The strategy behind never-ending war
US could have backed peace talks in Ukraine. Yesterday it was the only NO vote in UN on recognizing Palestinian statehood.
Day 196 of Israel’s war on Gaza. More than 33,800 dead. 1.7 million people displaced
Day 786 of the proxy war in Ukraine. More than 500,000 casualties. 6 million displaced.
Pres. Biden and Democratic strategist David Axelrod have aligned with Christo/fascist election-denyer, House Speaker Mike Johnson in pushing for billions more in weaponry to be sent to Israel and Ukraine. It’s another lesson for voters in how war-mongering factions come together when it comes to feeding the war machine.
Axelrod, who runs the University of Chicago Institute of Politics, has been bashing UC student protesters critical of campus-sponsored racists and right-wing extremist speakers coming onto campus.
But Axelrod, who calls those opposed to more weapons shipments “Putinists,” has been conspicuously silent about USC’s barring of class valedictorian Asna Tabassum from giving her graduation speech. His free-speech arguments are matters of convenience, it seems.
I should mention that Cold Warrior Sec. of State, Antony Blinken is an Institute alum.
Columbia students demand an end to genocide in Gaza
More than 108 arrests were made, New York City Mayor Eric Adams said in a news conference Thursday evening.
The students were “peacefully protesting for divestment from genocide,” said one of the organizers, Columbia University Apartheid Divest.
If university officials thought that getting rid of the encampment or arresting more than 100 protesters, would persuade students to give up, they may have been very wrong. — New York Times
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Ordinarily, you might have assumed these students would be the shock troops in the anti-Trump election campaign. But certainly not when a real-time genocide is unfolding in front of them.
There’s little I want more than to see Trump and the MAGAs routed in November. It shouldn’t be that difficult with Dems running with tons of money behind them and a 10 million national voter advantage against the most hated man in the world. But it will be near impossible with them running as the war party and with much of its base of young activists protesting the war on Gaza and being repressed, blacklisted, and arrested on campuses like Columbia.
Hidden history
An article in Foreign Affairs reveals the "hidden history" of diplomacy that could have ended the war.
In the midst of Moscow’s invasion in 2022, the Russians and the Ukrainians almost finalized a peace agreement. Negotiations began on February 28 at one of Lukashenko’s spacious countryside residences near the village of Liaskavichy, about 30 miles from the Belarusian-Ukrainian border. On March 3 and March 7, the parties held a second and third round of talks, this time in Kamyanyuki, Belarus, just across the border from Poland. The Ukrainian delegation presented demands of their own: an immediate cease-fire and the establishment of humanitarian corridors that would allow civilians to safely leave the war zone. It was during the third round of talks that the Russians and the Ukrainians appeared to have examined drafts for the first time.
Charap and Radchenko’s article in FA reveals the many other opportunities that the US and Russia had to avoid an all-out war in Ukraine—a war that has proven to be protracted, unwinnable by either side, and that has become a slaughterhouse for hundreds of thousands of Russians and Ukrainians.
So the obvious question is: What happened? How close were the parties to ending the war? And why did they never finalize a deal?
Putin has claimed that Western powers intervened and spiked the deal because they were more interested in weakening Russia than in ending the war. He alleged that Boris Johnson, then the British prime minister, had delivered the message to the Ukrainians, on behalf of “the Anglo-Saxon world,” that they must “fight Russia until victory is achieved and Russia suffers a strategic defeat.”
At the time, and in the intervening two years, the willingness either to undertake high-stakes diplomacy or to truly commit to come to Ukraine’s defense in the future has been notably absent in Washington and European capitals.
The Istanbul Communiqué called for the two sides to seek to peacefully resolve their dispute over Crimea during the next 15 years.
FA’s optimistic conclusion (It’s not mine)
Today, when the prospects for negotiations appear dim and relations between the parties are nearly nonexistent, the history of the spring 2022 talks might seem like a distraction with little insight directly applicable to present circumstances. But Putin and Zelensky surprised everyone with their mutual willingness to consider far-reaching concessions to end the war. They might well surprise everyone again in the future.
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From the German newpaper Berliner Zeitung
It has been clear for some time that neither Russia nor Ukraine can win this war, as neither will achieve the political goals for which they are fighting. Ukraine cannot defeat Russia militarily, even with Western support in the form of arms and ammunition and the training of Ukrainian soldiers. Even the delivery of “miracle weapons”, which has been demanded by laymen time and again, will not be the hoped for “game changer” that could shift the strategic situation in Ukraine's favour. At the same time, however, there is an increasing risk of even greater escalation, leading to a military conflict between NATO and Russia and the real danger of a nuclear war.
The war could have been prevented, had the West accepted a neutral status for Ukraine – which Zelensky was initially quite willing to do – renounced NATO membership and enforced the Minsk II agreement on minority rights for the Russian-speaking population. The war could have ended in early April 2022 if the West had allowed the Istanbul negotiations to be concluded. It is now once again, and possibly for the last time, the responsibility of the “collective West” and especially the USA to set a course towards a ceasefire and peace negotiations.
Amen.