Why are we sad? We miss war.
Why do some people have to fuel the war rhetoric permanently? Only to justify the exorbitant sums of money paid for useless military equipment? Or because the geo-strategic “expert/ advisor” armies need to justify the money they sell themselves for?
Too focused on the large interests of the mafia clans in the small Romanian politics, we are constantly embarrassing ourselves. I think most of us resigned to the ineptitudes and scams of the political class. It is not even allowing us to feel disappointment anymore, as we are not risking anymore expectations. The fact that some individuals, with enough openness to the public, manage to create turmoil with alarmist news is not enough of an argument to the catastrophic foreign policy led by Tândală from Cotroceni.
Geopolitics and geostrategy consist of tectonic movements at certain intervals, even if the results leave certain areas sad and in tears. We can’t control the sedimentation of the influence spheres at the level of some politicians that are insignificant on a global scale, but authors of some amateur statements. We can, at least for the sake of our children, keep calm and not call the wolf into our yard.
War is not coming. There are much more important issues on a global level for us to “afford” to begin a conflict as big as some hysterical commentators anticipated. The pandemic is writing the history of today, the risks regarding the disappearance of the middle class or the polarization of society fuel instability outbreaks much more dynamically than white noise for the control of influence zones. War has always been a means of expanding territorial control to manage resources discretionally. In the past violence was the most available means, but today instruments are much more sophisticated and armed conflict rarely escalates.
Energetic security in Western Europe is more important than who controls Crimea. Which is a closed case anyway. The dependence on Western finances and the difficulty in managing the multiple outbreaks, given the limited resources, is the reason the East won’t show its muscles more than it is necessary. For one more period of time the weapon industry lost the battle against that of medicine. We will have to wait until the sanitary situation will allow “terrorists” to threaten world peace. Because if we don’t have enemies, we make them up, right?
Help me, bro!
An argument for the war apostles can be the crisis in Belarus. Some are even rushing to claim that the situation at the Polish border is not an emigrant issue but rather a hybrid attack. Everything that we don’t define very clearly we hide behind some words or phrases that are harder to control. Hybrid threats, asymmetrical war or the resilience and versatility of capabilities are concepts our leaders use generously. Well, we are troubled because Patraulea from Nasiriyah promised us protection. “The Army has the mission to do everything it can to serve the nation!” But will is useless if you don’t have the capability. Moreover, the things that our future former interim prime-minister promises today do not apply tomorrow.
During Bogdan Aurescu’s recent visit in Washington, the strategic partner emphasised that the USA and Romania are “robust allies in NATO” and working hard on several issues. The eternal hope of Romanian foreign policy, the minister with no achievements whatsoever in two years, brought into discussion “the enhancement of the USA presence in Romania”. Don’t we have General Motors and Lockhead Martin in the Defence Ministry all day? Don’t worry, they will defend us… with promises. After all the USA had an “enhanced and dynamic presence” in Afghanistan, another strategic partner, until they didn’t at all and let it down.
“The United States will continue their policy to be there for their allies and partners at the Black Sea in order to guarantee that actions like those made by Russia in the area will not go any further”, declared the ad-interim appointee of the USA Embassy in Romania. David Muniz is the one who leads the diplomatic presence of the strategic partner in Bucharest and, when he has time, also welcomes Iohannis to a tea. Since January this year the United States have not had any ambassador in Bucharest and there is none in sight. To be fair there has been no USA ambassador in Afghanistan either, since August, after the retreat, but at least the appointee is not “ad-interim”.
Wearing a coat to the Pyramids
At least we managed to send an ambassador to Washington. He has nothing to do with diplomacy, he has no activity the field of foreign policy, he has no sort of experience, but why does it matter? His talent (in other areas) and family recommend him. Especially his family. Moreover Muraru as ambassador in the USA also meant George Maior as chief of the embassy in… Jordan. Talking about off the books.
If our pants are shaking in fear of a war we should know that the first defence line of a state is foreign policy. That which we don’t have and which supports Romania’s interest faintly to not at all. The president of our division promotes the image of the poor, countryside relative, lonely and clumsy, at every high-level reunion. How much range and credibility does a head of state have when during official visits he walks around with his wife like he’s on vacation? One whose country is in flames, but finds time for trips in the sands of Egypt?
The entire planet saw Tândală with his coat on the table at the COP26 Summit. He would have come with his golf bag too, but those guardians were mean and did not let him. And what did he do there? If only he had sold his coat, he would have balanced the budget. What can we expect from Romania’s foreign policy when it is led by a president that ruined the internal policy? The principle is easy and very Romanian: “if I’m not good at what I have to do, I should at least get in the way”.
Iohannis-six-houses left the Army to Ciucă. At least he has the certainty that there is no one more qualified to ruin it than the general of epic battles. Foreign policy told itself that Aurescu won’t make it alone, so he also contributes to its compromise. Who is better than the president of our division at walking around alone amongst heads of state gathered on the occasion of several reunions? And who takes a selfie more passionately than our Werner when he shakes the hand of a Biden who just woke up?
Your people leave, your people come/ We’re still here, like we’re dumb
A few weeks ago I wrote about the influence and interest spheres in the Foreign Affairs Ministry. How practically a small group of people share their benefits among themselves, and the people sponsors an army of “diplomats” whose results are inexistent. We are honoured by the interest the president of our division manifests for reading the information we provide generously. Those in the material I mentioned, who are preparing to move their ficus to another country, are not few.
Luminița Odobescu was appointed Romania’s ambassador in the European Union in 2015, a few weeks after Iohannis was invested president at Cotroceni. After brother Muraru left Washington Luminița is demanded to take on the difficult task to advise the German with six houses. Rather than do nothing in Brussels, it’s better to do nothing in Buchraest. She has nothing to advise Iohannis about anyway. Tândală is so conceited and self-indulgent, but equally lacking in vision and intellectual preoccupations, that no matter what anyone says to him, he would not be able to understand anyway.
And we wondered how Stelian Stoian has been Romania’s ambassador at Brussels too, for 8 years, beside the most important country in Europe, the North Atlantic Alliance. He drew the conclusion that Iohannis has been moving him around a little too often… to Vienna. The future chief of Romania’s permanent mission amongst international organizations in Austria’s capital will have a problem relocating his wife, minister advisor at the Embassy in Brussels, but he’ll solve it, as he’s capable to do so. We need to keep in mind that Stelică Stoian was Romania’s representative in the European Council, at Strasbourg from 2006 until 2013 when he moved to Brussels. He has not been able to come and work in Romania for over 15 years. Life is so unfair sometimes!
I also wrote about how the love relatioship between the SDP and Iohannis saw disturbing stories from times when „Jó napot kívánok” was nothing else but an expression to “qui s’aime se taquine”. Dănuț Neculaescu, son of the SDP baron in Dâmbovița, was not only taken by the NLP Government in December 2019, but his wife has been practicing foreign policy at Cotroceni for many years. The close relationship to the Carpathian Tândală seems to open the road to our NATO Embassy for Dănuț. He can also take Simonette with him as Defence state secretary, to write press releases in nut wood… language.
The ambassadors in Italy and Spain will have the most difficult tasks. They received bad news, followed by good ones. They will be… interchanged. Worried about the relocation issues George Bologan and Gabriela Dancău must have, we wonder if they took some of the luggage to Buchraest or shipped it all straight to Madrid and Rome?
More or less “special” pensioners burdened the budget with sums hard to bear for the public pension system. After a life in which responsibilities and challenges were morning coffee, receptions or dinners, more or less official, hundreds of “diplomats” qualify for monthly pensions that most Romanians can’t save in one year. The problem is not their wages, but rather the fact that no one has ever truly assessed their performances. It’s just the relations diagram that matters. The only thing that is valuable in a closed system with no results, Romania’s foreign policy. We have no foreign policy, we only have benefits to give and a terrible tendency to bark at command.
(an article by Pan Themis)