Brane Space: A Hard Thought: No Matter The Scenes Of Destruction NATO & Biden CANNOT Put Up A Ukraine 'No Fly' Zone!

To idiot politicians and pundits who want a Ukraine no-fly zone

As I'd written earlier, the actions of a president now in this Ukraine crisis are circumscribed. You can't just dispatch troops, fighter jets or an aircraft carrier to the Black Sea. Nor can you try to establish 'No fly' zones over Ukraine which would entail invading the same airspace, close contact with Russian fighter jets, potential misfires ....and tactical nukes exchanged. Followed by all -out nuclear war. This should not be so-called 'rocket science' or even content in a Mensa admission test!

Look, I get it. The emotional scenes of kids and young moms fleeing the carnage in various Ukrainian cities are heart-wrenching. Every time Janice herself sees another kid squeeze his or her stuffed animal close to the chest, she wants to cry. I want to grab Negan's bat 'Lucille'

and pound on Putin's head - as well as Trump's - for praising his attack on Ukraine (and now trying to worm out of it.) But this is neither the time or place for hot emotions to run wild, and create even greater problems - say like the extermination of humans in World War III. Hence, no matter the scenes of desperation - and they are legion - we absolutely cannot allow our emotions to rule our heads and dispatch troops, or attempt a 'no fly' zone with NATO and U.S. aircraft.

One would have thought this would be common sense, but I have noticed more and more pundits and pols leaning toward military involvement as the Russian pummeling of Ukraine goes on. This is bloody tragic for sure and will lead to likely thousands dead and cities turned to rubble - but it is still less than likely hundreds of millions incinerated in an all out nuclear war. Which scenes below from the movie 'Threads' I suggest any gung-ho readers watch again:

Threads (1984) - Bombing Scene - YouTube

And only a bloody fool would make a bet that Putin will not resort to nuclear weapons and is only bluffing when he makes threats. See e.g.

Vladimir Putin

'Yes, He Would': Fiona Hill Discusses Vladimir Putin Using Nuclear Weapons

by Brandon Gage | March 1, 2022 - 9:11am | permalink

— from Alternet

But more and more it appears - as this goes on - and believe me Americans will also pay a heavy price themselves with gas and grocery inflation (see next post), the media is also becoming soft in the brain. In a WSJ editorial last week Russia’s Assault on Ukraine’s Cities one at first read a rational paragraph, e.g.

"Some are already calling for NATO to establish a no-fly zone over Ukraine that would deny Russia air superiority. This is well-intentioned, but Ukraine today isn’t Libya in 2011 or Iraq in the 1990s where controlling the skies was far easier. NATO planes would have to engage Russian MiGs and antiaircraft systems."

But then quickly that reverted to bravado, and one wonders if the editor(s) even noticed the transition, e.g.

"Mr. Putin’s nuclear sabre-rattling is designed to make Mr. Biden and other Western leaders leave Ukraine to fight alone, even if he goes full Grozny. But the same risks existed throughout the Cold War, and the two sides avoided a direct confrontation despite much covert warfare."

But let me remind the esteemed WSJ editors that those risks were ameliorated by rational actors on both sides, including both then president John F. Kennedy and Soviet Premier Nikita S. Khrushchev during the Cuban missile crisis - when JFK faced down a hopped- up Joint Chiefs eager to bomb and invade Cuba. Thus, JFK refused their arm twisting to go in 'guns blazing' and instead chose a defensive naval blockade. In addition, he agreed to have American Jupiter missiles removed from Turkey.

Let's also try to bear in mind the total number of nuclear warheads in intercontinental missiles back then was perhaps 250 (on both sides), with Atlas (Convair) ICBMs making up most of the U.S. stock - along with Polaris (submarine-launched) missiles. The former could carry up to a single 3 megaton warhead - enough to incinerate New York or Moscow (See the terrific 1964 movie 'Fail Safe'). Today the total number of high megaton nuclear warheads is estimated to be over 11,000 with 6,00o on the Russian side. The balance of U.S. ICBMS, like the 'Minuteman III' and Peacemaker, are also MIRVed, i.e. multiple independent warheads. In effect, the devastation that would be wrought now by an all out nuclear war would make the 1962 version pale in comparison.

So far, to its credit, NATO and the U.S. have refused the calls for direct intervention (e.g. WSJ, 'U.S., NATO Reject Direct Intervention', p. A6. March- 5-6) with NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg noting: "NATO is a defensive alliance, it is not a party to the conflict".

Nor should it be. NATO as a defensive alliance can only get involved if one of its member states, such as Poland, is attacked. This then would more or less follow the plot line in 'Threads'. And yet the same date the article appeared, one saw the WSJ editors again doing their own goading for Biden and NATO to act more "decisively" - by twisting what is happening, e.g.:

"A N0-Fly zone could involve NATO pilots engaging with Russian planes... But why tell Mr. Putin that he has nothing to fear no matter what he does in Ukraine?"

But no one is telling Putin he "has nothing to fear"! He has plenty to fear if he crosses over the Ukraine border to attack Poland or Slovakia (where we visited in 2015, in Bratislava). The ongoing policy which is NATO defenses confined to NATO members is not "telling Putin he has nothing to hear", but reminding him all hell will break loose if he attacks a NATO member nation..

Egging on leaders to do more, including setting up a No Fly zone is simply not on and even the current ruminations - of sending Polish MIG jets to Ukraine - may be seen as a direct NATO escalation by Putin. Though to be sure a logistical problem exists in that there is a production backlog for F-16s, which would have to be sent to Poland in exchange for sending its MIG-29s to Ukraine (since Ukrainian pilots have trained only on the MIGs). Would Poland and other NATO countries with MIGs accept IOUs from the U.S.? Would they risk Russian wrath for transporting such aircraft? We don't know, but my bet is that any transfer of MIGs to the Ukraine theater will be taken as NATO interference.

We have to tread very carefully here, because, alas, it is not just one nation at risk but an entire planet. No one wants to live with over three billion rems of radiation making this planet uninhabitable for the next 10,000 years.

And:

Ukraine

If the US or NATO Put Fighters in the Air over Ukraine We’d Have World War Final

by Dave Lindorff | March 6, 2022 - 6:53am | permalink

Excerpt:

The tough-talk politicians in Washington and pundits in the media who are mindlessly calling for establishment of a US or US/NATO no-fly zone over Ukraine to allegedly deter Russian planes from bombing Ukrainian cities, or to “protect” Ukrain’s 15 nuclear reactors are nuts, and fortunately are so far not being listened to.

There are two things we can be glad about in this madness of war between Russia and Ukraine: One is that President Biden and the leaders of NATO countries in Europe all made it clear as Russia was amassing troops and heavy military equipment along its own and the Belarus borders with Ukraine that they would not be sending troops to defend Ukraine if Russia were to invade (they continue to hold that position even since the invasion began). The other is that both Russia and the US have huge stockpiles of nuclear weapons, many mounted on missiles that can reach each other’s homeland and decimate it, and that if launched, would take the rest of the world down with them.

And: