Doomed to repeat it

History repeats itself. So, you might want to pay attention. — Quavo

One of the recurring First Ward themes echoes philosopher George Santayana’s accurately quoted contention that “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” It’s a malady our politicians are particularly prone to.

For the most part, the local examples of the failure to heed an historical red flag have minor to moderate consequences. Illinois’ consistently poor fiscal decisions for example. But now we’re bearing witness to this phenomenon on a much greater and potentially far more dire scale – the Russo-Ukrainian War. Conventional wisdom indicated the Russians would occupy Kyiv in a week, but anyone who’s paid any attention to history knew the outcome would be entirely different.

And that practiced prescience begins with, going back to the Napoleonic era, the Russian army has never been able to mount an effective offensive, particularly if it occurs outside their borders.

It wasn’t the Russian military that put an end to the French emperor’s ill-fated invasion, it was the terrible winter and the scorched earth policy that denied the French army the capacity to overcome their long supply lines that led to that legendary retreat.

At a time when generals expected 20 to 25 percent casualties in any given battle, the Russian losses were catastrophic. We cringe at the 51,000 men lost on both sides at the battle of Gettysburg, but the Russians lost an unheard of 70,000 soldiers at the Battle of Borodino when the weaponry wasn’t nearly as devastating as it was in 1863.

That dynamic persisted into World War One where the Russian’s ill-conceived invasion of East Prussia was unceremoniously repelled at the Battle of Tannenberg. Lacking organization and any form of cohesiveness, one Russian army was almost completely destroyed and a second routed by a single German army. The Russians lost 122,000 men (92,000 captured) to Germany’s 13,000. Those persistent battlefield losses eventually led to the end of the czarist reign.

It didn’t get much better for the Soviets in the Second World War, either. They eventually prevailed against the Nazis, but again, their casualties were staggering as a result of brute force offensives where they pounded the German army head on with their superior numbers.

No one knows the exact total, but the Soviet Union lost at least 9 million soldiers on the Eastern Front, while their British and Americans counterparts lost just 800,00 in all theatres of the war.

Few people truly understand why Hitler decided to invaded Russia, but that’s exactly where history is truly repeating itself right now.

The German dictator had always harbored ambitions of conquest to the east, but in 1939 the Soviet Union boasted the largest and most well-equipped army in the world. Hitler’s generals argued that it would be folly to start a two-front war against an opponent with those reserves, but he overruled them by infamously declaring “We have only to kick in the door and the whole rotten structure will come crashing down.”

He had good reason to believe the Soviets would evaporate under the German blitzkrieg, too, based on that army’s abysmal performance in the 1939 Winter War. Little Finland with their 130,000 ill-equipped troops held off 400,000 Russian soldiers for three months. When the smoke cleared, the Soviets had suffered 270,000 casualties to Finland’s 68,000.

Had the Allies shown the same kind of determination the West has shown with Ukraine, the Fins would’ve won that war.

When it comes to doggedly defending the motherland in the face of horrendous losses, Russian patriotism is unsurpassed. As a number of famous generals have purportedly quipped, “Never get involved in a land war in Asia.” But as an offensive force, the Soviet Army has never been able to measure up, and we’re seeing that in the Ukrainian reincarnation of the Winter War right now.

Worse yet, Vladimir Putin’s inexplicable failure to heed his own history will have grim consequences for both he and his country. Neither the KGB nor the oligarchs will put up with this humiliation for much longer which means the Russian despot will “disappear” sooner rather than later.

But the real peril to the planet is, just like Hitler believed in 1941, Russia’s rivals – and even their “allies” – are starting to see that their army isn’t a viable force, and a country with a population on a par with Mexico can’t sustain those Ukrainian losses. Considering Russia’s vast mineral and energy resources, that display of weakness means old feuds will rear their ugly heads and even stranger things will happen.

This is why it’s SO important to study and understand history, particularly your own. Because if, like the song goes, you “don’t know much about” it, you’ll repeat the worst of it every step of the way as Mr. Putin is proving right now.