It’s as if Putin had taken the advice of China’s legendary general of ancient times, Sun Tzu: The ultimate test of a strategist’s skill is to win without fighting.
— from an op-ed by Doyle McManus in the Los Angeles Times, February 20, 2022
I don’t much like Vladimir Putin.
Not that we’ve ever met, or have any kind of relationship… unless you can call, “reading about him in the mainstream media and then writing humor columns about him,” to be a relationship.
He doesn’t seem to smile much. Maybe he’s not really enjoying his job? Even on the rare occasion when he’s smiling, he reminds me of a used car salesman.
A very successful used car salesman, that is.
According to a high-end wristwatch blog, Putin owns at least two Patek Phillippe watches valued at between $18,000 and $60,000. He’s quite possibly the wealthiest man on the planet, which is a pretty remarkable achievement for someone who doesn’t own a tech company.
Although, he might actually own a tech company? No one seems to know exactly what he owns. Maybe he doesn’t even know, himself, what he owns. That sort of thing can happen when you get really rich. You can own things that you don’t even know you own.
We know that he owns tanks. Photos of his tanks have been showing up regularly in the mainstream media, lately.
Personally, I’d like to see more photos of his watches. Tanks are a dime a dozen, these days… but how many people own a $60,000 watch?
I visited the TASS.com website yesterday — the Russian News Agency — thinking they might have some photos of Vladimir’s expensive watches, and of course they were talking about the controversy at Russia’s border with Ukraine, and the 150,000 Russian soldiers and 1,200 tanks that are merely practicing but are no real threat to Ukraine’s security.
No real threat… unless, of course, the West tries to get funny. Putting sanctions in place, or something like that.
Cutting off the flow of expensive watches, for example?
One of the articles on the TASS.com website quoted a Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin, addressing the tensions at the border, and commenting on US Secretary of State Antony Blinken’s recent remarks about Russia’s alleged plans to invade Ukraine.
“The Ukraine issue needs to be resolved through dialogue and talks, given the legitimate concerns of the parties, including Russia,” Wang Wenbin said at a press briefing. “It’s not right to act through threats, sanctions, and pressure.”
Understandably, the TASS article did not feature any photos of Vladimir’s tanks at the Ukraine border.
In fact, the TASS folks had instead inserted an entertaining video into the article about Wang Wenbin… apparently publicizing “Russia’s Favorite Cats.”
The cat video was in Russian, so I couldn’t tell if TASS was advertising some kind of “cat contest”. But it appeared to be a contest. Maybe the Russians like contests as much as we do?
I admit, some of the cats were cute enough to win a contest. (Some, I didn’t care for.) There was one cat who did back-flips on command.
But to circle back to Sun Tzu, the author of the classic Chinese military treatise, The Art of War, mentioned by commentator Doyle McManus in yesterday’s Los Angeles Times.
The Art of War was supposedly written 2,400 years ago, when spears and swords were still popular, and wristwatches had not yet been invented. One of the better-known English translations of Sun Tzu’s treatise includes this axiom:
2. Hence to fight and conquer in all your battles is not supreme excellence; supreme excellence consists in breaking the enemy’s resistance without fighting.
I wish I had known about this, back when I was married.
Now that I think about it, maybe Darlene had been reading Sun Tzu when I wasn’t looking.
In my own defense, my watch was purchased at Walmart. In fact, as I recall, Darlene bought me my watch.
But all’s fair in love and war.