In the midst of war, what an uplifting week it's been in terms of a world that, despite all its many worries, can still largely unite and offer hope.
Never in my lifetime have I seen such a coordinated, effective, and immediate response to a crisis.
Normally when war breaks out, the world divides, the sanctions are piecemeal, the hot air is voluminous, but not this time.
You can't buy an Apple product, H&M are closed, Maersk aren’t delivering, Boeing are out, oil and gas are gone and Volvo is closed. They are but a handful of the myriad of commercial operators who have cut ties.
Germany has basically torn up every post World War Two rule they had. They are funding third party countries with weapons, they have boosted defence spending beyond two percent of GDP, Nord Stream 2 is gone, and they agreed on the SWIFT move.
The European Union acted as a 27-country collective. There's quite a bit of commentary around that Britain, newly freed from Europe, has been able to spearhead a response previously unthinkable.
America, even though war weary and off the back of the astonishingly bad Afghanistan withdrawal, has managed to look like they are doing pretty much all they can short of actually shooting Russians.
Even China has not turned out to be anywhere near as problematic as many predicted.
When the United Nations, hampered by their weird rules, manages a vote in which only five countries are against a resolution and those countries are the aggressor, the aggressors nutty neighbour, Eritrea, Syria, and North Korea, you know the world is about as unified as we have seen in many a year.
Uplifting too is Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Surely, he's the Nobel Peace Prize winner if he survives this?
And the Ukrainian people. Who honestly would stay, get a gun, and build a Molotov cocktail here? No one. It’s a different culture, a different background and outlook, but it's impossible not to be impressed by the level of resistance this week in a war that, let's be honest, many said would be over by this past Monday.
Ultimately, Russia may still roll thorough Ukraine. But this week has been the window of hope and opportunity. There's the mad race to gets guns in Ukrainian hands and the mad race to cripple the Russian economy with sanctions.
This country should have, could have done more. Two million dollars for aid. As Mark Mitchell said Wednesday, the mongrel mob got more. God forbid, we should be like Australia and fund weaponry. Why help save a country when you can give them blankets when they are displaced?
But most of the world got it, and did something good about it. Thus, proving that in the right time and for the right reasons, we are all still on each other's side.
Mike Hosking is a New Zealand television and radio broadcaster. He currently hosts The Mike Hosking Breakfast show on NewstalkZB on weekday mornings.
3 comments:
The war in Ukraine is a terrible thing. But if it does have a silver lining it will hopefully be to shake Western politicians out of the dream they've been living for the past three decades.
It's clear now that reliable sources of energy, principally fossil fuels are critical to ALL modern societies and cannot be replaced by unreliable, low-energy density renewables which aren't even green!
It's also clear that, despite all the drivel and nonsense coming out of the UN on a daily basis, the World's still a dangerous place and we ignore our own defence at our peril.
That's an excellent and positive article Mike.
The courage of the Ukrainian populace is truly inspiring. Putin seemed to just assume the Red army could roll in and take over in a few days. The unity of the [Western, civilised] world has sent a clear message.
And - yes, it is embarrassing that NZ sends such a pitifully small amount of aid - all of us echo Mark Mitchell's comment that this government values the criminal gangs more than the people of Ukraine.
$2.75 million for Hawkes Bay mongrel mob.
$30 million to buy Ihumatao.
$1.5 million for 800 sq m section at Taipa.
$? Million spent on bribes to coerce people into getting vaccinated.
$150 million spent on abandoned Auckland cycle bridge.
$100 million on bribes to the media.
$1.3billion to the corrupt UN for ficticious climate change.
$3.5 million on peurile, dishonest advertising for 3 water.
And the list goes on and on.
$2 million for Ukraine @ 44 million population=4.5 cents each that should do it.
Well done NZ government!PATHETIC!
Post a Comment
Thanks for engaging in the debate!
Because this is a public forum, we will only publish comments that are respectful and do NOT contain links to other sites. We appreciate your cooperation.