LOAD 200

  Today I learned yet another new term, a concept of which I would have rather left unlearned, unknown, forever not part of my lexicon. Yet there it is. Yet another term emerging from this body and soul bruising war, this so unequally matched opponents.

Load 200. A term of the Ukrainian army signifying military deaths. Deaths in huge numbers. A term which now is applicable to the entire country, for all its citizens are part of an army, heaved shockingly, suddenly, into a war of vicious invasion and brave resistance. A brutal war of proxies, of substance, whose outcome will determine the future of mankind. A war between two opposing philosophies - democracy vs. autocracy. The two cannot coexist. It is a costly lesson we are learning.

 The conscripts of Russia, poorly trained, betrayed by their own government, fight against those representing the better side of humanity. These people bleed for us. Make no mistake about that. They bleed for humanity. They bleed for hope for a vital, uplifting future of mankind. All the while we stand by, sending in 'things', watching the blood flow, cowering in fear of a bully, refusing to face facts. Facts of historical verity. Facts which should remind us that never has appeasement and fear won the day. 

No bully is satisfied, always looking for more. For more territory. For more power. And that power is wielded with cruelty beyond words, with retrogression to barbaric times - a level which long ago should have been banished from the face of this earth. Apparently, humanity is a slow learner, has not internalized this lesson and here we are again. 

New and terrible weapons are raining down upon the citizens of Ukraine. A new and terrible warfare but not really new. A tried-and-true policy - scorched earth - imposed upon innocents in an invasion that is one massive crime against humanity, a giant ugly ball of war crimes. A war which will never end; the bully has the world cowering in fear, shivering, lest he ramp up the war - which he will do, no matter whether we openly join in the war or not. Putin's hunger for more, for territory, for subjugated nations, is unsatiable yet we are blind to that fact. Willingly, uselessly, tragically so.

We think he will stop at borders. Why? Borders have never stopped him before. His reincarnation of the tactics of Hitler, his piecemeal invasions and annexations of the territory of other nations, open violations of territorial integrity have been ongoing for many, many years. And why not? No one has stopped him. Never has the Western World put its collective foot down nor drawn a line whose crossing was a definite no - no. So why stop, when the opposition appears to be a balloon of leaky hot air, incompetent, unwilling to call out the bully, ever seeking the false peace, the peace that is not. 

And so, the people, the entire population of Ukraine bleed for us. We stand by the wayside, engaging in rhetoric - of no value, for it is followed by nothing. Putin's artillery reaches closer and closer to the borders of NATO countries, knowing deep within his blackened soul and heart that NATO will continue to do nothing, will come up with 'treaties' of cowardice, of acquiescence, and another domino country falls, prey to the ever growing, ever crueler claw of tyranny.

This is a war whose main strategy is 'suffocation', intimidation, attrition, as Ukraine empties out, the elderly, the children, the sick and wounded, the trapped, left behind, treated as armed soldiers. Indeed, the citizens of Ukraine are brave, beyond all expectations. Supposed to have acknowledged their 'cousinship' with the Russian people, Ukraine has chosen to deny the cousinship, and defy his forceful intrusion to their family. 

The thinking of the nations of the world is outmoded. We need to have come up with better strategies, ones that actually mean something, are actual realities rather than weak whimperings of nothingness. The country is being reduced to rubble. Beneath that rubble are thousands of trapped human beings. Every hour adds more to that tragic sum. Street to street fighting, bloody, costly, is ongoing, piece by piece, yard by yard, as the juggernaut of Russia continues, mowing down all in its path, impelled forward of its own weight.

Left out there in the open, the elephant of gigantic proportions that we are all ignoring, is whether we will allow this country - and all the countries to follow - to be subsumed into the growing darkness that is Russia under Putin. Will we allow another curtain to be drawn closed, lose all the progress made since the fall of the Soviet Union, kowtow to the autocrats who care naught for anyone other than themselves?

Humanity is at a crossroad. Which path will we choose? Either choice means conflict. Either means a challenge to a hopeful future. Either will demand great sacrifice. Either means a recognition of the fact, of the truth - WWIII has already begun. Whether it will progress to the next, formerly unthinkable level- nuclear weapons engaged - is up in the air. However, the man is deranged enough to employ their use no matter the choice we make. We need to recognize that and plan and act accordingly. There is no other way. There will be no forestalling the costs of future battlefields, for one way or another, a choice will be made and paid for, even as we pay for the debts incurred and accrued by poor leaders of the past - and present.

"Of course, it's terrible that's what's happening," said the 24-year-old from Moscow. "I feel really bad for everyone. I think that's why sport have to be example, we have to be united, we need to be outside politic, to show an example at least inside of sport."

So states a tennis player, dangerously so. There is no standing outside. There is no neutrality. This is a red line moment for humanity. We are all inside, not outside. We all share the same limited planet and what one does, affects all. One way or another. Inevitably so.

It is a point of no return. The presumed leader of the free world, this country of ours, is in the midst of its own precarious conflict. We have open traitors within the government. We have profound silence on the part of those who should condemn these traitors. We have open hatred and bigotry, white nationalists galore, preening in all their ugliness. We have mass shootings every day it seems. We have blatant attempts and legislation which threatens us all with voting limitations, with impediments to actual practice of democracy. We have those who wish to impose restrictions on our own bodies.  We have lost our own way, so how can we lead others properly?

 I have no answers to these questions, no cure for the situations that plague us and threaten our very existence, certainly as free people. I hope and pray that there are others with the answers, or at least have enough courage and wisdom to formulate them, to apply them, to stand up for all mankind. Finally. I hope. Barely.