The Russian Narrative

I recently responded to a comment made on a forum I often visit which said:

"For those who don't quite understand the Russian narrative yet, Russia has already redrawn its maps, told and made official to its people that the provinces of the Russian People in Ukraine are already part of Russia so the Ukrainians in those provinces aren't part of Ukraine but rather Ukraine's forces being in Russia. This means from the Russian standpoint Ukraine's incursion into Russia are merely forces on Russian lands that is no different than Russia clearing out Ukraine's forces in Ukraine.  As such, Russia remains focused in pushing Ukraine out of Russian drawn borders, which is why if the incursion inside of Russia doesn't result in land loss it is simply a failed Ukrainian operation that resulted in no change. The legislation of Russia is that its people and leaders aren't allowed to give up Russian any Russian territory. This means no peace deal can legally be reached with Russia unless Russia has all of the land it already redrew its map to include, it simply isn't legal according to Russian laws.  All of this is from my understanding and what I can gather, I think what I wrote is correct.

This is akin to Israel drawing up a map of Greater Israel, declaring all of Greater Israel as already belonging to Israel, and for Israel to never be able to stop until all of Greater Israel is under its control and free from the invaders who illegally inhabit it. This would mean committing genocide against foreigners in Greater Israel isn't unethical or genocide but is instead driving out and eradicating foreign invaders and their control of Israel's land."

I responded:

It's funny how in the West we sometimes decide it's OK for the victor in a war to annex territory - no one is calling Texas the "Occupied North Bank Territory" after the U.S. took it from Mexico. 

No one protests because the U.S. won Puerto Rico from Spain. 

But when Israel won back its ancient homeland in 1967 "Judea" isn't viewed that way - and they're constantly expected to give it up to create a new nation for their enemies - no one even says give the land back to Jordan, the country it was won from.

The people in the east of Ukraine are ethnic Russians who speak Russian and want to be part of Russia. 

Ukraine mistreated/persecuted them and Russia finally reacted to liberate it's oppressed people.  The only reason the West is prolonging the fighting there is because eastern and southern Ukraine not only has large oil and gas reserves but as Lindsey Graham admitted - 12 TRILLION dollars worth of bauxite and other minerals in the ground.  LINK

China will be the next country on a similar path if they move to "liberate" Taiwan soon.  Taiwan's people are ethnically Chinese but in this case they have been thriving under a wealthy capitalist democracy and have no desire to be "liberated" and reunited with mainland communist China.  China's communist party leadership, however, stands to gain a lot of patriotic support if they succeed in taking over Taiwan soon, and many analysts suggest they will blockade and invade Taiwan as soon as this year.  LINK

I don't think China should militarily force the Taiwanese to become part of communist China against their will - but it would be more legitimate than China's conquest of Tibet.  At least Taiwan was a province of China and the people there are ethnic Chinese who speak Chinese.  Tibet's people were independent and not Chinese and now their culture is being eradicated and the Tibetans are a minority in their own land.  I see no protests or wars over that.

It's not about what's "right" it's always about what's politically useful, often determined by the existence of oil and other minerals in the ground. Of course that's just my unpopular opinion. What's yours?