Russian Tensions
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“The Russian workers and the Ukrainian workers have far more in common with each other than ever have with their respective ruling classes. They should tell their respective ruling classes urging them to fight in a capitalist squabble over Ukraine’s economic resources to go f**k themselves.”
Except that’s not what the war is about. If one doesn’t understand the causes of the conflict, as you clearly don’t, how does one hope to resolve it?
Russia didn’t want this war. The Kremlin did everything possible to avoid it. You have no idea what you’re talking about.
November 4, 2022 at 2:53 pm #235645 REPLY
Thomas_More
Participant
And Russia’s workers could have sabotaged the invasion by following Rosa Luxemburg’s advice to workers in wartime: a mass industrial strike, stopping the war machine in its tracks.Unfortunately, patriotism stops the workers from realising how much power they have to stop war and save lives.
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Leftwingers and Leninists they only cite Rosa Luxembourg when it is convenient for them, they are not anti war, they are warmongers like the right wingers, and they are nationalists like the right wingers“Except that’s not what the war is about. If one doesn’t understand the causes of the conflict, as you clearly don’t, how does one hope to resolve it?
Russia didn’t want this war. The Kremlin did everything possible to avoid it. You have no idea what you’re talking about.”
____________________________________________________On the contrary, you don’t know what you are talking about. You are confusing the pretext for war for the cause which is basically economic in nature. This is the Marxian explanation for war which you oppose in favour of your own idealist explanation which is painfully inadequate. For example, the BS argument advanced by the Kremlin of wanting to “denazify” Ukraine rings particularly hollow when there is precious little to choose between these two right-wing, deeply authoritarian, and corrupt capitalist regimes.
Of course, any capitalist regime would prefer not to go to war with some other capitalist regime if they can get what they want by other means. Wars are costly and destructive but sometimes, when other means have exhausted themselves, war comes to be seen as the only option available
So, all German workers that were Nazis they deserve to be killed . I do not see any difference between Fascism and anti Fascism
I call Donbass “your” link since you refuse to accept any source other than pro-Russian or anti-West. Your rejection of Amnesty International is an example. (Strange when it it agrees with some as in its condemnation of Israel as an apartheid state it is an acceptable source)
OSCE reported that they had free access to inspect the Ukrainian side but were stopped from examining the separatist lines. Who was hiding what?
Your claim is that 125,000 Ukrainian troops were ready to invade. Donbas Insider reports military hardware preparations of an offensive but no mention of troops build-up. A strange omission.
Your claim is that the invasion was a preemptive strike to thwart an imminent intended Ukrainian invasion of separatist positions.
I question that premise. You accept it
But neither you nor I are privy to either side’s intelligence reports. As in all wars, one side blames the other side of starting it. There was an increase in artillery exchanges immediately prior to Russia’s invasion. You suggest it was a softening up preliminary to invasion. Others say it was an attempt by the separatists to provoke Ukraine and create the pretext for Russian intervention.
As you have not challenged the credentials of OSCE, perhaps this statement should be noted
OSCE Secretary General Helga Schmid the Secretary General condemned, in the strongest terms, the Russian military action against Ukraine. “It did not need to be this way. But Russia chose force over dialogue. Dialogue was offered.”I have already conceded that the SPGB accepts that the mediation for peace was genuine on all parts of the Western nation such as the UK’s bellicose pose.
The claim that Ukraine intended genocide against Russian-speakers is also unfounded. The casualty rate of civilians long before the evacuation you cite demonstrates the non-existence of such a policy. The evacuation of civilians had not been anywhere near completed, and many remained if Ukraine chose to deliberately target them.
But let us move on to the other justification of the invasion by Russia. The de-Nazification.
I asked you to identify who those nazis are and to detail their strength.
TM asked for you to define what a nazi means to Russia in the context of this war.
I appreciate as the sole pro-Russian advocate on the forum, you suffer the responsibility to answer your critics.
We all know that war creates strange bed-fellow. “My enemy’s enemy becomes my friend”.
Banderite followers have re-surfaced in Ukraine. The Azov battalion rightly has been recognised as possessing neo-nazi roots.
But what about the DPR’s Sparta battalion? What about the Russian Imperial Movement? A commander in the Somalia militia wore SS insignia.
There are many more militias that are extreme right-wing that many would call neo-nazi or neo-fascist
And they formed the government Of DPR. Pavel Gubarev. Alexander Zakharchenko. Igor Girkin.
And what about the foreign cheer-leaders?
Polish neo-fascist group “Falanga”, Italian far-right group “Millennium”, America’s Atomwaffen Division and Germany’s Der Dritte Weg, Finland’s neo-nazi Power Belongs to the People.
In all wars both sides seek to differentiate between the “goodies” and the “baddies”
The SPGB says a plague on both.
“I call Donbass “your” link since you refuse to accept any source other than pro-Russian or anti-West.”
A: that still doesn’t make it “my” source as it was yours and B: that’s simply not true.
“Your rejection of Amnesty International is an example. (Strange when it it agrees with some as in its condemnation of Israel as an apartheid state it is an acceptable source)”
I don’t know who you’re talking about but I don’t think it reliable under any circumstances. It is too compromised.
“OSCE reported that they had free access to inspect the Ukrainian side but were stopped from examining the separatist lines. Who was hiding what?”
Perhaps because in the past the OSCE has been caught spying for Ukraine.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-ukraine-crisis-russia-spy-idUSKCN0ZY27V
“Your claim is that 125,000 Ukrainian troops were ready to invade. Donbas Insider reports military hardware preparations of an offensive but no mention of troops build-up. A strange omission.”
And yet you stated that the publication had made no mention of a build-up of Ukrainian troops on the border. Now you agree it did. I’ll take that as an admission that you were in error.
“Your claim is that the invasion was a preemptive strike to thwart an imminent intended Ukrainian invasion of separatist positions.”
Correct.
“I question that premise. You accept it”
You do, despite the overwhelming evidence in support of my conclusion.
“But neither you nor I are privy to either side’s intelligence reports. As in all wars, one side blames the other side of starting it.”
You miss the fact that Kiev had already started the war 8 years earlier. Kind of a big oversight.
“There was an increase in artillery exchanges immediately prior to Russia’s invasion. You suggest it was a softening up preliminary to invasion. Others say it was an attempt by the separatists to provoke Ukraine and create the pretext for Russian intervention.”
Lol, the OSCE reported that the shells were overwhelmingly fired from the Ukrainian side.
“As you have not challenged the credentials of OSCE, perhaps this statement should be noted
OSCE Secretary General Helga Schmid the Secretary General condemned, in the strongest terms, the Russian military action against Ukraine. “It did not need to be this way. But Russia chose force over dialogue. Dialogue was offered.””He’s entitled to his opinion however wrong-headed it is.
“I have already conceded that the SPGB accepts that the mediation for peace was genuine on all parts of the Western nation such as the UK’s bellicose pose.”
You mean “not” genuine?
“The claim that Ukraine intended genocide against Russian-speakers is also unfounded.”
Ethnic cleansing is considered an act of genocide, no? That is what the Ukrainians had planned.
https://tass.com/defense/1418033
“The casualty rate of civilians long before the evacuation you cite demonstrates the non-existence of such a policy.”
Rubbish. The ethnic cleansing could not proceed because it was being resisted militarily.
“The evacuation of civilians had not been anywhere near completed, and many remained if Ukraine chose to deliberately target them.”
Ukraine was and to this very moment is deliberately shelling civilians. Watch a few Patrick Lancaster YouTube videos. He documents the ongoing slaughter of civilians by the coup regime on a daily basis.
“But let us move on to the other justification of the invasion by Russia. The de-Nazification.”
“I asked you to identify who those nazis are and to detail their strength.”
I linked to an article way back documenting the coup in Ukraine and the positions the far-right fascists took in the new government, specifically in the police/security forces, intelligence and education. The Ukrainian military included some 100,000 far right militiamen at the beginning of the conflict.
“TM asked for you to define what a nazi means to Russia in the context of this war.”
Extreme right nationalists who venerate Adolf Hitler or his collaborator Stepan Bandera and wish to lead the white race against their assorted imaginary foes.
“TM asked for you to define what a nazi means to Russia in the context of this war.”
Extreme right nationalists who venerate Adolf Hitler or his collaborator Stepan Bandera and wish to lead the white race against their assorted imaginary foes.
________________________________________________________________There are plenty of extreme right-wing nationalists in Russia too – and racists! They might not call themselves specifically Nazis – as you pointed out, it is forbidden to form a Nazi Party in Russia – but what’s in a name? Is there anything that rules out a de facto Nazi – that is someone sharing the same ideological traits as an “official nazi” – opposing said official nazi? Nothing that I can see. After all, a Russian nazi or neo nazi being an extreme right-wing nationalist would naturally be opposed to Hitler as a figurehead given that the German army invaded Russia and yet share more or less the same ideological outlook as the German Nazis but be dressed up under a different name.
In fact, your whole argument is very weak and unsupported. I make the point again – there is very little to choose between the authoritarian right-wing capitalist regime of Ukraine and the authoritarian right-wing capitalist regime of Russia. They are cut from the same cloth.
Furthermore, you have failed to identify the true extent of those in Ukraine in a) the government b) the army and c) the population at large who self-identify as Nazis according to YOUR OWN definition of Nazi – namely “Extreme right nationalists who venerate Adolf Hitler or his collaborator Stepan Bandera and wish to lead the white race against their assorted imaginary foes.”
I suspect the proportions would be relatively low in each case. I don’t think interest in figures like Stepan Bandera necessarily translates into identification with Hitler and the Nazis. It is not as simple as that. Bandera was a Ukrainian nationalist and it could well be this and not so much the fact he was a fascist that fuels this nostalgic interest in him in Ukraine. As this article points out:
“Bandera was in occupied Poland when on June 30, 1941, his comrades proclaimed an independent Ukrainian state in Nazi-occupied Lviv — and the Germans banned him from traveling to Ukraine. Adolf Hitler rejected the idea of Ukrainian independence, and Bandera was arrested and imprisoned in Sachsenhausen concentration camp until 1944.”
(https://www.dw.com/en/stepan-bandera-ukrainian-hero-or-nazi-collaborator/a-61842720)
I agree with Wez here about Freud. I think it is a shortcoming in socialists to ignore and not face the multiplicity of factors that prevent most of the working class from becoming aware.
“There are plenty of extreme right-wing nationalists in Russia too – and racists! They might not call themselves specifically Nazis – as you pointed out, it is forbidden to form a Nazi Party in Russia – but what’s in a name? Is there anything that rules out a de facto Nazi – that is someone sharing the same ideological traits as an “official nazi” – opposing said official nazi? Nothing that I can see. After all, a Russian nazi or neo nazi being an extreme right-wing nationalist would naturally be opposed to Hitler as a figurehead given that the German army invaded Russia and yet share more or less the same ideological outlook as the German Nazis but be dressed up under a different name.”
Yes,there are neo-Nazis in every country but in only one are they officially incorporated into the state’s miltary. That would be Ukraine. Ukraine officially venerates and holds as father of the nation a holocaust perpetrator and Nazi-collaborator, Stepan Bandera. Fascists hold key posts in the Ukrainian government, military and police forces. To suggest Russian neo-Nazis enjoy anything like their prominence in Ukraine is laughable.
“In fact, your whole argument is very weak and unsupported”
Rubbish. All my claims are evidence based.
“I make the point again – there is very little to choose between the authoritarian right-wing capitalist regime of Ukraine and the authoritarian right-wing capitalist regime of Russia. They are cut from the same cloth.”
No, they are not. You
See no distinction between any states on earth.“Furthermore, you have failed to identify the true extent of those in Ukraine in a) the government b) the army and c) the population at large who self-identify as Nazis according to YOUR OWN definition of Nazi – namely “Extreme right nationalists who venerate Adolf Hitler or his collaborator Stepan Bandera and wish to lead the white race against their assorted imaginary foes.””
I just did that very thing in my last post. Lol
“I suspect the proportions would be relatively low in each case.”
It’s not the numbers that are important but the control they have over society and their ability to implement their will. Both
Of which they have far in excess of their numbers.“I don’t think interest in figures like Stepan Bandera necessarily translates into identification with Hitler and the Nazis. It is not as simple as that. Bandera was a Ukrainian nationalist and it could well be this and not so much the fact he was a fascist that fuels this nostalgic interest in him in Ukraine. As this article points out:
“Bandera was in occupied Poland when on June 30, 1941, his comrades proclaimed an independent Ukrainian state in Nazi-occupied Lviv — and the Germans banned him from traveling to Ukraine. Adolf Hitler rejected the idea of Ukrainian independence, and Bandera was arrested and imprisoned in Sachsenhausen concentration camp until 1944.””
Lol. Now you’re an apologist for fascists. Love your work! He was briefly imprisoned by the Nazis who then released him.
“the OSCE reported that the shells were overwhelmingly fired from the Ukrainian side.”
Please refer me to your source on who began the firing?
“for peace was genuine on all parts of the Western nation such as the UK’s bellicose pose.” You mean “not” genuine?” My typo
“Ethnic cleansing is considered an act of genocide, no? That is what the Ukrainians had planned.”
Please provide evidence of the ethnic cleansing. Many more re-located to Russia voluntarily in the years from 2014 onwards. Not because of the threat of ethnic cleaning
I have watched some of Lancaster’s videos. Nothing definitive can be claimed in them other than his own interpretation. Would his presence have been permitted if his reporting was anti-separatist?
https://www.vice.com/en/article/wxneb4/ukraine-patrick-lancaster-journalist
Some hard facts
The 1991 independence referendum
Crimea: 54,.2% but an exceedingly low turn-out of 37% so it is questionable if Crimeans supported independence. Not so the other turn-out, about the same as any fair election.
Luhansk: 83.9%
Donetsk: 83.9%
People’s opinions can change and perhaps the later violence would bring a different result.But from all other polls conducted in DPR and LPR the favoured constitutional change was not secession but federalism.
Obliged to read the history of events due to our exchanges, I can only reach the same conclusion as I always had…nationalism is toxic and poisoned the minds of working people. The best thing for an ordinary person to do is to leave the country and the breakaway republics. In my youth I met a number of Northern Irish who felt the same way.
“in only one are they officially incorporated into the state’s military.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sparta_Battalion
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rusich_Group
A bit more politically bias website
Stepan Bandera’s Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists when Ukraine declared its independence in 1992, reorganized itself as the political party Congress of Ukrainian Nationalists (KUN).
In the 2014 parliamentary election it got less than 9,000 votes, or 0.05% of the 16 million cast.
In the 2020 local elections, it got 0.03% of seats.In most elections, it has run as part of a bloc with other right-wing parties under the Svoboda party’s umbrella, which only got 2.15% in the 2019 parliamentary election (not enough for official party status), and 1.62% for their candidate in the 2019 presidential election (ninth place).
Standard propaganda – demonize the enemy. Romanticise the past
Anarchists have also been appalled by Ukrainian nationalists claiming Mahkno as one of their own
https://www.anarchistfederation.net/nestor-makhno-and-the-ukrainian-revolution/
“Please refer me to your source on who began the firing?”
“Artillery rounds landed on both sides of the line of control but the vast majority of them exploded on the Donbas side. The same can be said for the impacts north-east of Luhansk.”
https://www.moonofalabama.org/2022/02/ukraine-who-is-firing-at-whom-and-who-is-lying-about-it.html
“Ethnic cleansing is considered an act of genocide, no? That is what the Ukrainians had planned.”
“Please provide evidence of the ethnic cleansing.”
You’ll notice I’ve written “had planned”. The Russian intervention scuttled said plans.
“I have watched some of Lancaster’s videos. Nothing definitive can be claimed in them other than his own interpretation.”
He is a journalist on the ground reporting and filming Ukrainian atrocities. I don’t know what more you expect of him.
“Would his presence have been permitted if his reporting was anti-separatist?”
Ukraine certainly has restrictions on journalists in Donbass. I don’t know that Russia does. Do you have evidence to the contrary?
https://www.vice.com/en/article/wxneb4/ukraine-patrick-lancaster-journalist
“Some hard facts
The 1991 independence referendum
Crimea: 54,.2% but an exceedingly low turn-out of 37% so it is questionable if Crimeans supported independence. Not so the other turn-out, about the same as any fair election.
Luhansk: 83.9%
Donetsk: 83.9%
People’s opinions can change and perhaps the later violence would bring a different result.”“Per the English meaning of the word Invasion, there literally and truthfully was no invasion of Crimea by Russia.
As for whether the Crimean people wanted to be part of Russia: As shown below, there is hardly a more verified fact in modern history than that the Crimean people always wanted to leave Ukraine and rejoin Russia.
Because Crimea had desperately tried to leave Ukraine and reunify with Russia, and because everybody knew that Crimea wanted to return to Russia, Crimea was regularly surveyed by pollsters and the UN itself concerning the matter. And all the surveys taken always showed the same thing: That Crimea wanted to leave Ukraine and rejoin Russia.
Crimea was a part of Russia, but was then given to Ukraine as a gift by a Ukrainian leader of the USSR. The giving of Crimea to Ukraine was illegal and invalid under Soviet law. So, Crimea was never lawfully a part of Ukraine.
The Crimean people, who were predominantly Russian, also never wanted to be part of Ukraine, and had tried for decades to leave Ukraine and rejoin Russia. But their efforts were repeatedly, illegitimately, and forcefully obstructed by the government in Ukraine. And the Ukrainian government’s efforts obstructing Crimea’s reunification with Russia were illegal under Ukrainian and international law.
Here is the comprehensive chronology of surveys of Crimea concerning the matter of whether they wanted to leave Ukraine and reunify with Russia. Also included is the history of surveys of Crimea following their 2014 accession to Russia, showing how satisfied and happy the Crimean people are over being reunified with Russia:
1991 – 94.3% of Crimeans vote to leave Ukraine and join the USSR as a republic. The USSR dissolves later that year and Crimea is unable to follow through on re-identifying as its own republic of the USSR, separate from Ukraine. Crimea isn’t self-sufficient, and Russia is bankrupt and unable to support Crimea, and so Crimea reluctantly settles for autonomous status within Ukraine — but immediately begins what will be its repeated attempts to leave Ukraine and rejoin Russia.
1992 – May 5: Crimea’s parliament declares Crimea to be independent, with an independence date set for August 2. The same day, Crimea’s parliament votes in favour of a new constitution which identifies Crimea as an independent state. May 6: Crimea’s parliament amends the new constitution to say that Crimea is a part of Ukraine. The independence referendum date is still in place. May 15: Ukraine’s parliament unilaterally annuls Crimea’s declaration of independence and orders Crimea to cancel the planned independence referendum.
1994 – January: Crimeans vote into power a Crimean government that is a pro secession from Ukraine and pro accession to Russia. May: Crimea’s parliament votes 94.5% in favour of restoring the 1992 Crimean constitution which declared Crimea independent from Ukraine. Kiev forcefully intervenes and orders the dissolution of the government.
1995 – Kiev takes away Crimea’s constitution in a unilateral measure to prevent Crimea from organizing referendums. This move by Kiev is a violation of Ukraine’s legal obligations and Crimea’s rights as stated in Article 1.1 and 1.3 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights treaty, which Ukraine is signatory to.
1997 – Crimea’s parliament votes 54 to 1 in favour of censuring a regional government installed by Kiev.
2008 – Kiev, Ukraine think-tank, Razumkov Centre, conducts a poll of Crimea and finds that 63.8% of Crimeans (76% of Russians, 55% of Ukrainians, and 14% of Crimean Tatars, respectively) would like Crimea to secede from Ukraine and join Russia.
2009 – 2011 – The United Nations Development Programme polls Crimea regularly on the question of whether Crimea would like to leave Ukraine and join Russia. And every time the result shows that, yes, Crimea would like to leave Ukraine and join Russia.”
The article continues but you get the idea.
“But from all other polls conducted in DPR and LPR the favoured constitutional change was not secession but federalism.”
Well, that isn’t the case anymore.
“Obliged to read the history of events due to our exchanges, I can only reach the same conclusion as I always had…nationalism is toxic and poisoned the minds of working people.”
Yes, Ukrainian nationalism has done that.
“The best thing for an ordinary person to do is to leave the country and the breakaway republics. In my youth I met a number of Northern Irish who felt the same way.”
And how is that possibly the best thing? To leave your life behind because Nazis want to take everything you have. Get out of here.
The so-called Nazis in the USA they do not have money to pay their rent, and some had to use public defenders to represent them in court, and most of them did not have any professional education, and most of them are not members of the USA ruling class
Fascism/Nazism in Italy and Germany was a capitalist movement and the leaders represented the capitalist class of both countries, and they influenced the minds of poor workers of both countries, as any other bourgeoise class has done for more than 3 centuries
They had economic, financial, military powers, and technological, and they had many scientists, they had influences in other countries and other capitalist classes around the world.
The so-called Nazis of Ukraine they are in the same condition as the USA Neo nazis, they are a bunch of poor workers it is only a pretext to start a war, and the opposite side of the conflict is as authoritarian as the government of Ukraine, and both are a bunch of right-wingers
Being white is not an element either, in Africa they were battalions supporting the German Nazis, the Nazis allied with countries where the population was not white, they made an alliance with Japan and some countries of Latin America supported them. Iran had one of the largest Nazi parties in the middle east. Aryan is not a race, they are languages and Semitic are language too
Adolf Hitler is not Nazism, he was a representative of the German capitalist class, nazism is not an individual, it is a class movement and without Hitler, it could have existed.
Ultra-nationalism is not enough to define Fascism, another element was the dictatorship of one party, racism, is not the main element either, before Nazism came about racism already existed.
It is a very weak case
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