A Few Thoughts on Borders

In Western Europe our border disputes are relatively tame. They include a centuries-long hateful occupation of part of Ireland and a part of Spain that was never ever any form of independent state yet is still trying to will itself into existence in revenge for being crushed (thank God) by the Nationalists in 1938.

In Eastern Europe border disputes aren’t dead. They aren’t even past. While I’ve spent a good deal of the week seeing signs like “Kosovo is Serbia” (because it is), I was intrigued to see this sticker on a utility box in Timisoara.

If you didn’t know, Bessarabia is a historical region that was never an independent country, but was an object of contention between differing ascending powers, be they Ottoman or Russian (mostly).

Today, Bessarabia lies mostly in Moldova and Ukraine, so it’s intriguing to see a sticker like this which is clearly advocating for a “greater Romania” idea.

It also is a part of why in this region of Europe (indeed, where Europe began) almost nobody buys the cut-and-dried narrative being sold by the Western media about what is happening in Ukraine.

They know that wars don’t have simple explanations or easy conclusions, because they lived wars very recently, which also featured outside interference, sanctions, and the sanctimonious condemnations of the world press.