UKRAINE WAR ANTHOLOGY #34

Compiled by Dick Bennett for a Culture of Peace, Justice, and Ecology

May 25, 2025

https://jamesrichardbennett.blogspot.com/2025/05/omni-ukraine-war-anthology-34-may-25.html

What’s at Stake:   A true—a complete and accurate– martial history of the USA.  Walter Hixson:  “From Columbus to the “forever wars” of the modern Middle East, Americans have sought imperial domination over other peoples, invariably deemed inferior, and have regularly chosen to go to war with them.”   These 34 anthologies (approx. 500 articles and books) provide that history for the US, Russia, and Ukraine, giving citizens the foundation for resistance; indeed, the foundation, available since 2014, had it been taught instead of the false war narrative promoted by both Parties and the corporate media, could have prevented the war.

CONTENTS  25 articles and books

Trump’s Call to Putin: [VFP-all] Is peace at hand in the long Cold War with Russia?

AGAIN A TIME FOR REFLECTION FOR PEACE

Walter Hixson.  “Imperialism and War: The History Americans Need to Own.”
Consortium News.
Benjamin and Davies.  War in Ukraine.  (Dick’s rev. with  Baud’s Operation Z).
Benjamin Abelow.  How the West Brought War to Ukraine. 
Melvin Goodman.   “A Personal Discussion of Russian National Security.”

THE WAR
Eva Bartlett.  “Maligned in Western Media, Donbass Forces are Defending their Future from Ukrainian Shelling and Fascism.”
Big Serge. “Total Kievan Debellation:The Russo-Ukrainian War: Year 3.”
John Helmer. “The War Came to Pokrovsk.” 
Lord Robert Skidelsky: “Speech in the House of Lords on Ukraine.”
Scott Ritter.   “Life, preempted.”
Chris Bambery.   “NATO’s spiralling commitments to Ukraine risk catastrophe.”

RELATED ARTICLES AND INTERVIEWS
Lederer and Peltz. “Russian foreign minister invokes nuclear capacity in UN speech…”
Lee Fang. “New York Times’ . . .War Escalation Journalism.”  
World Socialist Web Site.      “. . .long range NATO missiles against Russia….”

Ted Snider.   “The Damage Victoria Nuland Has Done.”
Anatol Lieven.  “Biden team blows off deadline for Ukraine war strategy.”
Unintended Consequences Interviews Benjamin Abelow.
Donald A. Smith.  “The US Provoked Russia over Ukraine.”
Jonathan McCormick.   “An Interview with Professor Nicolai N. Petro: On Ukraine’s prospects.”
James W. Carden.  “Why Does American Folly March on in Ukraine?”
 Nuclear Age Peace Foundation: “Ukraine War, The Third Year, featuring Grigory Yavlinsky.”
Saheli Chowdhury. “Ukraine … a private mercenary company of NATO. . . . ” (Interv.).
Larry Johnson.  “Star CIA Analysts Are Out of Touch With. . . Russia”.
Sonja Van den Ende.   “Media [and] Russian Retreat From Kherson….”
Aidan Jonah.   “Canadian Professor attacked by mainstream media for opposing NATO narrative on Ukraine.”    

Ukraine War Anthologyy #33

TEXTS

PEACE BEGINS?  May 24, 2025?

[VFP-all] Is peace at hand in the long Cold War with Russia? https://strategic-culture.su/news/2025/05/23/trumps-phone-diplomacy-with-putin-shatters-euro-atlantic-cold-war-mental-bloc/  ‘Eric & Hoa Herter’ via VFP-all vfp-all@googlegroups.com via uark.onmicrosoft.com 

“Trump’s phone diplomacy with Putin shatters the Euro-Atlantic Cold War mental bloc.”         Sat, May 24, 2025.   

Trump’s phone call with Putin this week has had a major impact, and one that has significant potential for peace.

A TIME FOR REFLECTION

FOR PEACE, THE BIG PICTURE: When Did the War Begin, Where, by Whom, and Why, and What and Who Sustained, Sustains  it? (Remember the sheer quantity of well-prepared statements by opponents of US/NATO/Ukraine warmakers.  #34 contains 127 articles and books.)

Warrior USA from Jamestown to Ukraine

Walter Hixson, Imperialism and War: The History Americans Need to Own. Institute for Research, 2021.

Publisher’s Synopsis
Transcending the mythology of “American exceptionalism,” the acclaimed historian Walter Hixson unveils a long history of war and imperialism, one that is deeply embedded in the American national DNA. From Columbus to the “forever wars” of the modern Middle East, Americans have sought imperial domination over other peoples, invariably deemed inferior, and have regularly chosen to go to war with them.

The consequences of the nation’s violent aggression have been severe yet not fully analyzed owing to the powerful boundaries erected by patriotic nationalism. Americans have viewed themselves as a “chosen people” and the United States as a “beacon and liberty,” the champion of the “free world,” but this self-serving discourse has served to enable continental and overseas imperialism and war.

Americans typically professed to go to war because they “had to” or to make the world “safe for democracy,” but only rarely were these scenarios in play. Rather, Americans usually chose to go to war, and US foreign policy rarely produced or even sought to produce democratic outcomes. Instead, the United States often engaged in violent repression of other peoples and bolstered dictatorial regimes, including those engaged in mass murder.

US war and imperialism frequently proved ineffectual, as they were often grounded in dramatic misperceptions. Foreign aggression also often sowed the seeds for “blowback” attacks and the continuation or renewal of conflict and warfare. Moreover–and rarely analyzed–continental and overseas aggression also undermined democracy, civil liberties, and progressive reform on the home front.

Rooted in decades of study and delivered in crystal clear and direct language, this book is must-reading for anyone wishing to go beyond the clichés that typically structure discussions of the history and contemporary prospects of American foreign relations. In a bold conclusion Hixson outlines the desperate need for adoption of a new paradigm of “cooperative internationalism” to transcend the nation’s penchant for war and     imperialism fueled by national self-worship.

“History Is Indispensable to Journalism.”  Consortium News (5-6-24).

It’s missing from corporate journalism for a reason and for the same reason is a big part of Consortium News. Read here…

You cannot understand a conflict without understanding its history. That’s why historical context is routinely suppressed by corporate media, such as in the Palestinian-Israel conflict and the war between Russia and Ukraine. They don’t want you to understand.

For establishment journalists, the violence in Gaza began on Oct. 7, 2023 and in Ukraine on Feb. 24, 2022.    Understanding the Palestinian conflict from 1948 forward, and the Ukraine war from the 2014 overthrow of the Ukrainian government and the start of the civil war completely changes one’s perception.  So establishment media suppress this history because it’s a perception they don’t want you to have. It goes against its agenda to promote Western foreign policies, rather than reporting on them.  . . . [In contrast, Consortium News] has published numerous articles on the history of the Palestinian conflict and last year we ran a timeline that explained the war in Ukraine in a completely different way from what Western governments and media are telling us.  

History is an invaluable part of Consortium News‘ reporting. Please contribute today to CN‘s Spring Fund Drive to help us to continue providing rare but essential historical context.    

Medea Benjamin and Nicolas J. S. Davies.  War in Ukraine: Making Sense of a Senseless Conflict.   OR Books, 2022.

     The last book I reported on in WWW about the Ukraine War was Jacques Baud’s Operation Z, a distinguished scholarly book published the same year as Benjamin’s and Davies’.   Baud uses Ukrainian and Western sources to discover the truth about the so-called “Russian invasion” by examining the validity of those sources.  It is both a history of the war from its inception and a criticism of Western mainstream media reporting of that history.  Baud doesn’t refer to George Orwell’s 1984, but the book provides a doublespeak analysis of the contradictions permeating US-Western-Ukraine pronouncements.   It is also organized with diagrammatic order, and every claim is supported, an example of which I cited in my review.

     I was inspired to read again Benjamin’s and Davies’ book, which I admired , to compare their history with Baud’s.  

     They have a similar aim: to stop the war by telling the truth.  They are responding to the “widespread condemnation across the West” that “Russia’s brutal February 2022 invasion of Ukraine” was “a simple dichotomy between an evil empire and an innocent victim.”   They tell a different story.  In B & D’s words: “But the West’s reneging on promises to halt eastward expansion of NATO in the wake of the collapse of the Soviet Union played a major part in prompting Putin to act.  So did the U.S. involvement in the 2014 Ukraine coup and Ukraine’s failure to implement the Minsk peace agreements.” (From authors’ summary preceding title page.)

       Although neither book offers an Index, making detailed comparisons difficult, my conclusion is that the only major difference between the two books is the fact that Baud takes 410 pages to tell the story for peace (it’s a major scholarly work), while B&D take 185.  Both books are cogently argued; together they offer a formidable refutation of the Ukraine/NATO-USA justification of the war by demonizing Putin and Russia, which constitutes another achievement by the movement to end wars. 

     One important part of War in Ukraine not found in Operation Z is chapter 7, “Flirting with Nuclear War,” where  B&D castigate especially the West for bringing the world “to the brink of a direct conflict that could escalate into nuclear war. . . .the most catastrophic existential threat the world faces.”

From the publisher praise from Counterpunch and Mairead McGuire: War in Ukraine: MAKING SENSE OF A SENSELESS CONFLICT BY  MEDEA BENJAMIN and NICOLAS J.S. DAVIES.  Preface by KATRINA VANDEN HEUVEL.

  2022.
“The timing of the publication of War in Ukraine: Making Sense of a Senseless War couldn’t be better. This text, written by antiwar activist Medea Benjamin and journalist Nicolas J.S. Davies, provides the reader with a clear and well-argued understanding of the Ukraine-Russian war that rejects the pro-war narratives of Kyiv, Moscow and Washington. The text tackles the conflict from a viewpoint that acknowledges Moscow’s February 22, 2022 aggression as illegal and wrong while also arguing that the conflict itself represents a greater geopolitical conflict where Washington is the instigator and the more aggressive actor.”  —Counterpunch
  “An important antidote to the war propaganda about Ukraine that so many in the West are caught up in.”  —Mairead McGuire, activist and winner of the Nobel Peace Prize

Benjamin Abelow.  How the West Brought War to Ukraine. 

May 8, 2022.
Misguided American and NATO policies created the Ukraine crisis. Now they risk nuclear war.   
https://medium.com/@benjamin.abelow/western-policies-caused-the-ukraine-crisis-and-now-risk-nuclear-war-1e402a67f44e  
This essay is now available, slightly modified and revised, in book form — Paperback, eBook, and Audible. You can purchase these at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and your local independent bookstore. You can also read more about me and my work at my website. A German-language edition is available in all markets, including in Germany, for example, here, and a free German edition — beautifully illustrated with landscape paintings by the artist Archip Kuindschi (1841–1910), for whom a museum is named in Mariupol, Ukraine — is available here. A Slovene translation, which is being published by the Slovenian Academy of Sciences and Arts, is in progress, and a Polish edition is being negotiated. Translations into other languages are being explored.
 Overview
For almost 200 years, starting with the framing of the Monroe Doctrine in 1823, the United States has asserted security claims over virtually the whole Western hemisphere. Any foreign power that places military forces near U.S. territory knows it is crossing a red line. U.S. policy thus embodies a conviction that where a potential opponent places its forces is crucially important. In fact, this conviction is the cornerstone of American foreign and military policy, and its violation is considered reason for war.

Yet when it comes to Russia, the United States and its NATO allies have acted for decades in disregard of this same principle. They have progressively advanced the placement of their military forces toward Russia, even to its borders. They have done this with inadequate attention to, and sometimes blithe disregard for, how Russian leaders might perceive this advance. Had Russia taken equivalent actions with respect to U.S. territory — say, placing its military forces in Canada or Mexico — Washington would have gone to war and explained that war as a defensive response to the military encroachment of a foreign power.

When viewed through this lens, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is seen not as the unbridled expansionism of a malevolent Russian leader but as a violent and destructive reaction to misguided Western policies: an attempt to reestablish a zone around Russia’s western border that is free of offensive threats from the United States and its allies. Having misunderstood why Russia invaded Ukraine, the West is now basing existential decisions on false premises. In doing so, it is deepening the crisis and may be sleepwalking toward nuclear war.

This argument, which I now present in detail, is based on the analyses of a number of scholars, government officials, and military observers, all of whom I introduce and quote from in the course of the presentation. These include John Mearsheimer, Stephen F. Cohen, Richard Sakwa, Gilbert Doctorow, George F. Kennan, Chas Freeman, Douglas Macgregor, and Brennan Deveraux.  . . . MORE https://medium.com/@benjamin.abelow/western-policies-caused-the-ukraine-crisis-and-now-risk-nuclear-war-1e402a67f44e     

A Call for Engagement and Negotiation
Melvin Goodman.  “A Personal Discussion of Russian National Security.”   Counterpunch (July 29, 2025). 

We are at a serious juncture with two mindless wars in East Europe and the Middle East.  Read in browser »FacebookTwitterRedditBlueskyEmail

I correctly anticipated significant criticism of my last piece for CounterPunch, which argued that President Vladimir Putin’s was not “unproved,” that NATO expansion was a significant factor in the Russian use of force, and that our policymakers and so-called experts failed to understand the central national security aspects of Soviet/Russian policy.  Among the critics of my CounterPunch article were Walter Slocomb who served in Clinton’s national security council and lobbied for NATO expansion, and a former colleague of mine at the National War College, Marvin Ott, who supported expansion and is anticipating a Russian victory in Ukraine to be followed by Putin’s aggression elsewhere.

I am not trying to minimize the Russian challenge to U.S. national interests throughout the Cold War, but there needs to be recognition of U.S. efforts to exaggerate the Soviet threat as well as the acknowledgment of systemic Russian domestic weakness.  A further problem is that there are too few U.S. experts on either Russia or East Europe, and too few institutes devoted to such study.  I benefitted from my graduate work at Indiana University’s Russian and East European Institute.  And I benefitted financially as well thanks to the Woodrow Wilson Dissertation Program and the generosity of Indiana University.

At the same time, the decline in expertise on arms control and disarmament also contributes to the decline in substantive exchanges with both Moscow and Beijing as well as Tehran and Pyongyang.  I was fortunate to have served as the intelligence adviser to the U.S. delegation in Vienna, where the SALT and ABM treaties were hammered out.  We could be facing a nuclear confrontation because of the lack of political discussions with these four key states.  The fact that we don’t even recognize Iran and North Korea shows how our diplomats have failed us and our policymakers have been so short-sighted.  (Arms control not only led to Soviet-American detente, it fostered European detente, which allowed 380,000 Soviet troops to withdraw from East Germany without incident.)

We are at a serious juncture with two mindless wars in East Europe and the Middle East.  Instead of developing a policy toward these two disasters, we are fixed on building so-called alliance relationships in Europe and the Indo-Pacific.  Thomas Friedman of the New York Times even wants to form an alliance with Israel and Saudi Arabia to combat Iran.  We should be dealing with Iran directly in an effort to avoid such alliance building, which will have no satisfactory outcome.  The expansion of NATO has weakened NATO politically, and contributed to a major war.  Our efforts to contain China with a series of alliance arrangements has only made it more difficult to deal with China regarding political security.  As a result of our efforts, we have pushed Moscow and Beijing into their closest relationship in their histories, and we are looking for ways to match and exceed their defense spending and nuclear modernization. . . .

In the 1990s, in the wake of the Soviet collapse, the United States sought to change the European theatre balance for no real reason.  The continued effort to expand NATO and to deploy power in East and Central Europe preordained a Russian reaction no matter who was in charge in the Kremlin.  U.S. planners thought the expansion of power in Europe would deter Russia from seeking advantages in the Third World, but this was another miasma in our thinking.  Russia has never developed a sophisticated power projection force that would be needed for a significant expansion of Russian power.  Nor does China appear to be interested in power project.  Only the United States believes that it needs 700 military facilities around the entire world. . . .MORE

Melvin A. Goodman is a senior fellow at the Center for International Policy and a professor of government at Johns Hopkins University.  A former CIA analyst, Goodman is the author of Failure of Intelligence: The Decline and Fall of the CIA and National Insecurity: The Cost of American Militarism. and A Whistleblower at the CIA. His most recent books are “American Carnage: The Wars of Donald Trump” (Opus Publishing, 2019) and “Containing the National Security State” (Opus Publishing, 2021). Goodman is the national security columnist for counterpunch.org.

THE WAR (understanding how it is ending]

Maligned in Western Media, Donbass Forces are Defending their Future from Ukrainian Shelling and Fascism

By Eva Bartlett.  CovertAction Magazine  (Nov 19, 2022). 

America is widely understood to be a key instigator behind conflict in Ukraine that has pitted brother against brother.  Smeared, stigmatized, and lied about in Western media propaganda, the mostly Russian-speaking people of the Donbass region were being slaughtered by the thousands in a brutal war of “ethnic cleansing” launched against them by the neo-Nazi regime in Kyiv, which the U.S. installed after the CIA overthrew Ukraine’s legally elected president in a 2014 coup.

Although the Donbass people had been pleading for Russian military aid to defend them against the increasingly murderous military assaults by the Ukraine government forces, which killed more than 14,000 of their people, Russian President Vladimir Putin declined to intervene. Instead, he tried to broker a peace agreement between the warring parties.

But the U.S. and Britain secretly colluded to sabotage peace negotiations, persuading president Zelenksy to ignore the Minsk III peace agreement that the Ukraine government had previously signed, and which had been countersigned by Russia, France and Germany.

Realizing that the U.S. and its NATO allies would never permit peace negotiations to succeed, Putin finally invaded Ukraine on February 24. Russian troops went in to support and reinforce the outnumbered and outgunned Donbass Special Forces who had been defending their land against attacks by the Kyiv government for nearly eight years. […]   Read in browser »

 “My intention here is [to] consider the aggregate of 2024 — arguing that this year was, in fact, very consequential. Taken as a whole, three very important things happened in 2024 which create a very dismal outlook for Ukraine and the AFU in the new year. More specifically, 2024 brought three important strategic developments. . . .”

My intention here is a radical zoom-out from… demoralizing and fatiguing small scale updates (as valuable as the work of the war mappers is), and consider the aggregate of 2024 — arguing that this year was, in fact, very consequential. Taken as a whole, three very important things happened in 2024 which create a very dismal outlook for Ukraine and the AFU in the new year. More specifically, 2024 brought three important strategic developments:

1.     Russian victory in southern Donetsk which destroyed the AFU’s position on one of the war’s key strategic axes.

2.     The expenditure of carefully husbanded Ukrainian resources on a failed offensive towards Kursk, which accelerated the attrition of critical Ukrainian maneuver assets and substantially dampened their prospects in the Donbas.

3.     The exhaustion of Ukraine’s ability to escalate vis a vis new strike systems from NATO – more broadly, the west has largely run out of options to upgrade Ukrainian capabilities, and the much vaunted delivery of longer range strike systems failed to alter the trajectory of the war on the ground.

Taken together, 2024 revealed a Ukrainian military that is increasingly stretched to the limits, to the point where the Russians were able to largely scratch off an entire sector of front. People continue to wonder where and when the Ukrainian front might begin to break down – I would argue that it *did* break down in the south over the last few months, and 2025 begins with strong Russian momentum that the AFU will be hard pressed to arrest. . . .MORE click on title [Serge seems to know every weapon, military unit, and movement.  If you like military history, you’ll read through his three-year detailed summary without pause.  -Dick]

Conclusion: Debellation

Trapped in an endless news cycle, with daily footage of FPV strikes and exploding vehicles, and a dutiful cottage industry of war mappers alerting us to every 100 meter advance, it can easily feel like the Russo-Ukrainian War is trapped in an interminable doom loop which will never end – Mad Max meets Groundhog Day.

What I have endeavored to do here, however, is argue that 2024 actually saw several very important developments which make the coming shape of the war relatively clear. To briefly recapitulate:

1.     Russian forces caved in Ukrainian defenses at depth across an entire critical axis of front. After remaining static for years, Ukraine’s position in Southern Donetsk has been obliterated, with Russian forces advancing through an entire belt of fortified positions, pushing the front into Pokrovsk and Kostayantinivka.

2.     The main Ukrainian gambit on the ground (the incursion into Kursk) failed spectacularly, with the salient being progressively caved in. An entire grouping of critical mechanized formations wasted much of the year fighting on this unproductive and secondary front, leaving Ukrainian positions in the Donbas increasingly threadbare and bereft of reserves.

3.     An attempt by the Ukrainian government to reinvigorate its mobilization program failed, with enlistments quickly trailing off. Decisions to expand the force structure exacerbated the shortage of manpower, and as a result the decay of Ukraine’s frontline brigades has accelerated.

4.     Long awaited western upgrades to Ukraine’s strike capabilities failed to defeat Russian momentum, and stocks of ATACMs and Storm Shadows are nearly exhausted. There are now few options remaining to prop up Ukrainian strike capacity, and no prospect of Ukraine gaining dominance in this dimension of the war.

In short, Ukraine is on the path to debellation – defeat through the total exhaustion of its capacity to resist. They are not exactly out of men and vehicles and missiles, but these lines are all pointing downward. A strategic Ukrainian defeat – once unthinkable to the western foreign policy apparatus and commentariat – is now on the table. Quite interestingly, now that Donald Trump is about to return to the White House, it is suddenly acceptable to speak of Ukrainian defeat. Robert Kagan – a stalwart champion of Ukraine if there ever was one – now says the quiet part out loud:

Ukraine will likely lose the war within the next 12 to 18 months. Ukraine will not lose in a nice, negotiated way, with vital territories sacrificed but an independent Ukraine kept alive, sovereign, and protected by Western security guarantees. It faces instead a complete defeat, a loss of sovereignty, and full Russian control.

Indeed.   None of this should be particularly surprising. If anything, it is shocking that my position – that Russia is essentially a very powerful country that was very unlikely to lose a war (which it perceives as existential) right in its own belly – somehow became controversial or fringe. But here we are.

“The War Came to Pokrovsk” By John Helmer (Posted Oct 07, 2024).   Originally published: Dances with Bears  on October 4, 2024 (more by Dances with Bears).   WarEurope, Russia, UkraineNewswire.
[This is Helmer’s interview of a citizen of Pokrovsk who is pro-Russian.  Her comments reveal the extreme past and present complications.  I have copied the conclusion.  –D]

Pokrovsk, in the northwestern corner of Donetsk region, is almost a Russian city again.

. . . Born in Pokrovsk and a resident of the city for 30 years, a professional psychologist and newspaper editor left the city ahead of the final battle between advancing Russian forces and the Ukrainian retreat. Her name is not published to protect family members who have remained. In the form of a question-and-answer interview, this is her story. . . . 

[This is the interviewee’s final comment.  –D]  Many stay in the city because they are afraid of losing their homes, shops and other real estate. Also, there is simply no way to leave. But the only thing that scares the residents of Pokrovsk is not the arrival of the Russian armed forces, but the fact that after the retreat, the Armed Forces of Ukraine will start shelling the city and turn it into the same ruins as Bakhmut and Avdeyevka.

[But Helmer adds a contradictory conclusion by the NYT reporter in Kiev, to which he adds several qualifying comments!  –D]  In the New York Times version of the evacuation of Pokrovsk, written by Andrew Kramer, artillery bombardment of the city will come, not from the retreating Ukrainian army but from the advancing Russian forces. For many years Kramer failed to be promoted at the Times bureau in Moscow but became chief of the organ’s Kiev bureau in 2022. From Pokrovsk Kramer reported: “Now, it is too late to ensure that Pokrovsk will be protected from artillery bombardment, the town’s military administrator said….Russian forces since April have ground through five defensive lines east of Pokrovsk, said Serhiy Dobryak, the town’s military administrator. With only two more lines remaining, the incursion into Russia, and the potential diversion it might cause, was essentially a last hope…The town for now is not at risk of imminent capture, he said, but officials expect a sustained artillery bombardment that is likely to leave it in ruins. That has been the fate of other Ukrainian towns like Bakhmut and Avdiivka that Russia pummeled into rubble before forcing Ukraine to pull back. ‘They will bring the artillery nearby and they will destroy the town,’ Mr. Dobryak said. “That will happen.’ ”

John Helmer is the longest continuously serving foreign correspondent in Russia, and the only western journalist to direct his own bureau independent of single national or commercial ties. He first set up his bureau in 1989, making him today the doyen of the foreign press corps in Russia. [I assume this info. appeared in Dances with Bears.  -D]

STOP THE WAR: BEGIN NEGOTIATING
Lord Robert Skidelsky: “Speech in the House of Lords on Ukraine, 25 October 2024.”  ACURA (10-29-24).
[Skidelsky explains the flaws in the Ukrainian/NATO strategy and urges a rapid end to the war.]

House of Lords October 28, 2024  [Scroll to end for negotiation proposal.]

. . .What Ukraine thinks it takes is shown by President Zelensky’s latest victory plan: the Russian army must be driven out of Crimea and Donbass. However, who now believes that Ukraine can achieve this kind of victory at the present level of western support? Rather, there is growing agreement that without expanded western support, Ukraine, despite its courage and determination, faces defeat. This was always likely once Russia started to mobilise on a larger scale. 
The demographics alone indicate this: you have a country of 36 million fighting one of 147 million. In the last four years, Ukraine’s population has shrunk by 20% while Russia’s has grown. A population the size of London has simply disappeared through war and migration; that is the reality on the ground. Of course, North Korean involvement has added a new front in this debate, but we must not delude ourselves that Russia needs North Korean troops to go on fighting. So the question arises: what more must we do to do what it takes?

There are two basic answers.  Tighten economic sanctions and use long-range missiles, but the first has already failed and the second is extremely dangerous to the whole world.

As I have argued  elsewhere, true ‘victory’ for Ukraine lies not in regaining lost territory but in becoming a prosperous, democratic European nation free of Russian political meddling and strong enough to defend itself against future military threats. Going on fighting a war that systematically destroys a new generation of young Ukrainians and annihilates the country’s infrastructure and economy would be the real victory for Vladimir Putin.

[NEGOTIATE]
Is there a way to bring the fighting to an end? The most hopeful recent development in this deadly game of chicken has been a statement by President Zelensky reported in the Financial Times two days ago:  “Russia putting an end to aerial attacks on Ukrainian energy targets and cargo ships could pave the way for negotiations to end the war”.  At last, there is a breakthrough to realism. Will the Government seize this opportunity to start some serious diplomacy? I mourn those who have died. What now moves me above all else is the thought of the thousands more young men, women and children yet to die if this war is not quickly brought to an end. I beg the Government to play their part in bringing the killing and destruction to a close.”

The Purpose of the War: Weaken Russia; Possible Consequence: Nuclear War .  STOP THE WAR
Scott Ritter.   “Life, preempted.”   Mronline.org (10-3-24).

Policymakers in both the U.S. and Europe are undertaking increasingly brazen acts of escalation in Ukraine designed to bring Russia to the breaking point.

Originally published: Scott Ritter Extra  on September 25, 2024 (more by Scott Ritter Extra).    Strategy, WarAmericas, Europe, Russia, Ukraine, United StatesNewswireNuclear Bomb / Missile, Nuclear War, Nuclear Weapons

What would you do to save Democracy? To save America? To save the world? How will you vote in November?

If you’re not thinking about the end of the world by now, you’re either braindead or stuck in some remote corner of the world, totally removed from access to news.

Last week we came closer to a nuclear conflict between the U.S. and Russia than at any time since the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962.

Today we are even closer.

Most scenarios being bandied about in the western mainstream media that involve a nuclear conflict between Russia and the United States have Russia initiating the exchange by using nuclear weapons against Ukraine in response to deteriorating military, economic, and/or political conditions brought on by the U.S. and NATO successfully leveraging Ukraine as a proxy to achieve the strategic defeat of Russia.

Understand, this is what both Ukraine and the Biden administration mean when they speak of Ukraine “winning the war.”

This is a continuation of the policy objective set forth by Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin in April 2022, “to see Russia weakened to the degree that it can’t do the kinds of things that it has done in invading Ukraine,” meaning that Russia should “not have the capability to very quickly reproduce” the forces and equipment that it loses in Ukraine.

This policy has failed; Russia has absorbed four new territories—Kherson, Zaporizhia, Donetsk and Lugansk—into the Russian Federation, and the Russian defense industry has not only replaced losses sustained in the Ukrainian conflict, but is currently arming and equipping an additional 600,000 troops that have been added to the Russian military since February 2022.

It is the United States and its NATO allies that find themselves on their back feet, with Europe facing economic hardship as a result of the extreme blowback that has transpired because of its sanctioning of Russian energy, and the United States watching helplessly as Russia, together with China, turns the once passive BRICS economic forum into a geopolitical juggernaut capable of challenging and surpassing the U.S.-led G7 as the world’s most influential non-governmental organization.

As a result of this abysmal failure, policymakers in both the U.S. and Europe are undertaking increasingly brazen acts of escalation designed to bring Russia to the breaking point, all premised on the assumption that all so-called “red lines” established by Russia regarding escalation are illusionary—Russia, they believe, is bluffing.

And if Russia is not bluffing?

Then, the western-generated scenario paints an apocalyptic picture which has a weak, defeated Russia using nuclear weapons against Ukraine in a last, desperate act of vengeance.

According to this scenario, which the U.S. and NATO not only war-gamed out but made ready to implement when these entities imagined that Russia was preparing to employ nuclear weapons back in late 2022-early 2023, the U.S. and NATO would launch a devastating response against Russian targets deep inside Russia designed to punitively degrade Russian command and control, logistics, and warfighting capacity. . . .MORE

When the United States launches the Trident missile carrying the low yield warhead, how are the Russians supposed to interpret this act?

The fact is, if the U.S. ever fires a W-76-2 warhead using a Trident missile, the Russians will assess this action as the initiation of a nuclear first strike and order the launching of its own nuclear arsenal in response.

All because the United States has embraced a policy of “first strike ambiguity” designed to keep the Russians and Chinese guessing about American nuclear intentions.

And, to put icing on this nuclear cake, Russia’s response appears to have been to change its nuclear posture to embrace a similar posture of nuclear pre-emption, meaning that rather than wait for the U.S. to actually launch a nuclear-armed missile or missiles against a Russian target, Russia will now seek to pre-empt such an attack by launching its own pre-emptive nuclear strike designed to eliminate the U.S. land-based nuclear deterrent force.

In a sane world, both sides would recognize the inherent dangers of such a forward-leaning posture, and take corrective action.

But we no longer live in a sane world.

Moreover, given the fact that the underlying principle guiding U.S. policies toward Russia is the misplaced notion that Russia is bluffing, any aggressive posturing we might engage in designed to promote and exploit the ambiguity derived from the first-strike potential inherent in existing U.S. nuclear posture will, more likely than not, only fuel Russian paranoia about a potential U.S. nuclear pre-emption, prompting Russia to pre-empt.

Russia isn’t bluffing.   And our refusal to acknowledge this has embarked us on a path where we appear more than willing to pre-empt life itself.

We need to pre-empt nuclear preemption by embracing a policy of strict no first use principles.

[CHOOSING PEACE AND EARTH AS HOME]

By choosing deterrence over warfighting.

By deemphasizing nuclear war.

By controlling nuclear weapons through verifiable arms control treaties.

And by eliminating nuclear weapons.

It truly is an existential choice—nuclear weapons or life.

Because they are incompatible with one another.

Western Missiles to Strike Russia

Chris Bambery.   “NATO’s spiralling commitments to Ukraine risk catastrophe.”    Editor.  mronline.org

We are on the possible verge of a major escalation in the war in the Ukraine, one which risks war between NATO and Russia, and one involving nuclear weapons, argues Chris Bambery.
Originally published: Counterfire  on May 29, 2024 by Chris Bambery (more by Counterfire (Posted May 31, 2024).

Economic Crisis, State Repression, Strategy, WarAmericas, Europe, France, Germany, Russia, Ukraine, United StatesNewswireATACMS Long-Range Missiles, British-French Storm Shadow/Scalp Long-Range Missiles, F-16 Fighter Jets, Military Weapons, North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), President Joe Biden, President Vladimir Putin, Russia-Ukraine War, Secretary of State Anthony Blinken, U.S HIMARS Short-Range Missiles, Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky

France and Germany have agreed that Ukraine should be allowed to use its allies’ missiles to ‘neutralise’ Russian military bases used to fire missiles into Ukraine, France’s president, Emmanuel Macron said on Tuesday on a state visit to Berlin. He added: ‘We should not allow them to touch other targets in Russia, and obviously civilian capacities.’ The German chancellor, Olaf Scholz, said he agreed with the French president, as long as the Ukrainians respected the conditions of the weapons’ suppliers. . . .  MORE

RELATED ARTICLES AND INTERVIEWS

NUCLEAR  DANGER

Edith Lederer and Jennifer Peltz.  WATCH: “Russian foreign minister invokes nuclear capacity in UN speech condemning the West.”  World SepT. 28, 2024 .

Russia’s top diplomat warned Saturday against “trying to fight to victory with a nuclear power,” delivering a U.N. General Assembly speech packed with condemnations of what Russia sees as Western machinations in Ukraine and elsewhere — including inside the United Nations itself.

Three days after Russian President Vladimir Putin aired a shift in his country’s nuclear doctrine, Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov accused the West of using Ukraine — which Russia invaded in February 2022 — as a tool to try “to defeat” Moscow strategically, and “preparing Europe for it to also throw itself into this suicidal escapade.”

Watch Lavrov’s remarks in the player above.

“I’m not going to talk here about the senselessness and the danger of the very idea of trying to fight to victory with a nuclear power, which is what Russia is,” he said.  The specter of nuclear threats and confrontation has hung over the war in Ukraine since its start. Shortly before the invasion, Putin reminded the world that his country was “one of the most powerful nuclear states,” and he put its nuclear forces on high alert shortly after. His nuclear rhetoric has ramped up and toned down at various points since.

WATCH: Harris meets with Ukraine’s Zelenskyy as Russia makes nuclear warning . . . .   MORE

Edith Lederer and Jennifer Peltz.  “Russia Issues Nuclear Warning.  UN Remarks Aim at Ukraine Allies.” Assoc. P, Arkansas Democrat-Gazette (9-29-24). 

Military-Corporate-MEDIA Complex

Lee Fang. “ New York Times’ Previous Reporting Undermines Its War Escalation Journalism.”   Sept. 13, 2024.

Warnings about major escalation of war — and potential nuclear war — take a backseat to think tank experts from the defense industry.    Lee Fang  
. . .The NYT series on think tank corruption began ten years ago. Little has changed in terms of the behavior of defense industry-funded think tanks. Instead, the NYT has gone on to embrace them.

In its ongoing reporting on the Ukraine-Russia war and the debate over whether to fuel the conflict, the NYT routinely goes to CSIS [Center for Strategic and International Studies, Seth G. Jones, a senior vice president] for quotes to justify more weapons and more war. The latest flashpoint is the news that NATO powers are moving to likely approve Ukraine’s use of Army Tactical Missile System missiles, known as ATACMS, to strike deep into Russian territory, potentially targeting oil refineries, factories, and other infrastructure that serve a mix of military and civilian purposes. The move would amount to a major escalation that may provoke a wider war across Europe, strikes on U.S. assets, or even nuclear war.

President Vladimir V. Putin has said that such missile strikes from American-provided ATACMS into Russian territory would “mean that NATO countries — the United States and European countries — are at war with Russia.” . . .. 

– the NYT is engaging in the same type of industry opinion laundering it once decried.  CSIS vice president Seth Jones doubles as an official at Beacon Global Strategies, a consulting firm that lobbies on behalf of the defense industry, with previous clients that include Raytheon.

As the NYT has previously reported, CSIS is funded and routinely directed by the largest defense contractors in the world. Lockheed Martin, the manufacturer behind the ATACMS missile system, is among the think tank’s largest corporate benefactors. As we’ve reported, Lockheed Martin stands to benefit financially from the war, citing $10 billion in opportunities.

 [Highland Industrial Park in East Camden, AR,  is a major center of Star Wars  production in the United States.]

“Plan to use long-range NATO missiles against Russia threatens uncontrolled escalation of global war.”

Editor.  mronline.org (9-29-24).  

After high-ranking NATO officials publicly called for Ukraine to use NATO weapons to attack deep inside Russia, Russian President Vladimir Putin formally presented a proposed update to Russia’s nuclear policy that would expand the conditions under which Moscow would use nuclear weapons.
Originally published: World Socialist Web Site (WSWS)  on September 26, 2024 by Statement of the WSWS Editorial Board (more by World Socialist Web Site (WSWS))  |  (Posted Sep 28, 2024).    Strategy, WarAmericas, Europe, Russia, Ukraine, United Kingdom, United StatesNewswire

Speaking before a meeting of the Russian Security Council on Wednesday, Putin declared:  aggression against Russia by any non-nuclear-weapon state, but with the participation or support of a nuclear-weapon state, should be considered as a joint attack on the Russian Federation.  He added, We reserve the right to use nuclear weapons in the event of aggression against Russia and Belarus.

This is the most blunt and concrete threat to date by Putin to use Russia’s nuclear arsenal, one of the two largest in the world, to respond to ongoing and ever expanding strikes by Ukraine, with the backing of the NATO powers, on Russian cities and infrastructure.   Earlier this month, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken visited Kiev, where he heavily implied that the US would move forward with the plan to allow Ukraine to use long-range NATO weapons against Russia.  . . .MORE

Ted Snider:  “The Damage Victoria Nuland Has Done.”  ACURA (Sept. 22, 2024).   Orig. pub. The American Conservative.
The State Department’s former top woman on Ukraine has strongly supported initiated and sustained the war.  Read in browser »

Anatol Lieven.  “Biden team blows off deadline for Ukraine war strategy.”   ACURA (Aug 07, 2024).  Perhaps the administration can’t admit it doesn’t have one.  Read in browser »
 

PODCAST.  Unintended Consequences.  “Ben Abelow: NATO, Russia and the Ukraine War.”  ACURA (Aug. 07, 2024).
As the Ukrainian war rumbles on is it time to examine whether NATO and the influence of America in Europe has contributed to the escalation in Eastern Europe? Benjamin Abelow joins Unintended Consequences to discuss his book How the West Brought War to Ukraine.

“Senior U.S. Diplomats, Journalists, Academics and Secretaries of Defense Say: the U.S. Provoked Russia in Ukraine” by Donald A. Smith, PhD.   (Forwarded to me by Sonny San Juan, one of my best forwarding sources.)   https://progressivememes.org/senior-US-diplomats-academics-journalists-and-secretaries-of-defense-say-the-US-provoked-Russia-in-Ukraine.html

It took some years for Americans to realize they’d been lied to about the war in Vietnam. Thanks to the publication of the Pentagon Papers, and thanks to the antiwar movement, Americans eventually learned about the injustices and failures of that war.

Likewise, it took several years after the starts of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan for Americans to realize they’d been lied to about those wars as well.

Americans are just now starting to realize that they’ve been lied to about the war in Ukraine. (The propaganda effort has been quite effective, with the New York Times, in particular, acting as a mouthpiece for the government’s position.) More and more mainstream publications are exposing the lies, and a majority of Americans now oppose further arming of Ukraine.

This essay is a summary of what the U.S. government has been hiding about the war in Ukraine, with links to sources for further information.

According to Brown University’s Costs of War project, U.S. military actions since 9/11 directly killed over 900,000 people,  with an additional 3.5 million people dying from indirect effects.  The wars cost Americans at least $8 trillion and displaced over 38 million people from their homes. The U.S. spends over a trillion dollars a year on its military, if you count all expenditures.

If we go back to the 1960s, the number killed by U.S. wars includes the several million killed in the Vietnam war, the approximately 1 million killed by U.S. support for Indonesian military’s attacks on left wing groups, and the hundreds of thousands, at least, killed in proxy wars and government overthrows in Latin America.

The wars, overthrows, and associated sanctions caused mass migrations worldwide — particularly in Europe and at the southern U.S. border — and destabilized politics. Yet almost nobody (except for whistleblowers) was held accountable for these disasters; indeed, many of the same people are in Congress or work for the government or the weapons industry.

Moreover, the U.S. government lied about almost all the wars — in particular, about the wars in Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan, but also about the war in Yugoslovia, as documented in Harper’s Magazine and here. (In short, the Kosovo Liberation Army that the U.S. supported was, basically, a terrorist organization funded by the CIA, an d U.S. propaganda greatly overstated the nobility of the U.S. intervention.)

So, it should come as no surprise that our government is lying now about the war in Ukraine. Specifically, claims by President Biden and others that the Russian invasion was “unprovoked” are greatly exaggerated.

Read what these diplomats, secretaries of Defense, journalists, academics, politicians, and others have to say:          Sat, Jun 15, 2024.  [28 scholars, politicians, et al. reject the US line regarding the origin of the war.  Following that is a summary of all the US lies and insincerities in response to Russian overtures for peace.   A major document in the history of peacemaking.      -D]  https://progressivememes.org/senior-US-diplomats-academics-journalists-and-secretaries-of-defense-say-the-US-provoked-Russia-in-Ukraine.html

(Note on San Juan.,  He is the highly regarded Filipino-US scholar.  In addition, beginning with a Ph.D. in British lit. with a book on Oscar Wilde, San Juan turned  to literary criticism, in which he was a chief critic of modernist criticism.  And all along he was a critic of US foreign policies, beginning with the atrocious US colonial repression of Filipino resistance. 

Jonathan McCormick.   “An Interview with Professor Nicolai N. Petro: On Ukraine’s prospects.”  ACURA (Jun 13, 2024). 
Fluent in both Russian and German from his youth, Dr. Petro served as Special Advisor for Policy in the Office of Soviet Union Affairs at the US State Department in the early 1990s, as dramatic and historic events were unfolding. Since that time he has written extensively on Russian foreign and domestic policy, and was […]
Read in browser »
https://standard.sk/680402/nicolai-petro-on-ukraines-prospects-if-something-happens-in-kiev-it-will-be-sudden-and-dramatic

[Wide-ranging discussion of the Istanbul Accords, the Budapest Memorandum, Ukrainian neutrality, the possibility of a coup, Germany’s negotiations at end of WWI,  negotiations between Zelensky and Putin, and more.  -Dick]

No country which is weaker and which borders a larger and stronger neighbour can survive if it makes an enemy of that neighbour. This has simply never happened in human history. The Americans and NATO obviously think only of their own security interests in relation to Russia, and Ukraine is only interesting to them as a tool to defeat it, says American professor Nicolai Petro.

As the situation in Ukraine gets steadily more desperate, with military experts now considering a possible collapse of Ukraine’s front line, some Western voices have begun to dismiss the conventional wisdom that negotiations must eventually take place between Moscow and Washington, calling instead for direct talks between Ukrainian and Russian leaders. One such voice is Nicolai Petro, Professor of Political Science at the University of Rhode Island and author of The Tragedy of Ukraine: What Classical Greek Tragedy Can Teach Us About Conflict Resolution. . . .

In what sense can the Istanbul accords be a starting point for negotiations, now that four oblasts, in addition to Crimea, have been annexed to Russia, and Russia is not likely ever to agree to give them back?
No, but Russia is still advancing within those four regions and looking to ‚liberate‘ them, as it sees it, to their administrative borders. When that happens, as seems likely, will Russia continue? And to what end? If I am right, that Russia invaded not in order to subjugate Ukraine but in order to force it to accept neutrality – to keep it from manoeuvring in ways that Russia considered threatening – then we’re essentially back to where the Istanbul accords left us: with the same deal on the table of security and neutrality for Ukraine in exchange for Russia not taking more territory, for not pushing further. It’s still the same exchange. So let’s assume for a moment one scenario, which is being more and more widely discussed. There’s a breakthrough on the front lines, the lines collapse, Ukraine has no defensive positions left. Russia can now either move forward – for example in the direction of major cities, Kharkiv, Kiev, Odessa – or not. Let’s assume Russia really doesn’t want to do that, because of the costs involved – in all senses. Then the option of not doing that becomes what they are offering – because they could obviously do it, given the collapse of Ukraine’s lines. And they say to Ukraine: we will in fact guarantee the security of your borders, in a multilateral guarantee with other parties agreeing to serve as guarantors, as they did in the 1990s with the Budapest Memorandum. And this then becomes part of the negotiations.

Right, the Budapest Memorandum, which involved Western countries as well. And you foresee this as a possibility as to how things might be settled, some sort of similar agreement for Ukraine’s security, guaranteed by Russia on one side and Western countries on the other?

Logic would dictate that if a country’s elite wants to survive, then in the face of military collapse it negotiates. It negotiates essentially a surrender. World War I ended without Germany being invaded, because the high command of the German staff said: Well, we lost the battle, we are now vulnerable, let’s cut a deal. Which is why they suffered at the settlement in Versailles, but not to the extent that the Austro-Hungarian and Ottoman Empires did, which were totally dismembered. And we know that the German high command basically posed an ultimatum to Kaiser Wilhelm II. They said we can’t fight anymore – there are no resources – so you need to abdicate, so that we can negotiate a ceasefire and surrender. So that would be the scenario presumably in Ukraine now. Again, not an unusual scenario – basically involving, as it did after World War I, a military coup replacing the political leadership at the time. . . . MORE

And is that feasible, given the fact that – as you mentioned when we talked last

Isn’t it more in Russia’s interest not to subsume Ukraine, but rather to keep it as a separate state that can serve as a buffer between Russia and NATO?

Well the interesting thing about that is that Ukraine is being offered a curious combination of security and economic prosperity: security by Russia agreeing to the current borders – guaranteed also by a number of other countries – and prosperity by membership in the EU.

Which Russia will not object to?

Will not object to, right. That was part of the Istanbul accords as well. It’s an interesting strategy, because what it ultimately does, oddly enough, is to reconstitute Ukraine in what I have been arguing for, for more than a decade. Actually sixteen years ago – in 2008, my first trip to Ukraine – I gave a talk at Kharkiv University, which was later published. And I said: Ukraine needs to be a bridge between Russia and the West. And by linking the essential security and economic interests of Russia and Europe in Ukraine, it effectively constitutes Ukraine as that bridge.

James W. Carden.  “Why Does American Folly March on in Ukraine?”  ACURA (Jun 13, 2024).
As the tide of the war has turned, perhaps permanently, in Russia’s favor (itself an entirely foreseeable development despite the wishful thinking that has characterized too much of what passes for informed analysis here in Washington), Ukraine’s Western sponsors find themselves scrambling to find a way to halt Russia’s momentum.   Read in browser »

What Future Might We Have and How?

 “Nuclear Age Peace Foundation: Ukraine War, The Third Year, featuring Grigory Yavlinsky.”    VIDEO.ACURA.  May 27, 2024.
The Nuclear Age Peace Foundation held a virtual event to discuss the third year of the Ukraine War and the nuclear dangers associated with this conflict. The event featured Professor Grigory Yavlinsky, a Russian economist and politician who ran for the Presidency of Russia three times. Yavlinsky was joined by ACURA President Katrina vanden Heuvel,  and Prof. Falk […]   They discuss what must be changed in present policies if the planet nuclear war is to be prevented.    Read in browser »      

“Ukrainian communist Dmitri Kovalevich: Ukraine has become a private mercenary company of NATO to fight against its opponents (Interview)” BY Saheli Chowdhury.  Mronline.org (5-21-24).

According to Dmitri Kovalevich, the United States controls all decisions in Ukraine, not only military but also economic. “It is not the Ukrainian [military] command that decides where to advance, what to undermine, what to shell; Ukrainian soldiers are acting on the advice of Western instructors,” he said, referring to the actions of the Ukrainian armed forces.

Originally published: Orinoco Tribune  on May 19, 2024 (more by Orinoco Tribune). Imperialism, State Repression, Strategy, WarAmericas, Europe, Russia, Ukraine, United StatesInterview, NewswireDmitri Kovalevich, North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), Russia-Ukraine War

 “Star CIA Analysts Are Out of Touch With Reality When it Comes to Russia” By Larry C. Johnson.CovertAction Magazine (Nov 26, 2022).
 They See Only the Bad Old Days of the Soviet Union

The CIA, thanks to Hollywood and fanboys, enjoys an undeserved reputation for competence in carrying out espionage and covert actions.

I am fascinated by the delusional punditry offered by former CIA officers, such as Douglas London and Steven Hall. Full disclosure, Hall was a young 20 something in my Career Trainee class (we entered on duty in September 1985). He is emblematic, in my opinion, of the problems that have plagued the CIA over the last thirty years–he was a legacy, i.e. got into the agency in part because his Daddy preceded him.

Steve, if you recall, was one of the liars who signed a letter declaring that Hunter Biden’s laptop had all the earmarks of Russian disinformation. Attaching himself to such a libelous letter (he was impugning the character of John Paul Mac Isaac) highlights his tendency to follow the herd and eschew critical thinking.

But I want to focus on Douglas London. He is popping up all over media, especially CNN and the Wall Street Journal, and offering analysis that ranges from the banal to the delusional.

Consider this snippet, published in the Wall Street Journal, in March:

“I spent 34 years in the Central Intelligence Agency’s clandestine service, and watching Vladimir Putin’s brutal war in Ukraine from the sidelines fills me with both sadness and a sense of opportunity. Espionage is a predatory business, and there’s blood in the water. Mr. Putin’s self-inflicted damage has done more to turn his own people against him than anything the West could have done. . . .

Russian mystique is gone. Mr. Putin has proved his country is the declining power that the best-informed Russia watchers claimed it was. Fewer pundits will wax poetic over Mr. Putin’s cunning and strategic brilliance. He might have been a capable operations officer during his KGB career, but he clearly missed the classes on self-awareness and counterintelligence. The more he tightens the security screws and covers Russia’s window to the world, the more likely those he depends on will turn against him.”

Got that? Russia, whose economy is clicking along nicely in contrast to the implosion underway in Europe, is a declining power in Mr. London’s fanciful world. Since the start of the Special Military Operation last February, Putin has frustrated Western attempts to paint him as Hitler reincarnated and has forged closer ties with China, India, Saudi Arabia and Brazil. […]     Read in browser »

Media Obscures Key Reason For Russian Retreat From Kherson; Namely to Prevent the Destruction of the Nova Kakhovka Dam

By Sonja Van den Ende.  CovertAction Magazine. Nov 21, 2022.
 

Predictions of imminent collapse of Russian army are fanciful

The Western media have widely celebrated the retreat of Russian forces from the city of Kherson, presenting the Ukrainians as liberators of the city and the Russian retreat as an example of the weakness of the Russian army and its impending collapse.  However, the same media have a track record of biased and misleading coverage of the Ukraine war that leads one to question its veracity in all aspects of its reporting.  With regards to Kherson, the media have failed to acknowledge that the Russian retreat was a calculated one designed in part to save the Nova Kakhovka dam, which the Ukrainians had threatened to blow up in an act of state terrorism.

The Khakovka dam has an associated lock and power station with an installed capacity of 357 megawatts. The water from its reservoir cools the 5.7 gigawatt Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant, the largest nuclear power plant in Europe, and flows through the North Crimean Canal to irrigate large areas of southern Ukraine and northern Crimea.

If the Ukrainians had attacked the Khakovka dam, it would mean that Crimea would run out of water and it could lead to a nuclear fall out, which Russia had warned about for weeks. . . .MORE

Risks of Opposing Warmongering

Aidan Jonah.   “Canadian Professor attacked by mainstream media for opposing NATO narrative on Ukraine.”   Editor.  Mronline.org (11-10-22).

A highly regarded Russia specialist in Canada, Professor Michael Carley at the University of Montreal, has refused to support the NATO narrative on the Ukraine conflict and has since been subjected to a vicious smear campaign.
Originally published: Internationalist 360°  on November 6, 2022 by (more by Internationalist 360°) (Posted Nov 09, 2022)

Human Rights, Media, Strategy, WarAmericas, Canada, Europe, Russia, UkraineNewswireNorth Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), Russia-Ukraine War

CONTENTS UKRAINE WAR ANTHOLOGY #33 (19)
Peace Talks
Abel Tomlinson.   Two Messages on Peace Conference.
Global South v. West.
Ben Norton.  Ukraine War Unpopular in US.
Sachs.  “Putin Offers Diplomacy.”
ACURA.  Poll: “Putin Wants Ukraine Ceasefire.”
“A Green Deal for Post-war Ukraine.”

Prashad.  China’s 12-Point Peace Plan.
Kevin.  China’s Peace Plan.
Quaker Peace Statement.
Fulbright’s Exchange and Bumper’s Peace Links.

Causes of and Continuation of the War
Benjamin Abelow.  How the West Brought War to Ukraine.
Kit Klarenberg.   “Civil War in Donbass 10 Years On.”

Russophobia
ACURA.  William Drew.  “The Hoover Institution Declares War on Russia.”
Rubenstein.  US Weapons to Azov Battalion.
Associated Press.  “New #225 Million…to Ukraine.”
Dave DeCamp.  “Speaker Johnson Thinks Ukraine Should Use US Weapons on Russian Territory.”

The War: Military History, Strategies, Tactics, Failures, Victories
Big Serge.  “Russo-Ukraine War: Widening the Front….”
Nikolai Petro.  “Ukraine’s Draft Woes….”
Dick Bennett.  Jacques Baud.  (Book).  Operation Z.  Analyzing Propaganda.

END UKRAINE WAR ANTHOLOGY #34