Putin’s grand inauguration sent a tough message

While TV news was riveted on Stormy Daniels’ revelations and pro-Palestinian protests, little attention was paid to the coronation of czar-like President Vladimir Putin for a fifth term. It doesn’t even come close to the belligerent parade of Russian nuclear-capable missiles that parades around Red Square on Thursday, the annual Victory Day of World War II.

I would argue that President Putin’s behind-the-scenes glorification was more important than President Donald Trump’s hush money trial and student unrest.

First, the ceremony reflected Putin’s optimism about victory in Ukraine. Despite Congress passing a long-delayed military aid package for Kiev, weapons arrive too late to prevent Russia from reaping dangerous new gains unless dispatched with a greater sense of urgency there is a possibility. Putin’s grooming is clearly fueled by the belief that new aid is too little, too late, and that Trump’s victory in November will mean the end of further US aid to Kiev.

Moreover, diverting the White House’s attention to Gaza shifts the administration’s desperately needed focus on helping Ukraine advance against Moscow this year, rather than in the unforeseen future.

But the deeper reason Putin’s pomp should have gotten more attention is because it showed what most Americans still don’t understand. That is the threat this Russian leader poses to Europe and America. The threat is all the more significant because of the unchecked power displayed by President Putin. He has received praise from President Trump’s aides and the Republican candidate himself.

Putin, the longest-serving Kremlin leader since Joseph Stalin, took the oath under the glittering arches of Andreevsky Hall in the Great Kremlin Palace, where Russian tsars were once coronated. This was followed by a 30-gun salute. President Putin had amended the Russian constitution to allow him to rule for life.

Recall that President Putin took office after a sham election in March in which no genuine alternative candidates were allowed to run. The most serious opposition leader, Alexei Navalny, survived being poisoned by Russian agents but was imprisoned in an Arctic penal colony. He conveniently died mysteriously in prison a month before the election.

Navalny is just the latest in a long line of Putin opponents to be poisoned or killed not only in Russia but across Europe.

If you want a theatrical glimpse of how this Kremlin’s ruthless killer operates, rush to New York before the British play “The Patriots” finishes its run. An all-star cast depicts how Putin brutally destroys Boris Berezovsky, a Russian oligarch who rises from political obscurity to become president but then boldly challenges the Frankenstein he created. You’ll be able to see it.

This is the quality of leaders Trump respects.

Kremlin bosses are cracking down on all dissent in Russia to a degree not seen since the collapse of the Soviet Union. He has statues of Stalin rebuilt throughout Russia.

And, as his grand inauguration ceremony confirmed, he is obsessed with Russia’s past imperial glory. “We are answering to a thousand years of history and our ancestors,” he declared. At the root of Putin’s invasion of Ukraine is a distorted view of Russia’s history.

Russia’s dictator believes his country has a “sacred duty” to swallow up or dominate other European and Central Asian countries that were once part of the empire. He considers himself the embodiment of a past conqueror, such as Catherine the Great, and has a statue of her in his office. At the ceremony, he boasted that the country is on the right path and made it clear that he intends to confront Western countries.

Putin, who essentially recolonized independent Belarus, insists Ukraine has no right to exist as an independent country. On Victory Day, he repeated his grotesque comparison of the battle between Moscow and Ukraine with the battle between Russia and the Nazis in World War II.

Never mind that in 2024, it is Putin who is playing the role of Hitler, as state Russian television serves as Joseph Goebbels’ propaganda network. In the weeks leading up to the inauguration, Russian talk show hosts raved about how Ukrainians were “animals” and advocated killing the parents, wives and children of Ukrainian soldiers.

A Russian plot to assassinate Ukraine’s Jewish President Volodymyr Zelensky just before Victory Day celebrations was fortunately thwarted by Ukraine.

Putin’s nuclear threat is aimed at preventing Western powers from contributing to Ukraine’s victory.

Given Putin’s failure to conquer Ukraine in three weeks as he had intended and the cost of the ongoing war, some wonder why the West should take him seriously. Maybe. Both this year and last year, only one Russian T34 tank, a relic of World War II, passed through Red Square during the Victory Day parade, demonstrating how much military resources Russia has committed to Ukraine. It shows how much you have invested.

This brings us to why it is heartburning that America’s attention has shifted away from Kiev.

President Putin believes that the West is divided and unstable and will eventually allow weaknesses in Western societies and their defenses to be exploited. That’s what made his bravado at this year’s Victory Day parade so flagrant, after last year’s more dire outlook.

After annexing parts of Ukraine, he intends to destroy its infrastructure and cities (unless the West rushes to further air defense the country). He seeks to undermine NATO by supporting far-right parties in Europe with propaganda and funding. The coup would be a victory for President Trump, who openly despises the Atlantic Alliance.

With a flurry of nuclear saber fire, including a parade of missiles passing through Red Square, Putin deters the West from rescuing Ukraine and allows for further planned Russian aggression on land, sea and space. I hope you will. “We will not let anyone threaten us,” he boasted as he looked out at the troops on Red Square.

Needless to say, China, Iran, and North Korea are watching closely to see if his bold statements will have any effect.

Most insidious is Putin’s posing as a bearer of global standards of “centuries of family values ​​and traditions,” as he said in his inaugural address. He is skillfully exploiting the cultural divide that has poisoned Western politics.

I know that President Trump envies President Putin’s ostentatious pomp and pageantry, military parades and salutes. Less obvious is the Russian leader’s success in persuading American conservatives to support conservative, Christian, anti-immigrant values ​​globally. It is regarded as

Never mind that this self-proclaimed defender of Orthodox Christian values ​​is responsible for the massacre of civilians, torture, rape, kidnapping of children, and murder of dissidents in Ukraine. This includes the persecution of LGBTQ people and encouraging women to stay at home and give birth to eight children to increase Russia’s population. It also includes forcing artists, filmmakers, and cultural institutions to toe the “patriotic” line or go to prison.

But the far right of the Republican Party has swallowed or simply admired Putin’s constant babbling about “family values.” Tucker Carlson, who still has a huge following, treats President Putin like a hero. President Trump praised him and invited Viktor Orbán, Europe’s most loyal patron, to Mar-a-Lago. The Conservative Party Political Action Committee rushed to Budapest, Hungary, to meet Mr. Orbán.

Furthermore, according to the latest Pew poll, 49% of Republicans support Putin’s claim that the U.S. is giving too much aid to Ukraine, ignoring the security implications of Putin’s victory. are doing. While 83% of liberal Democrats distrust Putin, only 61% of Republicans overall say the same.

While Americans ignored his Kremlin rhetoric, President Putin exposed the risks he posed to our country. I wish Putin supporters in the United States had been forced to watch his authoritarian facades over and over again. But that may only make those who despise liberal democracy admire him even more.

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