City of the Mind

      On the Term, “Myth”   In this essay, I will be using the term “myth” in the technical sense of, “a meaning giving story,” and not in the sense of something that is not true.  Every country has its national myths that help to give a sense of identity and purpose.  Empires, especially, need grand myths to explain or justify their expansionist or imperial endeavours to their population and to their adversaries.  For the Spanish Empire, it was saving the souls of the peoples they conquered.  For the French and British Empires, it was “the white man’s burden” of “civilising savages.”  For the Soviet Union, it was liberating the peasants and workers of the world from the counter-revolutionary forces of capitalism and creating a global proletarian paradise.  For the United States of America, it was the “manifest destiny” given by God to be a light to the nations and to shield the new republics in the America’...

  If we have learned one thing from Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, it is that we grossly underestimated Ukraine and grossly overestimated Russia.  In fact, what we have seen is that the Russian army is crap, its navy (at least the Black Sea Fleet) isn’t much better, and the air force is afraid of direct confrontation (remember how Turkey shot down that Russian fighter jet in 2015—and nothing happened?).  Right now, it is taking 50,000 Russian and North Korean troops to try to expel 15,000 Ukranians from Kursk.  Let that sink in.   Yes, Russia is making slow progress here and there, but at a cost that has led to more casualties in three years of war than the US sustained in all wars since 1945.  For Russia, their only effective conventional weapons are mass assaults (over a thousand casualties a day for a few meters of land), missile and drone attacks on civilian targets, and old-fashioned artillery (which they are running out o...