Ukraine Escalates

(c) by Mark Dempsey

Recently, Ukraine completed "Operation Spider Web," destroying some of Russia's nuclear triad (bombers) as deep as in Siberia. One of my friends, a Democrat, suprised me by praising Ukraine for that attack. 

I wonder how my friend would react if Cuba, or Canada used Russian weapons to attack bombers in North Dakota. In the Cuban missile crisis, when the Soviets were installing missiles in Cuba--not firing them--the US was apoplectic. We were literally ten minutes away from nuclear holocaust. A Soviet submarine captain--Vasili Arkhipov--ignored an order from the Kremlin to start World War III by firing his submarine's missiles. (Let's all celebrate Vasili Arkhipov day--October 27!)

As for whether the US is implicated in the Operation Spider Web attack, the experts I read (see the links below) say there's no question Ukraine couldn't have done this without using US intelligence. It was, in effect, an indirect attack on one nuclear power (Russia) by another (the US).

My Democratic friend's position is premised on the idea that Putin is the quintessential bad guy, and he attacked Ukraine in 2022, completely unprovoked. But that's false. The US provided many provocations over several decades.

First, in the late 1980s, G.H.W. Bush promised Gorbachev that, if he let East and West Germany unite, the US wouldn't expand NATO "one inch" to the east. Clinton and George W. Bush both broke that promise, and the US State Department spent $5 billion in "democracy promotion" in Ukraine leading up to the "Orange Revolution" protests in 2014.

In 2014, the elected president of Ukraine (Yanukovych) was offered two different aid packages: one from the European Union (EU) and the IMF, and one from the Russians. The Russian package required far less of Ukraine. The loans were at a lower interest rate, and, unlike the IMF loans, no public austerity would be needed to pay for them. 

 

Yanukovych turned down the EU deal and approved the Russian aid. With the encouragement of the US, protests erupted in Kyiv. Was the US behind organizing the protests? Never mind the billions spent by the US, neocon Undersecretary of State, Victoria Nuland, literally handed out cookies to the demonstrators. There was even evidence the snipers who killed demonstrators, whipping the crowd into a frenzy, were not Yanukovych's people--they were a false flag attack, a provocation from the neo-Nazi Ukrainians. In any case, the protests deposed Yanukovych, who fled to Russia. The Russians (who already had a lease there) claimed Crimea.

 

Both Ukraine and Crimea are critical security assets for Russia. Both Hitler and Napolean invaded Russia through Ukraine--it's the pass for invaders. As Tulsi Gabbard says, the Russians have legitimate security concerns here.

 

Publicly-available recordings disclose Victoria Nuland selected the next leader for Ukraine--no need for those pesky elections! In any case, there was no election, and eastern Ukraine (the "Donbass") was unhappy. Protests and riots erupted there. Kyiv responded by shelling the region, causing an estimated 14,000 casualties.

 

This was in 2014, and the Russian Special Military Operation (the "unprovoked" invasion) didn't occur until 2022. What was Russia's immediate response? Besides securing Crimea, where they already had leases, Russia sued for peace. Two meetings in Minsk and one in Istanbul were negotiating for peace.  Angele Merkel, the former German leader, said the West dragged its feet in negotiating to give the Ukraine time to arm.

 

"Truth is the first casualty of war" is an old saying. One example connected to Ukraine: the Snake Island  incident in which the Russians were blamed for assassinating Ukrainian soldiers who defied Russian demands for surrender. In truth, they became prisoners of war. But anything to get the blood lust for war going!

For background, here's John Mearsheimer's (video) assessment of the provocations for the Ukraine war from 2015, before the invasion. Here's a bit of his writing from after the invasion. In any case, he thinks US policy regarding Ukraine has been ill-advised. That video is a rather mild indictment of that policy compared to others but he still calls US policy "scary." 

Jeffrey Sachs'  account of US, Ukraine, and Russia policy condemns the provocations too. Sachs was involved directly in the meetings that came to many of the decisions about Ukraine, and he deviates from the standard narrative. He was protesting US belligerence as he participated in the decisions.

Finally, Laurence Wilkerson, Colin Powell's former chief of staff, has a rather pointed reaction to "Operation Spiderweb" (the attack on the Russian bombers). He says it's a bad idea, and a provocation that threatens nuclear war.

The praise for an Operation Spiderweb that threatens nuclear holocaust from my friends is at least a suboptimal response, and at worst vengeance misplaced.

...all of which reminds me of Winston Churchill's admonition: "I can always trust my friends, the Americans, to do the right thing. Unfortunately, they often do everything else first."