The address at our meeting last week was presented by Professor Robert Patman, Professor of International Relations at Otago University.

The talk was illuminating and very informative and was followed by questions from the floor.

I have broken down Professor Patmans address:

 

Why did Russia attack Ukraine?
Putin was wanting to demonstrate to the Russian people how powerful both he and the Russian military were and to avoid an investigation into corruption in Russia which was part of a foreign trade deal.
Putin  is in denial that Ukraine is a separate sovereign state. He believes that he is not invading Ukraine, simply liberating former Russian citizens.
Putin believed that the expansion of NATO was posing a threat to Russian security and wanted Ukraine to form a ‘buffer’.
Putin wanted his regime to survive. Against the advice of his advisers he invaded Ukraine.

Why has the war lingered on?
Putin is the architect of a catastrophic mistake, underestimating the resolve of the Ukrainian people.
Putin incorrectly predicted how the Western countries would react to his invasion and their level of support for Ukraine.
Putin controls the State Media. The general Russian population is unaware of the true situation.

Why will Russian use of nuclear weapons not occur?
The Chinese have warned Russia that their support for Putin and Russia will be withdrawn if nuclear weapons are deployed.
The Russian military will not support Putin in the use of nuclear weapons.
Nuclear fallout so close to Russian soil would be catastrophic to Putins regime.

How will the war end?
Vladimir Putin and his regime would need to be removed for the war to be ended
Russian public awareness and a total collapse of the Russian economy are two very likely scenarios for this to happen.

 

This is clearly an ongoing, evolving situation and it would be excellent to have Professor Patman back for an update at some future time.

Alan Anderson – Who Am I?
After thanking our club for making him feel welcome as a new member, Alan provided a captivating insight into his strong family connections to Dunedin. A proud Boomer born at Redroofs Hospital, the 5th of 6 children, he’s a fourth generation New Zealander (or, he muses, Aotearoian?).
His great grandfather Robert Anderson met his great grandmother Janet on a ship from Scotland to Dunedin in 1873 and they married at Knox Church the following year. The connection with Knox Church endured through generations, as we learned later. Robert established a Foundry in lower Moray Place which Alan’s grandfather John (the 3rd of 12 children) also worked at. John married Alan’s grandmother Isabella Alexandrina Gillfillan Brown Brooke Morton “a name you couldn’t make up” (names which have passed down into the family) and Alan’s father George was born in 1918, the 7th of 8 children.
George met Alan’s mother Rose while they were both singing in the Knox church choir, and singing was an important aspect of their lives. George was a member of both the RSA and Royal Dunedin Male Choirs, and his funeral at Knox Church is remembered for its rousing combined choir tribute.
Rose’s family had an equally strong Dunedin connection, with origins in England. Alan’s maternal grandfather Walter worked as a self-employed gardener at Orokonui Hospital, he married Alice and they built a home in Ventnor Street Mornington which remained a family hub for generations. It has always amused Alan that the children of a gardener were named Rose and Iris, and he reckons it’s lucky his grandfather wasn’t a butcher!   
Alan’s parents were engaged to be married before WWII, and George was enlisted and served 5 years as a nurse in a front-line field hospital in Egypt and Italy. Rose worked at Roslyn Woolen Mills. Within 2 weeks of George’s return from war, after such a long absence, they were married. Ventnor Street became the family home - 3 bedrooms, one bathroom for 8 people, but that was normal. (In one of life’s full circles, in 1965 Alan’s parents moved to a larger home in Lookout Point but then returned to Mornington, building a home in English Avenue backing onto their original Ventnor Street home!).
Family, the dining room table, and Mornington Presbyterian Church (with an ‘Anderson Walking Bus’ procession to church each Sunday) were central to Alan’s formative years. Alan’s wife Julie believes this is where Alan developed his “moral focus and conservative views”. Alan’s father became a self-employed builder and they would load up his Morris commercial flat deck truck for holidays, kids on the back, and take the old motorway via Seacliff to a relocated holiday home in Waikouaiti, stopping on Mt Cargill to fill up the radiator. Long summer days were spent at the beach and many happy memories made. This prompted Alan and Julie to replicate that childhood experience with a Twizel holiday home for their 2 children and 2 grandchildren.
Alan and Julie married in 1978 – soon to be 45 years - and Anderson’s Bay became home. Julie’s vocation is education, she taught for decades in Dunedin High Schools (with Craig Radford being a mentor early in her career) and was Principal of Queens High School for 10 years. Alan has not-so-fond-memories of being dressed up in a suit on duty at multiple school formals checking whether students had been drinking! Julie is now in charge of Ministry of Education for Otago/Southland and Alan sees her “fleetingly”. They have 2 children – Geoff an engineer who lives near Rotary Park and is looking forward to the new bike track, and Joanna who is a Capability Manager with Fire Emergency NZ in Wellington.
Alan’s career was in architectural draughting, beginning straight from school as a draughting cadet at Architectural Engineers Partnership. On his first day at AEP he was made redundant! But on his second day he was offered a position at McCoy and Wixon where he spent the next 8 years, studying part-time at Otago Polytechnic, and enjoying the collegiality and hijinks in the office.
In 1980 he spent 18 months in the George & Ashton design office behind Countdown Andy Bay where they manufactured 40T shipping containers and truck bodies. This was a fascinating opportunity to learn from gifted people (chemical engineers, tradies) about logistics and 24/7 operations.
In 1983 Alan and Julie did a VW Combi Van tour of Europe and Asia. India and its architecture was a highlight. He reflects that it had a population of 600M at the time, which has now doubled, so he wonders whether returning now there would be “nowhere to stand”!
Alan returned to Dunedin and from 1984 until retirement in 2019 – just before the country closed down for Covid - he worked at Mason & Wales, with a specialty in pricing projects, compiling specifications, and preparing documentation for building and resource consents. He views architecture as a public form of art, and notes that everyone has a different opinion on it but there is no right or wrong answer. His joy was the pleasure of seeing people enjoying use of the end product.
Alan has many interests, including spending time with friends and family – especially his delightful grandchildren and a Buddy he mentors and is currently teaching to cook; riding electric bikes; swimming; travelling both domestically in their campervan and internationally (and he’s away to Samoa soon); fishing (although he reckons for the time invested it would be cheaper to buy fish!); gardening (maintenance not development!); reading; and according to Julie he has an “unhealthy interest in NZ politics”.
Alan asked himself, as DG Phil Gully asked, “How am I really”? His answer: “I am happy. I am grateful for my health and fitness. I am very grateful for my wife and family, Dunedin, a great lifestyle. I am content and fulfilled. And this is my life!”