OMNI
US, RUSSIA, UKRAINE,
cold war ii ANTHOLOGY #17
April 8, 2022
Compiled by Dick Bennett for a Culture of Peace, Justice, and Ecology
What’s
at Stake: Like the UN Charter and the
Quakers’ AFSC and FCNL, OMNI’s anthologies seek a
world free of war and the threat of war.
These anthologies provide views alternative to those of the US War Party
(the Democrats and Republicans) and their mainstream media.
Contents of #17
Origins, CAUSES of the war
Sonja Van den Ende. Russian Perspective for Donbass
republics of
Donetsk and Luhansk.
Editor of MR. Origins of New Cold
War.
Jacques Baud Interviewed by Thomas Kaiser.
US: Prevent German and
Russian Cooperation.
US the Biggest Spoiler, Welcomes War between Ukraine and Russia.
TeleSUR. Washington’s Role in Ukraine
Jeopardizes World Stability.
Sanctions.
EU to Continue to Send Weapons to Ukraine.
Nazis in Ukraine. Putin’s Aim to
De-Nazify Ukraine.
Patrick Lancaster. Ukrainian and Azov
Forces.
Ukraine: Obama, Trump, Biden.
Jonathon Cook. Biden on Regime Change of
War Criminal Putin.
consequences of the
war
Atrocities: Bucha.
Mision Verdad, Art Hobson, Evan Bukey.
Nuclear Risks: NIRS.
Food Crisis, Hunger: Michelle Nichols,
Ukrainian Farmers.
Economic War: Prabir Purkayastha on US Dollar.
PEACEFUL FUTURE?
Constructive Peace Talks Now.
Negotiations after Ceasefire: 3 Articles from the Bulletin of the Atomic
Scientists.
TEXTS
ORIGINS, CAUSES OF THE WAR
Eye-Witness Report from Donbass:
How the War Looks From the Russian Side By Sonja Van den Ende, CovertAction Magazine, Apr 07, 2022.
[Followng in the tradition of the late Wilfred Burchett (1911-1983), an
Australian who reported on the Korean and Vietnam Wars from the communist side,
this article continues CAM’s reporting on the “other side” of the war in
Ukraine, the side that is not presented in western media. Readers can balance
this article with the pro-Ukrainian government stories we are fed every day and
try to discern the truth for themselves.—Editors]
As the war in Ukraine rages on, I visited the republics of
Donetsk and Luhansk as an embedded reporter with the Russian army.
Both of the republics are the trigger of the current conflict.
Russian President Vladimir Putin declared their independence on
February 24, 2022, something a lot of people were waiting for since the CIA
backed coup in Ukraine of February 2014. That coup had resulted in the ouster
of Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych and new laws forcing the Ukrainian
language on Russian-speaking residents. Luhansk and Donetsk consequently voted
on their independence and Ukraine attacked them, precipitating the
war. […]
The post Eye-Witness Report from Donbass:
How the War Looks From the Russian Side appeared first
on CovertAction Magazine.
The Editors . Origins
of the New Cold War and the onset of the current Russian entry into the
Ukrainian civil war. Monthly Review (April 5, 2022).
April 2022 (Volume 73, Number 11). https://monthlyreview.org/2022/04/01/mr-073-11-2022-04_0/?mc_cid=f64e38021d&mc_eid=ab2f7bf95e
As we write these notes at the beginning of
March 2022, the eight-year limited civil war in Ukraine has turned into a
full-scale war. This represents a turning point in the New Cold War and a great
human tragedy. By threatening global nuclear holocaust, these events are also
now endangering the entire world. To understand
the origins of the New Cold War and the onset of the current Russian entry into
the Ukrainian civil war, it is necessary to go back to decisions associated
with the creation of the New World Order made in Washington when the previous
Cold War ended in 1991. | more…
“The Policy of the USA Has Always been to Prevent Germany and Russia from
Cooperating More Closely” in Verein Schweizer Standpunkt by Thomas
Kaiser (March 15, 2022 ). Posted
Mar 31, 2022.
Empire, Inequality,
State
Repression, WarGermany,
Russia, United
StatesInterview
Historical, political and economic contexts of the war in
Ukraine. Interview with Jacques Baud, conducted by Thomas Kaiser.
US ENCOURAGED UKRAINE/RUSSIA
WAR to weaken Russia and for its MIC profits. Ceaseless war enriches a few and sustains the
profiteering War System. Editors. Mronline.org (4-7-22).
Global Times (March 31,
2022 ). Apr 06, 2022.
Media, State Repression, Strategy, WarEurope, Russia, Ukraine, United StatesNewswire
After the
latest round of talks between Russia and Ukraine in Turkey on Tuesday, both sides
said the negotiations released positive signals. Ukraine proposed adopting
neutral status in exchange for security guarantees from the international
community. Russia said the country would sharply cut military activity around
Kiev and Chernihiv. But…….
MORE https://mronline.org/2022/04/06/u-s-biggest-spoiler-of-ukraine-situation-european-security/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=u-s-biggest-spoiler-of-ukraine-situation-european-security&mc_cid=588796d33b&mc_eid=ab2f7bf95e
On March
24, NATO reaffirmed it “will continue to provide further political and
practical support to Ukraine” and “allies are substantially increasing their
defense expenditures.” By enhancing the role of NATO, the U.S. ties Europe more
firmly to its chariot; and through its dominant position, the U.S. has forced
Europe to take its side by escalating crisis and even war. The ultimate goal is
to constantly put Europe under its control.
While pouring cold water
on the Russia-Ukraine peace talks, the U.S. is stepping up its efforts to stir
the conflicts. This is in line with U.S. strategic needs. If Ukraine’s appeal
for a security guarantee is met, a new model of international security
guarantee will be opened up, which will mean weakening the role of the U.S. and
NATO. The U.S. clearly doesn’t want to see this result. It can be said that the
U.S. is the biggest spoiler of the
security in the entire Europe. The U.S. is the most reluctant to see a
cease-fire between Russia and Ukraine.
“Washington's Role in
Ukraine Jeopardizes World Stability”
Published 7 April 2022 0
"Ukraine will be further
devastated. And we may move on to terminal nuclear war if we do not pursue the
opportunities that exist for a negotiated settlement," Noam Chomsky said.
As the
Ukrainian conflict grinds on, picturing Washington's role in the chaos is less
challenging than predicting an endgame of the crisis. Since late February, the
United States has continued to add fuel to the fire by delivering lethal
weapons to Ukraine, goading allies into cornering Russia, and imposing massive
economic sanctions on Russian institutions and enterprises.
ANOTHER ROUND OF SANCTIONS
On
Wednesday, the United States imposed additional sanctions on Russia,
targeting its major financial institutions and the two daughters of
President Vladimir Putin. The United States will impose full blocking
sanctions on Russia's largest financial institution, Sberbank, and the
country's largest private bank, Alfa Bank, freezing any of the two banks'
assets in the U.S. financial system and prohibiting Americans from doing
business with them.
U.S.
President Joe Biden will sign an executive order banning new investment in
Russia by Americans no matter where they live, the factsheet said, adding the
executive order aims to "ensure the enduring weakening of the Russian
Federation's global competitiveness."
Since the
conflict broke out in Ukraine, the United States has imposed rounds of
sanctions on Russia, despite experts' warning that sanctions alone are
inadequate to de-escalate the tensions and might even invite a nightmare
scenario.
"For
the U.S. allies in Europe, the sanctions punish them as much as predictable
skyrocketing energy prices bedevil their economies now, and threaten even the
very survival of the European economy," said Herman Tiu Laurel,
founder of Philippine BRICS Strategic Studies.
"We
should fully understand the causes and consequences of the Russia-Ukraine
conflict. Will the sanctions against Russia solve the problem? Will the
sanctions force Russia to withdraw their troops? The answers unfortunately are
No. The sanctions will only deteriorate the world economy already weakened by
the COVID-19 pandemic," Wichai Kinchong Choi, senior vice president of the
leading Thai bank Kasikornbank, said.
U.S. ROLE IN CRISIS
The root cause of the outbreak of the conflict
is the continuous eastward expansion of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization
(NATO). Putin had repeatedly warned NATO against deploying its troops and
weapons to Ukraine, saying this represents a red line for Russia.
Russia's
concern that NATO is expanding to its borders has never been heeded by the United
States, "which is only interested in maintaining its hegemonic status in
Europe, and which has been steadily retreating from that collaborative policy
which the West committed itself to after the Cold War," said William
Jones, Washington bureau chief of the U.S. publication Executive Intelligence
Review.
In the past
several weeks, U.S. politicians have flown back and forth across the Atlantic
to instigate hostilities against Russia, while showing little interest in
acknowledging the root cause of or brokering a political solution to the
tragedy in Ukraine.
Immediately
after the Russia-Ukraine conflict broke out, Biden announced that the United
States would provide US$350 million in military aid to Ukraine. On March 16,
Biden announced an additional US$800 million in security assistance to
Ukraine.
https://www.telesurenglish.net/news/Washingtons-Role-in-Ukraine-Jeopardizes-World-Stability-20220407-0007.html
RELATED:
EU to Continue to Send Weapons to Ukraine
All these
moves run counter to global efforts to de-escalate the crisis and put world
stability in peril. No matter which side gains the upper hand in the crisis,
"the United States is the winner," said Chen Fengying, a researcher
with the China Institutes of Contemporary International Relations.
UKRAINIAN NAZIS
“Nazis in Ukraine: seeing through the fog of the information war.” Editor. Mronline.org
(4-4-22).
On February 24, Russian President Vladimir
Putin undertook what he referred to as a “special military operation … to
de-militarise and de-Nazify Ukraine.”
The UK
government admitted to sending anti-aircraft weapons weapons to Ukrainian
neo-Nazis from the white-supremacist Azov regiment of the National Guard.
1:19 PM · Apr 3,
2022·Twitter Web App, TeleSUR 4-7-22
[I
stumbled upon TWITTER messages, which looked endless.]
“Ukrainian forces want to surrender and Azov forces started shooting at
them – they are at war with each other.” Editor. Mronline.org
(3-30-22).
U.S. Navy veteran and independent journalist,
Patrick Lancaster, has been
making regular reports from Ukraine since the beginning of the crisis.
His reports reveal that what is happening on the ground is not what Western
corporate media would have you believe.
OBAMA, TRUMP, BIDEN AND UKRAINE
“Re-visiting Russiagate in light of the Ukraine war.” Editor. mronline.org (3-30-22).
Caitlin A Johnstone Blog (March 28, 2022 ).Posted Mar 29, 2022
Media,
State Repression,
Strategy, WarRussia, Ukraine, United StatesNewswireBarack Obama, Former president
of the United States of America Donald Trump, President
Vladimir Putin, Russiagate,
Ukraine War
It’s hard to believe that
the last president spent his term pouring weapons into Ukraine, shredding
treaties with Russia and ramping up cold war escalations against Moscow which
helped lead us directly to the extraordinarily dangerous
situation we now find ourselves in, and yet mainstream liberals
spent his entire administration screaming that he was a Kremlin puppet.
A lot of anti-empire
commentary is rightly going into criticizing how the Obama administration paved
the way to this conflict in Ukraine with its role in the 2014 coup and
support for Kyiv’s war against Donbass separatists. But what’s getting lost in
all this, largely because Trumpites have been using their mainstream numbers to
loudly amplify criticisms of the role of the Obama and Biden administrations in
this mess, is what happened between those two presidencies which was just as
crucial in getting us here.
Though
it’s been scrubbed from mainstream liberal history, it was actually the Trump
administration that began the U.S. policy of arming Ukraine in the first place.
Obama had refused forceful demands from neocons and liberal hawks to do so
because he feared it would provoke an attack by Russia.
In a 2015 article titled “Defying Obama, Many in Congress Press to Arm Ukraine“, The New York Times reported that “So
far, the Obama administration has refused to provide lethal aid, fearing that
it would only escalate the bloodshed and give President Vladimir V. Putin
of Russia a pretext for further incursions.” MORE
https://mronline.org/2022/03/29/re-visiting-russiagate-in-light-of-the-ukraine-war/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=re-visiting-russiagate-in-light-of-the-ukraine-war&mc_cid=f9cb4175fa&mc_eid=ab2f7bf95e
[Abel: Excellent analysis by journalist Jonathan
Cook.]
https://www.jonathan-cook.net/2022-03-30/biden-russia-regime-change/
Jonathan
Cook. “Joe Biden has confirmed to Russia
that the US really wants regime change.” 30
March 2022
Biden’s
comment – given the US record in Iraq, Libya and elsewhere – serves Putin’s
claim that his Ukraine invasion was pre-emptive.
Middle East Eye – 30 March 2022.
Did US President Joe Biden say the quiet bit
out loud at the weekend when he indicated that Washington
wanted regime change in Moscow? It may well have looked that way to his
Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin.
Earlier this month, Biden accused Putin of being a “war criminal”, even though the charge
drips with hypocrisy. Biden himself has played a critical role in Washington’s own historic war crimes:
from ensuring Congressional authorisation of the illegal invasion of Iraq in
2003 to his part in the Obama
administration’s expanded campaign of drone strikes across the Middle
East.
Then on Saturday, Biden
characterised Putin as a “butcher” who “cannot remain in power”. Perhaps
unsurprisingly, Washington officials quickly backtracked, while European allies scrambled to limit
the damage of comments suggesting the US might seek to
depose the leader of a rival nuclear power. Biden himself backtracked later.
But Putin has only to look
to other recent examples of Washington
meddling around the globe – from Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya to Syria, Iran
and Venezuela – to see that regime
change has regularly been front and centre of its playbook. Based on that
record, why would Putin imagine his own government would fare better? MORE https://www.jonathan-cook.net/2022-03-30/biden-russia-regime-change/
Excerpt: "The goal is not to ease Ukraine’s
plight, or bring the two sides to the negotiating table, but to turn it into
another quagmire for Russia, draining Moscow of manpower, firepower and
treasure, just as the US partially succeeded in doing in Syria – and long
before that, in the Soviet era, in Afghanistan.
This approach to rivals on the world stage has a long pedigree in
Washington. In 1941, a few years before he became president, Harry Truman
described the aim of the US in the Second World War as to bleed both Germany
and Russia: “If we see that Germany is winning the war, we ought to help
Russia; and if Russia is winning, we ought to help Germany, and in that way let
them kill as many as possible.”
What is
emerging is a NATO war against Russia on the cheap, with Ukraine serving as the
battlefield and Ukrainians paying the price. A further advantage for Washington
is that it can weaken Russia militarily in Ukraine while avoiding a direct
confrontation with another nuclear power. "
PART II: Some CONSEQUENCES OF
THE WAR AND OF WAR
Atrocities and Allegations of Atrocities
Photo deleted of corpses strewn on streets of
Bucha, Ukraine. Ukraine alleges Russia was behind the killings, but the
evidence does not corroborate these accusations. (Photo: Ronaldo Schemidt/AFP).
“Staged Massacre in Bucha.” Orinoco Tribune by Mision Verdad (April 5, 2022 ).
Posted Apr 07, 2022.
Inequality,
Media,
Strategy,
WarRussia,
UkraineNewswireBucha,
Corporate
Media
The city
of Bucha, in Ukraine, has recently come to the attention of the U.S. and EU
corporate media, for the purpose of criminalizing Russia for the supposed
assassination of 300 civilians. However, the lack of evidence for these claims
brings into doubt any allegations that the Russian military was involved.
After the
Ukronazi regime of Volodimir Zelensky published images depicting corpses in
Bucha, supposedly killed by the Russian military, in the middle of the street
and in mass graves, calls have been issued for Russia to be tried
internationally for war crimes.
Reuters
correspondents confirmed that they had seen bodies strewn in the streets, with
their hands and feet tied, as if they had been arrested.
The
Ukrainian Minister of Foreign Relations Dmytro Kuleba posted a series of tweets
in English with the images, and requests for the G7 countries to roll out even
more “sanctions” against the Russian Federation. He called the scene a
premeditated “massacre” carried out by the Kremlin and pleaded for more
international military aid. “Tanks, combat aircraft, heavy air defense systems.
Provide them now,” wrote Kuleba.
Sergei
Lavrov, Russia’s minister of foreign affairs, has responded that “another
attack of false claims was made in the city of Bucha, in the Kiev region, after
the Russian military had already left the area, as was planned and agreed upon.
A few days later, they organized a staged event there which the Ukrainian
spokespeople and their western sponsors have been disseminating throughout TV
channels and social media.”
Additionally the minister
of defense released a statement in
which he rejected Kiev’s accusations:
All of the
photos and videos published by the Kiev regime which supposedly show the
“crimes” committed by the Russian military in the city of Bucha, in the Kiev
region, are a novel provocation… While this city was under the control of the
Russian Armed Forces, not a single local resident was subject to violent
actions. The Russian military delivered 452 tons of humanitarian aid to
civilians in the Kiev region… During the entire period that the city was
controlled by the Russian Armed Forces and even after, the local residents
could freely move through the city of Bucha and use their cell phones… The
exits from Bucha were not blocked off. All of the local residents had the
opportunity to freely leave the city to the north, even towards Bielorrusia. At
the same time, the south of the city, even the residential areas in the
outskirts of the city, were bombarded for 24 hours by the Ukrainian troops with
heavy artillery, tanks and various missiles… We want to stress that the Russian
military left Bucha on the 30 of March, a day after the peace negotiations
which took place between Russia and Ukraine in Turkey… Furthermore, on the 31
of March, the Mayor himself [of Bucha], Anatoli Fedoruk, confirmed in a video
that the Russian military was no longer there and did not mention that any
local residents had been arrested and shot in the street… Thus, it is no
surprise that all of this so-called “evidence of crimes” in Bucha has appeared
four days later, when the Ukrainian Security Service and the Ukranian TV
representatives had arrived to the city… The fact that none of the bodies in
the images published by Kiev were suffering from rigor mortis is especially
worrisome, they lacked the pale complexion characteristic of a corpse and were
not covered in coagulated blood… All of this is irrefutable proof that the
photos and videos published from Bucha were produced by the Kiev regime for the
western media, just like the maternity hospital from Mariupol.
In this
regard, the Russian version starkly contrasts with the Ukronazi version of
events, which has so aptly been spread by the western media in a new chapter of
the information war against Russia. Russia’s government not only rejected the
claims of the Ukrainian president, but also affirms that the massacre was
“staged” and is a “provocation.”
As the
Zelensky government requests that the Kremlin be judged by the International
Criminal Court for war crimes, the United Kingdom has contested Russia’s calls
for a new session to be held at the United Nations Security Council in order to
discuss the subject, which is surprising since this would be the ideal place to
put forward the demands of Ukraine’s Foreign Minister.
When the
events are carefully analyzed, it becomes apparent that the Russians are much
closer to the truth that the Ukrainian regime.
Proof that the Ukronazi’s staged the events MORE https://mronline.org/2022/04/07/staged-massacre-in-bucha/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=staged-massacre-in-bucha&mc_cid=4c5fc2c0d5&mc_eid=ab2f7bf95e
[Bucha
is an example of the nationalization of information during wars by all sides. Violent wars are also propaganda wars.] Editor. Mronline.org (4-07-22).
The West has made a snap judgment about who
is responsible for the massacre at the Ukrainian town of Bucha with calls for
more stringent sanctions on Russia, but the question of guilt is far from
decided, writes Joe Lauria.
A context for assessing right now allegations
of Russian atrocities, repeated incessantly in US mainstream media, is provided
by George Paulson’s reminder that the first victim of war is the truth.
Note from Art 4-7-22::
Dear friends
–
Some
say that we can’t know what happened in places like Bucha. There is,
however, some real evidence about the Bucha executions. The problem is
that some evidence supports Russian atrocities while other evidence supports
Ukrainian atrocities. It should be possible to sort this out. Today’s
(Thursday) NWADG Ukraine report starts on p 1 and continues on p 6. Look
at the section titled “Executions Recorded.” The New York Times verified
videos recording Ukrainian troops executing Russian troops following a
Ukrainian ambush on a Russian column retreating from Bucha on 30
May. The report describes atrocities by a Ukrainian paramilitary unit
that has apparently been doing this sort of thing since 2014. I think
that any conclusion that the executions were carried out by Russians is premature,
to say the least. Yet according to the same article, Biden is playing up
the Bucha execution atrocities as a reason we should send military equipment to
Ukraine. This might be a classic example of why we go to war,
and why wars escalate. Thoughts?
Peace
- Art
|
The
sad truth is that atrocities are committed by belligerents on both sides during
wars.
This
was true of the Americans in the PTO, as Phil Trapp told me many times, even
though the Japanese were much more brutal - most notably in China.
In
Europe both the Germans and Soviets were noted for horrific atrocities - not
including the Holocaust. After D Day, Hitler sent crack SS divisions to
Normandy, who regularly slaughtered Allied captives. The British, Americans,
Canadians, and Poles replied in kind.
And
do not forget Vietnam. [Evan Bukey is a
prof. emer., History, UAF].
Nuclear Risks
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Food Crisis,
Hunger
· Briefing: World hunger and the
war in Ukraine
· Editor. Mronline.org (4-5-22).
·
· The New Cold War is rapidly heating up, with severe consequences
for people around the world. Our new series, Briefings, provides the key facts
on these matters of global concern.
March 29, 20225:44 PM CDTLast Updated 7 days ago
https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/with-ukraine-farmers-frontlines-un-food-chief-warns-devastation-2022-03-29/
With
Ukraine farmers on frontlines, U.N. food chief warns of 'devastation' By Michelle Nichols
A
combine harvester machine loads grain onto a transport truck near the southern
Ukranian city of Nikolaev July 7, 2013. REUTERS/Vincent Mundy/File Photo
UNITED
NATIONS, March 29 (Reuters) - The U.N. food chief warned on Tuesday that the
war in Ukraine was threatening to devastate the World Food Programme's efforts
to feed some 125 million people globally because Ukraine had gone "from
the breadbasket of the world to breadlines."
"It's
not just decimating dynamically Ukraine and the region, but it will have global
context impact beyond anything we've seen since World War Two," WFP
Executive Director David Beasley told the 15-member United Nations Security
Council.
Beasley
said 50% of the grain bought by the WFP, the food-assistance branch of the
United Nations, comes from Ukraine, "so you can only assume the
devastation that this is going to have on our operations alone."
"The
farmers are on the frontlines," he said.
Beasley
added that the crisis was compounded by a lack of fertilizer products coming
from Belarus and Russia.
"If
you don't put fertilizer on the crops, your yield will be at least 50%
diminished. So we're looking at what could be a catastrophe on top of a
catastrophe in the months ahead," he told the council.
Before
Russia's Feb. 24 invasion of neighbouring Ukraine, Beasley said the WFP was
already struggling with high fuel and food prices and shipping costs that was
forcing it to cut rations for millions of people in places like Yemen.
Beasley
warned if the conflict in Ukraine was not ended, "the world will pay a
mighty price and the last thing we want to be doing as the World Food Programme
is taking food from hungry children to give to starving children."
Russia's
U.N. Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia rejected accusations that Moscow's actions in
Ukraine had caused the "serious turbulence" in the global food
market, instead blaming Western sanctions on Russia.
Russia
calls its invasion a "special military operation" that aims to
destroy Ukraine's military infrastructure. The 193-member U.N. General Assembly
has overwhelmingly deplored Russia's "aggression" and demanded it
withdraw its troops. read more
U.S.
Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman told the council sanctions were not
fueling the global food crisis.
"The
responsibility for waging war on Ukraine – and for the war's effects on global
food security – falls solely on President Putin," Sherman said.
Register
now for FREE unlimited access to Reuters.com
Reporting
by Michelle Nichols; Editing by Karishma Singh. Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust
Principles.
Economic War
Russia/Ukraine War and Peace, US Dollar
“Ukraine and the Global Economic War: Barbarism or
Civilisation?”
Originally
published: Peoples
Democracy by Prabir Purkayastha (March 27, 2022 ). Posted March 30, 2022.
https://mronline.org/2022/03/30/ukraine-and-the-global-economic-war-barbarism-or-civilisation/
DOES the Ukraine war and the action of the U.S., EU, and the UK
spell the end of the dollar as the world’s reserve currency? Even if the peace
talks between Russia and Ukraine reach a 15-point peace plan, as Financial
Times has reported, the fallout for the dollar still remains. For the
first time, a major nuclear power and major economy were treated as a vassal
state. Its $300 billion foreign exchange reserves lying with the U.S., EU and
the UK were seized.
The threat to the dollar hegemony is only one part of the
fallout. The other is the complex supply chains, built upon the promise of a
stable trading regime based on the WTO principles, is also threatening to
unravel. The U.S. is discovering that Russia is not simply a petro-state as
they thought but supplies many of the critical materials that the U.S. industry
and the military need. This is apart from Russia being one of the critical
suppliers of wheat and fertilisers globally.
Seizing
Russia’s funds means that the faith the U.S. is the world’s banker and the
dollar is the global reserve currency, is in question. Why should countries
maintain any trade surplus and bank it abroad if that surplus can be seized at
will? The promise of a dollar as the world’s reserve currency was that all
surpluses in dollars were safe. With the seizing of the Afghan central bank’s
9.5 billion dollars recently, the U.S. had shown that it considers that dollars
held by another country with the U.S. central banks as a fair game. It may be
an economic asset in the books for a country. But it is effectively a political
liability, as the U.S. government can seize this asset at its will. This was
also shown earlier in Iraq, Libya, Venezuela. Seizing Russia’s foreign exchange
reserves by a handful of western countries–ex-colonial and settler-colonial
states–means that the so-called rules-based order is now based on weaponising
the dollar and the west’s control over the global financial system.
Economists–Prabhat Patnaik, Michael Hudson–and financial experts
such as Zoltan Potsar of Credit Suisse are now predicting a new regime in which
the Chinese Yuan or a variant of it will emerge as the world’s new reserve
currency.
Why these predictions? After the Second World War, the Bretton
Woods agreement led to the dollar becoming the world’s reserve currency. It
replaced the British pound and was pegged to gold, with $35 to an ounce of
gold. In 1971, President Nixon removed the U.S. dollar from the gold standard,
which meant that the dollar was now backed only by the U.S. government (or U.S.
Treasury) guarantees. In the post-war years, the dollar as reserve currency had
three things going for it. It was backed by the U.S., which was the world’s
largest industrial producer; the U.S. was the pre-eminent military power even
if challenged by the Soviet Union; and it was backed by West Asian oil, the
largest traded commodity, being priced in dollars.
The denomination of West Asian oil, particularly of Saudi
Arabia, was critical to the U.S. and was determined by its military power. The
coup in Iran against Mosaddegh, the 1963 coup in Iraq, and many other political
events there can be understood more easily, if we understand why oil was so
important to the U.S.. This was the basis of the Carter doctrine, extending the
Monroe doctrine equivalent to the Persian Gulf Region. Or what the cartoonists
drew: “Our oil is under their sand”. The U.S. control over West Asian oil and
its industrial and military power ensured that the dollar remained as the
world’s reserve currency. MORE https://mronline.org/2022/03/30/ukraine-and-the-global-economic-war-barbarism-or-civilisation/
FUTURE FOR PEACE
Peace Talks Now
“Russia promises reduced military activity, as Ukraine proposes ‘neutral’
status at talks.” Editor. Mronline.org (4-1-22)
After the three-hour meeting in
Turkey, Russia said it has decided to drastically cut back its military
activity near Kiev in order for peace talks to progress. According to TASS, top
Russian negotiator Vladimir Medinsky said the talks were
"constructive."
PEACE NEGOTIATIONS AFTER
ARMED FORCE
The
3 following items are from The Bulletin of the
Atomic Scientists (4-7-22).
The day after the war in Ukraine ends, the US policy
goal should be to assure that the circumstances that gave rise to this
devastating war should never recur, says Princeton University professor
Robert J. Goldston. Read more.
Nuclear arms control: Still necessary, but more difficult than ever. Some question whether arms control is even
possible in the new world order that was already taking shape before
Russia invaded Ukraine. And although the challenges facing
future nuclear arms control are daunting, they are not impossible to
meet. Read more.
Virtual Program: Ask nuclear experts your questions about the war in
Ukraine. On April 11, talk with nuclear experts Francesca
Giovannini, Pavel Podvig, and Manpreet Sethi as
they join Lauren Sukin to discuss the impact the war in
Ukraine will have on our nuclear future. Register now.
contents of russia,
ukraine, new cold hot war #16 https://jamesrichardbennett.blogspot.com/2022/04/omni-us-russia-ukraine-cold-war-ii.html
TomDispatch. New Cold and Hot Wars and Swelling Military.
Four Articles via Historians for Peace 3-23-22
Stephen Krotkin, Putin in Russian History.
Alfred McCoy, Putin and Xi Jinping in
Eurasia.
Juan Cole, We Shouldn’t Want a NATO No Fly
Zone.
Andrew Bacevich, US v. International Order.
US
Mainstream Reporting
Disinformation
in Dongass
Christelle
Néant, “Mariupol—Civilians Denounce the Crimes
of the Fighters of the Neo-Nazi Azov
Regiment.”
Max Blumenthal, Dubious BBC Correspondent.
Andi Olluri, Another War Not Reported.
Provocations and Sanctions: “The Irony of Sanctions Against Russia”
Remembering 2014: Dongass
And the Cold War and NATO: Albright
Daniel Kovalik, “Russia’s Invasion of Ukraine Signifies the End
of …Unipolar American Power”
Contents
#15
END RUSSIA UKRAINE # 17
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