In reply to the letter from Renato, RF, who unfortunately found my article “bizarre,” I would like to first of all reiterate that the threat and actuality of a war between Russia and Ukraine was not surprising. To clarify, for those like myself who have followed the relations between NATO/our US government – and I emphasize our government as a citizen and resident – and the Russian Federation over the past years, months and weeks, it was not at all incredible that the logic of confrontational American/alliance diplomacy, combined with an influx of ever more sophisticated weapons to Ukraine and stoking of nationalism, would end in Russian involvement. With Zelensky’s speech at the Munich Security conference, just a few days before Putin’s recognition of the breakaway republics, it in fact became increasingly clear that the logic of relations was rapidly driving towards war. I reject fully any association thereby with Renato’s “we,” who naively appeared to believe that the Kremlin would idly stand by as more alliance weapons were and are being handed to the Ukrainian nationalist government, which pushed ever more forcefully for EU and NATO membership, and the politically bankrupt moralizing claim that this “we” must apologize.
Yes, the Russian war against Ukraine is a tragedy, one which could and should have been avoided, foremost by us and our representatives. As an American citizen, however, I feel it is my duty to defend political principle more than to sheepishly cater to the attitudes of those who are “shocked” or confused about how the possibility of nuclear war has once more come about. The role of socialists in this moment ought not to be moralists who demand confession from those who have been too naive or ill-informed to understand the grave stakes of the global hegemon’s strategy and the Kremlin’s desperate stance, but to fight for actual peace and a democratic social order the world over, and to hold their own governments accountable through organized dissent and civil disobedience. Radical statements about a “capitalist peace” with humanitarian demands miss the mark of the political moment entirely and don’t do the grave threat of wider life and death justice.
It is NATO’s criminal expansion to Eastern Europe, as is clarified and evidenced in the article, and existence which is the main threat to global peace. To reiterate, the Ukrainian government’s NATO aspirations, which we are relaxedly reassured by the west are not possible for years to come, threatens the deployment of missile systems which would reach Moscow within a couple minutes, disabling its defenses, and is vocally, over decades, perceived across the political spectrum as a threat. Not saying this in a moment in which the whole world’s attention is directed by a choir of hypocrites deploring Russia’s threat to “freedom and democracy” and “brutal war” (what other kind of war is there?) is weakness in the face of the massive war propaganda and rationalizing capacity of our western governments. Statements on CNN et. al. haranguing Russia’s “war crimes” and “brutal war” only serve to give cover for the west’s continued arming and encouragement of the Ukrainian nationalist government and are likely destined to at least partially become, with the continuation of our governments’ current and proposed policies, a fulfilled prophecy that threatens wider escalation.
Renato’s assertion that now is not the time to fight our governments’ preposterously propagated lies and protracted aggression spanning decades is absolutely bankrupt of any political strategy for the international working class in the real situation and amounts to useless sentimental sympathy for the Ukrainian people’s current troubling dilemma. Calling for vague slogans such as “immediate peace” and equitable acceptance of refugees does nothing to clarify how, nor why organizational and educational campaigns against our governments’ actions should not be conducted, nor reveal what an actual positive strategy for the working class to win a democratic republic and power could possibly be. Renato’s claim that the Russian state is more autonomous than the American state paints Russia as an inherently aggressive and irrational state. This implies – given the current context of overwhelming media coverage and his claim that “now is not our moment” – that Russia is somehow uniquely aggressive in this complex crisis of many years and, consequently, logically, that we should encourage a Ukrainian “defencist” stance. This is a misguided strategy in the current moment, given the lack of international mass worker’s parties, the nationalist character of the Ukrainian government, its utter disregard over the last years for genuinely seeking to peacefully resolve its issues with the separatists and not pursuing neutrality towards NATO.
Instead, we should accept the consequences and responsibility of agreeing that NATO bears most of the accountability for the engendering of this crisis, among many others internationally by the way, and we should resist attempts to join the current chorus painting this Russian invasion as uniquely aggressive. It is impossible to form a strong opinion on this issue without engaging with recent historical developments and I encourage people to do their own research. When the people of Ukraine voted for Zelensky, they voted for a candidate who campaigned for peace but ended up waving on “Ukrainianization” and refused to negotiate with the “terrorists” of the ethnic/language majorities of the southeast. Instead, for eight years a reactionary war was waged by Kiev, with our governments arming a vanguard of neo-nazis, against these minority separatists which cost 14,000 lives. It is true that these were backed by Russia, yet the extent to which is clear by its extended refusal to actually provide protection.
Instead, Putin has now utilized the long crisis to pursue his overall foreign policy of enforcing “neutrality” on Ukraine. Given the nature of the situation, and the overwhelming power of the global hegemonic allied states’ ability to propagandize, as well as the Ukrainian government’s desperate measures of arming civilians, it is hard to see genuine neutrality coming about as the war is in fact likely to become ever more brutal. Given this, we should ask ourselves, why should we not call for a revolutionary defeatist strategy summed up in the slogan “the main enemy is at home!”, not only for comrades in Ukraine or Russia, but especially here?
Noam Chomsky’s term “Mad Vlad,” cited in the article, is an extremely fitting analogy for the caricatured way our governments have been attempting to frame the narrative against Russia for years and decades, attempting to conceal from our people the truth of activities in our name and that there have, in fact, been very rational concerns which have been driving Russian policy. Yet, to acknowledge that, one has to be willing to see and not dismiss Russian security concerns, foremost, regarding the place through which Napoleon and Hitler found convenient access, with scant natural barriers, to wage war on Russia. This is not a concern which relates to one’s attitudes towards Putin, the United Russia party or any other, but one which, again, runs across the Russian political spectrum. Previously, before Kiev’s continuation of the civil war, demonization of the separatist “terrorists” and nationalist unwillingness to abide by the Minsk Agreement, Ukrainian state neutrality or closer relations with Russia was an issue which Zelensky’s own voters supported in larger numbers than NATO membership.
Among the outpour of “solidarity” with the Ukrainian government, it is imperative that socialists demand genuine, internationalist worker’s solidarity and take a firm stance: categorically against any direct NATO member involvement, in any scenario or capacity, no-fly zone etc.; against our governments’ massive weapons deliveries to the Ukrainian government and stoking of the war; against the increase of our sanctions against the Russian people and vital economic sectors; against all chauvinist practices of our Ukrainian “allies”; to push for immediate Ukrainian-Russian ceasefire negotiations; for US/NATO-Russian detente, genuine, broad negotiations for European security to prevent further escalations; for the development of closer international ties with more aware socialists in all warring and war ridden countries; to initiate campaigns towards these ends, to abolish NATO and state clearly and unequivocally that, yes, the main enemy is still at home!
Comradely,
Alexander Gallus
