Tens of millions of those born and raised in the Orthodox faith such as myself are saying: Please stop this madness. We get it – Russia sees some encirclement both geopolitically and culturally. Yes, the march of the LGBT agenda can seem threatening, but you don’t use that as an excuse to invade a fellow Orthodox nation. And as some of your supporters have done, you do not build a foreign policy built upon resentment towards the so-called Anglo-Saxons. And you don’t launch an invasion based on fears of a NATO whose member peoples are more intent on living the good life than posing a threat to Russia. The Europeans for decades could not even meet the agreed goal of devoting 2 percent of their GDP to defense spending. Final thought here – you don’t threaten global annihilation against the United States – a nation that gave you 13,000 tanks and other similar assistance during World War II. There also seems to be a glaring contradiction in your reasoning – either the West is militarily strong, united, and hostile to Russia or it mired in decadence because of the LGBT movement and other societal factors – the West cannot be both.

The Ukrainians had no nefarious goals as they leaned westward – they simply saw that their once-poor neighbor Poland had prospered enormously as an EU member – indeed overshadowing the Ukrainian economy – and sought the same benefits to their own economy. There is so much wrong at play here. You don’t destroy the homes and infrastructure of a Ukrainian nation who you believe is one with yours as a matter of history, religion, geography, and linguistics. Perhaps the least of what is wrong here is who will rebuild Ukraine? It will be the ordinary Russian who will shoulder much of this burden.

Make no mistake about it, you are not building a Third Rome – a goal of Russian leaders that runs through its history – on the back of this war. Instead you have built an alliance with the Chinese Communist Party, which has worked for decades to extirpate Christianity from its lands. You recently gave China’s leader a sendoff from his visit that basically was humbling to yourself.

Your only other substantial ally seems to be Shiite Iran – a Muslim theocracy. To round things out, the third leg of your alliance is Muslim Chechnya. We need not reach the matter of a Turkish state moving more and more to an Islamist regime that has been playing both you and the Ukrainians.  Some in your camp say that in a nuclear exchange, your people have little to fear because your enemies are going straight to hell and your Orthodox are going to straight to heaven. If one could ignore the ludicrous nature of these beliefs, can you be so sure with the company you are keeping?

The last time Russian leaders miscalculated, it brought calamity upon them. Romanov Tsar Nicholas II sought to defend his Orthodox brethren in Serbia against Catholic Austria and what did it bring? WWI, the dissolution of the Russian Empire, Godless Communism to his lands, and the murder of himself and his family. We need not reach the matter that WWI brought about WWII which brought further destruction to your nation. Sadly, your nation is already too far along in repeating this calamity. The invasion and destruction of a neighbor based on resentment of the LGBT agenda, a reliance on Muslim allies, and resentments of the Anglo-Saxons as your supporters have characterized your opposition will have no positive ending for the Russian people.

While there is much dispute over whether Mark Twain wrote that history may not repeat itself, but it sure does rhyme, it is clear that history here is certainly rhyming and indeed may be almost exactly repeating itself.

Nicholas Kalis is the President of Kalis Development Corporation and has over five decades experience in commercial real estate. The George Mason School of Law granted Kalis a Juris Doctor degree. He also earned a Master of International Affairs from Columbia University’s School of Public and International Affairs. Kalis also graduated Queens College – City University of New York.