Thursday, May 2, 2024

Vogon Today

Selected News from the Galaxy

StartMag

Luiss, this is why Professor Orsini on Russia makes the University of Confindustria furious

2 years ago babelfish

Luiss, this is why Professor Orsini on Russia makes the University of Confindustria furious

Still sparks in Piazzapulita (La7) between Professor Orsini, and the other guests, including Paolo Mieli and Nathalie Tocci (Iai). The Luiss professor explains why he thinks it is wrong to supply Ukrainians with weapons and why we are misusing sanctions. All the details

Corrado Formigli's living room, Piazzapulita on La7, continues to be the scene of animated discussions, or "clashes" as the authors of the broadcast on social networks define them. Also yesterday evening one of the protagonists was the director of the Luiss International Security Observatory, Alessandro Orsini, who however – mindful of what happened last week and of the grooming by his University (which promptly distanced himself from his interventions ) – immediately stated that he was there in a personal capacity.

Here's what happened.

THE FOREWORD OF ORSINI

"I have to make some premises", Orsini begins before starting his speech and Formigli specifies that he does so because "his university has censored him for what he said last week".

“I'm speaking on a personal basis,” says the professor who was presented last time as director of the Luiss Observatory on international security presented last night as professor of sociology of international terrorism.

"I do not represent anyone, I condemn the invasion of Russia and I am on the side of Ukraine", continues Orsini before taking off a pebble: "I think that when a university professor, before speaking, must make all these premises I do not think it is a nice climate ".

THE THREE GIANT MILITARY EXERCISES OF NATO AND VON DER LEYEN ABSENT

“I would like to say that my reasoning cannot be understood if some information that has not passed through Italy does not pass”, clarifies Orsini.

“NATO – he explains – has carried out three gigantic military exercises with war scenarios in Ukraine. It made one in June 2021, which is called 'Sea Breeze' and which involved 32 countries. She will tell me, but how is this possible? There are 30 NATO countries. Because they also invited Australia – which technically is not part of NATO but is as if it were part of it – and other NATO friendly countries ".

“NATO – continues the professor – did another gigantic military exercise in July 2021, it is called 'Three swords', then it did another gigantic military exercise in September 2021, it is called 'Rapid Trident'. When they did the exercise in September 2021, Putin was firing on NATO ships and said: 'stop because you are bringing this situation to a point of collapse'.

“I ask myself – asks Orsini – where was von der Leyen when this happened?”.

THE ERRORS OF THE EU AND THE SENNO THE TRUMP

The professor, in support of his thesis that it is wrong to supply arms to Ukraine, gives two US examples, from the Trump administration, of how to avoid a war:

“In 2017, Trump and Kim Jong-un started arguing. Trump said: 'I want to invade North Korea'. His generals told him: 'we will have a million dead because Kim Jong-un can fire missiles on the American base in Guam and can gut the city of Seoul because it is within range'. Trump, in June 2018, said: 'if all these American soldiers are to die and even risk an attack on American soil, I'm going to lunch with Kim Jong-un', and in June 2018 he went to Singapore for lunch with Kim Jong-un and became friends with Kim Jong-un ”.

“Then there was the crisis in Venezuela between Guaidó and Maduro and Trump said: 'I want to invade Venezuela'. He was told: 'you can't do it because we have too many deaths in the American army and we bring the war into our hemisphere because behind Venezuela there are Turkey, Russia and China'. And Trump said: 'I don't invade' ".

This is why, according to Orsini, "we must learn from the United States because the United States thinks about their interests, about saving the lives of Americans and protecting the national territory".

IS THE EU A BANK POLITICAL ORGANIZATION?

At this point, the professor, who immediately clarifies not to utter a statement but a question asks: “In your opinion, is it possible to say that the European Union is a politically failed organization? That is, an organization that was born with the ECSC in 1951 to pool fundamental resources and prevent war in Europe, then created the European Economic Community (EEC) in 1957, then the European Union was born in order not to make war in Europe. Now, the European Union is giving arms to the Ukrainians ”.

FORECASTS (PAST AND FUTURE) OF ORSINI

"Where was the European Commission when it was very clear that Putin would break through the front?" Asks Orsini, reiterating that he had said these things on 4 December 2018, during a hearing in the Senate.

"If we do not understand these fundamental steps, – he continues – we do not understand that another war is about to break out in Georgia because if you look at the map you will see that the two situations are mirrored because in Georgia in 2008 Putin did the same thing as made in 2014 in Ukraine. It created two independent republics to protect the national territory and in July 2021 – another piece of news that did not pass through Italy – we made a gigantic NATO military exercise in Georgia ”.

ORSINI: WE ARE WRONG WITH THE SANCTIONS

Orsini then moves on to the issue of sanctions, arguing that "we are using them badly": "Based on my studies of the civil war in Yemen, I say that we are using sanctions badly" because "we should link them to a specific datum: dead children".

“In 2016 – he explains – Saudi Arabia killed many children under bombs and the UN sanctioned the country by putting it on a black list and saying that if it had killed others it would have tightened the sanctions. Saudi Arabia has set up a committee and subjected pilots who hit children in bombing to disciplinary measures. The consequence was that in 2020 the UN removed the country from the black list because the number has drastically decreased ”.

"[The European governments, ed .] Are killing more people because they have linked sanctions to the overall conflict, more sanctions will not stop it, – says Orsini – but if we try to pursue only one goal which is to save children, perhaps we can have a 'mitigation of the whole conflict. If Putin wants to kill fewer children, he will inevitably hit fewer civilians because they are always in the family. Since this is a long-term war, we must consider a strategic use of sanctions ”.

THE CLASH WITH PAOLO MIELI

Historian Paolo Mieli, in response to Orsini's reasons for the mistake of supplying Ukrainians with weapons, explains that the central question is: is the Ukrainian resistance good to help it to make it last a day longer or a day shorter? And to this, he emphasizes, a clear answer must be given: yes or no.

"Let's face it, – says Mieli, columnist for Corriere della Sera – for us, everyone was surprised by the idea that [the Ukrainians, ed ] resisted in this way, so compactly, so strongly, with this ability military, it is a huge surprise and to say now: 'no, let's not arm them, because it is better that they let themselves be massacred …' "

But for Orsini there is a fundamental error in Mieli's reasoning: putting the discourse on a moral level.

"If we give arms to the Ukrainians – replies the professor – we can somehow unload our conscience, but the fundamental point is that we Italians must not feel guilty if we do not give arms to the Ukrainians, we must feel guilty for having induced the Ukrainians to believe that we would defend them in the event of an attack by Russia, this is our sense of guilt ”.

Mieli disagrees and replies as follows: “The Ukrainians are not resisting because I, she or anyone else told them: 'deluded, that one day we will come'. No, they resist even if she and I don't go there ”.

THE CLASH WITH NATHALIE TOCCI

Even with the director of the Istituto Affari Internazionali, Nathalie Tocci, there was no shortage of sparks. Tocci, in fact, recalled that from the talks held yesterday in Antalya between the foreign ministers, the Ukrainian Dmytro Kuleba and the Russian Sergej Lavrov, the possibility did not appear that Putin today wants to negotiate, but rather that he wants to go all the way to take all of Ukraine.

Tocci recalled that Russia had been made a proposal, namely a neutral Ukraine with security guarantees from Russia, the United States, France, Germany and Turkey, and Lavrov, on behalf of his country, said a sharp 'no '.

And here Orsini says: “And so Putin finds them again inside the house like this”, and Tocci rightly points out: “But who is inside the house? And above all whose home? It is not his home, Ukraine is not his home. This is the bottom line. Ukraine is not Putin's home ”.

But Orsini replies undeterred: "Reasoning like yours will keep this war going and will make others break out".

According to Tocci, Putin could in the future become willing to negotiate "only and only when he is weakened to such an extent that he will have no other choice. But today, alas, we are not at this point ".

THE PRO ORSINI PETITION

From all this ambaradan, the petition 'No to censorship against Alessandro Orsini' has also sprung up in recent days, launched by other teachers and addressed to the minister of the University Cristina Messa. According to the promoters, the professor was in fact "censored by his university, Luiss Guido Carli, for his analyzes on the war in Ukraine" and denounced "the climate of obscurantism that is spreading in Italy".

But what Orsini and many pacifists ignore is what an article in Internazionale recalls with the lecture by the professor of international relations at the University of Chicago, John J. Mearsheimer, often quoted "by those who would like to blame the West for the invasion of 'Ukraine wanted by Putin ”.

That is to ignore "the Ukrainians' desire for democracy and their willingness to forge a link with the West", a sentiment judged by Mearsheimer "irrelevant and constructed from abroad […] but the truth is that in some moments history is made people's wishes, not the logic of the international system ”.

This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/mondo/luiss-orsini-russia-ucraina-guerra/ on Fri, 11 Mar 2022 11:22:07 +0000.