Russian Tensions
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TM, a lesson in actual history is reading what was said at the time.
Alien1 is right, we should all further our knowledge and understanding with deeper analysis, rather than the partisan media outpourings from both sides of the conflicts.
A beneficial use of one’s time would be to read our extensive archive of Socialist Standard articles published month by month during all the wars.
As Scott Ritter is a commentator respected by many on the forum, and one who I had cited long before others, his view on Putin’s new phase of the war is of interest.
It partially reflects something I posted earlier.
“the decision to conduct the referendums in the Donbass and occupied Ukraine, radically transforms the SMO from a limited-scope operation to one linked to the existential survival of Russia. Once the referenda are conducted, and the results forwarded to the Russian parliament, what is now the territory of Ukraine will, in one fell swoop, become part of the Russian Federation — the Russian homeland.
All Ukrainian forces that are on the territory of the regions to be incorporated into Russia will be viewed as occupiers; and Ukrainian shelling of this territory will be treated as an attack on Russia, triggering a Russian response. Whereas the SMO had, by design, been implemented to preserve Ukrainian civil infrastructure and reduce civilian casualties, a post-SMO military operation will be one configured to destroy an active threat to Mother Russia itself. The gloves will come off…”
Ritter’s analysis returns to the roots of the problem, “the continued pursuit of a decades-long policy of isolating and destroying Russia is a matter of existential importance”And from the very beginning of this very long thread, the geo-political pretext for the war was fully explored and explained. Ukraine’s “rights” to join NATO and the “self-defence” of the two republics were mere cover for the real motives.
A historian may well refer to the 19th Century, the same perennial problem recurring over and over through the decades. The Bear V the Eagles
“Ukraine’s “rights” to join NATO and the “self-defence” of the two republics were mere cover for the real motives.”
Russia’s defence of the Donbass republics was not “cover” for anything. Russia tried to end the conflict in the east diplomatically for 8 years. But the Natostanis would have none of it. Instead, they used the negotiating process of the Minsk Accords as cover to build a NATO army with which to ethnically cleanse the Donbass. As soon as this became obvious Russia moved to the republics’ defence, just as it should have. You see, the Russians aren’t cowards. And they hate Nazis. Bad luck for the Nazis.
More suspect for some here is Chomsky’s understanding.
First, he begins with an important caveat.
“…let me make it clear that I have nothing original to say about the military situation, and have no expert knowledge in this area. What I know is what’s reported, almost entirely from Western sources…”Later he makes this qualification
“It’s also useful finally to reiterate a familiar word of warning. Propaganda never ceases and rises to peaks of intensity at moments of crisis. Triumphant claims are always worth inspection”But he confirms what we said a long time ago, that peace was possible and it was the West and in particular Boris Johnson who sabotaged it.
He cites Foreign Affairs journal
“According to multiple former senior US officials we spoke with, in April 2022, Russian and Ukrainian negotiators appeared to have tentatively agreed on the outlines of a negotiated interim settlement. The terms of that settlement would have been for Russia to withdraw to the positions it held before launching the invasion on February 24. In exchange, Ukraine would promise not to seek NATO membership and instead receive security guarantees from a number of countries.”
Chomsky remarks “On dubious evidence, Hill and Stent blame the failure of these efforts on the Russians, but do not mention that British Prime Minister Boris Johnson at once flew to Kyiv with the message that Ukraine’s Western backers would not support the diplomatic initiative, followed by U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, who reiterated the official U.S. position that Washington’s goal in the war is to “weaken” Russia, meaning that negotiations are off the table.”
If one cares to review posts from that time, it will be confirmed that this was also the interpretation of most of us on this forum.
Chomsky too recognises the geo-political cause of the war.
“All of this is part of the reconfiguration of global order that has been going on for some time and was spurred onward by Putin’s criminal aggression. A side consequence was to deliver Europe into Washington’s hands. This most welcome gift was provided free of charge by Vladimir Putin when he rejected French President Macron’s last-minute efforts to avert an invasion, at the end with undisguised contempt, a major contribution to Washington’s Atlanticist project of global hegemony.”
When it comes down to it, in the end, the working class is of no importance, neither Ukrainian nor Russian.
The new world order started more than 3 centuries ago, and it is capitalism, the new world order is going to be socialism.
Let’s see in the next election of the US who Chomsky is going to support.
The capitalist class is paying for the war
Also, some left communists groups have said that it was a situation similar to the invasion of Kuwait whereas the USA wanted Iraq to invade
““All of this is part of the reconfiguration of global order that has been going on for some time and was spurred onward by Putin’s criminal aggression.”
Chomsky is flat out wrong. Russia is not guilty of aggression. This from Scott Ritter.
“While it might be in vogue for people, organizations, and governments in the West to embrace the knee-jerk conclusion that Russia’s military intervention constitutes a wanton violation of the United Nations Charter and, as such, constitutes an illegal war of aggression, the uncomfortable truth is that, of all the claims made regarding the legality of pre-emption under Article 51 of the United Nations Charter, Russia’s justification for invading Ukraine is on solid legal ground.”
“A side consequence was to deliver Europe into Washington’s hands.”
This has got to be one of Chomsky’s most asinine statements ever. Europe was already the US’ gimp.
“This most welcome gift was provided free of charge by Vladimir Putin when he rejected French President Macron’s last-minute efforts to avert an invasion”
The Kremlin told Macron to shove it because he wasn’t serious. He’d been stringing Russia along for years regarding the Minsk Accords, doing nothing whatsoever to enforce Ukrainian compliance. Macron was continuing this role and the Russians saw right through it.
So what now? Nuclear war?
I do not think that the capitalists want to destroy each other completely, it might be the last alternative that they might use
MS and TM, we seem to be faced with a classic case of mission creep. When there is a military set-backs, the first reaction is to escalate.
Putin learned the military maxim, no plan survives the first contact with the enemy and the first shot.
If annexation goes ahead, Russia will not be able to cede any of its conquered occupied territories in any negotiated peace for it will be against its 2020 constitution.
Putin is digging his hole even deeper so that it will be harder to extricate Russia from the war. It must be complete victory or unending war.
An all-out war and the end the pretence of the euphemistically called “special military operation”
But it would be foolhardy for any of us to predict the course of this war.
Recall Sudetenland and the German-speaking people in Czechoslovakia?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sudeten_Germans“Putin is digging his hole even deeper so that it will be harder to extricate Russia from the war. It must be complete victory or unending war.”
Name an “unending war”. There’s no such thing.
“But it would be foolhardy for any of us to predict the course of this war.”
I’m happy to be foolhardy. In three months Russia will have mobilised it’s 300,000 extra troops at which point it will launch a winter campaign that will overwhelm the Ukrainian military. In the face of certain annihilation and the collapse of its (proxy) armed forces Natostan will be forced to sue for peace. Ukraine will be demilitarised, denazified and neutral.
The rivalry between the capitalist class is a war without ending, even more, peace among the capitalists is the continuation of the politic of war by other means, even Lenin said that too. WW1 and WW2 never ended, they continued their rivalry in other territories, carving the territories of other capitalists, and looking for other spheres of influence, routes and territories. The cause of war is the market and the market has not ended, therefore, we will continue seeing wars around the wars between the capitalists. Rosa Luxembourg wrote too that capital is one of the enemies of the capitalists because it forces them to expand and look for new territories and to produce more and compete with each other. This system is unstable and the agreement between the capitalists are always violated by them, not worth the paper
PS Raya Dunayevskaya wrote (probably in a humoristic way) that WW2 did not end, the capitalists need a short break to continue
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