I think that what galls me the most may be the frequent references to Ukraine as a democracy and a free country. This reflects the willful blindness of the American political and media classes, and hence the ignorance of the American people, to the fact that in 2014 the United States sponsored a coup in Ukraine that ousted a democratically elected president and replaced him with a puppet president. At the present time, that puppet is Volodymir Zelensky, but he can easily be replaced whenever the puppet master chooses. Ukraine is no more democratic than Russia. In fact, Ukraine is worse, because it has neo-Nazis and fascists in high, low and in-between places.
I came of age during the Vietnam War, and in my long life, I have witnessed my country, the USA, initiate, fight and sponsor wars that killed tens of millions of people and turned many millions more into refugees. Never do I recall the public outcry, the pulling of hair and rending of garments over suffering civilians as is occurring now over the suffering of the Ukrainian people. I, too, feel for them, but the disproportionate level of public grief (and anger) has all the trappings of crocodile tears being played to the hilt by politicians and the media. It is a classic example of mass hysteria. Where was this outpouring of emotion when the US was leveling Fallujah, Mosul and Raqqa? Goddam hypocrites!
this war has been a looooooong time coming. It's no accident Biden is prez for this war.....he's personally involved, first hand, neck deep. (Like how Bernanke, depression era finance specialist just "happened" to be Fed chair before the Great Financial Crisis of '08). CIA's cofer black was on the board of Burisma when a Biden was also involved w Burisma. The owner of Burisma is the promoter of the neo nazi Azov battalion irregulars. When Jon McCain was campaigning "against Putin" in the open (in the Palin launch election, a dry run for Trumpism), his own campaign manager was representing PUtin's side, for money, in Ukraine. How does that happen? hmmm......THen there's the years old video of McCain, Lindsey Graham, and Klobuchar ginning up Ukranian troops in fatigues.
excerpt: "Franklin Templeton became Ukraine’s biggest private creditor in 2013, with an investment of about $7 billion across funds, the year before a revolution toppled the country’s former president, prompting a separatist insurgency in its eastern regions. The fighting crippled Ukraine’s finances, forcing it to seek a sovereign-debt restructuring in 2015." hmmm...........a great investment goes poof in ONE YEAR.
Manafort also Ukraine.
This war may be "news" to us sheep, but on the inside, they've been planning for looooooooooooong time. playing BOTH sides pro and against Russia in Ukraine, till their desired outcome scores.
Ive been wondering if the poisoning of Navalny is an earlier part of a full scale non- military attack on Russia ( no choir boys to be sure).
It never made sense. A man they could have killed within Russia many ways, many times, in many places gets
1) poisoned in a place which could not be more public
2) a location which would get max publicity ( airport and plane), easy escape for poisoners.
3) given an agent associated with Russia but also made in Porton Down
4) given just enough to make him sick but not to kill him, some precision required.
5) sent to Germany by the Russians where it would have been known they would detect Novichok, if they had thought or knew that was the poison.
6) he immediately wanted to return to Russia which allegedly poisoned him
7) so did the Skripals , Skripal senior having been a long defunct and irrelevant? spy. Also given just enough poison to make them sick but not a lethal dose. They lived very close to Porton Down in Salisbury.
It just doesn’t ring true to me. False flag seems more likely? Note how the story has dropped from view.
Possibly. I've mused that privately as well. But it was strategic in 2 ways! Not only does it help tar and feather Russia (always a good choice for the Anglo press), but it also tarred and feathered Jeremy Corbyn, who was subsequently declared anti-semitic and removed from any tv coverage. Corbyn was openly saying IN 2012(!) the west should "engage" Russia, and he had no problem seeing their point of view etc etc. That was a big NO-NO!
I think, the things we go through are quasi-planned quite far in advance....so they got rid of Corbyn, and put us on a path on rails to where we are now. Now there's no getting off the rails, except "their way" ie. the Tory way which is the ruling trans atlantic establishment.
Conveniently, UK have also "Brexited", like tough talking Jens Stoltenberg announcing stepping out of his job..riiiiight before the body fluids stage of conflict. It turns out the EU only existed to expand NATO, and to subsidize newly joined economies with ~5% of GDP stipends every year (thanks EU taxpayer!). Now that NATO is on the wall with Russia, suddenly the trans atlantic establishment felt EU was no longer "needed"...breaksit.
Still waiting for SNL to open with a song of the Palestinians, the Syrians, or the Venezuelans. Heck, I'd even settle for one about the American poor, or why not Julian Assange? We must remember the last time we got this treatment was when Hillary Clinton lost an election. How fucked up is that?
As to the current mess, yes; there is a lot of memory-holing going on. War tends to do that, as does our eternally corrupted peace.
I don't want nuclear war, but I also don't want people living under governments that don't allow protest or the reading of Caitlin Johnstone articles. Washington is idiotic for fomenting this confrontation and Putin is idiotic for embracing it. I should end this with some pithy upbeat kicker -- just like the evening news -- but there just isn't any to be had.
Freeness is a continuum that must always be readdressed; not cartoon absolute placards to be waived. I'm for more freedom of expression, no matter where.
I've been so pessimistic about our ability to uphold our "freedoms" after the collusion I witnessed when Wallstreet and our government allowed the theft of 18 million homes during the Great Financial Crime Spree of 2008. That literally obliterated my middle class naivete.
The news about how Ukraine had a plan to squash expats of color by denying them exit has not come out yet (not immigrants, expats, people attending schools, workers etc). Horrific scenes of people AT the border (not waiting for a crowded train mind you, etc, but AT the forking checkpoint) being turned away and forced to spend freezing nights outside w/o shelter. They dint have "exit visas" get it? To get an "exit visa" expat women might have to "give favors", men might have to grease palms ....good fun. No news of corruption, only "free" country in world that wants to make sure you're allowed to leave: http://see-you.in.ua/en/page/what-exit-visa
I'm certain that all these squeaky clean narratives that cropped up overnight that happen to align with western global power goals is just some huge coincidence. Yeah, that's it.
Thanks Caitlin. Hoping that cooler heads prevail & a ceasefire is attained in short order. So ashamed of being an American these last decades. Traveling to Europe this coming summer with a Russian friend no less. Wondering how we will be treated?
I get the feeling that the Russians are following a war plan that we in the West don't see, understand, or refuse to admit. When the US bombed Serbia the we knocked out power plants, TV stations, bridges. We also tried to knock out (kill) Serbian leadership. We also bombed the Chinese Embassy killing several of their diplomats. The Russians have done none of that, Very odd. Pictures of the Ukrainian capital with the exception of a very few short rounds seem remarkably intact with the electricity still on and cars moving in the street. Leadership targets completely untouched. Not the Defense Ministry, not the President's Offices, etc. Even the Iranians with their drones could have hit them. I can't say I understand what they are up to but the effects go way beyond "stubborn Ukrainian resistance",
Your observation is 100% correct, at least up to now. I expect the fighting to get messier at some point, but the contrast to the American way of war is striking. Basically, the Americans first demolish a city with bombardment and then send in troops for mopping up operations. Russia has been avoiding that approach, possibly at the cost of losing more of its soldiers than would otherwise be the case.
Wrong ! "Russia has been avoiding that approach" only for 1(one )reason , to save civilian /brotherly lives . That was Russia#s approach to this particular "war " which is NOT a war but cleansing country from nazis, mercenaries and other evil .
You might forgive us for misunderstanding Putin's humanitarian motivations when Russian bombs and rockets keep falling on schools and apartment buildings; a strange way treat ones brothers and sisters. I believe the phrase that's refusing to escape your lips is war crimes. I'm sure each dying Ukrainian civilian was thinking "cleansing" and not "war" as they died, happy that Putin remains so steadfastly concerned for their welfare.
This isn't to say that Nazis aren't a thing within Ukraine, but given Putin's previously stated wish to reconstitute the territory of the old Soviet Union, it seems to me that Nazism is simply a means to a larger strategic end, rather than his prime motivator as you would have us believe.
In addition, it's hard to take Putin's claims to cleanse Ukraine of evil seriously while he domestically censors and arrests anyone who dares criticize his increasingly corrupt 20 year reign. As the great philosopher Elvis once said, clean up your own back yard. (My own government could use a large dose of the same treatment.)
Regarding the Russian attack strategy, what makes much more sense is that Putin -- long isolated and surrounded by cowering yes-men -- is starting to believe his own bullshit about Ukraine being a country of Russian-loving citizens kept prisoner against their will by an unpopular president. (Maybe more than a bit of projection going on here?)
In this regard, it would make sense that Putin would initially send in hapless, unmotivated and untrained conscripts, whose mere presence would hopefully cause the Ukrainian government to fall. Clearly, this didn't happen, but does give a clear answer to an otherwise obvious and bizarre inept performance by the Russians in the initial stages of hostilities. This may not be the entire answer, but what you posted has no basis in reality.
It has been odd. I'm wondering if Dunkirk isn't being replayed. Hitler refrained from wiping out the British army with an eye toward better later negotiations with Britain. Decimating Kyiv would make any post-war situation that much more difficult.
Conversely, Putin could have been the victim of his own propaganda thinking that sending in a few scattered, ill-trained conscripts would leave his crack army intact and be enough to have a grateful Ukraine throw down their arms. Who really knows?
And again you make a wrong statement ! Russia IS NOT DECIMATING any Ukrainian town or city since Ukraine and it's population is BROTHERLY nation to Russia. - Same language, same religion, same history, same territory, same habits and same industry (before evil dirty people divided it. ) .....
A friend of mine who is the veteran of a couple tours in Iraq reports the same.
We blew up TV towers, radio stations, gas, sewer and water infrastructure on Day One, not to mention, we took out the electrical grid. Russia has done none of those things, for whatever reason. And we flattened entire blocks with artillery, airstrikes and MLRS salvoes, without the slightest concern for civilians. Again, not much evidence of that in Ukraine. The internet even works.
Speaking of internet, there are also plenty of clips on the internet of civilians calmly driving their cars past columns of Russian armor. My friend reports that, during the invasion phase, anyone foolish enough to do something like that was liable to get shot.
The Western media coverage of what's happening is absurd. The war started in 2014, but they're treated Act IV as if it's Act I.
The West could easily just agree to a summit and say Ukraine will remain a neutral country. Notice how they have no interest in doing that? They would like to see Russia drawn in and drawn down. However, the Anglo-American oligarchy just doesn't have the leverage it used to have, and they're basic playbook will now only result in a strengthened Eurasian alliance.
In reality, we could actually have a serious dialogue and discourse with both Russia and China, and collaborate on great projects, like greening the deserts in both the Middle East and Africa, building the Bering Strait tunnel, developing fourth generation nuclear power plants and new connectivity hubs. However, the current entities that have the US and other Western governments captured don't want that because they are obsessed with a Malthusian depopulation agenda, which means they have to do everything they can to block all major development projects and instead promote the more Delphic ''sustainable'' option.
Thank you for your most powerful, intelligent assessment of the current state of the US/UK war machine. This war could have been averted and yet was provoked by our war mongers in Washington intentionally. I spent 22 years thinking I was working for a great defense company and see that I was disillusioned. They are America's war machines that thrive on global conflicts. I am an American but I clearly hate our involvement in NATO. It must end.
Am I the only one who is bothered by the differing reception for refugees depending on whose war they are escaping? The warm welcome offered by the European Union to Ukrainian families stands in stark contrast to their heartless efforts to block desperate Middle Eastern refugees arriving in unseaworthy boats. Then there is the USA's treatment of evacuees fleeing the consequences of our war-on-drugs, children in cages and a border wall. The disparity is mind-boggling.
I posted Melania's "I don't care, do u" Designer jacket photo on a photo sharing site, .....guess what....? The site censored it ! It would NOT allow such sentiment to be aired with links to headlines of Ukrainian family separation. I had only three pics: Daily telegraph article about Ukrainian mass migratoin, melania pic, and BBC article about Ukraine family separation. Taken down.
Noam Chomsky had a term for the dissonance you're feeling (from his book "Manufacturing Consent"): "worthy victims" vs "unworthy victims".
As an Italian-American, I call "racist foul" on all the commentators who pursue the Hitler comparison. It's clearly anti-Italian bias to leave out my idol, Mussolini, who, after all, was the historically earlier purveyor of Fascismo. And were I serious about this campaign, I'd bet I could find a collection of shitlibs to go along with my racism trope --- after all, to some of those minions of Hillary Clinton, any identity-politics explanation is superior to facing the facts that their country is by far the greatest purveyor of terrorism the planet has ever seen. Il Duce would be proud. Facismo, per sempre, cittadini.
It truly sucks to figure this out, but it must be faced, that we (the U.S.), are the world's bully, occupying nearly every country currently in existence.
I've been around long enough to see that.
I am the ONLY generation of my family tree that has not been in military combat, and I have no male progeny.
I'll have no grandchildren to ask, "What did you do in the war, Grandpa?", to which I'd reply, "I didn't get one." I missed Viet Nam by 2 years and wasn't about to join up and serve in the next one.
The war started in 2014, when the US State Department and Anglo-American intel agencies ran a putsch with the help of actual REAL neo-Nazis. The Ukrainian government was in fact overthrown by an Anglo-American coup, in part with the help of remnants of the real Ukrainian Nazis networks going back to WWII, which the Anglo-American intel agencies protected, just like they did with their rat lines, just like they did using Nazis to run coups and dictatorships in South America. Why is this barely mentioned when discussing the background for the current situation, which has been 8 years in the making? Why is this being minimized and downplayed?
What the Anglo-American intel establishment pulled in Ukraine in 2014 was Operation Gladio-style stuff.
To quote from ''Immune to Irony: Nazi Collaborators and Authoritarian Personalities Denounce Russia'':
''After having been established by the CIA, NATO and MI6 in 1956, Operation Gladio saw hundreds of terrorist cells deployed by former leaders of Nazi intelligence embedded across Europe who were used to kill civilians and troublesome politicians while stoking the fires of anarchy along the way. These acts of terror were in turn used to justify the excessive “emergency management” by oligarchically captured trans Atlantic nations throughout the Cold War based upon the logic that “the war against communism justifies everything… including fascism”.
While some say that the Gladio Operations were cancelled when the Soviet Union disintegrated, evidence points to a very different picture.
One particularly loud case is found in the figure of Andriy Parubiy, founder of the neo-Nazi Social-National Party of Ukraine who was appointed to serve as Secretary of the National Security and National Defense Committee (RNBOU) in the post-regime change putsch managed by Victoria Nuland and overseen by Joe Biden.
It is noteworthy that Parubiy, who has close ties to Freeland (herself the proud granddaughter of Hitler collaborator Michael Chomiak) cozied up to Justin in 2016 while seeking weapons, training and other logistical support from Canada. Meetings between Canadian politicians and leading neo-Nazi groups from Ukraine like the Azov Battalion continued to be so frequent that the Ottawa Citizen reported on November 9, 2021 that:
“Canadian officials who met with members of a Ukrainian battalion linked to neo-Nazis didn’t denounce the unit, but were instead concerned the media would expose details of the get-together, according to newly released documents. The Canadians met with and were briefed by leaders from the Azov Battalion in June 2018. The officers and diplomats did not object to the meeting and instead allowed themselves to be photographed with battalion officials despite previous warnings that the unit saw itself as pro-Nazi. The Azov Battalion then used those photos for its online propaganda, pointing out the Canadian delegation expressed “hopes for further fruitful co-operation.”
i reflexively believed that Hillary was just a secular mafia type evil. It is ever more clear that I was incorrect. She is evil to her rotten, satan worshipping core. She may even be an emanation of Jezebel herself. She is opposed to all that is good. In my mind, she is even a candidate for Antichrist. Think this is hyperbole? The wikileaks show her wanting to sacrifice a female child to Moloch.
Could we please give Satan and the entire headache of the Hebrew Scriptures a rest? We're all on the brink of being blown up, so let's at least muster a bit of dignity. Thanks.
Hmm. That's a whole semester in the Theology dept. right there. Of course I refute that on many levels and accept your statement too. But I don't think you want to hear my take on the ransom sacrifice or God forbid, Moloch, Gehenna and the whole shebang. It's gets technical.
one can’t have a candy store understanding of religion and respond to a theological comment. its probably the hardest work there is. why? because it touches on everything, absolutely everything. and like a complex scientific device such as CERN, subtle details can ruin the entire enterprise.
"We were now been given so much weaponry, not because as some say, 'West is helping us'...but because we perform the tasks set by the West, because we the only ones who are ready to do them, because we have fun killing and we have fun fighting"
How they gonna do a "no-fly" zone when Russia already has S-400s, S-500s? It is reputed, One S-400 can clear airspace for a 100km radius. Who's gonna fly planes over an S-400?
I think that what galls me the most may be the frequent references to Ukraine as a democracy and a free country. This reflects the willful blindness of the American political and media classes, and hence the ignorance of the American people, to the fact that in 2014 the United States sponsored a coup in Ukraine that ousted a democratically elected president and replaced him with a puppet president. At the present time, that puppet is Volodymir Zelensky, but he can easily be replaced whenever the puppet master chooses. Ukraine is no more democratic than Russia. In fact, Ukraine is worse, because it has neo-Nazis and fascists in high, low and in-between places.
I came of age during the Vietnam War, and in my long life, I have witnessed my country, the USA, initiate, fight and sponsor wars that killed tens of millions of people and turned many millions more into refugees. Never do I recall the public outcry, the pulling of hair and rending of garments over suffering civilians as is occurring now over the suffering of the Ukrainian people. I, too, feel for them, but the disproportionate level of public grief (and anger) has all the trappings of crocodile tears being played to the hilt by politicians and the media. It is a classic example of mass hysteria. Where was this outpouring of emotion when the US was leveling Fallujah, Mosul and Raqqa? Goddam hypocrites!
I call it the neo - 4H club. Hubris, Hypocrisy, Humbuggery, and Horseshxt.
this war has been a looooooong time coming. It's no accident Biden is prez for this war.....he's personally involved, first hand, neck deep. (Like how Bernanke, depression era finance specialist just "happened" to be Fed chair before the Great Financial Crisis of '08). CIA's cofer black was on the board of Burisma when a Biden was also involved w Burisma. The owner of Burisma is the promoter of the neo nazi Azov battalion irregulars. When Jon McCain was campaigning "against Putin" in the open (in the Palin launch election, a dry run for Trumpism), his own campaign manager was representing PUtin's side, for money, in Ukraine. How does that happen? hmmm......THen there's the years old video of McCain, Lindsey Graham, and Klobuchar ginning up Ukranian troops in fatigues.
There are no nazis? Why was this necessary back in 2016: https://www.thenation.com/article/archive/congress-has-removed-a-ban-on-funding-neo-nazis-from-its-year-end-spending-bill/
The DNC has been taking Ukraine money from waaaay back, since VIktor Pinchuk times. Huge amounts of skullduggery.
Franklin Templeton, rather connected to DNC, invested money in Ukraine only to have it go poof:
"https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-04-21/templeton-pares-ukraine-holding-in-40-billion-global-bond-fund"
excerpt: "Franklin Templeton became Ukraine’s biggest private creditor in 2013, with an investment of about $7 billion across funds, the year before a revolution toppled the country’s former president, prompting a separatist insurgency in its eastern regions. The fighting crippled Ukraine’s finances, forcing it to seek a sovereign-debt restructuring in 2015." hmmm...........a great investment goes poof in ONE YEAR.
Manafort also Ukraine.
This war may be "news" to us sheep, but on the inside, they've been planning for looooooooooooong time. playing BOTH sides pro and against Russia in Ukraine, till their desired outcome scores.
Ive been wondering if the poisoning of Navalny is an earlier part of a full scale non- military attack on Russia ( no choir boys to be sure).
It never made sense. A man they could have killed within Russia many ways, many times, in many places gets
1) poisoned in a place which could not be more public
2) a location which would get max publicity ( airport and plane), easy escape for poisoners.
3) given an agent associated with Russia but also made in Porton Down
4) given just enough to make him sick but not to kill him, some precision required.
5) sent to Germany by the Russians where it would have been known they would detect Novichok, if they had thought or knew that was the poison.
6) he immediately wanted to return to Russia which allegedly poisoned him
7) so did the Skripals , Skripal senior having been a long defunct and irrelevant? spy. Also given just enough poison to make them sick but not a lethal dose. They lived very close to Porton Down in Salisbury.
It just doesn’t ring true to me. False flag seems more likely? Note how the story has dropped from view.
Possibly. I've mused that privately as well. But it was strategic in 2 ways! Not only does it help tar and feather Russia (always a good choice for the Anglo press), but it also tarred and feathered Jeremy Corbyn, who was subsequently declared anti-semitic and removed from any tv coverage. Corbyn was openly saying IN 2012(!) the west should "engage" Russia, and he had no problem seeing their point of view etc etc. That was a big NO-NO!
I think, the things we go through are quasi-planned quite far in advance....so they got rid of Corbyn, and put us on a path on rails to where we are now. Now there's no getting off the rails, except "their way" ie. the Tory way which is the ruling trans atlantic establishment.
Conveniently, UK have also "Brexited", like tough talking Jens Stoltenberg announcing stepping out of his job..riiiiight before the body fluids stage of conflict. It turns out the EU only existed to expand NATO, and to subsidize newly joined economies with ~5% of GDP stipends every year (thanks EU taxpayer!). Now that NATO is on the wall with Russia, suddenly the trans atlantic establishment felt EU was no longer "needed"...breaksit.
Excellent comment!
Washington got the war it wanted, and now is prepared to fight to the last Ukrainian.
Still waiting for SNL to open with a song of the Palestinians, the Syrians, or the Venezuelans. Heck, I'd even settle for one about the American poor, or why not Julian Assange? We must remember the last time we got this treatment was when Hillary Clinton lost an election. How fucked up is that?
As to the current mess, yes; there is a lot of memory-holing going on. War tends to do that, as does our eternally corrupted peace.
I don't want nuclear war, but I also don't want people living under governments that don't allow protest or the reading of Caitlin Johnstone articles. Washington is idiotic for fomenting this confrontation and Putin is idiotic for embracing it. I should end this with some pithy upbeat kicker -- just like the evening news -- but there just isn't any to be had.
Countries that don't allow protests: like Canada and USA! USA! USA!
Freeness is a continuum that must always be readdressed; not cartoon absolute placards to be waived. I'm for more freedom of expression, no matter where.
I've been so pessimistic about our ability to uphold our "freedoms" after the collusion I witnessed when Wallstreet and our government allowed the theft of 18 million homes during the Great Financial Crime Spree of 2008. That literally obliterated my middle class naivete.
The news about how Ukraine had a plan to squash expats of color by denying them exit has not come out yet (not immigrants, expats, people attending schools, workers etc). Horrific scenes of people AT the border (not waiting for a crowded train mind you, etc, but AT the forking checkpoint) being turned away and forced to spend freezing nights outside w/o shelter. They dint have "exit visas" get it? To get an "exit visa" expat women might have to "give favors", men might have to grease palms ....good fun. No news of corruption, only "free" country in world that wants to make sure you're allowed to leave: http://see-you.in.ua/en/page/what-exit-visa
It's nasty business, war.
I'm certain that all these squeaky clean narratives that cropped up overnight that happen to align with western global power goals is just some huge coincidence. Yeah, that's it.
Thanks Caitlin. Hoping that cooler heads prevail & a ceasefire is attained in short order. So ashamed of being an American these last decades. Traveling to Europe this coming summer with a Russian friend no less. Wondering how we will be treated?
I get the feeling that the Russians are following a war plan that we in the West don't see, understand, or refuse to admit. When the US bombed Serbia the we knocked out power plants, TV stations, bridges. We also tried to knock out (kill) Serbian leadership. We also bombed the Chinese Embassy killing several of their diplomats. The Russians have done none of that, Very odd. Pictures of the Ukrainian capital with the exception of a very few short rounds seem remarkably intact with the electricity still on and cars moving in the street. Leadership targets completely untouched. Not the Defense Ministry, not the President's Offices, etc. Even the Iranians with their drones could have hit them. I can't say I understand what they are up to but the effects go way beyond "stubborn Ukrainian resistance",
Your observation is 100% correct, at least up to now. I expect the fighting to get messier at some point, but the contrast to the American way of war is striking. Basically, the Americans first demolish a city with bombardment and then send in troops for mopping up operations. Russia has been avoiding that approach, possibly at the cost of losing more of its soldiers than would otherwise be the case.
Wrong ! "Russia has been avoiding that approach" only for 1(one )reason , to save civilian /brotherly lives . That was Russia#s approach to this particular "war " which is NOT a war but cleansing country from nazis, mercenaries and other evil .
You might forgive us for misunderstanding Putin's humanitarian motivations when Russian bombs and rockets keep falling on schools and apartment buildings; a strange way treat ones brothers and sisters. I believe the phrase that's refusing to escape your lips is war crimes. I'm sure each dying Ukrainian civilian was thinking "cleansing" and not "war" as they died, happy that Putin remains so steadfastly concerned for their welfare.
This isn't to say that Nazis aren't a thing within Ukraine, but given Putin's previously stated wish to reconstitute the territory of the old Soviet Union, it seems to me that Nazism is simply a means to a larger strategic end, rather than his prime motivator as you would have us believe.
In addition, it's hard to take Putin's claims to cleanse Ukraine of evil seriously while he domestically censors and arrests anyone who dares criticize his increasingly corrupt 20 year reign. As the great philosopher Elvis once said, clean up your own back yard. (My own government could use a large dose of the same treatment.)
Regarding the Russian attack strategy, what makes much more sense is that Putin -- long isolated and surrounded by cowering yes-men -- is starting to believe his own bullshit about Ukraine being a country of Russian-loving citizens kept prisoner against their will by an unpopular president. (Maybe more than a bit of projection going on here?)
In this regard, it would make sense that Putin would initially send in hapless, unmotivated and untrained conscripts, whose mere presence would hopefully cause the Ukrainian government to fall. Clearly, this didn't happen, but does give a clear answer to an otherwise obvious and bizarre inept performance by the Russians in the initial stages of hostilities. This may not be the entire answer, but what you posted has no basis in reality.
It has been odd. I'm wondering if Dunkirk isn't being replayed. Hitler refrained from wiping out the British army with an eye toward better later negotiations with Britain. Decimating Kyiv would make any post-war situation that much more difficult.
Conversely, Putin could have been the victim of his own propaganda thinking that sending in a few scattered, ill-trained conscripts would leave his crack army intact and be enough to have a grateful Ukraine throw down their arms. Who really knows?
And again you make a wrong statement ! Russia IS NOT DECIMATING any Ukrainian town or city since Ukraine and it's population is BROTHERLY nation to Russia. - Same language, same religion, same history, same territory, same habits and same industry (before evil dirty people divided it. ) .....
A friend of mine who is the veteran of a couple tours in Iraq reports the same.
We blew up TV towers, radio stations, gas, sewer and water infrastructure on Day One, not to mention, we took out the electrical grid. Russia has done none of those things, for whatever reason. And we flattened entire blocks with artillery, airstrikes and MLRS salvoes, without the slightest concern for civilians. Again, not much evidence of that in Ukraine. The internet even works.
Speaking of internet, there are also plenty of clips on the internet of civilians calmly driving their cars past columns of Russian armor. My friend reports that, during the invasion phase, anyone foolish enough to do something like that was liable to get shot.
Agreed.
The Western media coverage of what's happening is absurd. The war started in 2014, but they're treated Act IV as if it's Act I.
The West could easily just agree to a summit and say Ukraine will remain a neutral country. Notice how they have no interest in doing that? They would like to see Russia drawn in and drawn down. However, the Anglo-American oligarchy just doesn't have the leverage it used to have, and they're basic playbook will now only result in a strengthened Eurasian alliance.
In reality, we could actually have a serious dialogue and discourse with both Russia and China, and collaborate on great projects, like greening the deserts in both the Middle East and Africa, building the Bering Strait tunnel, developing fourth generation nuclear power plants and new connectivity hubs. However, the current entities that have the US and other Western governments captured don't want that because they are obsessed with a Malthusian depopulation agenda, which means they have to do everything they can to block all major development projects and instead promote the more Delphic ''sustainable'' option.
Robert, here for you to understand "what they are up to " - https://www.veteranstoday.com/2022/03/02/analysis-eu-declares-war-on-russia/
Thank you for your most powerful, intelligent assessment of the current state of the US/UK war machine. This war could have been averted and yet was provoked by our war mongers in Washington intentionally. I spent 22 years thinking I was working for a great defense company and see that I was disillusioned. They are America's war machines that thrive on global conflicts. I am an American but I clearly hate our involvement in NATO. It must end.
Am I the only one who is bothered by the differing reception for refugees depending on whose war they are escaping? The warm welcome offered by the European Union to Ukrainian families stands in stark contrast to their heartless efforts to block desperate Middle Eastern refugees arriving in unseaworthy boats. Then there is the USA's treatment of evacuees fleeing the consequences of our war-on-drugs, children in cages and a border wall. The disparity is mind-boggling.
White makes right.
I posted Melania's "I don't care, do u" Designer jacket photo on a photo sharing site, .....guess what....? The site censored it ! It would NOT allow such sentiment to be aired with links to headlines of Ukrainian family separation. I had only three pics: Daily telegraph article about Ukrainian mass migratoin, melania pic, and BBC article about Ukraine family separation. Taken down.
Noam Chomsky had a term for the dissonance you're feeling (from his book "Manufacturing Consent"): "worthy victims" vs "unworthy victims".
As an Italian-American, I call "racist foul" on all the commentators who pursue the Hitler comparison. It's clearly anti-Italian bias to leave out my idol, Mussolini, who, after all, was the historically earlier purveyor of Fascismo. And were I serious about this campaign, I'd bet I could find a collection of shitlibs to go along with my racism trope --- after all, to some of those minions of Hillary Clinton, any identity-politics explanation is superior to facing the facts that their country is by far the greatest purveyor of terrorism the planet has ever seen. Il Duce would be proud. Facismo, per sempre, cittadini.
It truly sucks to figure this out, but it must be faced, that we (the U.S.), are the world's bully, occupying nearly every country currently in existence.
I've been around long enough to see that.
I am the ONLY generation of my family tree that has not been in military combat, and I have no male progeny.
I'll have no grandchildren to ask, "What did you do in the war, Grandpa?", to which I'd reply, "I didn't get one." I missed Viet Nam by 2 years and wasn't about to join up and serve in the next one.
I'm too old for this sh*t.
The war started in 2014, when the US State Department and Anglo-American intel agencies ran a putsch with the help of actual REAL neo-Nazis. The Ukrainian government was in fact overthrown by an Anglo-American coup, in part with the help of remnants of the real Ukrainian Nazis networks going back to WWII, which the Anglo-American intel agencies protected, just like they did with their rat lines, just like they did using Nazis to run coups and dictatorships in South America. Why is this barely mentioned when discussing the background for the current situation, which has been 8 years in the making? Why is this being minimized and downplayed?
What the Anglo-American intel establishment pulled in Ukraine in 2014 was Operation Gladio-style stuff.
To quote from ''Immune to Irony: Nazi Collaborators and Authoritarian Personalities Denounce Russia'':
''After having been established by the CIA, NATO and MI6 in 1956, Operation Gladio saw hundreds of terrorist cells deployed by former leaders of Nazi intelligence embedded across Europe who were used to kill civilians and troublesome politicians while stoking the fires of anarchy along the way. These acts of terror were in turn used to justify the excessive “emergency management” by oligarchically captured trans Atlantic nations throughout the Cold War based upon the logic that “the war against communism justifies everything… including fascism”.
While some say that the Gladio Operations were cancelled when the Soviet Union disintegrated, evidence points to a very different picture.
One particularly loud case is found in the figure of Andriy Parubiy, founder of the neo-Nazi Social-National Party of Ukraine who was appointed to serve as Secretary of the National Security and National Defense Committee (RNBOU) in the post-regime change putsch managed by Victoria Nuland and overseen by Joe Biden.
It is noteworthy that Parubiy, who has close ties to Freeland (herself the proud granddaughter of Hitler collaborator Michael Chomiak) cozied up to Justin in 2016 while seeking weapons, training and other logistical support from Canada. Meetings between Canadian politicians and leading neo-Nazi groups from Ukraine like the Azov Battalion continued to be so frequent that the Ottawa Citizen reported on November 9, 2021 that:
“Canadian officials who met with members of a Ukrainian battalion linked to neo-Nazis didn’t denounce the unit, but were instead concerned the media would expose details of the get-together, according to newly released documents. The Canadians met with and were briefed by leaders from the Azov Battalion in June 2018. The officers and diplomats did not object to the meeting and instead allowed themselves to be photographed with battalion officials despite previous warnings that the unit saw itself as pro-Nazi. The Azov Battalion then used those photos for its online propaganda, pointing out the Canadian delegation expressed “hopes for further fruitful co-operation.”
https://canadianpatriot.org/2022/02/25/immune-to-irony-nazi-collaborators-and-authoritarian-personalities-denounce-russia/
In a word: things are not what they seem...
As usual, spot on! Thank you Caitlinn for shedding light where it is urgently necessary!
Oh dear what a fuss1 When it's all so good for Wall St, and the weapons-making corporations You spoil-sport!
i reflexively believed that Hillary was just a secular mafia type evil. It is ever more clear that I was incorrect. She is evil to her rotten, satan worshipping core. She may even be an emanation of Jezebel herself. She is opposed to all that is good. In my mind, she is even a candidate for Antichrist. Think this is hyperbole? The wikileaks show her wanting to sacrifice a female child to Moloch.
Could we please give Satan and the entire headache of the Hebrew Scriptures a rest? We're all on the brink of being blown up, so let's at least muster a bit of dignity. Thanks.
Moloch, the Antichrist and modern day child sacrifice?...all in one comment?..things is getting weird!
I find it kind of hilarious to hear child sacrifice condemned by those who worship a god notable for doing the same thing.
Hmm. That's a whole semester in the Theology dept. right there. Of course I refute that on many levels and accept your statement too. But I don't think you want to hear my take on the ransom sacrifice or God forbid, Moloch, Gehenna and the whole shebang. It's gets technical.
one can’t have a candy store understanding of religion and respond to a theological comment. its probably the hardest work there is. why? because it touches on everything, absolutely everything. and like a complex scientific device such as CERN, subtle details can ruin the entire enterprise.
"We were now been given so much weaponry, not because as some say, 'West is helping us'...but because we perform the tasks set by the West, because we the only ones who are ready to do them, because we have fun killing and we have fun fighting"
https://twitter.com/a_lutacontinua/status/1498404956474425346?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
EU declares war on Russia. https://www.veteranstoday.com/2022/03/02/analysis-eu-declares-war-on-russia/
How they gonna do a "no-fly" zone when Russia already has S-400s, S-500s? It is reputed, One S-400 can clear airspace for a 100km radius. Who's gonna fly planes over an S-400?