Lessons from Putin: Think twice before casting your vote

Russian President Vladimir Putin attends a meeting with the head of the Russian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs Alexander Shokhin in Moscow, Russia on March 2, 2022. [Sputnik/Mikhail Klimentyev/Kremlin via REUTERS]

Man is brutal! Beastly! Merciless! An individual seeks self-preservation even through savage means. Thomas Hobbes, the English Philosopher, in his work, the Leviathan, explained why people wage deadly wars against each other. The state of human nature, he said, is cruel when faced with fear. 

The Russian invasion of Ukraine, now mediatised globally, brings to the fore the desire of man to conquer, control and exercise maximum power. There is a historical genesis to the invasion to which many of us in far distant countries do not know and will probably never get to conclusively judge which side of the conflict has legitimate claims. President Vladamir Putin did not just wake up to attack Ukraine. He planned over time, prepared the military for the task and build outcome scenarios.