When will the United States Stand Up to Tyrants?

Russian President is a dictator. His parliament is a rubber stamp. There is no freedom of press or thought in Russia. China’s premier is another dictator who also denies human rights.

Russian Pres. Putin has no plans to call off his invasion of Ukraine, a U.S. official warned ABC News on Thursday. It is obvious to me that his objective is more than Ukraine. His fear is that there are free democracies immediately adjoining his country and that success of those nations demonstrates to Russians that democracy works.

The European Union has added Russian President Vladimir Putin and Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov to its sanction list, High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Josep Borrell said in a press conference on Friday following the EU Foreign Affairs Council in Brussels. Wow! That will really upset Putin and Lavrov and make Russia backoff.

For the first time ever, the NATO Response Force has been activated as a defensive measure in response to Russia’s ongoing invasion of Ukraine. The activation of the response troops does not mean that any US or NATO troops will go into Ukraine, which is not a member of the alliance. US President Joe Biden has been clear that US troops are deploying to eastern Europe to help bolster NATO countries nervous about Russia’s aggressive actions, but they will not be fighting in Ukraine.

This entire scenario is proving that there is no NATO that will stand up to Putin. As Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia are targeted which NATO nations will come to their aid when Putin threatens the use of nuclear weapons?

Many of our less than courageous members of the U. S. congress will be saying that war in Europe is their problem not ours.

When all the rest are under Russian domination what then?

“First they came …” is the poetic form of a 1946 post-war confessional prose by the German Lutheran pastor Martin Niemöller (1892–1984).
It is about the cowardice of
German intellectuals and
certain clergy—including, by his own admission, Niemöller himself—following
the Nazis‘ rise to
power and subsequent incremental purging of their chosen
targets, group after group.

First they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out—
     Because I was not a socialist.

Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out—
     Because I was not a trade unionist.

Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—
     Because I was not a Jew.

Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.