What if…Ukraine was Texas?

Ukraine superimposed with Texas

By Obeng Umama Bera

I am an African American woman, born in the United States. I am a descendant of black people who were once enslaved by white Americans. For this reason, I have absolutely no stake in the Ukraine-Russia War of 2022. It occurred to me that much of the Ukraine-Russia War is very similar to a rift happening in the United States that started under Trump’s leadership. As a Black woman who witnesses and experiences racism in the United States and have had experience with the way some white people can think and behave, especially after the January 6th Capitol riots, nothing that I am seeing over in Ukraine is surprising me, especially when you frame it from a white nationalist perspective.

I am hearing stories of Ukrainians asserting their white Ukrainian ethnocentrism by prioritizing the exodus of Ukrainians out of the country over African and East Indian students. I do not like it but I am definitely not surprised. Similarly, Russia not too long ago infiltrated white American social media to stoke white racist nationalism and support the election of Trump. Ukraine nor Russia is the black American’s friend. Neither is the United States for that matter as the Voting Rights Act stalls in Congress. Sure, the countries have shown a few token acts of kindness to black people. Ukraine has taken in African refugees from Cameroon. Russia has supported African nations resisting West European colonialism. The USA elected a black President. For those of us who are a part of the African diaspora, for better or worse, we call Russia, Ukraine, and the United States our home. But black people all know that we are a visitor in a white land and so watching this Russian-Ukrainian war gives me a different perspective from the one that the United States is trying to shove down our throats in the media.

So let’s play a game of What If…? Just like the Disney+ TV series I finished binge-watching the other night.

What If…. Ukraine was Texas?

Hear me out here. What I propose is not that far-fetched. I think it will help us predict how the Ukraine-Russia War is going to play out from the beginning to the end. I know I am having fun predicting the moves of all of the countries.

Let’s begin. I will lay the framework for how the current Ukraine-Russia relationship can easily be duplicated in America between Texas and the United States.

In recent years under Trump’s leadership, Trump’s coziness with Putin and the Republicans’ dismissal of Russian influence in U.S. elections opened my eyes to the very real possibility that the U.S. could be quietly conquered by Russia. Fox News and other right-wing media downplayed Russia’s threat to our country. Republicans failed to pass a bill that would have strengthened our elections against Russian hackers. Far right Republicans didn’t care that an American enemy was engaging in cyberattacks against the U.S. as long as they benefitted from it.

That’s when I got scared. Despite America’s deplorable treatment of black Americans, I instinctively knew that the lives of black Americans would become infinitely worse under Vladimir Putin because Putin is not just a white European man, he is also a powerful Russian nationalist who only cares about Russia and its interests. This means that he doesn’t have one hint of the white American guilt that has allowed black Americans to attain a few of the civil rights we have in America right now.

Trump’s bro crush on Putin clearly influenced the right-wing, conservative, white nationalist racist nuts swamping America. To my point, Russia TV news is using white U.S. conservative talking points to support Russia’s position with Ukraine. Tucker Carlson and other right-wing conservatives were just last month questioning why the U.S. should offer any support to Ukraine. I mean Russia’s not that bad, right?

But Russia did attack Ukraine. Now all the media outlets have sided with Ukraine and against Russia. As an American and a Democrat, I am supposed to side with Ukraine too. But as a black American woman who has lived in America all of her life, something about all of this looked eerily familiar. Being a black American woman in the United States where our votes are regularly pimped by white men for white political gain and nothing to show for it in return, I can recognize a pimp game when I see one. Ukraine is getting pimped by the United States and western Europe just like Russia was pimping Trump and his neo-Republicans to get Trump to make things more favorable for Russia.

Ukraine is about the same size as Texas. Texas is a state in the United States, like California, that acts like it is independent from the United States. Last year, Texas filed for secession from the United States because Texas Republicans are mad that Trump did not win re-election all while claiming that the 2020 election was rigged.

What if… Texas did secede from the United States? It was only about 175 years ago when Texas was its own territory in Mexico. Texas was annexed into the United States in 1845 so whites could get away from Mexicans and then they seceded from the United States in 1861 to join the Confederacy. They fought to the death at the Alamo during the Civil War to keep black Americans as slaves.

Ukraine and Texas are white-controlled territories with a strong sense of independence and white nationalism, but due to its geological position, they both have a close relationship with its neighboring territories. For Ukraine, it’s the rest of Western Europe and Russia. For Texas, it is Mexico and the rest of the United States.

During World War II, Ukrainians sided with Nazi Germany and allowed Nazi Germans to kill Russians, Jews, Slavs, and Romas in exchange for Ukrainian independence from Russia. Nazism still leaves its mark in Ukraine and still attracts the U.S. neo-Nazis to Ukraine.

White American insurrectionists from the Jan. 6 Capitol insurrection are encouraged to travel to Ukraine and connect with the white right-wing extremist groups in Ukraine for military training. Just because their current president is Jewish does not erase the white nationalism underpinning Ukraine just as having Barack Obama as our first black president did not erase white American racism against black Americans.

Back to our What If… story.

What if Texans gained enough sympathy and support and successfully seceded from the United States? What if Texas elected Donald Trump as their president? Donald Trump is notoriously pro-Russian. Trump and all his cabinet members had strong Russian ties. Russian oligarchs were large investors in all of Trump’s many real estate ventures. https://newrepublic.com/article/165553/donald-trump-everything-vladimir-putin-wished-russian-asset

Donald Trump wanted to pull the United States out of NATO and end an alliance with South Korea which in essence would severely weaken NATO alliances and isolate the United States. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/14/us/politics/nato-president-trump.html Since leaving office, Trump has maintained a friendship with North Korea. https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/2/10/update-1-trump-says-he-is-in-touch-with-north-koreas-kim-book

So now you have Texas who has seceded from the USA with Texas President, Donald Trump, who is friends with Russia and North Korea. Texas country is run by right-wing white nationalists who embrace their new independence and freedom and will fight like hell if anyone tries to take it away. They revel in freedom rights. Freedom to go maskless. Freedom to ransack the U.S. Capitol building. Freedom to tote their guns wherever they go. You have some Texans who live in Dallas/Austin and Houston who never wanted Texas to secede from the United States but since they didn’t feel like moving out of their big homes, they just remained in Texas.

The new country of Texas inherited U.S. military bases like Fort Hood and Fort Bragg, but the U.S. took back all the weapons stored there so Texas is going to have to build up their military forces on their own. In fact, Texas has to build up everything on their own.

President Trump goes to Russia, North Korea and their coalition of countries and asks it to support their new independent country by giving Texas some money, resources, and weapons to help it get on its feet. The Russia coalition is made up of Russia, China, North Korea, Iran, Iraq, Syria, India, Afghanistan — just to name a few. Except for India, these are all the countries that the United States sees as enemies. Each of these countries have powerful militaries and Russia, China, and North Korea have nuclear weapons.

The Russia coalition, noting Texas’ advantageous position near the United States, agree to pour billions of dollars in aid, weapons, and resources into Texas in the name of “supporting Texas sovereignty and independence” wink, wink. The Russia coalition tells the Texas people over and over how much they love Texas and admire the courage and bravery it took to break away from the evil United States. Russia and Texas spend lots of time talking about how bad the United States is. They think Joe Biden is a senile, megalomaniac who is losing his mind. Texas tells Russia all about how the United States never embraced law and order, letting all of the illegals and blacks in to bring in drugs and commit crimes. Texas told Russia that the United States elections are rigged. Texas complains how the United States always used Texas for its beef and oil. Texas brags to Russia that the United States is helpless without Texas. Russia nods quietly and lets Texas vent and complain about how badly the United States treated them. Texas thinks it is nice to have someone to talk to and who understand them and what they are trying to do. Texas also thinks it is cool to have powerful friends like the Russia coalition who have weapons and could protect them if the United States messes with them. Maybe if they get with the Russia coalition, they can become strong like Russia and China.

Although the U.S. could not stop Texas’ secession in this What If? scenario, the USA is no fool. Having Trump as president of Texas is a serious threat to the national security of the United States. The U.S. Department of Defense has warned that an independent Texas who is friendly to the Russia coalition might allow Russian coalition forces into American territory. The U.S. Department of Defense remembers the 1962 Cuban missile crisis when Russians installed nuclear-armed Soviet missiles on Cuba, just 90 miles from U.S. shores. An independent Texas with Trump as president gives Russia and its entire coalition an opportunity to get close enough to attack America if it wanted to. There is no way in hell the United States is about to let this happen.

From this perspective, the U.S. meets with Texas and asks them to stay away from the Russia coalition and not make military allegiances with them. President Trump refuses and tells the U.S. to go where the sun don’t shine. Trump declares the United States is trying to push Texans around and take away their freedoms. Trump declares that Texas is a sovereign country, and the United States cannot tell Texans what to do anymore. Why would Texas stop working with their new powerful friends just because the United States said so?

The U.S. tries to meet with Trump again about this, but this time Trump asks his friend, Russia, to sit in on the talks between him and the United States. Russia says it will help out in anyway it can. Russia reassures Trump that their country fully supports Texas sovereignty and independence and will attend the talks to make sure the United States doesn’t try and bully them just because they are still trying to get on their feet as a new country. Texas loves how supportive the Russian coalition has been and starts to feel emboldened. Texans are fighters and don’t take shit from no one.

The United States continues to meet with President Trump, but the talks are going nowhere. The CIA is now reporting to the United States that Texas wants to join the Russian coalition. Uh, oh! Shit is getting real now. The old fogies in the Department of Defense start freaking out. They remember the tension from the Cuban missile crisis and the Cold War, and they do not want that to happen again. If Texas joins the Russian coalition, then any of those countries could put military bases into Texas. The United States knows that one of the reasons Russia was helping Texas in the first place was to get Texas to put their Russian coalition military forces there. That includes fighter jets, tanks, troops, long-range missiles, and submarines. The United States were tolerant of Russia pimping Texas for a deal on their oil supplies and maybe some beef, but weapons and military bases????

You think the United States is going to stand there and watch the Russian coalition militarize Texas against the United States? They didn’t let it happen in 1962 during the Cuban missile crisis and they are not about to start now especially not from treasonous Americans who stormed the U.S. Capitol and would have attacked Congressmen and women if given the chance.

The U.S. ups the ante and threatens Texas with military action if they don’t stop what they are doing. The U.S. starts sending troops and tanks along I-10 and I-55 as a way to communicate that they are serious and because the United States realizes that the only way to stop Texas is to take it over. The United States meets with each of the state governors to remind them of what is at stake if they let a Russian coalition into the country. You have some Texan sympathizers, but they understand that they cannot let Russia into the country. The U.S. discusses with bordering states how to handle Texas refugees and reminds them that they are not trying to kill their fellow Texans.

Russia sees what the United States is about to do. The Russia coalition never loved Texas like that, BUT they don’t want to lose out on the military advantage of being friends with Texas so they continue to tell Texas how much they support their sovereignty and will help them any way they can by sending Texas more guns, money, and aid. But Russia warns Texas that they will not risk World War 3 by sending any troops or fighters over to Texas.

The United States had already calculated that the Russia coalition was just using Texas, gassing its head up with white nationalist rhetoric and talks about freedom and gun rights? The U.S. knows damn well that Russia, China, and North Korea are not about to fly all the way over to Texas to get its back in a fight because they will then have to go up against the United States. The U.S. has told Russia, China, and North Korea that if they interfere, the U.S. will go nuclear on they asses so they need to back the fuck off and let the U.S. handle they business.

And let’s keep it real, Russia, China, and its friends never planned on getting Texas’s back anyway, not militarily anyway. Russia and friends are millions of miles away and Texas doesn’t have anything they really need. Texas was always just a pawn in their larger military strategy to further their empire, but Texas is definitely not worth going up against the United States for.

Meanwhile in Texas, Trump pumps up the Texans to get them ready to fight. Trump tells the Texans they got this.

So the United States invades Texas and takes it over. The war has begun. The world freaks out. How dare the U.S. attack a sovereign country? There are U.S. citizens still living in Texas. Is the U.S. going to kill them too? Russia TV shows non-stop coverage of the attack from the Texan perspective.

Russia, China, and North Korea move ships into the Pacific Ocean just in case the U.S./Texas battle spills out into North Korea territory, but they know that’s unlikely. They know the U.S. is not trying to attack Russia or its allies either.

Russia and China fully understand that the United States is doing what it needs to do, but Russia and China will “condemn” the USA anyway. It’s all for show. The Russian coalition enact some weak sanctions against the United States to put on a show like they are supporting Texas. The Russia coalition tells its citizens some bullshit about all these sanctions against the U.S. like how U.S. sports teams aren’t allowed in the 2022 Paralympic Games or in the Russian World Soccer Championships. China decided to make some extra money, I mean sanction the U.S., by jacking up the prices for all Chinese imports into the U.S. which drove down the value of the dollar since everything that Americans buy comes from China. The Russia coalition seizes, I mean, freezes whatever money Americans have in foreign bank accounts. Iran and other middle eastern countries make some money, I mean, sanction the United States by raising the price of oil to the United States. Our gas prices skyrocket. Russia is not crazy though. It still wants to make money with the United States, so the Russia coalition won’t stop the United States from doing deals with them through the F.A.S.T. banking system.

Meanwhile in Russia, there are a few anti-Putin media pundits calling out Russia on its bullshit and are challenging Putin to get into a fight with the United States. The anti-Putin politicians are just talking shit. No one in power is listening to them.

The Russian coalition get together and decide to steal anything that the American oligarchs left in its countries and along its coast lines. Biden warned American oligarchs like Jeff Bezos, Bill Gates, Elon Musk, Jim and Alice Walton, and Mark Zuckerberg that this might happen so they moved all of their money out of Russian coalition bank accounts before Texas was attacked. Mark Cuban who lived in Texas said he would sell his American sports team to support the Texans. Russia brags on its TV about all the yachts that it seized and how Russia is really sticking it to the American billionaires. No it is not. It is just making our billionaires more mad at Trump.

Russian coalition countries stop airing American programming. It didn’t matter because the U.S. had already cut off Russian TV and China news channels and banned right-wing media outlets from reporting anything pro-Russian. The Russia coalition media channels show nonstop coverage of the destruction in Texas to demonize the United States. This helps to chip away at the “good guy” image of the United States to their own citizens just in case there are U.S. sympathizers in their own country. Russia regularly features President Trump and other vulnerable Texan’s like women and children citizens on Russia TV so Trump still feels like the Russians are his friends. Russia gets other countries to join in denouncing what the United States is doing to those “poor Texans”.

The negative media coverage against the United States makes the U.S. look bad and therefore makes Russia, China, and North Korea, look less bad.

None of these sanctions matter to the U.S. The United States has many other trading partners it can make money from. The United States has its own oil, food, nuclear power supply, military, and manufactured goods. The United States is a superpower for a reason. The so-called sanctions from the Russian coalition are just a money grab from enemies of the United States and the U.S. knows it. Until the national security of the United States is solidified, nothing is going to stop the United States from its plan against Texas.

Russia and all its friends host an emergency United Nations meeting to condemn the United States for attacking Texas. The U.S. doesn’t care. They know that meeting is bullshit too. The United States knows that if Russia and China really gave a damn about Texas they would have sent military support to Texas and gotten into the fight. The United States knows that Russia and China are thousands of miles away and Texas just is not worth a fight so close to the United States. The United States calculated that the Russia coalition only wanted Texas for its military proximity to its real target, the United States.

And why should Russia and its allies risk its soldiers for Texas? It wasn’t that long ago that Texas used to be a part of their shared enemy, the United States. The Republicans were the main ones going up against Russia just 40 years ago and Russia hasn’t forgotten. Ethnically, Texans are more like Americans than like Russians, Chinese people, or other Asians in the East. It is cute that these Texans are declaring their independence and sovereignty, but Russia knows damn well that the United States is the big dog in the western hemisphere just like Russia is the big dog in Europe and China is the big dog in Asia.

So, if Ukraine is Texas and Russia is the United States, what does the United States want? The United States wants what it always wanted. Texas must end its allegiances with the Russian coalition. If Texas doesn’t plan on ending its allegiances with the Russia coalition, then the United States will have to fully subdue Texas.

In the first days of the U.S. attacks when Texas sees that the U.S. is serious, the United States will once again negotiate with Texas and tell Texas that they will respect their sovereignty if Texas and keep Trump as President if Texas:

1. Gives up its military.
2. Promises to never make a military allegiance with any country without permission from the United States.
3. Only buys weapons from the United States or its partners and even then, the United States gets to conduct inspections to make sure that Texas is not trying to rebuild a military that is powerful enough to take on the United States.
4. Allow U.S. troops to occupy Texas and offer Texas military protection.
5. Promise to make the United States its primary trading partner so that it stays financially dependent on the United States.

Early in the fighting, President Trump should have taken the first deal from the United States if the deal allowed Texas to maintain its sovereignty. Had they taken the first deal, Trump could have asked the United States for money for Texas reconstruction efforts and asked the United States to let Texas trade (make money) with whoever it wanted to in return for not being a military threat to the United States. Texas could have maintained its independence and sovereignty in trading, immigration, legal, and social affairs.

But this is Texas and they never back down without a fight. This is a fight about freedom, sovereignty, and their rights! Texas won’t go for these terms because they think they have a chance against the United States. Russia has been feeding Texas some bullshit military strategies that Texas thinks might work like having Texans make Molotov cocktails, arming more Texans with guns and cursing out U.S. soldiers in the street. Trump’s head is still gassed up on ideas of freedom and independence and Trump doesn’t want to punk out after just a few days of fighting. So, the first round of talks fail.

The United States amps up its attacks against Texas and continues its strategy to neutralize Texas. The United States will attack all of the ways that make Texas independent with this strategy:

1. The United States first attacks all of Texas’ military structures — which wasn’t much to begin with.

2. Next the United States is going to take control of the Texas water filtration plant, nuclear power plants, oil drilling sites and refineries, oil pipelines, and food storage facilities.

3. The United States will eliminate cell phone towers and other means of communication.

4. The United States will surround all of its borders.

5. It will take over its major cities and go after Austin, Texas, the capital of Texas.

6. It will block foreigners from getting money into Texas.

7. They will bleed Texans out of the country so Trump has no country to lead.

Texans will fight even harder now because they risk losing access to food, water, power, communications, and men. The United States have already taken over El Paso, Galveston, and Houston. Since Austin, the Texas capital, is more inland, it is harder for the United States to push into there. Millions of Texans are fleeing Texas. They are pouring into neighboring Texas-friendly states like Oklahoma and Louisiana.

Breaking News: The white people in Texas just blocked the black people in Houston from leaving the country making sure that the white Texans were the first to get on buses leaving out of Texas.

Trump still talks to Putin everyday and doesn’t seem like he plans to stop. He keeps airing videos asking Putin to help his country. He brags about how a grandma with a gun took down a U.S. fighter plan. The war continues on.

From the United States’ vantage point, if this goes on too long, the United States is going to get pissed off and they will move to the final strategy. Up until now, it had been letting Texans escape into neighboring states, because it didn’t want to kill Texans — just weaken the population. All along the United States just wanted Trump to stop dealing with the Russia coalition.

But since Trump refuses to stop, the United States will move on to its third strategy. Destroy centers of Texas leadership. Anyone who could control the military and has influence with the Russian coalition will be taken out.

1. Assassinate/depose President Trump and everyone in his circle and replace him with someone willing to annex Texas back into the United States. The U.S. already planned on replacing Donald Trump with Beto O’Rourke.

2. Kill as many remaining Texan fighters and Trump supporters as possible.

3. Find every place that Texas leaders and Trump supporters are hiding in and either assassinate them or take them as prisoners of war so Texans will better accept their defeat.

4. Fully occupy Texas and put Texas under complete U.S. military control to completely subdue Texas.

5. Hunt down all Texas nationalists and Trump supporters across the United States and force their surrender, kill them, or make them flee the country.

If that doesn’t work, then the United States will be forced to burn Texas down to the ground.

We are seeing these dynamics play out right now as the Ukraine-Russia conflict unfolds. I think the pro-Ukrainian media blast is to cover up what the United States is not doing.

Personally, I don’t think Putin wants a massive war with anyone. Putin has no plans to expand his invasion into Poland or any NATO eastern European countries. That’s just American propaganda talk. Overtaking a country as big as Ukraine without annihilating the Ukrainian people is a huge task all by itself. Sure, Putin could decimate Ukraine to the ground with repeated air strikes, but he is not doing that because destroying Ukraine is not his objective. If Ukraine was Texas, and Russia was the United States, destroying Texas would not be the U.S. objective either.

I also don’t think the United States or NATO alliances care enough about Ukraine to risk a fight with Russia. Hell, the United States is the reason why Russia attacked Ukraine in the first place. The United States will keep Ukraine on a string of false promises for as long as it takes. Meanwhile Russia is showing the United States, NATO, and Ukraine, that it will only be pushed so far. The U.S. has to protect its own national security so it is staying out of it.

Unfortunately, the people of Ukraine, like many other fledgling countries before them, fell for the Western bribes and rhetorical bullshit and are caught in the crossfire. Meanwhile Russia is asking Ukrainians, “Where’s your big U.S. daddy now?”

Americans are safely at home glued to the TV watching this horrible saga unfold.