Neither the budgets of the Generalitat, nor the proposal of Núñez Feijóo to illuminate a new bipartisan Spain with forceps, nor the efforts of the Prosecutor’s Office to maintain the disqualifications for the leaders of the process and even less Ayuso and the fight in the mud with the girl short verb prodigy of the Complutense. With forgiveness and with all due respect: rubbish. Autonomous entertainment.
Don’t get me wrong, each of these issues has its importance –some of it very much– and influences our collective life. Only by comparison with what happens a few days outside of hobbitland, these matters suddenly become extremely small.
That Germany has given its arm to twist and authorized the shipment of tanks to Ukraine is the most important thing that has happened in our world in many months. A dramatic announcement without fine print about the new risks that we Europeans are going to have to assume. The war variable continues to gain prominence when it comes to influencing and drawing the future of our lives. Only our limited ability to pay continuous attention to such a complex matter and the natural tendency to confuse the universe with the meters we can walk with our shoes keep us from such consideration.
Even the purely Spanish derivative of what happened becomes dwarfed. That if the Spanish Government no longer has excuses for not doing the same and also sending tanks and ammunition, that if what we will give away in the name of the rojigualda is scrap metal that is not even suitable for scrapping, let’s see what Podemos and the others say Sánchez’s partners –including ERC–, clinging as they continue to the idea that Vladimir Putin can be stopped with discs of poems by Miquel Martí i Pol set to music by Lluís Llach. Giblets for frugal self-consumption. After all, in this play Spain is a second-rate character and she perfectly interprets her role as a supporting actor. The US demands, Germany recoils but compromises and the rest of us go in line where they tell us, that where there is a boss, no sailor is in charge.
It sends a powerful message to Putin, analysts agree. Balance the battlefield with state-of-the-art armored cars to face the new great Russian offensive that the experts on our side forecast for spring. Tanks to prolong the war and increase the costs that Russia must pay for having started it, regardless of what the final result of the conflict will be. Because the truth is that the solemn little phrase that only Ukraine can win is nothing more than the expression of a wish. It has the same truth as false.
More war, longer and probably bloodier. More costs for longer. And after the tanks, will it be time to open the debate on aviation? What are we going to do when the consignment of armored vehicles that makes Zelenski so happy also demands air cover to defend against silver planes skimming the rooftops?
The argument used to justify the escalation dictated by the voice-over, that we are dealing with a madman who must be stopped at any cost, expels from the discussion any position that does not coincide squarely with the warmongering commitment. But regardless of the fairness of our position, the risks that go along with it must be illuminated more intensely. Basically so that in such an important issue –playing peace– the citizenry can feel in the game at least as an informed player. And that happens by updating the balance of costs and threats to which we expose ourselves due to our own decisions – the governments that we elect – or those of others, but that we have no choice but to share. By the way, it hurts to see Europe without the ability to manage, in parallel with the shipment of tanks, something that resembles a diplomatic proposal for peace. Not that it was just to look good and appease consciences. But Europe weighs what it weighs. And Spain a little less.
