{"id":64239,"date":"2022-11-26T10:05:32","date_gmt":"2022-11-26T15:05:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=64239"},"modified":"2022-11-26T10:05:32","modified_gmt":"2022-11-26T15:05:32","slug":"it-was-never-about-ukraine","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=64239","title":{"rendered":"It Was Never About Ukraine"},"content":{"rendered":"<header class=\"entry-header\">\n<h3 class=\"entry-title\"><a href=\"https:\/\/original.antiwar.com\/ted_snider\/2022\/11\/22\/it-was-never-about-ukraine\/\">It Was Never About Ukraine<\/a><\/h3>\n<\/header>\n<div class=\"entry-content\">\n<p>In his March 21\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.state.gov\/briefings\/department-press-briefing-march-21-2022\/\">press briefing<\/a>, State Department spokesman Ned Price told the gathered reporters that \u201cPresident Zelenskyy has also made it very clear that he is open to a diplomatic solution that does not compromise the core principles at the heart of the Kremlin\u2019s war against Ukraine.\u201d A reporter asked Price, \u201cWhat are you saying about your support for a negotiated settlement \u00e0 la Zelenskyy, but on whose principles?\u201d In what still may be the most remarkable statement of the war, Price responded, \u201cthis is a war that is in many ways bigger than Russia, it\u2019s bigger than Ukraine.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Price, who\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.state.gov\/briefings\/department-press-briefing-february-25-2022\/\">a month earlier had discouraged talks between Russia and Ukraine<\/a>, rejected Kiev negotiating an end to the war with Ukraine\u2019s interests addressed because US core interests had not been addressed. The war was not about Ukraine\u2019s interests: it was bigger than Ukraine.<\/p>\n<p>A month later, in April, when a settlement seemed to be\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/archive.ph\/14c2N#selection-4291.57-4299.284\">within reach<\/a>\u00a0at the Istanbul talks, the US and UK again pressured Ukraine not to pursue their own goals and sign an agreement that could have ended the war. They again pressured Ukraine to continue to fight in pursuit of the larger goals of the US and its allies. Then British prime minister Boris Johnson\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.pravda.com.ua\/eng\/articles\/2022\/05\/5\/7344096\/\">scolded<\/a>\u00a0Zelensky that Putin &#8220;should be pressured, not negotiated with.&#8221; He added that, even if Ukraine was ready to sign some agreements with Russia, the West was not.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Once again, the war was not about Ukraine\u2019s interests: it was bigger than Ukraine.<\/p>\n<p>At every opportunity, Biden and his highest ranking officials have\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.defense.gov\/News\/Transcripts\/Transcript\/Article\/3220910\/secretary-of-defense-lloyd-j-austin-iii-and-army-general-mark-a-milley-chairman\/\">insisted<\/a>\u00a0\u201cthat it&#8217;s up to Ukraine to decide how and when or if they negotiate with the Russians\u201d and that the US won\u2019t dictate terms: \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.whitehouse.gov\/briefing-room\/speeches-remarks\/2022\/11\/14\/remarks-by-president-biden-in-a-press-conference-bali-indonesia\/\">nothing about Ukraine without Ukraine<\/a>.\u201d But that has never been true&#8230;<\/p>\n<p>\u2026click on the above link to read the rest\u2026<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>It Was Never About Ukraine In his March 21\u00a0press briefing, State Department spokesman Ned Price told the gathered reporters that \u201cPresident Zelenskyy has also made it very clear that he is open to a diplomatic solution that does not compromise the core principles at the heart of the Kremlin\u2019s war against Ukraine.\u201d A reporter asked [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[6400,694,18278,820,821,2080,827,834,862],"class_list":["post-64239","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-geopolitics","tag-antiwar-com","tag-russia","tag-ted-snider","tag-uk","tag-ukraine","tag-united-kingdom","tag-united-states","tag-us","tag-war"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64239","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=64239"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64239\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":64240,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64239\/revisions\/64240"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=64239"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=64239"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=64239"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}