Let the Weapons Flow and the Body Count Grow
Say "no" to killing, "no" to war
Two articles I read yesterday are typical of polarized, indeed antithetical, views on the Russia-Ukraine War.
At the British Guardian, Simon Tisdall says this is Europe’s moment to step up and support Ukraine in a righteous war against Putin. He concludes, with passion:
Zelenskiy is right. Risk-averse Nato has been too slow and too cautious from the start. To outpace tyranny, Europe must fight – and fight to win. Our common future depends on it.
Putin, the tyrant, must be stopped in Ukraine, or Poland and Germany could be next. Fighting to win means that Ukraine must be given not only hundreds of Leopard 2 tanks but also combat jets. The combination of tanks, jets, and related ancillary equipment will enable Ukraine to drive Russian forces out of the country in a quasi-Blitzkrieg operation. Victory to the West!
At Antiwar.com, Edward Curtin predicts Russia will win this war even as he suggests it’s mainly the West’s fault for inciting it via NATO expansion and U.S. involvement in the 2014 coup in Ukraine:
we are being subjected to a vast tapestry of lies told by the corporate media for their bosses, as the US continues its doomed efforts to control the world. It is not Russia that is desperate now, but propagandists such as the writers of this strident and stupid editorial [by the New York Times]. It is not the Russian people who need to wake up, as they claim, but the American people and those who still cling to the myth that The New York Times Corporation is an organ of truth. It is the Ministry of Truth with its newspeak, doublespeak, and its efforts to change the past.
Which is it? Is this a war that the U.S. and NATO must win, along with Ukraine, to stop an evil and expansionist dictator, or is this a war that the U.S. and NATO provoked, and surely will lose, given Russia’s military superiority empowered in part by the justice of its cause?
To me, the disturbing part of such polarized, us versus them, views is that they really guarantee only one thing: more fighting and more death. Let the weapons flow and the body count grow: that is the result of these debates.
War, as almost any military historian will tell you, is inherently unpredictable. I have no idea who’s going to “win” this war. I do know the Ukrainians are losing. I say this only because the war is being fought on their soil, and the longer it lasts, the more Ukraine will suffer.
That doesn’t mean I want Ukraine to surrender, nor do I want it to lose. But I don’t think it will win with more Western tanks and planes. Just about any escalation by the West can be matched by Russia. I see further stalemate, not Blitzkrieg-like victories, and stalemate means more and more suffering.
It’s said the pen can prove mightier than the sword. Why not try talking in place of tanks? Put those mighty pens to work by signing an armistice or even an enduring peace treaty. Ukraine and Russia are neighbors; unless they want perpetual war, they must find a way to live together.
More weaponry to Ukraine is unlikely to produce decisive victory, but it is likely to produce far more death and destruction in that country. It’s high time both sides said “no” to killing, “no” to yet more war.
Think it's past TIME to admit this is OUR WAR to punish Russia; Ukrainians are merely PAWNS in our terrible and deadly game.
CNN: "However, as Ukraine pleads for more advanced weaponry and tanks, US and Western officials are urging Ukrainian officials to shift focus from that brutal fight and prioritize instead a potential offensive in the south, using a different style of fighting that takes advantage of the billions of dollars in new military hardware recently committed by Western allies. The US specifically wants Ukraine to focus on a style of mechanized maneuver warfare that uses rapid, unanticipated movements against Russia, sources familiar with their discussions said."
Lemee' see; Looks like we are pretty much running the show with our thinly disguised effort to EXPORT DEATH; which seems to be what our economy is based on.
Too bad that no U.S. politician wants to appear WEAK and support a negotiated solution.
I guess it's difficult to fight a WAR on TERROR when you are actually the TERRORIST
Without indulging in predictions about who will win this awful war, I have to agree with what you quoted from Curtin:
. . . we are being subjected to a vast tapestry of lies told by the corporate media for their bosses, as the US continues its doomed efforts to control the world. It is not Russia that is desperate now, but propagandists such as the writers of this strident and stupid editorial [by the New York Times]. It is not the Russian people who need to wake up, as they claim, but the American people and those who still cling to the myth that The New York Times Corporation is an organ of truth. It is the Ministry of Truth with its newspeak, doublespeak, and its efforts to change the past.
If you ask: “Which is it? Is this a war that the U.S. and NATO must win, along with Ukraine, to stop an evil and expansionist dictator, or is this a war that the U.S. and NATO provoked, and surely will lose, given Russia’s military superiority empowered in part by the justice of its cause?“ you provide two false alternatives.
Putin is not “an evil and expansionist dictator” and so, if there were any reason for thinking that this is “a war that the U.S. and NATO must win” that could not be the reason why they “must win” it. And this IS this a war that the U.S. and NATO provoked; but they may not lose it, although perhaps they will arrange a nuclear conflagration so that everyone will lose everything.
People who talk like Simon Tisdall, Jens Stoltenberg, Boris Johnson, Lindsey Graham, Joe Biden, Ursula von der Leyen, and all that lot (they are, indeed, legion), are too stupid and too evil to live but all of their premises are false, and have been proven to be false. People are entitled to take sides on this awful war only if they speak out of something other than ignorance and mendacity. “What surrounds us . . . is a vast tapestry of lies, upon which we feed”, said Harold Pinter, in 2005. (Curtin didn’t invent that line.) https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/literature/2005/pinter/lecture/ If you read Pinter’s speech, you’ll notice that nothing has really changed since 2005, except perhaps to get worse.
“It’s high time both sides said ‘no’ to killing, ‘no’ to yet more war.” The thing is, however, that there are more than just two sides. Zalensky (a token name for one gang of heinous villains) refuses to say ‘no’. The U.S. and NATO (more token labels, for several more gangs of heinous villains) refuse to say ‘no’. Putin (another token name, but not for a gang of heinous villains) has already said ‘no’. Almost all of the world beyond the Collective West has said ‘no’. But those who have said ‘no’ can have no effect. One side that is left out is the Ukrainian people (not the Ukra-Nazis)—the ones whose sons, husbands and fathers are doing all the dying. If they said “no”, the war would be over. But perhaps they are not allowed to say ‘no’. What a tragedy.