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On Washington's Ukrainian Fiasco: "Who Is The Real Problem Here?"

Tyler Durden's picture




 

Submitted by David Stockman via Contra Corner blog,

In just 800 words Pat Buchanan exposes the sheer juvenile delinquency embodied in Washington’s current Ukrainian fiasco. He accomplishes this by reminding us of the sober restraint that governed the actions of American Presidents from FDR to Eisenhower, Reagan and Bush I with respect to Eastern Europe during far more perilous times.

In a word, as much as they abhorred the brutal Soviet repression of the Hungarian uprising in 1956, the Prague Spring in 1968 and the solidarity movement in Poland in the early 1980s, among many other such incidents, they did not threaten war for one simple reason: These unfortunate episodes did not further endanger America’s national security. Instead, in different ways each of these Presidents searched for avenues of engagement with the often disagreeable and belligearent leaders of the Soviet Empire because they “felt that America could not remain isolated from the rulers of the world’s largest nation”.

Accordingly, during the entire span from 1933, when FDR recognized the Soviet Union, until 1991, when it ended, the US never once claimed Ukraine’s independence was part of its foreign policy agenda or a vital national security interest. Why in the world, therefore, should we be meddling in the backyard of a far less threatening Russia today?

More importantly, if Ike could invite Khrushchev to tour America and pow-wow with him at Camp David after the suppression of the Hungarian freedom fighters and his bluster over Berlin, what in the world is Obama doing attempting to demonize Putin and make him an international pariah? The fact is, Crimea had been part of Russia for 200 years, and the Donbas had been its Russian-speaking coal, steel and industrial heartland since the time of Stalin.

Putin’s disagreements with the Ukrainian nationalists who took over Kiev during the Washington inspired overthrow of its constitutionally-elected government in February are his legitimate geo-political business, but have nothing to do with our national security. And whatever his considerable faults, Putin is no totalitarian menace even remotely in the same league as his Soviet predecessors. In that regard, Hillary Clinton’s sophomoric comparison of him to Hitler is downright preposterous.

At the heart of the matter is the War Party’s desire to punish Putin for pushing back against American interventionism in Syria, Iran, Iraq and elsewhere in the Middle East. For that Washington has now ensnared itself in an ancient ethnic struggle that has roiled Russia’s borders for centuries; and has landed smack in the middle of an attempt by Kiev’s nationalists to violently maintain the “territorial integrity” of a nation who’s boundaries have been meandering all over the map since the middle ages.

In that context, Senator John McCain’s call to arm the ruffians, opportunists, oligarchs and neo-fascists who took power in a street level coup in Kiev is downright lunatic. It causes Buchanan to ask, “Who is the real problem here?”

The answer is that it’s not Putin, and that conclusion comes from a brilliant partisan scholar of 20th century foreign policy who is no left-wing pacifist.

 

By Pat Buchanan (via Anti-war)

In 1933, the Holodomor was playing out in Ukraine.

After the “kulaks,” the independent farmers, had been liquidated in the forced collectivization of Soviet agriculture, a genocidal famine was imposed on Ukraine through seizure of her food production.

Estimates of the dead range from two to nine million souls.

Walter Duranty of the New York Times, who called reports of the famine “malignant propaganda,” won a Pulitzer for his mendacity.

In November 1933, during the Holodomor, the greatest liberal of them all, FDR, invited Foreign Minister Maxim Litvinov to receive official U.S. recognition of his master Stalin’s murderous regime.

On August 1, 1991, just four months before Ukraine declared its independence of Russia, George H. W. Bush warned Kiev’s legislature:

“Americans will not support those who seek independence in order to replace a far-off tyranny with a local despotism. They will not aid those who promote a suicidal nationalism based upon ethnic hatred.”

In short, Ukraine’s independence was never part of America’s agenda. From 1933 to 1991, it was never a U.S. vital interest. Bush I was against it.

When then did this issue of whose flag flies over Donetsk or Crimea become so crucial that we would arm Ukrainians to fight Russian-backed rebels and consider giving a NATO war guarantee to Kiev, potentially bringing us to war with a nuclear-armed Russia?

From FDR on, U.S. presidents have felt that America could not remain isolated from the rulers of the world’s largest nation.

Ike invited Khrushchev to tour the USA after he had drowned the Hungarian Revolution in blood. After Khrushchev put missiles in Cuba, JFK was soon calling for a new detente at American University.

Within weeks of Warsaw Pact armies crushing the Prague Spring in August 1968, LBJ was seeking a summit with Premier Alexei Kosygin.

After excoriating Moscow for the downing of KAL 007 in 1983, that old Cold Warrior Ronald Reagan was fishing for a summit meeting.

The point: Every president from FDR through George H. W. Bush, even after collisions with Moscow far more serious than this clash over Ukraine, sought to re-engage the men in the Kremlin.

Whatever we thought of the Soviet dictators who blockaded Berlin, enslaved Eastern Europe, put rockets in Cuba and armed Arabs to attack Israel, Ike, JFK, LBJ, Nixon, Ford, Carter, Reagan and Bush 1 all sought to engage Russia’s rulers.

Avoidance of a catastrophic war demanded engagement.

How then can we explain the clamor of today’s U.S. foreign policy elite to confront, isolate, and cripple Russia, and make of Putin a moral and political leper with whom honorable statesmen can never deal?

What has Putin done to rival the forced famine in Ukraine that starved to death millions, the slaughter of the Hungarian rebels or the Warsaw Pact’s crushing of Czechoslovakia?

In Ukraine, Putin responded to a U.S.-backed coup, which ousted a democratically elected political ally of Russia, with a bloodless seizure of the pro-Russian Crimea where Moscow has berthed its Black Sea fleet since the 18th century. This is routine Big Power geopolitics.

And though Putin put an army on Ukraine’s border, he did not order it to invade or occupy Luhansk or Donetsk. Does this really look like a drive to reassemble either the Russian Empire of the Romanovs or the Soviet Empire of Stalin that reached to the Elbe?

As for the downing of the Malaysian airliner, Putin did not order that. Sen. John Cornyn says U.S. intelligence has not yet provided any “smoking gun” that ties the missile-firing to Russia.

Intel intercepts seem to indicate that Ukrainian rebels thought they had hit an Antonov military transport plane.

Yet, today, the leading foreign policy voice of the Republican Party, Sen. John McCain, calls Obama’s White House “cowardly” for not arming the Ukrainians to fight the Russian-backed separatists.

But suppose Putin responded to the arrival of U.S. weapons in Kiev by occupying Eastern Ukraine. What would we do then?

John Bolton has the answer: Bring Ukraine into NATO.

Translation: The U.S. and NATO should go to war with Russia, if necessary, over Luhansk, Donetsk and Crimea, though no U.S. president has ever thought Ukraine itself was worth a war with Russia.

What motivates Putin seems simple and understandable. He wants the respect due a world power. He sees himself as protector of the Russians left behind in his “near abroad.” He relishes playing Big Power politics. History is full of such men.

He allows U.S. overflights to Afghanistan, cooperates in the P5+1 on Iran, helped us rid Syria of chemical weapons, launches our astronauts into orbit, collaborates in the war on terror and disagrees on Crimea and Syria.

But what motivates those on our side who seek every opportunity to restart the Cold War?

Is it not a desperate desire to appear once again Churchillian, once again heroic, once again relevant, as they saw themselves in the Cold War that ended so long ago?

Who is the real problem here?

 

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Tue, 07/29/2014 - 00:00 | 5016168 Kirk2NCC1701
Kirk2NCC1701's picture

"Who is the real problem here?"

Ask whom you may not criticize (w/o career-ending or freedom-ending blowback), and there's your answer. 

Hint:  a certain Elite, a subset, who have wrapped themselves in the cloak of a certain culture and belief -- but do not act like that culture or belief.  They are truly wolves in sheep clothing.

Tue, 07/29/2014 - 00:19 | 5016237 I Write Code
I Write Code's picture

I agree the US has no business in the Ukraine but Buchanan is just as twisted an anti-semite as any of the idiots who hang around here blaming Joos for everything, and his logic here is just about as disgusting as can be - we were pals with Stalin during the Holodomor so we have no reason at all now to be upset at so much less?  What?  That doesn't begin to follow.  And Buchanan never *does* give the reason why we (not me!) are getting involved, why Obama seems so exercised about it.  Are we supposed to just understand that it's Joos - as maybe a dozen posters here happily suggest?

Buchanan was a happy conservative populist back when, and I liked all his stuff, right up until the kink in his brain went off and he started yapping about Joos - or on alternate Thursdays, Negros.  And he even knows this about himself, but he just can't help it.

I haven't the foggiest f'ing idea what it is about the Ukraine that gets Obama involved, or what it is about Putin or Russia that seems to be drawing his meager attentions.  Obama is a lout and an oaf, even if you grant that he "means well", which is of course dubious.  He always insults his opponents and has no idea how to cooperate or negotiate, even in his own interests.  And he has surrounded himself with twisted sycophants even worse.  Must be almost like visiting an Israel thread on ZH.

Conspiracies of Joos, Gnomes, Bilderbergs, greys, banksters, Cloward-Pivens, Kenyans, Muslims, Hawaiians, Harvard Crimsons, ... or Obama like Buchanan just has a kink in one of those arteries deep in his brain, and certain things set it off, and then hell's out for Christmas.

Tue, 07/29/2014 - 00:44 | 5016332 TNTARG
TNTARG's picture

The article is not about Buchanan nor the jews.

Not everything is about jews. I'm kind of tired of the jews' centered reasoning. I'm feeling discriminated.

:)

Tue, 07/29/2014 - 01:30 | 5016439 bid the soldier...
bid the soldiers shoot's picture

But don't you mean "Joos"?

The piteous call of the Crested Joo Cock to all the woebegone Joo Hens in the 'hood is enough to give the sturdiest commenter dyspepsia.


 

Tue, 07/29/2014 - 05:19 | 5016727 Joenobody12
Joenobody12's picture

Gods chossen people think they are so smart they can do what they want to anyone. They think they can take on and destroy Russian just as they did to the Arab countries in the ME. 

The tragedy of 6 million Jews died in WW2 give them the right to start WW3. 

Tue, 07/29/2014 - 06:48 | 5016824 Mabussur
Mabussur's picture

The zionists are playing on the amalgam made by uneducated people between Jews and zionists. (caps as intended)

Tue, 07/29/2014 - 11:35 | 5017906 tvdog
tvdog's picture

Except that 6 million Jews did not die in the Holocaust; at most a couple hundred thousand did. Do the Jews know, and are they simply lying?

Tue, 07/29/2014 - 07:45 | 5016923 basho
basho's picture

f*ck you with your anti-semite crap. the palestinians are more semitic than the israelis ever were. it is you and your twisted ghetto mentality that is anti-semitic. get a life schoolboy

Tue, 07/29/2014 - 09:03 | 5017140 SMC
SMC's picture

Propaganda... accuse, blame, hate.

 

 

Tue, 07/29/2014 - 10:24 | 5017508 flapdoodle
flapdoodle's picture

The Zionists realized early on that Pat Buchanan was a threat to their narrative so they have been liberally using the "anti-semite" brush on Pat for decades.

I am ashamed to say at one time I doubted Pat for that reason, but no more. Pat has been right all this time, and it takes a tremendous amount of courage to go against the Zionists. Pat Buchanan is a treasure and a beacon of truth in the darkness.

Tue, 07/29/2014 - 00:33 | 5016297 TNTARG
TNTARG's picture

We desperately need to use our brain.

 

Tue, 07/29/2014 - 00:47 | 5016337 Tinky
Tinky's picture

When Pat Buchanan becomes the voice of reason on U.S. foreign policy, it's time to run, not walk, to the nearest exit.

Tue, 07/29/2014 - 01:50 | 5016478 syntaxterror
syntaxterror's picture

BO: This is my last election. After my election I have more flexibility.
Medvedev: I understand. I will transmit this information to Vladimir.

Seems like there's a pretty damn good dialogue to me. It's all going to plan.

Tue, 07/29/2014 - 08:54 | 5017108 smacker
smacker's picture

I believe that exchange happened quite some time ago, before 2012 at a guess. Things have gone south since.

Tue, 07/29/2014 - 11:38 | 5017929 tvdog
tvdog's picture

And there's no reason to believe that Obama was being any more honest with the Russians than he is with the American people.

Tue, 07/29/2014 - 02:09 | 5016504 smacker
smacker's picture

"...disagreeable and belligearent leaders of the Soviet Empire"

I suspect a major reason behind why the Soviet Union leaders appeared as "disagreeable and belligearent" still exists. Like their predecessors, Russian leaders today find themselves bombarded by relentless Western lies, propaganda and horror stories about themselves, spread thru MSM by the Western elites deliberately intended to paint them as dangerous, global pariahs. Hilary Clinton's recent comments describing Putin as another Hitler was personally abusive and misjudged. Above all it was a lie. She is unfit ever to be President.

If American political elites were to meet with Putin today, they'd probably find him rather angry and hostile. What do they expect? Obama, Kerry, H Clinton, McCain and many others have spent since the 17th July spewing out lies and blaming it all on Putin. Would they expect to be greeted by Putin with warm handshakes and free caviar & vodka??

The West is reaping what it has sown.

Tue, 07/29/2014 - 04:33 | 5016688 Aussiekiwi
Aussiekiwi's picture

' Hilary Clinton's recent comments describing Putin as another Hitler was personally abusive and misjudged. Above all it was a lie. She is unfit ever to be President.'

I could not agree more, she is far too subject to over the top emotional outbursts.

Tue, 07/29/2014 - 06:51 | 5016828 Mabussur
Mabussur's picture

Thank the Lord she has laid all of her eggs already and can't get on the rag any more. Now to deal with those pesky hot flashes ...

Tue, 07/29/2014 - 06:27 | 5016804 BeetleBailey
BeetleBailey's picture

Kudos farmboy....spot on is Roberts

Tue, 07/29/2014 - 10:55 | 5017681 messystateofaffairs
messystateofaffairs's picture

"Washington is confronting Russia with a very stark situation, surrender or war."

1. There is already a cold war and has been since Regans time. It is escalating and Russia is skillfully playing it.

2. Proxy shooting wars between Washington and Russia have and are taking place.

3. Washington looks to be intimating at setting the stage for a direct conventional shooting war with Russia by moving NATO military resources into Ukraine. Russia no doubt is monitoring that situation and could preemptively occupy Ukraine in response to that, should it appear to become real. The first one to openly occupy Ukraine invites the other to start what will morph into a nuclear war. It's like China and Taiwan, a mexican standoff during which cold war propaganda rages. Cold war is war, so democracy cannot be allowed or the enemies propaganda and attendant takeover will take place inside your own country. Putin stopped that inside of Russia and is controlling the narative there. We are all watching the cold war propaganda and tactical jabs take place while the direct shooting war Mexican standoff is in effect. ZH  commenters are mostly of the opinion that Washington, instructed by Israel, is on the offense as the aggressor while Russia, headed by Putin, is on the defense, using NATO's own economic weaknesses against them. Some, like myself, feel the ultimate stakes is world slavery, spearheaded by the US and directed by Israel.

Tue, 07/29/2014 - 05:10 | 5016721 zipit
zipit's picture

What Barry is doing is trying to create a diversion.
And it seems to be working.

Tue, 07/29/2014 - 08:16 | 5016755 Joenobody12
Joenobody12's picture

What Barry is doing is more golfing. What his unsupervised dual citizens are doing is to engage Russia so the US sponsored ISIS figthers can use US weapons (captured , ha ha we dont have drones or bombers) to invade and topple the Syrian government. Iran is next. 

How bad will it get depends on how Putin responds. Will he engage in a limited conventional war and get wear out or will he surprise the God chosen people that he is willing to use nuke ? 

If I were him, I would use overwhelming force to take over Ukraine now and just sit back with its nuke openly pointing at the west and dare them to go over the cliff.

Our national policy is all geared towards furthering Israel's ambition of breaking up all the ME countries into small , constantly infighting, little pieces. 

Tue, 07/29/2014 - 06:32 | 5016806 The Wizard
The Wizard's picture

Pat, it's a currency war. The BRICS recognize the weakness in the petrodollar and are going for the jugular demanding reforms in the IMF. If a new balance is not forthcoming they will go at their way. It does not make certain of those in control of the fiat petrodollar system happy their control is being threatened. If there is to be a change we will do it my way. Temper tantrums at work.

Tue, 07/29/2014 - 06:56 | 5016837 viator
viator's picture

Because Putin kicked Soros and his many NGOs out of Russia?

Tue, 07/29/2014 - 07:24 | 5016883 viator
viator's picture

"I have recorded for readers the propaganda that is used in order to demonize Putin and Russia. But even I was stunned by the astounding and vicious lies in the UK publication The Economist on July 26. The cover is Putin’s face in a spider web, and, you guessed it, the cover story is “A Web of Lies.” http://www.economist.com/news/leaders/21608645-vladimir-putins-epic-deceits-have-grave-consequences-his-people-and-outside-world-web?spc=scode&spv=xm&ah=9d7f7ab945510a56fa6d37c30b6f1709

You need to read this propaganda both in order to see the gutter level of propaganda in the West and the obvious drive to war with Russia. There is no evidence whatsoever in the story to support The Economist’s wild accusations and demand for the end of Western “appeasement” of Russia and the harshest possible action against Putin.

The kind of reckless lies and transparent propaganda that comprises The Economist’s story has no other purpose than to drive the world to war."

http://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2014/07/28/war-coming-paul-craig-roberts/

Tue, 07/29/2014 - 10:20 | 5017489 messystateofaffairs
messystateofaffairs's picture

What you are reading in the Economist is Rottenchilld bareing his Satanic personality, somewhat in frustration.

Tue, 07/29/2014 - 08:39 | 5017055 blindman
blindman's picture

John Miller - No Confounding Mystery, Simply Conspiracy.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=alexXYWzqPA&list=UULi4Ug4BWI78QWg2DmHAKyA
.

Tue, 07/29/2014 - 08:51 | 5017094 dizzyfingers
dizzyfingers's picture

"...what in the world is Obama doing attempting to demonize Putin and make him an international pariah?'

In a world-vote for international pariah, which would win?

Tue, 07/29/2014 - 09:07 | 5017156 gcjohns1971
gcjohns1971's picture

I believe Obama WANTS to create international disorder.

I believe he WANTS to create as much chaos World-Wide as he can.   The purpose of the chaos is to collapse society so that the financiers can take control of the reconstruction.

Now, before Europe gets too angry about this I would remind that millions upon millions of votes for Obama came from Europe in the form of absentee ballots. Many who cast those ballots were not American citizens.

The fact is that just about anyone can vote in an American election.  And the world DOES vote in our elections.

Tue, 07/29/2014 - 08:53 | 5017107 Farmer Joe in B...
Farmer Joe in Brooklyn's picture

While I totally agree with the premise that we have no business mettling in this whole Russian/Ukrainian mess (it's Europe's problem, not ours).... Putin IS just as evil as his former Soviet predecessors.  

Very thin veil of democracy in Russia these days.  While Putin may not have genocidal aspirations, he has very little regard for human life, as has been shown time and again during his rise to power.

In any case... Europe's problem....

Tue, 07/29/2014 - 10:22 | 5017496 Circle of DNA
Circle of DNA's picture

Russia is far more democratic than any western "democracy". Your brain has been deactivated by the corporate sluts of the western media.

Wed, 07/30/2014 - 01:30 | 5021341 napper
napper's picture

Well stated.

Tue, 07/29/2014 - 12:21 | 5018143 samsara
samsara's picture

"...he has very little regard for human life"

What's that Drone-ing noise I hear? 

Tue, 07/29/2014 - 09:00 | 5017129 gcjohns1971
gcjohns1971's picture

"Who is the problem here?"

The answer to that question depends on what location you mean when you say, "here".

If you are in the US, the communists infesting the Federal Government are most certainly the problem.  If you are elsewhere, the communists in the US are certainly A PROBLEM - but there are far from the only problem.

Tue, 07/29/2014 - 09:02 | 5017131 Tachyon5321
Tachyon5321's picture
The real reason we have a Ukraineian problem is that Vice President Joe Biden's son is involved in an oil drilling operation in east Ukraine that was stopped stopped because of the fighting.  If Russia wins Joe Bidden's son is out millions.    
Tue, 07/29/2014 - 10:25 | 5017514 Circle of DNA
Circle of DNA's picture

The whole Ukraine is just a backwater colony of Zionism run by the CIA installed psychopaths  

Tue, 07/29/2014 - 12:11 | 5018102 Duffy
Duffy's picture

I'll go more basic - I think the real problem is the American people have been led into the deep waters of hyperinterventionism, and no longer even ask what fucking business is it of the US.

 

My parents included. They always use the sort of royal "we".  "We' have ot do something about the kidnapped girls.  "We" can't abandon Iraq to terror groups.

Fucking "we".   what a dangerous, disingenuous word. 

What fucking business is it of the US, whether Ukraine signs a treaty with the EU, or with Russia, and why does no one talk about the fact Putin allowed that Ukraine could sign agreements ith *both* but it was the EU that demanded an all-or-nothing treaty?

Its megalomania, and its banksterism, and its corporate war profiteering, and it's jewish zionism buttressed politically by 40 or 50 million Judaized Christians - a deliberate process of hijackin and brain-washing by the way, begun even before the Scoffield bible began fooling idiot Evangelicals into becoming Neo-Talmudists.

Tue, 07/29/2014 - 12:43 | 5018228 RMolineaux
RMolineaux's picture

When the hell are we going to get fanatic neo-cons out of the foreign policy apparatus?

I salute Buchanan's accuracy and perceptiveness.

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