Dictators May Want an Anschluss But Neither Belarusians Nor Russians Do, SerpomPo Telegram Channel Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, December 8 – Vladimir Putin’s approach to Belarus is based on the proposition that Belarusians will put up with it and that Russians will celebrate such an Anschluss. But neither is correct: The Belarusian people don’t want to be part of Russia, and the Russian people have accepted Belarusian independence even if the Kremlin hasn’t, SerpomPo says.

             Any new arrangement between Belarus and the Russian Federation will be the work of the two dictators, the telegram channel says; neither the Belarusian nor the Russian nation will be behind it whatever Putin thinks and his propagandists claim (t.me/SerpomPo/4795 reposted at echo.msk.ru/blog/serpompo2018/2551245-echo/).

            “The people of Russia are not demanding the Anschluss of Belarus: there are no actions in support of the inclusion of Belarus within Russia. Not only no mass actions but not even individual pickets. There can’t be found in Russia even a single fool who would go to the Kremlin with a placard about the need for ‘a union state,’” SerpomPo observes.

            The Russian people have accepted Belarus as a separate people and a separate country. But that isn’t the case with the Russian bosses. “they want to deprive the citizens of Belarus of their own state. Consequently, there are mass protests of the opposition at the Russian embassy in Minsk” to tell Moscow that is not what they want.

            Moreover, and this is often ignored, “there are in Minsk no mass or indeed any actions demanding that Lukashenka create ‘a union state’ with Russia. There aren’t any fools there. None. What this means is that the people of Belarus on the question of the independence of their country is in a firm alliance with the people of Russia.”

           

            Not so with the two dictators. They are driven by other issues – “power and property. One, Putin wants an Anschluss in order to again ‘be reelected’ in a new state for another 12 years, to keep power and property for his family and friends. The second, Lukashenka, wants to hold onto power and property and not give them to Putin for the latter’s purposes.”

            “We therefore note the following: The disintegration of the USSR occurred without the participation of the peoples, by the signatures of three leaders in Belovezhskaya pushcha. The attempt to include Belarus within Russia also is occurring without the participation of the peoples.”

            Once again, the leaders want to decide everything on their own as if the people were trash. Whether the peoples this time will be able to prevent that remains to be seen.  But it is certain that neither Russians nor Belarusians want a union state whatever Putin and his minions say.