Russia, Ukraine and U.S. Hegemony
The following is an edited version of a talk by the author as part of a panel at a public forum in Toronto on June 12, 2015. The forum was sponsored by the Centre for Social Justice and Socialist Project. You can view the talk here on ‘Left Streamed’.
The Ukraine/Russia conflict is particularly ominous because tensions with the United States could escalate into a nuclear war. For this reason, it is necessary to understand NATO’s role, patterns of U.S. domination and the nuclear arms race. The political world is dangerously in flux, with entangled military and economic alliances and a robust weapons trade. This is similar to the prelude to World War I when it took one trigger to unleash cascading inter-state violence.
The demonization of Russia and Putin leaves out the role of the United States and NATO. Seumas Milne, writes in The Guardian, March 4, 2015, “A quarter of a century after the end of the Cold War, the ‘Russian threat’ is unmistakably back. Vladimir Putin, Britain’s defence secretary Michael Fallon declares, is as great a danger to Europe as ‘Islamic State’…
“Putin’s authoritarian conservatism may offer little for Russia’s future, but this anti-Russian incitement is dangerous folly. There certainly has been military expansionism. But it has overwhelmingly come from NATO, not Moscow.”
James Bissett is a former Canadian ambassador to Yugoslavia, Albania, and Bulgaria. He wrote in the Ottawa Citizen last year, “The current crisis in Ukraine threatens global security and at worst has the potential for nuclear catastrophe. At best, it signals a continuation of the Cold War. Sadly, the crisis is completely unnecessary and the responsibility lies entirely in the hands of the United States-led NATO powers. The almost virulent propaganda onslaught blaming Russia for the instability and violence in Ukraine simply ignores reality and the facts.”
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