Russian Tensions
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sshenfield:
Regarding your post #227302 of March 4 —
I am curious about your reading habits. Did you not see that the Tridni Valka statement was already linked to here — https://www.worldsocialism.org/spgb/forum/topic/russian-tensions-2/page/43/#post-227045 — on February 26?
Is it that you read the Forum only sporadically, without catching up on what you’ve missed since last reading? Or is it that only certain posters and not others are graced by your attentions?
I don’t know if everyone will be able to watch this but it looks as if the Indian media might be where to find reasonably balanced reporting on the war. At least you won’t hear it said that what has happened was “unprovoked” and the “sole responsibility” of Russia as the pro-NATO politicians are always claiming. Both sides are to blame and a plague on both of them.
It’s capitalism and its built-in clashes between states over markets, sources of raw materials, trade routes and investment outlets and spheres of influence to protect them that is the ultimate cause of all wars. It’s the system, stupid.
Ukrainian intransigence?
Russia was opening six humanitarian corridors:
From Kyiv to Gomel, southeastern Belarus
From Mariupol to Zaporizhzhia, southeastern Ukraine
From Mariupol to Rostov-on-Don, southern Russia
From Kharkiv to Belgorod, southern Russia
From Sumy to Belgorod
From Sumy to Poltava, central UkraineUkraine’s Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk has said a Russian proposal to evacuate civilians out of Kyiv, Kharkiv, Mariupol and Sumy is not an acceptable option as the humanitarian corridors mostly lead to Russian cities. Three of them exited to Russian cities, one to Belarus and two to central and southeastern Ukraine.
Vereshchuk called on Russia to agree to a cease-fire from Monday morning to allow Ukrainians to evacuate toward the western Ukrainian city of Lviv instead.
Won’t Ukraine being in the EU be questioned by Russia?
I mean, Ukraine will be absorbed into Russia when the war is over (providing it remains a regional-only conflict)!Reply to ZJW: I suspect that I learned of Tridni Valka from the forum, made a note of it, and then forgot where I had got it from. Another case of memory deterioration with old age.
This thread now has 903 posts. Anyone who is paying close attention to every post must have little time for anything else. I see nothing wrong in paying less attention to some posters than to others who have shown themselves better informed and more thoughtful.
The Western media focus only on the people fleeing Ukraine westward via Lviv to Poland or to Hungary, Moldova or Romania, whose number has now passed the million mark. By ignoring all those going to Russia or Belarus they vastly underestimate the total number of refugees, who must already number several million. We know that two million have been evacuated from the Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics and are now in camps or with relatives in southern Russia. Many more must have crossed nearby borders from other areas into Russia or Belarus. If you are in Sumy, for instance, which makes more sense — the short trip across the Russian border or the long journey west?
There are even, it appears, some crooks in Ukraine scamming workers who are trying to get their pets to safety:
Watch out for bogus “rescuers” in Ukraine:
Discrimination against the Roma in Eastern Europe is well documented. And it continues in this war.
Once they found shelter, she and other Roma were chased out of their tents by the Ukrainian border authorities.Moldova’s authorities decided to separate Roma refugees from ethnic Ukrainians, in an attempt to prevent tensions between the two ethnicities.
According to the UNHCR map here 47,800 refugees have gone to Russia (presumably not including those from the Donbas republics?), which is about the same as have gone to Rumania. And 357 to Belorussia. I suppose these are the numbers the UNCHR registers or has reported to it.
From George Galloway’s website, with him in an interview that explains the Chinese aspect and how its economy will benefit from the sanctions.
Has the Western financial institutions shot itself in the foot?
What is the point in getting us all hyped up for war with Russia if such a war is not intended?
I am pessimistic and believe that the US
they want to prolong the situation in Ukraine as an instrument to change the Putin regime and the least is that they care about the civilians.
all of them Putin and NATO are playing with fire and the danger of a nuclear catastropheJean McCollister, an old colleague of mine from the nuclear disarmament movement of the early 1980s who now lives in Slovenia, has circulated the following statement on FaceBook:
We are all losers in this conflict.
It didn’t have to be this way. If political leaders and policymakers had shown some wisdom and understanding over the last few decades, it never would have come to this point. A few did, but they were overridden by the short-sighted, the greedy, the arrogant, the ignorant, the power-hungry and the downright evil.
Obviously we all lose in a nuclear conflagration, which is a distinct possibility in these chaotic, reckless times.
Ordinary Ukrainians and their animals all over the country lose no matter the eventual outcome, suffering daily from the violence and trauma of an unnecessary war on their territory, now no longer limited to just the Donbass, where the violence and suffering had been ongoing for eight years, but spreading across the whole of Ukraine.
Ordinary Russians and their animals lose by being cut off from the world, repressed, censored, and jailed at home, suffering the brunt of economic sanctions, and treated as personae non gratae abroad for something they had no control over.
Ordinary people and their animals the world over–Americans and Europeans too–lose from being further squeezed by rising prices, particularly in the energy sector, and increasing poverty. I’m seeing posts here and there declaring willingness to pay more for gas in order to “help” Ukraine by “putting the screws to Putin”. Cool. But it won’t just be the price of gas skyrocketing as payment systems and supply chains are completely disrupted by US-imposed sanctions. We will see how these people feel six months from now. And apparently no one realizes that this gleeful satisfaction over sticking it to Putin entails other costs, namely Ukrainian lives, given false hope and sacrificed in a conflict that they cannot win.
Putin loses by contributing, through his aggressive actions, to the very outcomes he least desires: a Europe previously divided over how best to engage with Russia now united in its opposition, a halt to Nordstream 2, NATO expansion made even more likely, massive sanctions affecting the Russian economy, the achievement of villain-in-chief status in the world today, hated and despised in much of Ukraine outside the Donbass, and possible unrest and loss of popularity at home that could conceivably even end up removing him from power (don’t hold your breath).
Zelensky loses as leader of a country that, already plagued by corruption, extremism, and lack of democracy, has now descended into chaos, civil war and violence. He is being hailed for his heroism but will be remembered by history (should we survive to write it) for his folly and haplessness. Voted into power as the peace candidate, he not only failed to deliver on his promises but has fanned, or at least failed to put out, the flames of war. Whether he truly desired an agreement with Russia is debatable, but even if he did, he has been hamstrung and unable to act independently, manipulated by neocon American officials wanting to use Ukraine as a tool against Russia on one side and, every time he seemed willing to talk with Donbass separatists, pressured and threatened by Ukrainian neo-Nazi groups on the other, preventing any such meetings and a lasting peaceful settlement that could have emerged from them.
America loses as the racism, hypocrisy, and double standards of its foreign policy and military interventions become glaringly blatant for all to see, entailing a further loss of its credibility as a global actor. Pot, kettle; sauce, gander, goose; choose your metaphor. The blowback from emboldening, arming, and training militant right-wing extremists and neo-Nazis, oops, I mean freedom fighters, in Ukraine will, sooner or later, reach America’s shores, just as support to “some stirred-up Muslims” in Afghanistan did. The swift and ruthless application of widespread economic sanctions against Russia may appear as a display of power and influence, but you can be sure the unintended lesson has not been lost on many observers: don’t make yourself vulnerable to US sanctions. The status of the dollar as the world’s reserve currency will thus likely become a thing of the past. And a decades-long policy of humiliation and deliberate exclusion of Russia from Europe has led to the realization of a US geopolitical and strategic nightmare: bringing Russia and China closer together.And China? Hm. Maybe I’m missing something but I’m not seeing a downside for China here (assuming we manage to avoid nuclear warfare).
When the dust settles and the bodies have been buried, we may be lucky enough to find ourselves in a best-case scenario: a peaceful, stable, multipolar world of nations that respect universal human rights and international law.
But we could have had all that long ago, without war—back in the 1990s, after the Cold War ostensibly ended—were it not for the relentless US drive for global hegemony. Why did so many countries have to be ruined and so many millions have to die first?
Jean McCollister…
This these best statements so far
about this war and I wish everyone reading his humanitarian view of this tragedy we are living today!!!Amnesty international accuses Ukraine a war crime in exposing Russian POWS to public curiosity.
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