TRADITIONAL PILLAGING
September 12, 2022 -Durt Fibo

Once again, Russian military personnel are being reported as engaging in mass looting and destruction. These days the havoc follows along with their retreat. In their happier months it progressed with incursions into Ukraine, and got far more violent as it went. Such people act in rage, desperation, sadism, or in keeping with cultural examples set by their leaders. Alas, Russia has long had terrible examples. In 1698, Peter the Great, along with his entourage known as “The Grand Embassy,” stopped in London. King William III complained that he could not remain in the same room as Peter because of his suffocating stench. Peter and his group then moved to the Deptford residence of Sir John Evelyn, who later reckoned up a bill to cover the damage done to his home and presented it to the British government. According to Karl Shaw, Peter and his men “tore up paintings and furnishings, smeared vomit and excrement on the floors and walls, smashed expensive parquet floors and used paintings as target practice with their guns.”