People may wish for whatever you can imagine for the New Year. Love, gifts, new job promotion, some special desires, and so on.
I also have my special desires to keep in mind for 2023. Two wishes.
The first one is global, and the second one is merely local.
The first one is easy because it is about the war in Ukraine. It not only kills tens of thousand military personnel from both sides and civilians in Ukraine.
It directly threatens me.
I will explain. Putin’s nightmarish war is changing Russia with the purpose to make it Iran v. 2.0. Simply because it is the only way to win the war, in his mind. My whole lifestyle and life expectations are being changed by the madman in Kremlin. The country is closing from the outside world, and the views that only yesterday were considered edgy, now are mainstream, such as the creation of the USSR part 2, or oppressing the Ukrainians to the point they will be mentally and physically too devastated to resist.
The new Dark Ages are coming and then I will have a choice: to leave the country or submit to the ayatollahs in the Kremlin who want yesterday to become our tomorrow. I mean, if I am going to have a choice because the country could be closed literally, with no permission to cross the borders for men of my age.
I am not an optimist now and I believe that most Russians are so indifferent, or simply have a slavish mentality that even in the case of Putin’s military defeat they would still buy his tales about Russia’s eternal greatness and revenge for Ukraine and the West.
This is some crazy world I don’t want to live in. My whole life is proof that the other way to live is possible.
So my main 2023 wish is that most of my nation be awakened somehow and realize that they’ve been fooled for two decades. Then everything will be changing fast.
My second desire is my petty one: as an English-speaking copywriter, I want to finalise my expertise in creating cryptocurrency content as this area is very promising in my profession. Plain and simple.
So two wishes. Let’s see in 12 months where I will be.
A wish for 2023
I have plenty, but sadly few of them will come to fruition in 2023.
My biggest wish is for the carnage in Ukraine to cease, but that’s not on the cards for the next 12 months.
I want the calamitous cost-of-living crisis in Britain, mainly affecting the most vulnerable people, to stop, but it’s only going to get worse. If there’s a really cold winter, I can see massive power cuts in a sea of discontent. Riots on the street may follow, simply because the people will be at the end of their money supply, and the end of their tether.
Unhappily, the British Prime Minister, the utterly wretched Rishi Sunak, will still be in position by the year’s end, although I expect him to be even more beleaguered as his equally contemptible Tory party try their best to destroy themselves with ideologues on the right and rebellious back-benchers. I hope they succeed.
I wish Donald Trump to finally be indicted, but the American system is slow and cumbersome, and again, it won’t happen in 2023.
One wish that might just come true for me is for China not to invade Taiwan. Maybe that nasty Xi Jinping might attempt a blockade, but he probably won’t want to gamble with a full invasion. He has enough internal problems to sort out first.
With a bunch of predominantly idiots running the world, there is nothing with which to look forward in the next 12 months. So instead, my wish for 2023 is purely personal.
I wish for all my family and friends to be able to withstand the various calamities that may test their will and resolve, I wish them all to retain their health, and to be able to use their natural humanity, humour and general congeniality to ensure they get through the next year without too many trials and tribulations.
Happy New Year!
A wish for 2023
There’s a saying in my country: “Be careful what you wish for, you may get it.”
I know everyone, myself included, wants the war in Europe to end in 2023. I personally know Russians who are in denial about their country’s progress in this conflict. They honestly believe Russia is winning, and will win. In fact, if the evil West would stop supplying the Nazis, this whole thing would be over in weeks. It’s the West thats prolonging the war. The idea that Russia may be prolonging the war is something that hasn’t even occurred to the pro-Putin choir.
Planet Earth, save four poor, smallish nations run by dictators, wants Ukraine to win. This coming Summer would be a great time to finish the systematic rape of women. In fact, today would be even better.
Let’s step back for a moment and consider this. What if Ukraine really does take all their territory back in 2023? I mean all of it. What would a total defeat of the Russian Army bring: Peace? No! What if this mess ends with the Russians cornered down at the bottom of Crimea?
Strong men, dictators and wannabe dictators are all the same. To a person, they only care about personal power. NOTHING else. The stakes are personally high for Vlad. If Ukraine gets a victory that humiliates Russia, Putin will accidentally fall out a window or maybe he’ll stop a bullet with his temple. What he will not do is stand trial at The Hague or retire to his billion-dollar Dacha.
So, let’s pretend that we get what the entire planet wishes for in 2023: the remains of the Russian Army cornered at the bottom of a peninsula with no hope of escape. Will Putin use nukes? You betcha. From his point of view, there are absolutely no down sides. None.
He cares about power and of course, not accidentally falling out windows. So, he might as well throw the dice, nothing to lose.
For the rest of us there is a great deal to lose. If he uses nukes the Americans will come. That’s a promise. If the Russians are having trouble with the Ukrainians, the Americans will be a night-mare. Think the Americans will come alone? Not a chance in hell: they will drag maybe thirty countries along. Wagner Group leader Prigozhin has had dealings with the US Marines in Iraq and has made himself clear; he wants no part of that bunch. Putin doesn’t care.
So instead of only being defeated, the Russian army will be smashed against a beach on the Black Sea. Then Ukraine will demand Russia pay full reparations. Russia will be left with no choice in the matter and Putin’s date with a hard sidewalk will come.
Now, before you celebrate too much, I ask you to consider Germany after World War One. Russia could splinter into several new countries with a rump Russian state centered on a huge region around Moscow and St. Petersburg: Angry, humiliated, and hungry for pay-back. Think 1930s Germany except with nuclear weapons.
Be careful what you wish for.
P.S. I’ve never written a Post Script before, oh well… From the above you may be tempted to think I’m not in favor of a Ukrainian win or an early end to the war. I want both; now! But even more important is to have lasting peace. Mess this up and there will be a war in Taiwan, and another in Central Asia between the Stans, and another in the Himalayas, oh, and another between Armenia and Azerbaijan, and Georgia has some unfinished business too. And let’s not forget that Russia will not let all these non-Russian speaking Republics go without a fight. Like it or not Russia keeps a tight lid on several of these angry conflicts. The world must get this right