georgia in 2008, when there was all this talk of EU and NATO ascension back then.  It is also why he retains a military presence in Moldova, and why he was so quick to defend Belarus when it looked like the country was teetering on the edge of collapse.  This is his backyard and if diplomacy no longer worked, then he would use the criminal language of the street to convince Russians of the existential threat the West posed his country.

Even still, he tosses out "diplomacy" as a possible end to his invasion of Ukraine, but what can one really say at this point?  He is no longer content to have Crimea and the Donbas, he wants nothing less than the eastern half of Ukraine with Kyiv as its capital.  Does he really think that Ukraine is willing to cede half its country to Russia and that the West will oblige?

Of course, the problem becomes how to get him out if hostilities were to cease.  He has massive forces in Ukraine now, and will remain there as long as it takes to get what he wants.  We can stall him, but we can't stop him.  It is clear beyond any doubt that he wants to bring Ukraine back into the Commonwealth of Independent States.  This empty shell of an organization was never anything other than a diplomatic surrogate of the USSR, although there were aspirations at one time that it would rival the EU.  

So, we get ready. The Baltic states were never part of the CIS, but he wants them too.  He wants to control all of the eastern coastline of the Baltic Sea, as Josef and Peter once did.  If he could, he would take Finland too, but such overreach would leave him too exposed.  

He already is exposed as it is, with 60 percent of his military force expended in Ukraine, hoping to get Lukashenko to send his troops to the front, but apparently there is division in the Belarusian ranks.  These soldiers no more want to fight in Ukraine than do Russian troops, who have apparently deserted in mass, as food supplies dwindled and they found themselves trapped in the country.

I suppose that is why I am a little less worried than Daina.  Ukraine is occupying all his attention.  His military appears to be spinning wildly out of control.  Western military observers are at a loss to understand what the strategy is here, as he appears to be holding his air and naval forces in reserve, maybe out of fear of a NATO attack, or that he just thought he could waltz into Ukraine and take it over with minimal effort and minimal casualties, as he did Crimea.  However, the body bags are piling up, and Ukrainian officials are asking Russian mothers to take back their sons that are currently being held in captivity.  This is shaping into a monumental embarrassment for Putin, which of course worries Western military observers that he might resort to rash actions to regain the upper hand.  So, we prepare ourselves for any eventuality. 

Daina's only reason to go to Kaziukas is to buy cold smoked sausage and hard bread, which lasts for days.  We've already made our basement into a fallout shelter.  Hopefully, it won't come to that.  We can only wish that St. Casimir is still watching over our fair city and that no harm will come to it, while our hearts bleed for Ukrainians in Kyiv and other besieged cities throughout Ukraine.