As of now, it’s a relatively safe bet to believe that the Donbass region will be severed from Ukraine, with the remaining Ukrainian state having a neutral status. This diminished Ukraine might’ve (at least in the short term) a greater per capita anti-Russian dynamic, which could prove problematical for that state.

Russia has been losing the propaganda war. Russian President Vladimir Putin appears to be looking long term. At one time, the current Head of the Chechen Republic (official title) Ramzan Kadyrov, had opposed the Russian government. Now, he’s on very good terms with the Kremlin.

In time, a greater number of Ukrainians might begin questioning Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, as someone who (under the influence of some nationalists) further instigated and prolonged a conflict, whose end result could’ve occurred on better terms for Ukraine, without the deaths, displacement and destruction, resulting from Russia’s military action.

In turn, Putin could be increasingly viewed as someone who for years had tried to reasonably see a peaceful implementation of the 2015 UN approved Minsk Protocol and need for a new European security arrangement.

Likewise, contrary to the Kiev regime and Western mass media propaganda, Russia has so far waged a limited military operation, causing far less civilian deaths, when compared to the US military actions in Afghanistan and Iraq. Among the issues, are armed combatants using civilians and civilian areas as cover.

For those selectively seeing Putin as a monster, consider Madeleine Albright’s infamous comment on the large-scale Iraqi deaths caused by US military action and how she has been given kudos by the likes of Wesley Clark.

A number of Kiev regime claims about Russia’s military action have been later proven false. It’s therefore prudent to not automatically believe everything that government says before a fully substantiated overview.

In an interesting April 1 RT CrossTalk discussion, University of Rhode Island Professor Nicolai Petro foresees a more nationalistic Ukraine. Petro adds that this nationalism might’ve a noticeable anti-Western sentiment as well. Kiev regime propaganda has repeatedly suggested that the West hasn’t done enough to help their side. Over the years, some pro-Stepan Bandera Ukrainians have a xenophobic element, which is negative towards Jews, Poles and Russians.

If Petro’s projection takes shape, there could be a continued tense political division in a hypothetically diminished Ukraine, formally divorced from Crimea and Donbass. Pro-Russian sentiment within Kiev regime-controlled Ukraine hasn’t been comp​letely eliminated.

The abrasive Ukrainian nationalism idolizing Bandera is an anathema to many Ukrainians. The Banderite element in the Ukrainian Rada has been attempting to officially ban the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, that’s loosely affiliated to the Moscow Patriarchate.

The Moscow Patriarchate affiliated Orthodox Church has for centuries been by far the most popular church in Crimea, Donbass and numerous other areas of the former Ukrainian SSR. It’s quite arrogant for the Kiev regime to lay claim on lands, where the latter oppose the censoring trends favored by the former. There’re no Kiev regime calls to cancel culture Bandera.

In Western mass media, no context is ever given when the black and red Banderite flag is shown. BTW, the head of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church with loose Moscow Patriarchate ties, has spoken against the Russian military action, as have numerous clerics of the Russian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate.

On the flip side, the ongoing military conflict is seeing casualties among Ukrainian neo-Nazis. In a somewhat roundabout way, Zelensky appears to have acknowledged the negative attributes of these extremists, during an April 1 Fox News segment – an exchange that the network has apparently omitted in its archive. The failed neo-Nazi advocacy could eventually lead to a significant drop in its influence.

At the outbreak of the Russian military action, I proposed a settlement having Crimea fully recognized as Russian, along with a recognition of Donbass as a very autonomous part of Ukraine and an end to the anti-Russian sanctions. I’m now not as sure that Russia would accept this proposal.

The implemented sanctions against Russia have created a boomerang effect, which could become more evident. Over the long haul, it’s not so easy to isolate a country as powerfully determined Russia. Much of the world hasn’t gone along with the West’s anti-Russian sanctions.

Given time, the sanctions against Russian athletes and artists could end on the realization that this action is farcical in its hypocritically implemented bigotry. Using the same premise, it wouldn’t be so difficult to justify the banning of athletes and artists from other countries, when their respective nation (in the not-too-distant past) engaged in military action that killed and displaced many.

With a consistent standard in mind, Ukrainian athletes and artists could be banned for the Kiev regime carnage in Donbass over the past eight years. The Kiev regime can be credibly held accountable for about 10,000 deaths (overwhelmingly civilian) and displacing up to one million to Russia. Donbass is on the other end of the former Ukrainian SSR, farther away from the EU. Hence, the Donbass victims of Kiev regime terror don’t get much, if any Western mass media compassion and coverage.

US President Joe Biden will probably and deservingly be a one term president. His likely Republican successor might be in a better position to improve US-Russian relations – somewhat on par to what happened with US-Soviet relations after Ronald Reagan’s victory over Jimmy Carter.

In the meantime, it’s imperative for responsible voices within the US and elsewhere to not throw in the towel. Western mass media censorship can only go so far.

eurasiareview.com

Millions of Westerners raised to admire the ultimate spectacle of high-tech, robotic power, must have quickly suppressed their awe at the shock – this was Russia’s war of aggression, not ‘ours’. This was not an approved orgy of destruction and emphatically not to be celebrated.

Rewind to April 2017: over video footage of Trump’s cruise missiles launching at targets in Syria in response to completely unproven claims that Syria had just used chemical weapons, MSNBC anchor Brian Williams felt a song coming on:

‘We see these beautiful pictures at night from the decks of these two US navy vessels in the eastern Mediterranean – I am tempted to quote the great Leonard Cohen: “I’m guided by the beauty of our weapons” – and they are beautiful pictures of fearsome armaments making what is, for them, a brief flight…’

TV and newspaper editors feel the same way. Every time US-UK-NATO launches a war of aggression on Iraq, Libya, Syria – whoever, wherever – our TV screens and front pages fill with ‘beautiful pictures’ of missiles blazing in pure white light from ships. This is ‘Shock And Awe’ – we even imagine our victims ‘awed’ by our power.

In 1991, the ‘white heat’ of our robotic weaponry was ‘beautiful’ because it meant that ‘we’ were so sophisticated, so civilised, so compassionate, that only Saddam’s palaces and government buildings were being ‘surgically’ removed, not human beings. This was keyhole killing. The BBC’s national treasure, David Dimbleby, basked in the glory on live TV:

‘Isn’t it in fact true that America, by dint of the very accuracy of the weapons we’ve seen, is the only potential world policeman?’ (Quoted, John Pilger, ‘Hidden Agendas’, Vintage, 1998, p.45)

Might makes right! This seemed real to Dimbleby, as it did to many people. In fact, it was fake news. Under the 88,500 tons of bombs that followed the launch of the air campaign on January 17, 1991, and the ground attack that followed, 150,000 Iraqi troops and 50,000 civilians were killed. Just 7 per cent of the ordnance consisted of so called ‘smart bombs’.

By contrast, the morning after Russia launched its war of aggression on Ukraine, front pages were covered, not in tech, but in the blood of wounded civilians and the rubble of wrecked civilian buildings. A BBC media review explained:

‘A number of front pages feature a picture of a Ukrainian woman – a teacher named Helena – with blood on her face and bandages around her head after a block of flats was hit in a Russian airstrike.

‘“Her blood on his hands” says the Daily Mirror; the Sun chooses the same headline.’

‘Our’ wars are not greeted by such headlines, nor by BBC headlines of this kind:

‘In pictures: Destruction and fear as war hits Ukraine’

The fear and destruction ‘we’ cause are not ‘our’ focus.

Former Guardian journalist Jonathan Cook noted:

‘Wow! Radical change of policy at BBC News at Ten. It excitedly reports young women – the resistance – making improvised bombs against Russia’s advance. Presumably Palestinians resisting Israel can now expect similar celebratory coverage from BBC reporters’

A BBC video report was titled:

‘Ukraine conflict: The women making Molotov cocktails to defend their city’

Hard to believe, but the text beneath read:

‘The BBC’s Sarah Rainsford spoke to a group of women who were making Molotov cocktails in the park.’

For the entire morning of March 2, the BBC home page featured a Ukrainian civilian throwing a lit Molotov cocktail. The adjacent headline:

‘Russian paratroopers and rockets attack Kharkiv – Ukraine’

In other words, civilians armed with homemade weapons were facing heavily-armed elite troops. Imagine the response if, in the first days of an invasion, the BBC had headlined a picture of a civilian in Baghdad or Kabul heroically resisting US-UK forces in the same way.

Another front-page BBC article asked:

‘Ukraine invasion: Are Russia’s attacks war crimes?’

The answer is ‘yes,’ of course – Russia’s attack is a textbook example of ‘the supreme crime’, the waging of a war of aggression. So, too, was the 2003 US-UK invasion and occupation of Iraq. But, of course, the idea that such an article might have appeared in the first week of that invasion is completely unthinkable.

Generating The Propaganda Schwerpunkt

On 27 February, the first 26 stories on the BBC’s home page were devoted to the Russian attack on Ukraine. The BBC website even typically features half a dozen stories on Ukraine at the top of its sports section.

On 28 February, the Guardian’s website led with the conflict, followed by 20 additional links to articles about the Ukraine crisis. A similar pattern is found in all ‘mainstream’ news media.

The inevitable result of this level of media bombardment on many people: Conflict in Ukraine is ‘our’ war – ‘I stand with Ukraine!’

Political analyst Ben Norton commented:

‘Russia’s intervention in Ukraine has gotten much more coverage, and condemnation, in just 24 hours than the US-Saudi war on Yemen has gotten since it started nearly 7 years ago… US-backed Saudi bombing now is the worst since 2018’

This is no small matter. Norton added:

‘An estimated 377,000 Yemenis have died in the US-Saudi war on their country, and roughly 70% of deaths were children under age 5’

Some 15.6 million Yemenis live in extreme poverty, and 8.6 million suffer from under-nutrition. A recent United Nations report warned:

‘If war in Yemen continues through 2030, we estimate that 1.3 million people will die as a result.’

Over half of Saudi Arabia’s combat aircraft used for the bombing raids on Yemen are UK-supplied. UK-made equipment includes Typhoon and Tornado aircraft, Paveway bombs, Brimstone and Stormshadow missiles, and cluster munitions. Campaign Against the Arms Trade reports:

‘Researchers on the grounds have discovered weapons fragments that demonstrate the use of UK-made weapons in attacks on civilian targets.’

Despite the immensity of the catastrophe and Britain’s clear legal and moral responsibility, in 2017, the Independent reported:

‘More than half of British people are unaware of the “forgotten war” underway in Yemen, despite the Government’s support for a military coalition accused of killing thousands of civilians.

‘A YouGov poll seen exclusively by The Independent showed 49 per cent of people knew of the country’s ongoing civil war, which has killed more than 10,000 people, displaced three million more and left 14 million facing starvation.

‘The figure was even lower for the 18 to 24 age group, where only 37 per cent were aware of the Yemen conflict as it enters its third year of bloodshed.’

The Independent added:

‘At least 75 people are estimated to be killed or injured every day in the conflict, which has pushed the country to the brink of famine as 14 million people lack a stable access to food.’

On Twitter, Dr Robert Allan made the point that matters:

‘We as tax paying citizens and as a nation are directly responsible for our actions. Not the actions of others. Of course we can and should highlight crimes of nations and act appropriately and benevolently (the UK record here is horrific). 1st – us, NATO, our motives and actions.’

We can be sure that Instagram, YouTube and Tik Tok will never be awash with the sentiment: ‘I stand with Yemen!’

As if the whole world belongs to ‘us’, our righteous rage on Ukraine is such that we apparently forget that we are not actually under attack, not being bombed; our soldiers and civilians are not being killed. Nevertheless, RT (formerly Russia Today), Going Underground and Sputnik have been shut down on YouTube and Google as though the US and UK were under direct attack, facing an existential threat.

Certainly, we at Media Lens welcome the idea that powerful state-corporate media should be prevented from promoting state violence. It is absurd that individuals are arrested and imprisoned for threatening or inciting violence, while journalists regularly call for massive, even genocidal, violence against whole countries with zero consequences (career advancement aside). But banning media promoting state violence means banning, not just Russian TV, but literally all US-UK broadcasters and newspapers.

Confirming the hypocrisy, The Intercept reported:

‘Facebook will temporarily allow its billions of users to praise the Azov Battalion, a Ukrainian neo-Nazi military unit previously banned from being freely discussed under the company’s Dangerous Individuals and Organizations policy, The Intercept has learned.’

In 2014, the Guardian’s central and eastern Europe correspondent, Shaun Walker, wrote:

‘The Azov, one of many volunteer brigades to fight alongside the Ukrainian army in the east of the country, has developed a reputation for fearlessness in battle.

‘But there is an increasing worry that while the Azov and other volunteer battalions might be Ukraine’s most potent and reliable force on the battlefield against the separatists, they also pose the most serious threat to the Ukrainian government, and perhaps even the state, when the conflict in the east is over. The Azov causes particular concern due to the far right, even neo-Nazi, leanings of many of its members.’

The report continued:

‘Many of its members have links with neo-Nazi groups, and even those who laughed off the idea that they are neo-Nazis did not give the most convincing denials.’

Perhaps the hundreds of journalists who attacked Jeremy Corbyn for questioning the removal of an allegedly anti-semitic mural – which depicted a mixture of famous historical and identifiable Jewish and non-Jewish bankers – with the single word, ‘Why?’, would care to comment?

According to our ProQuest search, the Guardian has made no mention of the neo-Nazi Azov Battalion in the last week – as it most certainly would have, if Ukraine were an Official Enemy of the West. ProQuest finds a grand total of three mentions of the Azov Battalion in the entire UK national press – two in passing, with a single substantial piece in the Daily Star – in the last seven days. ‘Impressive discipline’, as Noam Chomsky likes to say.

‘Russia Must Be Broken’

Britain and the US have been waging so much war, so ruthlessly, for so long, that Western journalists and commentators have lost all sense of proportion and restraint. Neil Mackay, former editor of the Sunday Herald (2015-2018), wrote in the Herald:

‘Russia must be broken, in the hope that by breaking the regime economically and rendering it a pariah state on the world’s stage, brave and decent Russian people will rise up and drag Putin from power.’

If nothing else, Mackay’s comment indicated just how little impact was made by the deaths of 500,000 children under five when the US and Britain saw to it that the Iraq economy was ‘broken’ by 13 years of genocidal sanctions.

For describing his comment as ‘obscene’, Mackay instantly blocked us on Twitter. His brutal demand reminded us of the comment made by columnist Thomas Friedman in the New York Times:

‘Like it or not, we are at war with the Serbian nation… and the stakes have to be very clear: Every week you ravage Kosovo is another decade we will set your country back by pulverising you. You want 1950? We can do 1950. You want 1389? We can do 1389 too.’

We can enjoy the ‘shock and awe’ of that comment, if we have no sense at all that Serbian people are real human beings capable of suffering, love, loss and death exactly as profound as our own.

On Britain’s Channel 5, BBC stalwart Jeremy Vine told a caller, Bill, from Manchester:

‘Bill, Bill, the brutal reality is, if you put on a uniform for Putin and you go and fight his war, you probably deserve to die, don’t you?’

Unlike his celebrated interviewer, Bill, clearly no fan of Putin, had retained his humanity:

‘Do you?! Do kids deserve to die, 18, 20 – called up, conscripted – who don’t understand it, who don’t grasp the issues?’

Vine’s sage reply:

‘That’s life! That’s the way it goes!’

We all know what would have happened to Vine if he had said anything remotely comparable of the US-UK forces that illegally invaded Iraq.

MSNBC commentator Clint Watts observed:

‘Strangest thing – entire world watching a massive Russian armor formation plow towards Kyiv, we cheer on Ukraine, but we’re holding ourselves back. NATO Air Force could end this in 48 hrs. Understand handwringing about what Putin would do, but we can see what’s coming’

The strangest thing is media commentators reflexively imagining that US-UK-NATO can lay any moral or legal claim to act as an ultra-violent World Police.

Professor Michael McFaul of Stanford University, also serving with the media’s 101^st Chairborne Division, appeared to be experiencing multiple wargasms when he tweeted:

‘More Stingers to Ukraine! More javelins! More drones!’

Two hours later:

‘More NLAWs [anti-tank missiles], Stingers (the best ones), and Javelins for Ukraine! Now!’

Echoing Mackay, McFaul raved (and later deleted):

‘There are no more “innocent” “neutral” Russians anymore. Everyone has to make a choice— support or oppose this war. The only way to end this war is if 100,000s, not thousands, protest against this senseless war. Putin can’t arrest you all!’

Courageous words indeed from his Ivy League office. Disturbing to note that McFaul was ambassador to Russia under Barack Obama, widely considered to be a saint.

‘Shockingly Arrogant Meddling’ – The Missing History

So how did we get here? State-corporate news coverage has some glaring omissions.

In February 2014, after three months of violent, US-aided protests, much of it involving neo-Nazi anti-government militias, the president of Ukraine, Viktor Yanukovych, fled Kiev for Russia. Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR) provide some context:

‘On February 6, 2014, as the anti-government protests were intensifying, an anonymous party (assumed by many to be Russia) leaked a call between Assistant Secretary of State [Victoria] Nuland and US ambassador to Ukraine Geoffrey Pyatt. The two officials discussed which opposition officials would staff a prospective new government, agreeing that Arseniy Yatsenyuk — Nuland referred to him by the nickname “Yats” — should be in charge. It was also agreed that someone “high profile” be brought in to push things along. That someone was Joe Biden.’

The BBC reported Nuland picking the new Ukrainian leader:

‘I think “Yats” is the guy who’s got the economic experience, the governing experience.’

FAIR continues:

‘Weeks later, on February 22, after a massacre by suspicious snipers brought tensions to a head, the Ukrainian parliament quickly removed Yanukovych from office in a constitutionally questionable maneuver. Yanukovych then fled the country, calling the overthrow a coup. On February 27, Yatsenyuk became prime minister.’

We can read between the lines when Nuland described how the US had invested ‘over $5 billion’ to ‘ensure a secure and prosperous and democratic Ukraine’.

In a rare example of dissent in the Guardian, Ted Galen Carpenter, senior fellow for defence and foreign policy studies at the Cato Institute, wrote this week:

‘The Obama administration’s shockingly arrogant meddling in Ukraine’s internal political affairs in 2013 and 2014 to help demonstrators overthrow Ukraine’s elected, pro‐​Russia president was the single most brazen provocation, and it caused tensions to spike. Moscow immediately responded by seizing and annexing Crimea, and a new cold war was underway with a vengeance…’

Carpenter concluded:

‘Washington’s attempt to make Ukraine a Nato political and military pawn (even absent the country’s formal membership in the alliance) may end up costing the Ukrainian people dearly.

‘History will show that Washington’s treatment of Russia in the decades following the demise of the Soviet Union was a policy blunder of epic proportions. It was entirely predictable that Nato expansion would ultimately lead to a tragic, perhaps violent, breach of relations with Moscow. Perceptive analysts warned of the likely consequences, but those warnings went unheeded. We are now paying the price for the US foreign policy establishment’s myopia and arrogance.’

Within days of the 2014 coup, troops loyal to Russia took control of the Crimea peninsula in the south of Ukraine. As Jonathan Steele, a former Moscow correspondent for the Guardian, recently explained:

‘NATO’s stance over membership for Ukraine was what sparked Russia’s takeover of Crimea in 2014. Putin feared the port of Sevastopol, home of Russia’s Black Sea fleet, would soon belong to the Americans.’

The New Yorker magazine describes political scientist John Mearsheimer as ‘one of the most famous critics of American foreign policy since the end of the Cold War’:

‘For years, Mearsheimer has argued that the U.S., in pushing to expand NATO eastward and establishing friendly relations with Ukraine, has increased the likelihood of war between nuclear-armed powers and laid the groundwork for Vladimir Putin’s aggressive position toward Ukraine. Indeed, in 2014, after Russia annexed Crimea, Mearsheimer wrote that “the United States and its European allies share most of the responsibility for this crisis.”’

Mearsheimer argues that Russia views the expansion of NATO to its border with Ukraine as ‘an existential threat’:

‘If Ukraine becomes a pro-American liberal democracy, and a member of NATO, and a member of the E.U., the Russians will consider that categorically unacceptable. If there were no NATO expansion and no E.U. expansion, and Ukraine just became a liberal democracy and was friendly with the United States and the West more generally, it could probably get away with that.’

Mearsheimer adds:

‘I think the evidence is clear that we did not think he [Putin] was an aggressor before February 22, 2014. This is a story that we invented so that we could blame him. My argument is that the West, especially the United States, is principally responsible for this disaster. But no American policymaker, and hardly anywhere in the American foreign-policy establishment, is going to want to acknowledge that line of argument…’

In 2014, then US Secretary of State John Kerry had the gall to proclaim of Russia’s takeover of Crimea:

‘You just don’t in the 21st century behave in 19th century fashion by invading another country on completely trumped up pretext.’

Senior BBC correspondents somehow managed to report such remarks from Kerry and others, without making any reference to the West’s invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan.

The pattern persists today. When Fox News recently spoke about the Russia-Ukraine crisis with former US Secretary of State, Condoleezza Rice, one of the key perpetrators of the illegal invasion-occupations of Afghanistan and Iraq, she nodded her head in solemn agreement when the presenter said:

‘When you invade a sovereign nation, that is a war crime.’

The cognitive dissonance required to engage in this discussion and pass it off as serious analysis is truly remarkable.

Noam Chomsky highlights one obvious omission in Western media coverage of Ukraine, or any other crisis involving NATO:

‘The question we ought to be asking ourselves is why did NATO even exist after 1990? If NATO was to stop Communism, why is it now expanding to Russia?’

It is sobering to read the dissenting arguments above and recall Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer’s warning to MPs last week:

‘Let me be very clear – There will be no place in this party for false equivalence between the actions of Russia and the actions of Nato.’

The Independent reported that Starmer’s warning came ‘after leading left-wingers – including key shadow cabinet members during the Jeremy Corbyn-era key, John McDonnell and Diane Abbott – were threatened with the removal of the whip if their names were not taken off a Stop the War letter that had accused the UK government of “aggressive posturing”, and said that Nato “should call a halt to its eastward expansion”’.

Starmer had previously waxed Churchillian on Twitter:

‘There will be dark days ahead. But Putin will learn the same lesson as Europe’s tyrants of the last century: that the resolve of the world is harder than he imagines and the desire for liberty burns stronger than ever. The light will prevail.’

Clearly, that liberty does not extend to elected Labour MPs criticising NATO.

In the Guardian, George Monbiot contributed to the witch-hunt, noting ominously that comments made by John Pilger ‘seemed to echo Putin’s speech the previous night’. By way of further evidence:

‘The BBC reports that Pilger’s claims have been widely shared by accounts spreading Russian propaganda.’

Remarkably, Monbiot offered no counter-arguments to ‘Pilger’s claims’, no facts, relying entirely on smear by association. This was not journalism; it was sinister, hit and run, McCarthy-style propaganda.

Earlier, Monbiot had tweeted acerbically:

‘Never let @johnpilger persuade you that he has a principled objection to occupation and invasion. He appears to be fine with them, as long as the aggressor is Russia, not Israel, the US or the UK.’

In fact, for years, Pilger reported – often secretly and at great risk – from the Soviet Union and its European satellites. A chapter of his book, ‘Heroes’, is devoted to his secret meetings with and support for Soviet dissidents (See: John Pilger, ‘Heroes’, Pan, 1987, pp.431-440). In his 1977 undercover film on Czechoslovakia, ‘A Faraway Country’, he described the country’s oppressors as ‘fascists’. He commented:

‘The people I interview in this film know they are taking great risks just by talking to me, but they insist on speaking out. Such is their courage and their commitment to freedom in Czechoslovakia.’

Three days before Monbiot’s article was published in the Guardian, Pilger had tweeted of Ukraine:

‘The invasion of a sovereign state is lawless and wrong. A failure to understand the cynical forces that provoked the invasion of Ukraine insults the victims.’

Pilger is one of the most respected journalists of our time precisely because he has taken a principled and consistent stand against all forms of imperialism, including Soviet imperialism, Chinese imperialism (particularly its underpinning of Pol Pot), Indonesian imperialism (its invasion of East Timor), and so on.

Conclusion – ‘Whataboutism’ Or ‘Wearenobetterism’?

Regardless of the history and context of what came before, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is a major international crime and the consequences are hugely serious.

Our essential point for over 20 years has been that the public is bombarded with the crimes of Official Enemies by ‘mainstream’ media, while ‘our’ crimes are ignored, or downplayed, or ‘justified’. A genuinely free and independent media would be exactly as tough and challenging on US-UK-NATO actions and policies as they are on Russian actions and policies.

To point out this glaring double standard is not to ‘carry water for Putin’; any more than pointing out state-corporate deceptions over Iraq, Libya and Syria meant we held any kind of candle for Saddam, Gaddafi or Assad.

As Chomsky has frequently pointed out, it is easy to condemn the crimes of Official Enemies. But it is a basic ethical principle that, first and foremost, we should hold to account those governments for which we share direct political and moral responsibility. This is why we focus so intensively on the crimes of our own government and its leading allies.

We have condemned Putin’s war of aggression and supported demands for an immediate withdrawal. We are not remotely pro-Russian government – we revile Putin’s tyranny and state violence exactly as much as we revile the West’s tyrannical, imperial violence. We have repeatedly made clear that we oppose all war, killing and hate. Our guiding belief is that these horrors become less likely when journalism drops its double standards and challenges ‘our’ crimes in the same way it challenges ‘theirs’.

Chomsky explained:

‘Suppose I criticise Iran. What impact does that have? The only impact it has is in fortifying those who want to carry out policies I don’t agree with, like bombing.’

Our adding a tiny drop of criticism to the tsunami of Western global, billion-dollar-funded, 24/7 loathing of Putin achieves nothing beyond the outcome identified by Chomsky. If we have any hope of positively impacting the world, it lies in countering the illusions and violence of the government for which we are morally accountable.

But why speak up now, in particular? Shouldn’t we just shut up and ‘get on board’ in a time of crisis? No, because war is a time when propaganda messages are hammered home with great force: ‘We’re the Good Guys standing up for democracy.’ It is a vital time to examine and challenge these claims.

What critics dismiss as ‘Whataboutism’ is actually ‘Wearenobetterism’. If ‘we’ are no better, or if ‘we’ are actually worse, then where does that leave ‘our’ righteous moral outrage? Can ‘compassion’ rooted in deep hypocrisy be deeply felt?

Critics dismissing evidence of double standards as ‘whataboutery’, are promoting the view that ‘their’ crimes should be wholly condemned, but not those committed by ‘Us’ and ‘Our’ allies. The actions of Official Enemies are to be judged by a different standard than that by which we judge ourselves.

As we pointed out via Twitter:

Spot all the high-profile commentators who condemn Russia’s aggression against Ukraine…

…and who remain silent about or support:

* Invasions of Afghanistan & Iraq

* NATO’s destruction of Libya

* Saudi-led coalition bombing of Yemen

* Apartheid Israel’s crushing of Palestinians

The question has to be asked: Is the impassioned public response to another media bombardment of the type described by Howard Zinn at the top of this alert a manifestation of the power of human compassion, or is it a manifestation of power?

Are we witnessing genuine human concern, or the ability of global state-corporate interests to sell essentially the same story over and over again? The same bad guy: Milosevic, Bin Laden, Saddam, Gaddafi, Assad and Putin; the same Good Guys: US, UK, NATO and ‘our’ obedient clients; the same alleged noble cause: freedom, democracy, human rights; the same means: confrontation, violence, a flood of bombs and missiles (‘the best ones’). And the same results: control of whole countries, massively increased arms budgets, and control of natural resources.

Ultimately, we are being asked to believe that the state-corporate system that has illegally bombed, droned, invaded, occupied and sanctioned so many countries over the last few decades – a system that responds even to the threat of human extinction from climate change with ‘Blah, blah, blah!’ – is motivated by compassion for the suffering of Ukrainian civilians. As Erich Fromm wrote:

‘To be naive and easily deceived is impermissible, today more than ever, when the prevailing untruths may lead to a catastrophe because they blind people to real dangers and real possibilities.’ (Fromm, ‘The Art Of Being’, Continuum, 1992, p.19)

DE and DC

medialens.org

You get a lot of moral clarity when you realize that the US government is the most despotic and corrupt regime on the entire planet by a very wide margin. This clarity informs your perspective in a way that helps you see through a lot of the propaganda narratives that are laid over the public’s vision about what’s going on in our world.

Whenever I say the US is the most tyrannical regime on earth I get a lot of objections from people, and these are always people who simply haven’t thought very hard about the horrific realities of US foreign policy. Sure you can name some governments who are more brutal and oppressive toward their own citizenry than Washington, but you can’t name any who are more brutal and oppressive overall when you zoom out and look at the big picture.

The United States is currently circling the planet with hundreds of military bases and waging wars which have killed millions and displaced tens of millions just since the turn of this century. Its sanctions and blockades are starving people to death en masse every single day. It works to destroy any nation which disobeys its dictates by toppling their governments via CIA coups, proxy armies, partial and full-scale invasions, and the most egregious number of election interferences in the entire world.

Biden picked up where Trump left off and has been aggressively bombing Somalia.

Successive US administrations have cycled through a myriad of excuses to bomb the country, not acknowledging that they are bombing the very “terrorists” they created.https://t.co/QJ2yc6YbN8

— The Grayzone (@TheGrayzoneNews) August 13, 2021

There is no other government on earth about which you can say anything like any of these things. No other government on earth is doing anything which rises to this level of evil. Not Iran, not North Korea, not Russia or China or any of the other big scary boogeymen we’re told we must be afraid of my the mass media. You can argue that other governments have perpetrated comparable evils in the past, but you cannot argue that any of them are doing so currently. In our present reality as it actually exists, the United States is the worst monster, and it’s not even close.

There’s really no counter-argument to this. Even if you’re an intellectual six year-old and still believed in 2021 that the US uses its military for beneficent purposes, the fact that we now know the US military just wasted trillions of dollars and thousands of lives on a 20-year war which accomplished literally nothing besides making horrible people rich and lied to the world about it the entire time should dispel that childish delusion once and for all.

The fact that the US happens to export the bulk of its tyranny outside of its borders (though certainly not all of it) doesn’t change the fact that it is more tyrannical than any other government. This just means its tyranny dominates the entire world instead of a single nation.

And ordinary Americans don’t even get anything out of it. It would be bad enough if they were consenting to their government committing murderous piracy around the world because all that theft was enriching their lives and making Americans the wealthiest, happiest and healthiest people on earth, but it isn’t. Americans experience some of the world’s worst wealth inequality without any of the social safety nets afforded to people in every other developed nation, so they’re not even getting a slice of the piracy pie. They only consent to their government being the most despotic regime on earth because they are propagandized.

Afghanistan Proves The US Military Needs Its Budget Slashed To Ribbons

For 20 years the Pentagon lied that it’s building a government that can stand on its own. Now it’s crunch time, and it turns out they were building a fake movie set made of cardboard.https://t.co/ijytSfSuWY

— Caitlin Johnstone (@caitoz) August 11, 2021

So in this sense all the accusations the US and its allies make against governments which refuse to bow to Washington are in reality a kind of whataboutism. “Whataboutism” is a word empire apologists constantly bleat whenever you point out that the US is perpetrating some version of an abuse it accuses another government of perpetrating (and it always is), but in reality they’re the ones using accusations to try and distract the conversation from what it should actually be about: the most tyrannical and abusive government on earth.

There is no legitimate reason to focus on the abuses of any other power structure as long as the US and its allies are committing vastly worse atrocities. The most powerful and destructive government on earth should be receiving far more criticism than any other, but instead, because its propaganda dominates the world, it actually receives far less criticism. Being clear on this gross imbalance and the need to correct it is instructive for anyone with their eyes open, because it shows where your efforts and opposition should be directed.

caityjohnstone.medium.com

The US-centralized empire is waging nonstop wars that have killed millions of human beings just since the turn of this century, and people will still say things like “We’ve really got to do something about Cuba.”

The US-centralized empire is circling the planet with hundreds of military bases, working to destroy any nation which disobeys its dictates and brandishing armageddon weapons at its enemies like a drunken hillbilly with a shotgun, and people are still like “Something must be done about China’s intellectual property theft!”

Among the violent and destructive governments in our world, one towers high above all the others in a league entirely of its own. Add in the malign behavior of its allies, who effectively function as arms of the same single empire on foreign policy, and the gap between it and the next-worst offender grows even greater. And yet, somehow, many people act as though this power structure should not face a unique level of criticism and scrutiny.

When imperialists yell the word “whataboutism” what they really mean is “Stop pointing out the damning contradictions, inconsistencies and hypocrisy of my position.”

— Caitlin Johnstone (@caitoz) August 6, 2020

A lot of propaganda-addled empire loyalists bleat the terms “whataboutism” and “false equivalency” at anyone who responds to criticisms of nations like Russia or China by pointing out the terrible things the US does and continues to do, implying that America is far better than those other nations and that even bringing them into the same conversation is absurd. And they are correct, it is absurd, but for the exact opposite reason they think: the US is far, far worse.

There is no other power structure that is anywhere near as violent, thuggish and authoritarian as the one that is currently using its military and economic might to murder, starve, bully and cajole the rest of humanity into submission and obedience to its interests. No one else comes anywhere remotely close. Any analysis of international dynamics which fails to place this fact front and center in its understanding is necessarily a flawed, power-serving analysis.

It’s not just the brainwashed human livestock of the mainstream who fail to take this reality into account, but also many self-styled “anarchists” and other ideologues who fancy themselves to be up-punching critics of power. The mantra “I oppose all governments equally” will often see such types enthusiastically supporting the downfall of US-targeted governments like Syria and China, simply because those governments are more authoritarian than they’d like. Because it’s not informed by a reality-based weighting of world power dynamics as they actually exist, their “anti-authoritarianism” sees them supporting the most tyrannical agendas of the most tyrannical power structure on earth.

The “I oppose all governments equally” flag. pic.twitter.com/MJGdXerObo

— Caitlin Johnstone (@caitoz) March 31, 2021

You’ll hear them called “anarcho-imperialists” or “anarcho-neocons” by anti-imperialists; people whose internet anarchism leads them to actively facilitate western propaganda initiatives against targeted governments because those governments are not pure and utopian enough for the delicate sensibilities in their blond dreadlock-adorned heads. They’ll pay lip service to opposing the US government too, but “opposing all governments” without that opposition reflecting the fact that one government is orders of magnitude worse than any other is supporting that very government.

The fallacy of “I oppose all governments equally” is best summarized by the Anatole France quote, “In its majestic equality, the law forbids rich and poor alike to sleep under bridges, beg in the streets and steal loaves of bread.” All things are not equal, and treating all governments as though they are the same will always serve the interests of the most powerful government.

It’s like those American libertarians who say “I oppose all forms of welfare, including corporate welfare!” Well guess what mate? Put your shoulder against that value system and shove, and then watch whose welfare ends up getting cut. I’ll give you a hint: it won’t be the rich guys.

Force always flows most freely when it’s being directed against those who power opposes, next most freely when it’s directed against those to whom power is indifferent, and least freely when it’s directed against the most powerful themselves. It’s always far easier to flow with power than against it; that’s why the richest people are always those who collaborate with existing power structures. Firing your energy at “all governments equally” will see that energy picked up and ran with wherever it opposes the governments the largest power structure doesn’t like.

“Neither Washington nor Beijing”, is essentially (and secretly) a pro-Washington, anti-Beijing position.

Equating both sides always helps the more evil side.

Just because both US and China are wrong, doesn’t mean both are equally wrong.

— Maitreya Bhakal (@MaitreyaBhakal) February 28, 2021

As journalist Maitreya Bhakal recently put it:

“Neither Washington nor Beijing”, is essentially (and secretly) a pro-Washington, anti-Beijing position. Equating both sides always helps the more evil side. Just because both US and China are wrong, doesn’t mean both are equally wrong.

The problem is the nation that is infinitely less wrong than the other, is criticized infinitely more. Criticism should be proportional to the crime. This is why those who push for “equality before law” in China — ignore it while comparing China to US.

It’s basically like saying “Neither Hitler nor Obama”: Imagine how pleased Hitler would be at being equated with Obama — no matter the latter’s crimes. Those who call for nuance when opposing “whataboutism” fail to apply nuance when comparing US and China. Thus, the effect (and in many cases, the purpose) of Bothsidesism is to not only to make the more evil side look less evil, but also to justify the more evil side’s evil atrocities against the less evil side.

People often tell me “You don’t oppose imperialism, you only criticize US imperialism!” And to them I always reply, well, show me the other government that’s circling the planet with hundreds of military bases, waging nonstop wars and orchestrating the destruction of any nation which disobeys it. I’ll criticize that one too.

China is just as imperialist as America, Caitlin! pic.twitter.com/f6pdfimMja

— Caitlin Johnstone (@caitoz) March 20, 2021

I make no bones about the fact that I prefer to focus my criticisms on the most powerful and destructive power structure in the world. It’s not weird and suspicious to do this, it’s weird and suspicious that more people don’t do it. It is the sane and normal thing to do, and the fact that this isn’t the default assumption says so much about how extensively our society is wound around the convenience of the powerful.

Not only is focusing your opposition on the most powerful and destructive government the most rational use of your energy, it’s also impossible to circulate criticisms of US-targeted nations without facilitating and participating in the US propaganda campaigns against those governments. I guarantee you that if I changed my tune and suddenly began authoring articles decrying the treatment of Alexei Navalny and the Uyghurs in Xinjiang province, those articles would go more viral than anything I have ever written, because they flow in the direction of existing imperialist propaganda campaigns. I would be responsible for the consequences of my doing this.

And there would be consequences. Before they launch missiles, they launch narratives. Before they drop bombs, they drop propaganda. The path to every bullet in every war is paved with mass-scale narrative manipulation, and when we choose to participate in that paving we are just as culpable for the death and destruction that ensues as the guys who drop the actual bombs. The devastating effects of war against nations like Syria or Iran and the potentially world-ending consequences of cold war aggressions against Russia and China rest on the shoulders of those who helped circulate the narratives which facilitated them.

So be real with yourself about what you’re putting out there, and be responsible about it. Be mindful of whether you’re helping to advance an agenda with a lot of energy behind it from the most powerful forces on earth, because those are the agendas that will be enacted. Don’t let your “anarchism” turn you into a goddamn stormtrooper for the empire.

caityjohnstone.medium.com

(Thanks to John Helmer who, as far as I know, was the first to suggest that Moscow is preparing a treason accusation against him.)

On 1 February RT published a video taken by the FSB of a meeting between Second Secretary Ford of the British Embassy in Moscow, identified by the FSB as an SIS officer, and Vladimir Ashurkov at a restaurant in Moscow. The video was filmed some time in 2012. Ashurkov is the Executive Director of Navalny’s Anti-Corruption Foundation; he is presently living in the UK where he sought refuge after being charged with embezzlement. In the video he is making a pitch for financial support to the tune of “10, 20 million dollars a year” not, he assures Ford, “a big amount of money for people who have billions at stake”. In short, invest in us us and, when we take over, we’ll pay you back. With interest. Big interest. In the meantime, perhaps Ford could get him some kompromat for use inside Russia. In a word, he’s trying to sell Russia to a foreign power. Which, by any standards, is treason. Ford is non-committal and merely suggests that Ashurkov look to one of the foreign NGOs that the British fund. (It should be understood that the “N” in “NGO”, is silent like the “p” in “pseudo”.). But, given that the video was made six or seven years ago, we don’t know whether the British or others took up Ashurkov on his offer. But we can be reasonably sure that the FSB knows the answer to the question.

I believe that the publication of this video marks a major step towards the Russian government charging Navalny and his organisation with treason. Note that RT attached to its report a discussion of the famous “spy rock”. Utter nonsense: “alleged… allegedly… allegations”, a “fabrication”, more “pressure against Russian NGOs” RFE/RL assured us in 2006; “they had us bang to rights” admitted a British official in 2012. The FSB has cleverly disarmed the expected cries of fake! setup! lies! and other denials from the West by reminding everyone that it was the FSB that told the truth that time.

Security services hate revealing anything. Their unvarying intention is to hang onto information because a little bit of information can be nursed into a lot of information: a seed revealed is just a seed, but a seed kept and nurtured can grow into a forest. I recommend Spies: The Rise and Fall of the KGB in America to show how the ancestors of Russia’s security organisations nurtured every little seed until they grew so big a network in the American government that they were probably better informed than the White House. So, to get them to give up a seed is a big step. It doesn’t happen, as they say, by accident.

Consider what seeds and seedlings the FSB gave up with this video.

The video exposed a man the FSB had identified as British intelligence. They could have marked him, followed his career, noticed with whom he associated, where he went, whom he met. Fed him false information, exposed his network, found others, followed them and, who knows, turned or compromised some. Now, he’s blown and probably won’t go anywhere near the Russian world again. The British will be back-checking his contacts and network and making a damage assessment and probably shutting things down. So, the FSB gave up years of exposure and mapping of networks.

The video also reveals the degree to which the FSB is following Navalny’s organisation. Everyone assumed that it was, of course, but it appears that the surveillance team was waiting in the restaurant. So that gives away another part of the FSB’s modus operandi. For all we know, the restaurant was a favourite place of the Navalny organisation; not any more: they won’t be going there again.

Note how good the sound recording is. That would presumably reveal something about the technology and trade-craft the FSB possesses. I’m sure that, to those who know these things, other details of trade-craft and equipment were revealed as well.

It is an easy deduction that the FSB has more information that it has not revealed: for example whether Ashurkov’s pitch resulted in a sale. (Note that Navalny’s organisation receives a certain amount of funds via the anonymous Bitcoin). Neither has it revealed any other videos of similar sales pitches that one must assume it has. One can only assume that the FSB already has a good case and can trace the money.

As everyone knows, Navalny fell sick on a flight inside Russia and a few days later, wound up in a hospital in Germany saying he had been poisoned with novichok. While the ever-changing story requires the reader to completely suspend disbelief, as usual in the information war against Russia, new variants are rolled out, confident that its targets aren’t paying attention past the headlines that Putin has poisoned someone again. Thanks to John Helmer’s reporting, we know that the doctors at the Charité Hospital found many health problems when it examined Navalny but no evidence of novichok. The novichok “evidence” comes from German and Swedish military facilities which have declined to publish their findings. Navalny, for his part, has several times asserted that Putin attempted to kill him with novichok. So, we have evidence from two civilian hospitals that show no novichok; there are assertions that it was novichok, but they’re secret and come from military sources; Navalny says it was novichok. Does this look like prima facie evidence that Navalny collaborated with foreign intelligence agencies against his country?

Where did Navalny get the illustrations for his video on Putin’s supposed palace? We know that the building is very far from finished because people went to see it. So somebody supplied the faked-up interiors (complete with Putin himself). A Germany-USA production? “in early December, the [German] studio received a request from the United States about whether it had free production capacity. In strict secrecy, work began on Navalny’s film”. Perhaps there’s another charge here, given the expected importance of this “proof” of Putin’s supposed corruption for Navalny’s campaign. (Another silly story for the gullible, by the way: where would he keep his loot and when does he have time to enjoy it?)

The entire Western propaganda structure leapt on the story. I’ll just quote this one thing from the NYT’s resident sage, Thomas Friedman, because of its amusement value:

Putin is not very important to us at all. He’s a Moscow mafia don who had his agents try to kill an anti-corruption activist, Aleksei Navalny, by sprinkling a Soviet-era nerve agent, Novichok, in the crotch of his underwear. I’m not making that up! Russia once gave the world Tolstoy, Tchaikovsky, Rachmaninoff, Dostoyevsky, Sakharov and Solzhenitsyn. Putin’s Russia will be remembered for giving the world poisoned underwear.

“Poisoned underwear”, “mafia don”, “he keeps stalking us”. Plenty more where that came from: if it’s Putin or Russia, the accusation is the proof. Vide Biden’s demand that “He should be released immediately and without condition“. Suspiciously like a coordinated operation; perhaps the FSB can actually show connections.

Navalny is the latest in a long line of Western anti-Putin heroes. I’ve been in this business for three decades and I’ve forgotten half of them. Reports on protests that carefully avoid mentioning people who would spoil the narritive. Putin is a “moral idiot“. Lots of poisonings of opponents (is the absence from that list of the long-recovered and now-discarded Yushchenko significant?) and even non-poisonings; but no explanations for why the (almost invariably ineffective) poisons change: dioxin, thallium polonium and now novichok. Protests are always about to bring him down. Endless endless nonsense about Putin himself – too much to catalogue. Russophrenia. And so on and on; the people change – Browder and Khodorkovskiy fade to the background, Berezovskiy gives up, begs to be allowed home, kills himself (they say) – but the story never changes. Pussy Riot was huge until it wasn’t. Pavlenskiy does something in Russia, he’s a hero, same thing in France, he’s arrested. Always a fraudulent election in Russia (Moscow should take a leaf out of Washington’s book and call all such claims “conspiracy theories” and block discussion.) Washington says it had the MH17 shootdown on film, but you can’t see it. Nothing is ever proven but it never stops. The audience is assumed to have the IQ and attention span of gnats: Moscow hacked the U.S. election system in 2016 but in 2020 the system was watertight while Russia was hacking everything else. It’s information war; most of it nonsense from proven liars. Maybe Moscow has had enough. The Biden Administration is full of Russia-baiters all fully invested in the Trump/Putin conspiracy theory; there will be no change; it’s time for Moscow to give up expecting anything else.

Maybe Moscow is going to make an example of the latest Western favourite and charge him with treason and prove it. Maybe that’s why this video was released. It would appear to be a case of “providing financial, technical, advisory or other assistance to a foreign state or international organization . . . directed at harming Russia’s security” as the treason law puts it. A revision of the law that came into effect, as it happens, in the year the video was recorded. Collaborating with foreign intelligence structures to create a poisoning narrative would appear to fit the definition too. How about writing a letter to a foreign head of state asking him to sanction your country?

And more hints of evaporated patience: Moscow handed over to the OSCE videos of Western police beating up protesters – Austria, the Netherlands, Poland, the USA, Finland, France and the Czech Republic – helpfully pointing out “For doubters, we have shown a contrasting model. How they do it and how we do it. Feel the difference”. The message is clear: motes and beams; or, as they like to say in the West, “whataboutism“. Moscow then expelled diplomats from three countries, accusing them of participating in protests.

Washington, London et alia will protest in the usual way with all the usual statements about human rights that they themselves are pretty casual about at home (“Почувствуйте разницу”), but I suspect that Moscow doesn’t care much what its enemies say. In this matter it may well be that the idiotic Navalny poisoning story, coming after all the other evidence-free accusations, was the last straw. And perhaps Beijing’s success in shutting down the equally foreign-inspired troubles in Hong Kong was an encouraging example.

We will see, but it’s another indication that Moscow has had enough. After all, there’s an audience out there that isn’t glued to CNN and the NYT. There’s no chance of changing minds in Washington or London; it might still be possible in Berlin and Paris – Nord Stream II is probably the test – but there are hundreds of millions out there who are listening. Zone B, the Saker calls it.

Disney is the subject of controversy in mainstream circles again, not because it is a sprawling monopolistic media megaconglomerate whose giant Mickey head is devouring the world like Galactus, but because parts of its live-action version of Mulan were filmed in Xinjiang province.

Vox reports:

“Some viewers who paid to stream the movie on Disney+ last weekend found something troubling in the credits: Disney thanked eight government bodies in Xinjiang, a western province in China where around 2 million Uighur Muslims have been forced into concentration camps by the Chinese government. It turns out parts of Mulan were filmed in Xinjiang two years ago, well after the world knew about Beijing’s plan to ‘reeducate’ Uighurs with Communist Party doctrine.”

I Don’t Always Believe CIA Narratives. But When I Do, I Believe Them About China.

“China is such a curious anomaly in the narrative matrix. Many who are normally skeptical of claims by western governments immediately swallow anything said about China.”https://t.co/1EtQOPOFee

— Caitlin Johnstone (@caitoz) July 22, 2020

Now it is worth pointing out at this point that there is no reason to accept on faith the claim that two million Uighur Muslims have been forced into concentration camps in Xinjiang. The US-centralized empire is ramping up a propaganda campaign against China to manufacture support for cold war escalations with the goal of preventing the emergence of a true multipolar world, and that empire has an extensive history of lying about these things. There are massive, gaping plot holes in the Xinjiang narrative we’re being fed by the State Department stenographers in the mass media, and its key points of evidence always trace back to extremely dubious sources like the odious fanatic Adrian Zenz.

None of this proves the Uighur population isn’t being persecuted to some extent in Xinjiang; propaganda campaigns are typically wrapped around some sort of hard factual center and it’s entirely possible that there’s some degree of truth to them. We just have no reason to believe unproven claims by known liars at this time; there’s no proof of their claims that rises to the level required in a post-Iraq invasion world. Doesn’t mean you should believe the Chinese government are a bunch of girl scouts, it just means you don’t accept claims about them as true and verified when they are not.

But the point I’m actually interested in making today is that even if we were to pretend the establishment claims about what’s happening in Xinjiang have been completely authenticated by independently verifiable proof, it still wouldn’t be as bad as what the US is doing on the same front.

China’s official reason for having had what it calls voluntary “vocational training” camps is to fight extremism to counteract the large number of terrorist attacks that have been happening in Xinjiang, which even if involuntary would be similar to what has been tried by US allies like Saudi Arabia and France. It doesn’t matter if you believe China’s official argument; that’s irrelevant to the comparison I’m about to make because America’s official argument for its “war on terror” is bogus anyway.

Tens Of Millions Of People Displaced By The ‘War On Terror’, The Greatest Scam Ever Invented

A new report has found that at least 37 million people (a conservative estimate) have been displaced as a result of America’s so-called “war on terror” since 9/11https://t.co/MsFul5zf7L

— Caitlin Johnstone (@caitoz) September 9, 2020

So that’s what China claims it’s doing to combat terrorism, and, even if we fully accept the CIA/CNN narrative on the matter as being 100 percent true, the consequences of that effort are that millions of Uighurs are currently imprisoned in cruel concentration camps.

Meanwhile, what does the US claim it is doing to fight terrorism? Launching full-scale ground invasions, toppling regimes, nonstop bombing campaigns, genocidal proxy wars, and illegal occupations.

Researcher Nicolas J S Davies put together a three-part investigation for Consortium News in 2018 to find out how many people had been killed in America’s post-9/11 wars. Part one covers Iraq, part two covers Afghanistan and Pakistan, and part three covers Libya, Syria, Yemen and Somalia. At the end of the series, Davies writes the following:

“Altogether, in the three parts of this report, I have estimated that America’s post-9/11 wars have killed about 6 million people. Maybe the true number is only 5 million. Or maybe it is 7 million. But I am quite certain that it is several millions.”

Several millions. Not detained. Not involuntarily subjected to re-education programs. Killed. Five to seven million lives snuffed out, in the name of fighting “terrorism”.

That’s just people who were killed. It says nothing of the tens of millions of people America’s so-called “war on terror” who were forced to flee their homes in desperation. It says nothing of the mass-scale chaos, suffering and trauma that America’s response to acts of terrorism have inflicted upon people which will affect them for the rest of their lives.

This is plainly worse than even the very worst things the US is accusing China of doing.

When imperialists yell the word “whataboutism” what they really mean is “Stop pointing out the damning contradictions, inconsistencies and hypocrisy of my position.”

— Caitlin Johnstone (@caitoz) August 6, 2020

I do not bring this up with the intention of committing the unforgivable sin of “whataboutism”, but to point out that the governments, politicians, pundits and reporters who are rending their garments about human rights violations in Xinjiang do not actually care about human rights. If they did they would be putting more effort into attacking the depravity of their own government’s escalating “war on terror” than they are into unsubstantiated and far less egregious allegations against a nation that their government has targeted for balkanization.

I point this out because all the most prominent voices condemning China for human rights abuses in Xinjiang are not trying to help the Uighurs, they are trying to retain status and esteem in the globe-sprawling empire whose existence depends on continually destroying, undermining and absorbing any power which stands against them. Xinjiang is a geostrategically crucial region on the world stage for the role it’s to play in China’s Belt and Road Initiative, and both China and the US-centralized empire want it working in their own interests. Only difference is it is actually a Chinese territory.

Ignore the fake garment-rending of people who criticize other governments more than they criticize the far worse behaviors of their own. Stay focused on facts and evidence, be ever mindful of agendas, and remain always unapologetically skeptical of the narratives of power.

medium.com

 – Dan Zak: “Whataboutism: The Cold War tactic, thawed by Putin, is brandished by Donald Trump“. Washington Post, 18 August 2017

“Trump Embraces One Of Russia’s Favorite Propaganda Tactics — Whataboutism”

– Danielle Kurtzleben, NPR, 17 March 2017

Essentially, it’s an appeal to hypocrisy ― a logical fallacy also known as “tu quoque.” Instead of proving that your opponent’s claim is wrong on its face, whataboutism argues that it’s hypocritical of the opponent to make that claim at all.

And, the author helpfully goes on to explain: “Perhaps unsurprisingly, considering the Trump administration’s murky ties to Vladimir Putin and his associates, whataboutism is viewed by many as a Russian import.” Trumputin again! (Written, of course, before Mueller crashed.)

The author is half right: it’s hypocrisy, but it’s not an appeal to it, it’s a revelation of it.

As the quotations above show it’s a real meme: Google has thousands of hits on “trump putin whataboutism” – accusing someone of whataboutism, as apparently routinely practised by both, is supposed to be a final, complete and crushing response. Whataboutism is “a constant diversion away from actual relevant news items, facts, and arguments into constant accusations of hypocrisy” and a commonplace of Russian propaganda.

In a court of law someone who is accused of murder cannot defend himself by saying that his accuser has a dirty nose or, even, that he is himself a murderer. And neither is it accepted that the defence against an accusation of a dirty nose is saying that the accuser is a murderer. In a court of law the charge, whether dirty nose or murder, has to be proven to the satisfaction of the judge or jury; the personal behaviour of the accusing lawyer is not relevant.

But we’re not talking about a court of law here – we’re talking about an information war in which accusations are crafted to sway public opinion. In that “court” it is relevant to point out when the accusing dirty pot is calling the accused kettle black. Not to do so is a “diversion away from actual relevant facts” by changing the subject and pretending that the only subject is your crimes, not mine.

For example. Russia is routinely accused of violating the “Rules-Based International Order”. (What a great name: who wouldn’t want to live in a Rules-Based International Order and shun those who tried to overturn it?) A quick search turns up these accusations: “The Russian government wears its disdain for the rules-based international order as a badge of pride“; “What can the West do to keep Russia in check, when the country’s state policy is fundamentally at odds with the rules-based international order“; “It is Russia’s actions which threaten the international order on which we all depend“; “Today, I will set out how the Russian government under President Putin is taking steps that are weakening the rules-based order“; “Russia – a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council – has repeatedly attacked the global rulebook of normal behaviour.” Lots more examples can easily be found. Said Rules-Based International Order is praised as having kept world peace, as a “cornerstone” and other kinds of goodnesses. So, clearly, Putin & Co, by trying to overthrow it, are committing a crime.

But, actually, the accusation is only another propaganda shot at the contumacious Putin. Leaving aside the self-satisfied hype, we’re supposed to agree that this “order” is worldwide although few in, say, Africa or Asia would have happy feelings about it. But, most significantly we are required to not listen to what Putin actually says; over and over again, year after year: (this month): “Let me reiterate: truly mutually respectful, pragmatic and consequently solid relations can only built between independent and sovereign states“, or his essay in the NYT in 2013 when he said “The United Nations’ founders understood that decisions affecting war and peace should happen only by consensus”.

But enough of reality, back to whataboutism.

Many of these fulminations cite Crimea as the moment when Putin’s Russia irredeemably breached the Rules-Based International Order but the accusation was commonplace long before Putin appeared. Russia wanted “the right to do what it pleases in its own backyard” in 1994; was probably not going to be “an equal and fair player” and believed that “countries become strong only by making other countries weak” in 1996; was “subverting its neighbors’ independence” in 2006. In short “Russia is remarkably resistant to progress, material and moral“. In other words, fashions change but Russia is always the enemy: Russia wanted to dominate the energy reserves in the Caspian in 1997, but signed on to an equitable division in 2019. Never mind that accusation (and who remembers it now?) on to the next accusation! In 1997 we knew Russia wanted to trash the Rules-Based International Order, in 2019 we still know but fresh accusations replace the worn-out ones.

So, setting aside the fact that the Ukrainian constitution was nullified with the violent overthrow of the elected President, ignoring the fact that violence against Crimeans had already started, forgetting that the first action of the coup was to outlaw their language, ignorant that Crimea had the status of an autonomous republic, never mentioning there were already Russian troops legally there, pretending that the referendum was done at gunpoint, shedding crocodile tears over the suddenly discovered Crimean Tatars, carefully refusing to visit the place to see whether reality conforms to illusion and all the rest of it, let us do a little whataboutism.

If the return home of Crimea – that’s what the Crimeans call it – is to be considered a violation of the Rules-Based International Order, what was the smashing up of Yugoslavia? A popular expression of the self-determination of peoples or a foreign intervention for less shiny principles? What was the invasion of Afghanistan? Rules-Based or not? If the invasion of Afghanistan was “Rules-Based” on self-defence principles (still – 18 years later!) what was the “Rules-Base” for the invasion of Iraq? How about the destruction of Libya? By what principle of the Rules-Based International Order are US and allied troops in Syria? Especially “guarding” the oil fields? Where’s the “Rules-Base” that says Washington should care about what Maduro does in Venezuela, or is it a fundamental principle of the Rules-Based International Order that “It will make a big difference to the United States economically if we could have American oil companies really invest in and produce the oil capabilities in Venezuela“?

I reiterate that we are not in some courthouse in which, say the case of Crimea’s incorporation into the Russian Federation is being tried in Courtroom Number 1 and the NATO attack on Libya in Courtroom Number 2, the NATO presence in Syria in Courtroom Number 3 and so on. In that case the Russian defence team would not be justified in saying that the other guys are in court too; it would have to argue the case at hand (relying no doubt heavily on Article 1.2 of the UN Charter); in the other courtroom the defence would be relying on… good question.

We are in the “court of public opinion” and here it is relevant that NATO & Co accuse Russia of doing things without admitting that they do much worse. After all, in Russia’s so-called sins – Crimea, South Ossetia and Abkhazia – we can find solid majority support from the local population. NATO would have a harder time finding that support in its various post Cold War interventions. Or, to put it more plainly: Ossetia, Abkhazia and Crimea are pretty peaceful places; the Balkans, Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Libya etc etc are not. (To say nothing of the departure of US troops from Syria being hastened with jeers and stones.)

Occasionally Western news/propaganda outlets will confess to “the long history of the US interfering with elections elsewhere” but only to airily dismiss the issue because “the days of its worst behavior are long behind it”. (Ukraine, Venezuela, Russia and Hong Kong are not, we must assume, “interferences” and it would be “whataboutism” to suggest that they are somehow worse than the imaginary Russian intervention in the US election.)

In short, what is dismissed as “whataboutism”, and therefore unworthy of discussion, is reminder to the listener of reality; in a world of moralistic accusations that Russia has violated the sacred Rules-Based International Order it is a pointer to the West’s hypocrisy. If we are supposed to think that Russia did something bad and unlawful in Ossetia or Crimea violating the so-called Rules-Based International Order why is it wrong to point out that NATO this century has never paid a moment’s attention to the UN Charter or any other part of the, admittedly feeble, structure of international law?

The Bible advises us not to obsess about the tiny speck in the other person’s eye while ignoring the big hunk of wood in our own: “For with what judgement ye judge, ye shall be judged: and with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you again.”

And if that’s not “whataboutism” what is?