James M. Redwine

Russia

Brothers From Other Mothers

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Photo by Peg Redwine

This week I ran into a man whose family has connections to Ukraine. They live in the country of Georgia now as Peg and I have been doing for the last five months where we are working with the Georgian judiciary. His perspective on Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is quite personal as is the perspective of the Russian man who sat next to me on a flight from Istanbul, Turkey to Batumi, Georgia last Wednesday.

The two men looked quite similar. Both were rather tall and athletically built and about 40 years of age. One man’s native language is English but the other speaks fluent Russian. His English created several entertaining exchanges for us that we worked through in mutual good humor. My Russian barely qualifies as communication even though Peg and I picked up some phrases when I was in Russia in 2003 working with the Russian judiciary.

I also managed to pick up a few Ukrainian words when I was in Ukraine in 2000 working with Ukrainian judges. I tried my Ukrainian lexicon with the man whose relatives speak Ukrainian, but it was more comic relief than communication.

Both men have children and both would like to see the war between Russia and Ukraine ended immediately if it can be done in a reasonable manner as each sees it. Peg and I are much more aligned with Ukraine than Russia, which the Russian obviously suspected when I told him at our mutual introduction Peg and I were Americans. He was initially rather cautious in his comments but once he decided I did not hold him responsible for Putin’s military decisions, he relaxed quite a bit. Unfortunately, our flight was only about two hours in length so he and I did not have time to bring Ukraine and Russia to the Peace Table.

He did share several deeply personal experiences and emotions with me during our short flight. When I told him our son had boxed at West Point and that I had helped train both amateur and professional boxers, he opened his mouth and showed me a set of perfect lower teeth. He said he had boxed in Russia and once got into the ring against a much larger boxer without wearing a mouthpiece. He had $3,000 worth of false teeth and a hard-earned lesson about uneven and unfair fights as a result.

The English speaker is a swimmer and an avid hiker who believes physical health is essential to mental health and both men do not hesitate to strongly state their views which are closely related to what kind of future their children may look forward to in a post Ukrainian-Russian war environment.

If the two fathers were to be placed together in a lineup, I would have a difficult time picking out which one was which. Both are about 6 feet tall and weigh about 200 pounds. Both have very short cropped, light colored hair and lean facial features. They could be brothers if looks were the only criteria.

They could, also, be brothers if their concerns for their families and their countries could be considered relevant DNA features. It struck me that both of them might be better choices for leaders of Ukraine and Russia than what we have, although this is purely my thought, as neither of them made such a suggestion. Of course, their natural national allegiances probably interfere somewhat with their ability to set aside any magnanimity. However, each of them recognized the children in the other country are not to blame; only the adults may be held accountable. That is, if the adults come to a realization they should be.

I shared with each man my concern that Russia might be of the same mind a friend of mine who was a supporter of Israel had in 1973 when Egypt could have overrun Israel with its superior, but non-nuclear, military power. At that time most experts believed Israel had stolen enough nuclear secrets from America to construct nuclear weapons. Now, we know they have.

Anyway, my friend stated his passionate support for Israel included Israel’s “right” to destroy the whole world if Egypt were about to destroy Israel. Such nihilistic blindness is what I and my new acquaintances most fear in our current war.

 

Hot Wars and Cold Seats

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Photo by Peg Redwine

Each morning I look off my apartment balcony at the ships floating on the Black Sea that lies between the countries of Georgia on the southeast and Ukraine to Georgia’s northwest. So far the ships have remained of the merchant variety, but I always look first to make sure. Georgia is a country of four million people with virtually no way to defend itself. The Georgian government that fears Russia on Georgia’s northern border and the citizens of Georgia who fly Ukrainian blue and yellow flags are in constant yang and yin over the war being waged just across the Black Sea. The government worries about poking the Russian bear and the citizens publicly rally and demonstrate in support of the Ukraine population.

Recently Russia has been stirring up its long held relationship with the country of Belarus that lies between Russia’s western border and Ukraine’s northern border. Belarus is in the same military condition as Georgia. Belarus, as led by the politically embattled president Alexander Lukashenko, with its nine million citizens, is even more supine to Russia’s might than Georgia. Therefore, Belarus does not pretend to resist Russian moves to use Belarus as a staging ground for Russia’s military and probable invasion of Ukraine. At the very least, Belarus provides Russia with a vital logistical path for re-supply of its military.

Belarus Flag in Batumi, Georgia. Photo by Peg Redwine

This morning, December 15, 2022, I am gazing at the tankers and grain ships right outside my window and, as we humans often experience, a totally unrelated memory of a simpler time comes to mind. In 1954 my family had a new Ford automobile, the kind with front fenders. Some of you will remember fenders and maybe will have even ridden on them to deliver newspapers as my brother Philip and I used to when we could wheedle Mom into driving us along our paper route. In 1954 the Korea War was over and our generation’s war in Viet Nam had not yet begun. The hero of the Normandy Landing of WWII, Dwight Eisenhower, was president of the United States and America was keeping the Soviet Union on its heels, not with bombs but with the humanitarian Marshall Plan.

In those halcyon days in Pawhuska, Oklahoma the Pawhuska Journal Capital newspaper was owned and operated by Glen Van Dyke and Phil and I had one of the delivery routes. We would go to the Journal Capital office on Kihekah Avenue and get bundles of papers. Phil and I would fold them into five-point throwing projectiles and fill two canvas bags that we hung over the Ford’s hood ornament. We each sat on a fender and competed for distance and accuracy as we banged the papers off the porches of our neighbors who sometimes complained to our parents.

I did not read the Journal Capital then and never had any inclination at age 11 to write a column in it. However, I do remember my mother and father sitting at the kitchen table and laughing at Glen’s witty sayings in his regular column. I still remember Mom and Dad laughing out loud when Glen complained that modern science seemed to be able to create hand warmers and foot warmers but for some reason could not come up with a toilet seat warmer. Gentle Readers, that was almost 70 years ago and, while we are now on our way to Mars, we still have not cracked the code on toilet seats. However, we seem to still be sending vast amounts of aid to keep the Russians on their heels.

Photo by Peg Redwine

The U.S.S.R. Revisited

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Photo by Peg Redwine

In Batumi, Georgia there are many Ukrainian flags flying and the blue and yellow colors of Ukraine are displayed in shops, on cars and even whole sides of buildings. Georgians relate to, understand and support Ukraine that has a border along the Black Sea as do Georgia and Russia.

The Black Sea is an important shipping water and leads ultimately to the Mediterranean Sea and therefore the whole world economy. Just as the Black Sea port of Odesa is critical for Ukraine to access the Black Sea, directly across the Black Sea is the equally vital port city of Batumi, Georgia where Peg and I are living. We look out from our apartment’s balcony across the Black Sea and often wonder if Russia will invade Georgia as it has before. In fact, Russia’s military currently occupies 20% of Georgia.

Peg and I drove within a few kilometers of part of the Georgian territory claimed by Russia when we traveled from the capital of Georgia, Tbilisi, to our judicial duty station in Batumi. We were warned to not try to get near the Russian military installation as Russia considers that a part of Russia, much as it does Ukraine’s Crimean area. And with our American passports, we might become fair game for a Gulag. Just ask Brittney Griner.

Photo by Peg Redwine

As I am writing this column on Sunday morning, December 04 (our son’s birthday, by the way) I am looking out our 17th floor window at merchant ships on the Black Sea. One of the ships has two large metal tanks that occupy almost the entire length of the ship and appear to be equipped to haul natural gas. Many of the ships that go by us are loaded with semi-trailers. Batumi has little in the way of exports except wine; Georgia claims to be the 8,000 year old birthplace of wine. However, as this is both a port city and a warm water tourist destination, a great deal of grain and manufactured materials are imported to Batumi. The concern, of course, is that Georgia with its 37,000 man military would be a mere nuisance if Russia and its million man army decided this port is an attractive excuse to re-claim all of Georgia as part of the historical Russia. After all, Stalin was born in Gori, Georgia and even attended the Tbilisi Spiritual Seminary. Since Stalin was history’s greatest butcher of human beings and presided over the Soviet Union (U.S.S.R.) for over 25 years, the concerns of Georgians do not seem unreasonable.

Speaking of the U.S.S.R., the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, I am currently reading a book that cites stories from Georgian persons who lived under the Soviet Union. The book contains 70 stories, one for each of the 70 years the U.S.S.R. existed, and was compiled by editor Buba Kudava. In his forward to the book, Kudava addresses the U.S.S.R. name:

“Until only recently, Georgia was part of a country whose falsity began with its very name. The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, as it was called in full. Four assertions, and all four of them lies!

How, after all, could the term “union” be applied to a group of territories brought together without their consent, through fear and violence, and held together through force of arms? How could the descriptor “soviet” be used when no true “councils” were consulted and no true counsel sought? How could rampant totalitarianism be described as “socialist”? And how could any of the “union’s” 15 sham “republics” be deemed worthy of that name, with all of its associated high ideals?

Four assertions, and the same number of falsehoods.”

Life in Soviet Georgia, ISBN 978-9941-487-64-4 (2021), p. 7

Literature often tells us more than news reports about what actually happened to people and how it felt to those affected by the events. The stories from this book strike me as valid observations of where Russia truly stands when it comes to Ukraine and Georgia and maybe the other thirteen “Republics” of the old U.S.S.R. I understand why Georgians stand with Ukrainians.

Peace Be Upon Us

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Photo by Peg Redwine

The United States and Russia have been jockeying for position in Ukraine since, at least, 2014. Three American presidents, Obama, Trump and Biden, and one Russian president, Putin have been in power during this period.

According to a publication of the Congressional Research Service updated on October 21, 2022 the United States has, up to October 14, 2022, provided $20.3 billion in “security assistance” to Ukraine. As one can observe on CNN, Russia has destroyed large swaths of Ukrainian territory and Google projects if the war ended now it would cost between $100 billion – $200 billion dollars to reconstruct the damaged areas. The human cost was not considered but it is immense.

Ukraine’s Crimea area was taken over by Russia by force in 2014. The world took note and America began arming Ukraine in anticipation of just what happened on February 24, 2022. If that invasion had not happened the United States could have saved over $20 billion dollars, Ukraine could have been spared up to $200 billion dollars in reconstruction costs and Russia could have preserved untold billions in economic and humanitarian costs. The spin off cost to the rest of humanity is incalculable with the loss of tens of thousands of lives, untold wounds and injuries and millions of people displaced from their homes.

We humans have known since cave man days that there may be times when peace is bought at too dear a price, but there never is a time when war is good in either human or economic terms. What we have not yet perfected is a method of maintaining a just peace in the face of an aggressor who is bent on an unjust war.

But we all know peace is best and war is worst. Muslims greet people with “Peace be upon you” and Christians cite the peace-keeping propensities of Jesus as his greatest virtue. Jews say “Shalom” (peace) when coming or going and virtually every culture claims peace as one of its paramount goals. We humans have repeatedly codified peace as one of our greatest treasures.

The Charter of the United Nations, ratified on October 24, 1945, at Chapter VI, Article 33, demands that disputing countries:

“[S]hall, first of all, seek a solution by negotiation, enquiry, mediation,
conciliation, arbitration, judicial settlement, resort to regional
agencies or arrangements, or other peaceful means of their own choice.”

“The Security Council shall, when it deems necessary,
call upon the parties to settle their dispute by such means.”

Just such a solution was found to the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962 by United States President John F. Kennedy and Soviet Union President Nikita Khrushchev. America had installed nuclear missiles in Turkey, then on the border of the USSR, and in Italy that was not far from Russia. Khrushchev responded by seeking to install nuclear missiles in Cuba. Instead of nuclear war, America withdrew its armaments from Turkey and Italy and the USSR turned its missile loaded ships around and took them home.

There are similarities to the current confrontation among Russia, Ukraine and America. The United States has armed Ukraine that borders Russia. Russia rattled its sabres for some time and has brought disaster on itself, Ukraine and, potentially, its other neighbors, such as Georgia that was invaded by Russia in 2008 and 2014. Poland, Finland, Moldova, etcetera, etcetera remain within Russia’s radar. Perhaps reliance on the wisdom of the United Nations Charter might be in order.

As Abraham Lincoln advised:

“Discourage litigation (and war is the ultimate litigation);
Persuade your neighbors to compromise whenever you can.”

In their book, Law and Economics, at p. 356, Robert Cooter and Thomas Ulen state:

“For any trial [war], a settlement usually exists that makes both parties better off, so trials [wars] are usually inefficient.”

 And legal philosopher Richard Posner states:

“The primary (though not the exclusive) function of law is
to aid parties by altering incentives.”

                                                Economic Analysis of Law, p 256

The American Bar Association explains that disputes should be approached by emphasizing a problem solving attitude (integrative bargaining) in which both sides seek a solution that meets their interests. And other countries should encourage such an approach, not exacerbate the problem.

Now one might think we are a little late in the Russia/Ukraine War to pour oil on troubled waters, but what is the alternative, perpetual and expanding war? Besides, Ukraine is only one of Russia’s neighbors. Peace in the whole world should be the goal. For as suggested by the Charter of UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization):

“Since wars begin in the minds of men”,
peace must supplant conflict in their hearts.

Whose Ox?

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Photo by Peg Redwine

What is wrong with the American political system? Why are people so upset? Are we living in the End Times, the dreaded Eschaton? Why is Kanye West (Ye) such a pariah to many and a voice crying in the wilderness to some? Will Donald Trump save America or destroy it? How about Joe Biden? Was that referee blind when he called pass interference against my team or maybe he had a bet on the game? Really, can someone explain to me how anyone can see any possible redeeming value in talking to Putin? We probably ought to just go ahead and push our button before he does his. And, what is it about lawyers? If I hear one more attorney say to me, “On the other hand,” I am going to throttle him. There is only one side to an issue, the right side. I do not need someone telling me to consider someone else’s views in politics, religion, the Supreme Court or my in-laws. In other words, there is nothing wrong with America, or the war in Ukraine, that could not be fixed if they would put me in charge.

These thoughts woke me up at 4:00 a.m. Georgia Time this morning after Peg and I had had a discussion with two of our Georgian (the country) friends yesterday afternoon. I had casually raised the thought that much as America reacted to the Cuban Missile Crisis, perhaps Putin was concerned about the United States and other NATO countries having military installations near Russia’s borders. Of course, we know we would not launch any nukes into Russia, but does Putin? Perhaps we should apply a lawyerly analysis and try to see the situation from all points of view. Well, I tell you, Gentle Reader, that was not a popular approach with my Georgian friends whose country has already been seriously encroached upon by Russia. In the Russia vs. Ukraine War, most Georgians and most Americans see only one side with one point of view. Russia fired before talking, so Ukraine and its allies should do the same. After all, Georgia or Moldova, or Poland may be next. If history is the guide, as it often is, then trusting Putin to be reasonable is not reasonable.

Peg and I like our Georgian friends who have been gracious and welcoming. Georgia is a beautiful country and our apartment right on the Black Sea would not show well ringed with Russian war ships. We do side with Ukraine as I also made several Ukrainian friends when I taught Ukrainian judges for a couple of weeks over Christmas time in 1999-2000.

Russia is in the wrong and Ukraine is in the right. That may start the analysis, but it should not end it. A nuclear war is not in Ukraine’s best interest nor in Georgia’s. And it most certainly is not in America’s. So, as I cautiously kept the remainder of my lawyerly, Jesus-type of mote and log reasoning about Putin to myself, I thought about all those times our friends and family wondered what was wrong with us when we gently said, “On the other hand.”

Shanghaied

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On February 04, 2022 Russian President Vladimir Putin, on an invitation from Chinese President Xi Jinping, attended the China Winter Olympic Games in Beijing. Twenty days later Russia invaded Ukraine. Nancy Pelosi, the Speaker of the United States House of Representatives, in response to an invitation, visited Taiwan over China’s objections on August 2, 2022 and China immediately responded with massive military maneuvers around Taiwan.

Russia has now been at war with Ukraine for over six months. Ukraine has been supplied with many billions of dollars’ worth of military hardware by America before and during the war. Taiwan has recently received a pledge of over one billion dollars’ worth of military aid from the U.S. The U.S. has long supported Taiwan’s independence from China which claims Taiwan as part of China.

Russia and China share some common borders on the eastern and western edges of both countries and share one main nemesis, America. On September 15 and 16, 2022 Xi and Putin will meet face to face at the Shanghai Cooperation Organization Summit in the city of Samarkand, Uzbekistan. The United States is not invited.

It is possible Russia and China just want to confer on the relative merits of their national ballet companies and the ten billion cubic meters of national gas Putin promised to Xi in their February meeting. Or perhaps Putin and Xi want to compare notes on how each can continue in power beyond the traditional terms of prior Chinese and Russian presidents.

On the other hand, I suggest the two leaders may be getting together to discuss their largest common problem, us. Not much information was released from their conference in Beijing in February and almost no advanced agenda has been published for their Shanghai Cooperation Organization Summit. My suspicion is the name “Shanghai” was not chosen idly. It may be that China is reminding the United States of the practice of tricking or forcing sailors to serve on merchant ships sailing to Shanghai in the 1800’s as was often done by American, British and French merchants. Perhaps it is meant as an otherwise inscrutable warning to America to butt out of Ukraine and Taiwan.

As for me, I think Pelosi or anyone else ought to have the right to visit Taiwan and, I think, Ukraine’s territorial integrity should be respected. Of course, I find it difficult to analyze the motivations of China, Russia or even my own country when it comes to engagement in foreign wars unless one is attacked. It seems to me our Constitution’s provision for military defense, not offense, makes sense. But then I am not in charge of our foreign policy. If I had been, Viet Nam, Iraq and Afghanistan might have unfolded differently and maybe Ukraine and Taiwan too. Those are matters our elected leaders are much more informed upon, I hope.

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