Lordre: Liz

Showing posts with label Liz_Truss. Show all posts

Get rid of Liz Truss and the warmongering braggarts

Liz Truss went too far in trying to take ownership of the war in Ukraine and proposing conditions that would never be acceptable to any administration in Moscow, threatening to further inflame and escalate the conflict, even according to The Guardian.

Truss had said that Britain should set a war aim of depriving Russia of Crimea, which Moscow considers core Russian territory and protects under its nuclear deterrent. This is such a delusional statement that it would be less absurd to have heard Russian generals talk of recapturing the Reichstag. Crimea is long gone, and Ukraine is about as likely to send troops there as it is to Vladivostok. Even pro-Western dissidents in Russia refuse to talk of Crimea as anything other than part of Russia.

In addition to her, we see Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Armed Forces James Heappey eagerly justifying attacks by Ukraine into Russian territory using UK weapons. Apparently, he is unaware of the potential risk to British territory if we set ourselves a goal of destroying targets in Russian territory.

Total war, by proxy?

In the case of both politicians mentioned here, Britain possibly overestimates its power, having no grasp of how or where Russia could respond in kind or the kind of casualties British personnel could suffer if Russia were to begin maliciously handing out all modern armaments necessary to kill British troops worldwide. It seems some of our leaders just view the Slavic mind as dull, easy prey, incapable of the creativity to even copy what we do.

We also assume that our playing by a set of rules forbidding direct attacks on the other side confines the Russians to also abiding by these rules, when that is not the case if the rules only benefit us and not them. Would we ourselves keep playing by the rules if Russia was the only beneficiary under them, and the costs for us playing were severe? A country will only allow so much damage to them indirectly, before they hastily look for ways to retaliate, even if they are caught doing so.

Any plan that includes averting a nuclear war but still destroying Russia's cities and strategic objects, using Ukrainian troops to do so as encouraged by Heappey, would be folly. Britain's targeting of strategic objects and vital defences in Russia, even using a third country or fiddling with the command structure to hide responsibility for the attacks, would trigger Russian strikes on strategic targets in Britain. It would be no different than if we began attacking Russia directly, so Russia could see nuclear attacks as a proportionate response.

A brag too far

Liz Truss seems at some level to be aware that her foolish and rash warmongering cannot be walked back. She has tried to take full ownership of the Ukrainian war effort, declaring that a defeat in this war is unthinkable and would mean a profound loss of security for us.

In reality, there is an alternative course that keeps the country safe: just get rid of Liz Truss, James Heappey, and the others who displayed misplaced military swagger and tried to take ownership of the Ukrainian war effort. This would restore a level of calm, helping prevent escalation while benefiting still from whatever they had done, if any of it had any benefit.

It is okay for common soldiers to belittle their adversaries and brag. However, a serving government minister, who believes a continent-spanning nuclear hyperpower is some easy prey they will soon hang on their wall as a personal trophy, is an imbecile. That person should not be permitted to speak another word in any official capacity.

When it comes to foreign policy, British politicians are overly fond of characterising themselves as Winston Churchill fighting against an evil aggressor abroad.

The UK has been trying to negotiate its own tripartite security pact with Ukraine and Poland, in a repeat of actions that contributed to the outbreak of World Wars One and Two. As such, it seems that the idolisation of past wartime leadership is so ingrained in British politicians that they don't mind repeating those men's mistakes.

1939, again and again

Britain's Defense Secretary Ben Wallace claimed there was a "whiff of Munich" when he visited Moscow, while continuing to warn about an imminent Russian invasion of Ukraine. What is it with the constant World War Two comparisons, which were going on even during the Iraq War?

What is happening with these politicians is a kind of cosplay. Like lesser Roman emperors, they have no identity of their own (except maybe Boris Johnson) and have to compare themselves with prior historical characters or dress up as them, as UK Foreign Secretary Liz Truss did in Moscow. And it is a portrayal of characters - as in, fictional ones. Living in comfort, it is possible that some subconscious part of us forgets that history actually happened, with our minds instead processing it only as song and story. Most of us who think of historical figures instead think of actors portraying them on a screen. Mixed with pervasive monitoring, social media, and the transformation of politics into live entertainment, the effect may be to blur the boundaries of reality and fantasy even among those involved in important policy decisions, resulting in a sense of stardom and glamour among political figures who should instead focus on reality.

Russia only needs to be compared with Russia

It is a well-known fallacy to point out that the other side, e.g. Vladimir Putin's Russia, is acting in some way like Adolf Hitler or Nazi Germany, but this fallacy has nevertheless become a talking point of British politicians. The refutation is clear: so what? Hitler enjoyed cream cakes as well, but that isn't a refutation of them.

Both sides annexed land and redrew the borders of Europe in World War Two. In fact, the Kremlin redrew more borders prior to, during and after World War Two than the Nazis did. The anti-Hitler Allies even demanded the redrawing of borders and division of Germany as a condition for post-war peace. The Nazi comparison is ridiculous, when Russia's actions are better compared with other Russian actions that the Allies approved of. Even the creation of the Eastern Bloc was agreed by the Allies themselves.

Repeating past mistakes

The assumption that the UK was a blameless and righteous power in earlier conflicts, and that the same approach should be cosplayed to maintain European security now, is also wrong.

The UK made strategically and morally dubious commitments in both World Wars and helped to start them. Britain's alliance with Belgium committed it to fight there in World War One, and was stupid. After the horrors of that conflict, the recognition that it was wrong to sacrifice so many men and deplete our own strength to protect a small country that would hardly appreciate it set in. That was the logic of Neville Chamberlain.

However maligned Chamberlain is, he had a point, from a moral perspective. As with Belgium, arguments about Britain defending Poland were irrational. Britain could not in fact help Poland, for purely logistical reasons, so it was making a pledge it could not fulfil. Of course, that did not make Britain's role in starting the war irrational; the pledge was simply fake. The strategic basis for waging a war on Germany and forgetting about Poland's fate was rational. Nazi Germany was an unacceptable competitor. Then, they conquered resources in Czechoslovakia and Poland and became an even more unacceptable competitor. The declaration of war was a choice in Britain's interests, not Poland's.

The Second World War is considered to be a just war. A consensus on that is still essential to the global security maintained by the victors of the war, the permanent members of the United Nations Security Council. However, it was only truly known to be a just war at some point during it, when evidence of Axis atrocities was clearer. In the early days of the war, the conflict seemed like no more than a repeat of World War One.

Unnecessary grand alliances

The First World War was not a just war, and was not necessary for Britain. It was solely the result of faulty moral proclamations about protecting Belgium from the propagandised "Hun". It was not worth the loss of life to Britain, to prevent the Germans from humiliating France as they did in the Franco-Prussian War and were attempting to repeat.

The current pre-"World War Three" tensions in Eastern Europe are a lot more like those of World War One than World War Two. There is no clear indication that the other side is evil, carrying out any sort of mass atrocity, or planning anything truly offensive to humanity, so there is no moral case to make an alliance.

Britain has no strategic need for Ukraine or Poland. There are no cultural, linguistic or historical ties to either country. These is no reason to share their burdens, anymore than there is a need for us to share Morocco's burdens and side with it against Western Sahara. They are completely irrelevant, and yet our necks are potentially being risked for them.

It seems as if, in their eagerness to become heroes by re-enacting World War Two, British politicians have forgotten not just the horror of that war but the horror of World War One. Their cosplay is being done with no apparent goal in mind other than their own stardom.

It would be a "strategic mistake", as UK Foreign Secretary Liz Truss put it, for Russia to attempt to conquer Ukraine entirely.

However, expectations about Russia seizing all of Ukraine and depriving the country of independence seem to be only idle speculation based on the mere presence of many Russian troops near Ukraine. Britain and America have not seen any plans about a Russian attack.

For all we know, Russia intends to maintain such troops permanently for as long as there is still a potentially dangerous conflict in the adjacent Donbass region in Ukraine. The Russian troop presence near Ukraine is no more evidence of a Russian invasion now than in spring last year, when we received the same warnings. We have been through this before.

Preserving Ukrainian democracy

What seems new, though, is the scandalous political situation in Ukraine, in part created by Western blunders. US foreign policy figures such as Professor Michael McFaul assert that Ukrainian democracy is Russia's biggest fear. This seems unlikely, when considering the oligarch-ridden and corrupt state of Ukrainian politics.

Ukraine could even be plunging into an undemocratic abyss as President Volodymyr Zelensky seeks to arrest political opponents and the US helps demonise them. Two top opponents Zelensky has sought to imprison are Petro Poroshenko, Ukraine's president following the ouster of the pro-Russian Viktor Yanukovych, and Viktor Medvedchuk, who is considered the pro-Russian favourite in the Ukrainian opposition at present. Between them, these two figures and their parties represent many of the opposition seats in Ukraine's parliament. If the US cared about democracy in Ukraine, it would ask Zelensky to cut them some slack as the EU did.

Popular opposition media have faced total bans as well, on the same grounds of alleged treasonous activity. However, any opposition activity or different foreign policy views could be construed as treasonous to the incumbent government, making democracy nearly impossible. Rather than noticing this worrying trend, the United States encourages it.

Falsely labelling Ukrainian politicians as Russian agents

Medvedchuk's preference for good relations with Russia in no way invalidates his right to compete for democratic votes in Ukraine. Don't expect the Americans to see it that way, though. Don't expect them to think external American interference in the Ukrainian parliament is any obstacle to democracy, either.

Both the US and the UK seem to have started announcing Ukrainian opposition figures are Russian agents, and it is clearly false information, endangering their ability to work and even threatening their lives. This suggests the Western countries in question are insincere about bringing democracy to Ukraine and are only looking for expansion of Western power and alliances.

Consider also that any allegations about Russia illegitimately using politics to interfere in Ukraine behind the scenes are obviously hypocritical. To unearth these interferences would require the Americans or British themselves snooping around, interfering in Ukrainian democracy and picking favourites. Is our interference somehow inherently more democratic than others, even when not based on any vote or pertaining to any attempt to assess the democratic will?

Closer to the West doesn't necessarily mean democracy

Arrests of opposition, bans on media and labelling of opposition figures as Russian assets may bolster the Western hold over the Ukrainian government and bring it closer to the NATO orbit, but we should not confuse this with advancing democracy. It literally means denigrating the country's opposition and backing a regime that wants to maintain power.

We may be looking at an example of Western countries acting with no principles and simply waving around the word "democracy". The word is used as if it doesn't point to political practice. Instead, it is presented as an elusive justification for other practices, including tyranny.

The lost wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, both of which involved the US and UK implanting deeply unpopular regimes in the name of "democracy", without realising these regimes had no legitimacy, should be a warning about what could happen in Ukraine if the current policy is maintained.

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