Yes, Ukraine is winning the war… no, Russia is winning it! Which one of these two strictly differing conjectures is most approximate to what we call truth? No self-respecting man or woman in the world would risk their reputation by unequivocally responding to the question right now.
Let’s for a second symbolically bisect the world into the believers of Ukraine’s victory and the advocates of Russia’s success. Wishful thinking clearly characterizes the attitude on both sides. Without any analytical thinking or factual corroboration, Ukraine’s fans would insist, foaming at the mouth about it, that Ukraine is confidently striding toward triumph. Conversely, Russia’s devotees will kill themselves to prove that Russia is all set to be the champion.
We all know propaganda is a huge part of any war, used to keep up a soldier’s courage to give his life for “the right cause”. The cynicism of Man has no limits, and within the framework of that egregious sarcasm, where each party has its own forged truth, tens of thousands are dying, and even more are left crippled for the rest of their lives.
Sakartvelo is as divided as the rest of the world on the issue; only, we have not yet counted the believing heads, either on one side or the other. As a matter of fact, refraining from statistics in this case might make sense, because any attempt to document the numbers might result in a societal conflict within a society already strained and exhausted.
Unbelievably, the maintenance of peace and calm has become utterly dependent on the outcome of the war in Ukraine. This brings with it the eradication of that distressing talk about Georgia opening a second front against Russia by taking advantage of the situation and recapturing its occupied territories. The supporters of Russia’s “successful” “Special Military Operation” tirelessly and persistently talk about the perilous possibility of the mentioned second front, and the believers in Ukraine’s victory in the war are just as tirelessly and persistently using every opportunity to mock their opponents’ preoccupation with the idea of unleashing said front.
It’s all seems a tool of that habitual propaganda used by local political rivals to display their versions of truth so as to empower their stand and whet their chance to emerge explicitly victorious from the long-extant precarious circumstances. Politicians are the grandmasters of garbling the narratives of the day. In reality, none can wait to declaim the triumph-revealing words of Hollywood make: “And the winner is…” On hearing it, we will relax as never before, so high has the sense of moral and physical exhaustion been from the damned war. Any news about the end of the war, fought for the attrition of Mankind’s nervous system, will allows us to at last re-embark on peaceful cooperation and unhampered development.
The question whether this is possible or not is mind-boggling. Anything would serve well as a finale to this bellicose show (except a nuclear end to the story). On the other hand, a deterrent nuke fright might be our only chance to prevent the collapse of our multi-thousand-year civilization, which has never been so close to annihilation as it is today. Can we say ‘Who cares?’ No, because Man has not yet reached that level of degradation.
Op-Ed by Nugzar B. Ruhadze
