Ukraine

[french frank]

I follow Ros Atkins' BBC reports and they are admirably clear and cogent. One thing that I hadn't connected (obvious though it may be ) until now is that Putin's 'de-Nazification' claims about Ukraine are leading up to Russia's May 9 celebrations about Russia's undoubted 'Victory over the Nazis' in World War 2. Russia is 'a bastion against Nazis and fascism' is the message which is a further reminder of the Orwell 1984 quotes I mentioned in another thread.

In the interests of balance, this is the criticism of the BBC/Atkins for 'whitewashing Nazism'. Take your choice.

And again, al Mayadeen is said to be pro-Syrian government, ergo pro Putin?

[Dave2002]

I follow Ros Atkins' BBC reports and they are admirably clear and cogent. One thing that I hadn't connected (obvious though it may be ) until now is that Putin's 'de-Nazification' claims about Ukraine are leading up to Russia's May 9 celebrations about Russia's undoubted 'Victory over the Nazis' in World War 2. Russia is 'a bastion against Nazis and fascism' is the message which is a further reminder of the Orwell 1984 quotes I mentioned in another thread.

At least there are only a few days left before May 9th. Russia did suffer badly in WWI, and the Russian military sustained heavy losses. They also fought vigorously against the Germans. Many Ukrainians also suffered under the Nazi invaders, and it seems likely that many Ukrainians fought alongside Russians against the Germans.

The situation now seems to me to be completely different from WWII. Now it is the Russians who are the aggressors.

Regarding news reporting - it's probably wise not to place too much reliance on any news items in the short term. Some sources and distribution outlets may be more reliable, but there are many reasons why we may not be getting the full picture.

[french frank]

Regarding news reporting - it's probably wise not to place too much reliance on any news items in the short term. Some sources and distribution outlets may be more reliable, but there are many reasons why we may not be getting the full picture.

Absollutely right. It's a cultural influence that leads me to accept what the BBC says (just as for others it's a political influence which leads them to mistrust!); but comparing the Ros Atkins piece with the newspaper article 'demolishing' it, Atkins has facts and figures: the Ukrainian armed forces number 250,000 of which the Azov battalion comprises 1,000 of whom by no means all (possibly very few now) are ideological Nazis. What other evidence is there - at all - of Nazis in Ukraine? We're not told.

I suspect the idea connects with the narrative of 'Russians' - Russian speakers - being persecuted in Donbas also feeds that narrative. Where is the evidence that the Ukrainian people have been 'taken hostage' by Nazis? Where are the grateful Ukrainians greeting the Russian liberators with flowers? Where there seems a total illogicality in the Putin version is that a Russia which is a non-aggressor is no threat to any part of the west, so why would the west want to attack it? On the contrary, it has every reason to build bridges with Russia - not least because of the hitherto reliance on Russian gas &c.

And all that said, of course Russia has something to be immensely proud of in its history on its 'Victory Day'.

[Dave2002]

Seems that hackers managed to corrupt Russian TV yesterday, and change the messages and the names of all the TV programmes. Also another media outlet managed to put up a lot of anti-regime headlines - with links to more detailed articles.

Of course this might not be true - may not have happened. So Russia's Victory Day didn't quite go as planned - allegedly.

[Mario]

Oh, if only this proves to be true.

Mario

[french frank]

So Russia's Victory Day didn't quite go as planned - allegedly.

If he'd been hoping it would coincide with a successful conclusion to the 'special military operation', it certainly didn't go as planned.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/may/09/russian-journalists-pro-kremlin-site-lenta-anti-war-articles

[richardfinegold]

Absollutely right. It's a cultural influence that leads me to accept what the BBC says (just as for others it's a political influence which leads them to mistrust!); but comparing the Ros Atkins piece with the newspaper article 'demolishing' it, Atkins has facts and figures: the Ukrainian armed forces number 250,000 of which the Azov battalion comprises 1,000 of whom by no means all (possibly very few now) are ideological Nazis. What other evidence is there - at all - of Nazis in Ukraine? We're not told.

I suspect the idea connects with the narrative of 'Russians' - Russian speakers - being persecuted in Donbas also feeds that narrative. Where is the evidence that the Ukrainian people have been 'taken hostage' by Nazis? Where are the grateful Ukrainians greeting the Russian liberators with flowers? Where there seems a total illogicality in the Putin version is that a Russia which is a non-aggressor is no threat to any part of the west, so why would the west want to attack it? On the contrary, it has every reason to build bridges with Russia - not least because of the hitherto reliance on Russian gas &c.

And all that said, of course Russia has something to be immensely proud of in its history on its 'Victory Day'.

Do we have accurate estimates of how many people were killed by Paramilitarys on both sides in the contested regions since 2014? The article cited vaguely alludes to atrocities committed by the likes of the Azov Battalion.
While my sympathies are with the Ukrainians in this conflict, I do think there has been a one sided reportage in the West. The presence of a Jewish Leader in Ukraine is a fantastic propaganda coup—how could their be Fascism in Ukraine if they have one?—but I read an article in the New York Review of books on the eve of the War that cited ubiquitous graffiti extolling Bandera. The Azov Battalion isn’t the only Anti Semitic, anti Islamic group operating there.
I would like to think that things have changed there, but I quite literally owe my existence to Ukrainian Anti Semitism. My grandparents fled pogroms in Ukraine as teenagers and then met in the States. Both my Parents acted as translators for their parents when they were small children. The rest of my extended family disappeared in places like Babi Yar. The legacy of pogroms goes back at least 500 years. Currently all Ukrainians are united against the common enemy, and Putin’s claims of Fascism dominating the present Government are clearly absurd. However, the Fascists are still there, however inconvenient their existence may be for the current cause

[french frank]

However, the Fascists are still there, however inconvenient their existence may be for the current cause

The Fascists are in the US, the Fascists are in the UK, the Fascists are in Russia, Germany, France, Italy … The question is: 'How far are they instruments of state policy?' And as for the the Azov Battalion itself, are they Fascists or do they simply have Fascists among them? Even if the Battalion were Fascist through and through, and persecuting ethnic Russians, that in itself would not legalise a Russian invasion, bombing and shelling Ukrainian cities. Can one agree to use that as a starting point in deciding who to believe?

[Serial_Apologist]

The Fascists are in the US, the Fascists are in the UK, the Fascists are in Russia, Germany, France, Italy … The question is: 'How far are they instruments of state policy?' And as for the the Azov Battalion itself, are they Fascists or do they simply have Fascists among them? Even if the Battalion were Fascist through and through, and persecuting ethnic Russians, that in itself would not legalise a Russian invasion, bombing and shelling Ukrainian cities. Can one agree to use that as a starting point in deciding who to believe?

In the end it is sovereign national self-determination that is the bottom line where invasions are involved, except in the rarest instances, eg Cambodia, where by invading, the Viet Cong halted the mass extermination in Cambia being perpetrated under Pol Pot, or where the invaded country was itself the initial aggressor or invader.

Lately I've been disturbed to come across a permissive attitude on the part of certain left-wing websites towards admitting propaganda supportive (to whatever degree) of Putin, on the grounds that Nato's past double standards should render its and its supporters' pronouncements on Ukraine comprehensively unacceptable today. If it were that black and white our job would be so much easier! Whenever I am demanded to produce "evidence" for criticising I'm afraid I really have little time for followers who appear to accept willy-nilly the lines being fed them on such grounds, and tell them to stop being credulous and do their own research.

[french frank]

on the grounds that Nato's past double standards should render its and its supporters' pronouncements on Ukraine comprehensively unacceptable today

There are two points (actually, probably more, but I'm struck by two points). Yes, there is a legal argument about Nato's "double standards" though even there cases are hardly one-sided cut-and-dried. What strikes me (currently reading as I am about the successive editions of the Dictionary of Newspeak ), I would say that even the widely used expression 'Nato expansion' is weaselly. It gives the impression that the momentum comes from the west pushing eastwards when in reality the movement is of the eastern bloc towards the west. It obviously suits Russia to denounce this as 'Nato expansion'. But that's because they don't like the idea to be accepted that this on the contrary is a 'flight from Russia'. If Russia has a right to protect its own security, so do other countries have a right to protect theirs. All that Russia actually "fears" from Nato is its interference in Russian imperialist ambitions.

Meanwhile, Putin's declaration that 'There is no such nation as Ukraine", that Ukrainism (=Nazism, presumably) must be wiped out has a very sinister stench to it.

[Serial_Apologist]

There are two points (actually, probably more, but I'm struck by two points). Yes, there is a legal argument about Nato's "double standards" though even there cases are hardly one-sided cut-and-dried. What strikes me (currently reading as I am about the successive editions of the Dictionary of Newspeak ), I would say that even the widely used expression 'Nato expansion' is weaselly. It gives the impression that the momentum comes from the west pushing eastwards when in reality the movement is of the eastern bloc towards the west. It obviously suits Russia to denounce this as 'Nato expansion'. But that's because they don't like the idea to be accepted that this on the contrary is a 'flight from Russia'. If Russia has a right to protect its own security, so do other countries have a right to protect theirs. All that Russia actually "fears" from Nato is its interference in Russian imperialist ambitions.

Meanwhile, Putin's declaration that 'There is no such nation as Ukraine", that Ukrainism (=Nazism, presumably) must be wiped out has a very sinister stench to it.

We might consider using the term "greater Russianism" for Putin and his chums' ambitions, for the want of figuring them out. The idea let alone aim of wiping out a neighbouring country with a population of tens of millions is clearly that of someone thinking against self-interest, who must be deranged. My guessing is that there is something sentimental in the tacit support for Putin found among certain sectors of the left in the West: here was a country that had removed itself and its huge land mass from the capitalist nexus of exploitation, ("hooray!") gone through Stalinism as a consequence of isolation, managed to vanquish Hitler Nazism, purloin the West's nuclear know-how and beat it in the space race, and had finally, maybe, found its place back in civilisation with the arrival of Gorbachev - only to see its hinterland dismembered and sold off to the lowest bidders, ignominious and ignored as the West failed to face up to its own consequences - fundamentalism and climate change. As is the case with all cults - Nazism and Putinism are two - to cement a new mythologically-based unity transcendent of class they needed to posit external threats of their own, and nurture apologists abroad.

[RichardB]

even the widely used expression 'Nato expansion' is weaselly. It gives the impression that the momentum comes from the west pushing eastwards when in reality the movement is of the eastern bloc towards the west.

I guess that depends on what you mean by "movement". The West-East movement is of the apparatus of a military alliance dominated by the USA. The East-West movement is of capital. Basically it's a protection racket.

[Frances_iom]

Stalin was also imperialist - don't forget under agreement with Hitler Germany + USSR partitioned Poland between themselves, also invaded Finland, Stalin then murdered the Polish Intelligentsia - hushed up by Churchill as he needed Russia to fight the Nazis on the Eastern front (so as to reduce pressure in the West) and didn't want public opinion to turn against Stalin, and was willing to supply arms via the Arctic convoys that killed many naval + merchant marine forces. The main ability of left leaning socialists seems to me to be an innate inability to distinguish deeds from mere cant.

[RichardB]

Stalin was also imperialist

I don't see anyone defending Stalin, do you?

[french frank]

I guess that depends on what you mean by "movement". The West-East movement is of the apparatus of a military alliance dominated by the USA. The East-West movement is of capital. Basically it's a protection racket.

Let's be clearer then. Nato is not pushing the former eastern bloc countries to join. They want to join as a protection from possible Russian aggression. As far as the Ukraine conflict is concerned, you either think the west/Nato is to blame for provoking Russia. Or you think Russia is to blame. Take your choice.