[Craic] Fwd: U.S. Peace Council Statement: The Escalating Crisis in Ukraine Poses an Imminent Threat to World Peace!

[Mr. Gillis]

Once again we see NATO and the US beating the drums of war and Canada going
willingly along the garden path with this insanity.  This piece is an
excellent history of the duplicity of the US and NATO in creating this
crisis and ultimately exposes Biden's continuing complicity and promotion
of American Empire.  Further, the western media goes along with this
nonsense unwilling to question the Empire's narrative while the situation
remains incredibly and increasingly dangerous.

May we all work and pray for peace and justice!


Greg


---------- Forwarded message ---------
From: U.S. Peace Council U.S. Peace Council <USPC at uspeacecouncil.org>
Date: Mon, Jan 3, 2022 at 2:45 PM
Subject: U.S. Peace Council Statement: The Escalating Crisis in Ukraine
Poses an Imminent Threat to World Peace!
To: <greg.j.gillis at gmail.com>


The Escalating Crisis in Ukraine
Poses an Imminent Threat to
World Peace!

*U.S. Peace Council Statement*

*January 2, 2022*

For weeks, the U.S. corporate media have been shrill in declaring that
Russia, having positioned tens of thousands of Russian troops on the
border, may be about to invade Ukraine. U.S. State Department spokesmen
have been threatening Russia with punishing economic sanctions if there
were an invasion. Daily, if not hourly, TV viewers are shown satellite
images supposedly showing Russian troop concentrations on the Ukraine
border, accompanied by unflattering photos of a scowling Vladimir Putin,
depicted as the evil source of the newU.S.-Russia tensions.

The cold war with Russia, festering since 2014 and the U.S.-backed coup in
Ukraine, may be potentially even more menacing than the new cold war with
China. If the armed standoff between the Ukrainian military and the
Russian-supported separatist forces in eastern Ukraine, becomes — by
miscalculation or design — a conventional war between Russia and NATO, it
could escalate into nuclear war.

*US/NATO Expansion and Cold War Provocations*

This is the second Ukraine crisis in a year. In March, the U.S. announced
$125 million in military aid to Ukraine, including armed coastal patrol
boats and radar equipment, with another $150 million package in June. This
included radar, communications, and electronic warfare equipment for the
Ukrainian Air Force. This latest package appears to include deploying U.S.
training personnel to Ukrainian air bases. According to published reports,
Turkey, another NATO state, is supplying Ukraine with the same drones it
provided to Azerbaijan for its war with Armenia over the disputed territory
of Nagorno-Karabakh in 2020.

In April 2021, the anti-Russian government of Ukraine threatened an
offensive against breakaway Russian-speaking eastern regions of Donetsk and
Luhansk, and Russia assembled thousands of troops along Ukraine's eastern
border. Since April 2021, NATO has been building up military pressure on
Russia in the region.

Summer 2021 saw 30,000 troops take part in Operation Defender Europe 2021,
a mammoth set of U.S.-led military exercises from the Baltic to the Black
Sea, while last month the U.S. staged simulation bombing raids within 12
miles of Russian airspace. According to NATO itself, its warplanes
confronted Russian aircraft 290 times in 2021, most of the time along
Russia's western borders. It means nearly 80 percent of NATO's 370 flight
missions this year involved confrontations with the Russian air force.

On Dec 7, 2021, Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs Victoria
Nuland testified
<https://u1584542.ct.sendgrid.net/ss/c/atcYNHk4Eh2YdGnwBh-YDHp6kgvGRMQePuRsV5K2bx184saC8JJzTQetqUoNmngQga_bBBNoIPbnypbhAGYQdm-7CWXLeo0iT2zQdnc5BzZ4cH-4Hl-spYIo2Fru2z6bJfjD1UN36Rz7DNG7KOMvRCPkVCK1FPqT5EWoHSdR3oxIGnhxnXEtsGpQCw7Nczhrge1cisKQwF7pEj_DADt5ew-U0BJAT0TpI8rWmIpdtFm-VvmpfqhG1Ofqfkk02ggGxwG1leCeWOyox50A194NlICJwY-XHcFkoo3SQ5zorQmuQLP0onj-RF6jGuvkwnqqXsnW5fJ4YhVagxM0wIXz4APTBFtWb3PnhkfluMRAMHpYBRpli_BudKyX3X7F7hwT79GYOUKNjg2CQPaCiMJcejVlneKY6J52gDZMyn6IhD2ny4zq4Rqw65CBN0bCOjC83B4WB8lHPh6iaEnl5BPp2Q/3ie/vncvNxqmQe-C6vnKhvWHeg/h0/1jgXSvFyJ73TyPWUVUBYRD6wWo1Ey2ophIadOdfzLSw>
to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee that the U.S. government has given
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$2.4 billion to Ukraine since 2014 “in security assistance,” which included
$450 million that was given in 2021 alone. She reportedly tried to reassure
Moscow that the U.S. and NATO were still committed to the 2014-2015 Minsk
Accords, which included a ban on offensive military operations and a
promise of greater autonomy for Donetsk and Luhansk within Ukraine. But her
assurances were undone by Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin when he met with
Ukraine's President Zelensky in Kiev in October, reiterating U.S. support
for Ukraine's future membership in NATO, promising further military support
and blaming Russia for "perpetuating the war in Eastern Ukraine."

*The Russian Proposals*

Russian diplomats are well justified in warning that current U.S./NATO
policy in Ukraine risks crossing Russia’s security “red lines” and facts on
the ground support their concerns:

● Consider the fact that every U.S. and NATO promise to keep NATO away from
Russian borders has been broken for thirty years.

● Consider the fact that since 1990, NATO — which ought not to exist since
its antagonist, the Warsaw Pact, went out of existence in 1991 — has moved
inexorably eastward. In 1990, with German reunification and the annexation
of the GDR, all of Germany became part of NATO. In 1999 the Czech Republic,
Hungary, and Poland joined NATO. In 2004 Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania (all
former Soviet Republics), Bulgaria, Romania, Slovakia, and Slovenia joined
NATO. In 2009 Albania and Croatia joined NATO. In 2017 Montenegro joined
NATO. In 2020 North Macedonia joined NATO.

● The incorporation of Ukraine into NATO would move NATO weapons and troops
even closer to the heartland of Russia. This is to say nothing of the fact
that, within living memory, the Russian people suffered invasion from the
West. In 1941-45 Hitler's armies, 4 million strong, devastated the country
in a genocidal war that took some 27 million lives.

In his year-end press conference on December 23rd, Mr. Putin stressed that
“Further movement of NATO eastward is unacceptable. They are on the
threshold of our house. Is it an excessive demand — no more attack weapons
systems near our home? Is there something unusual about this?” One need not
be an unqualified admirer of the politics of Vladimir Putin to acknowledge
that the Russian leader has legitimate security concerns.

In mid-December, Russia took a diplomatic initiative and presented a list
of security proposals to the United States. According to the Wall Street
Journal:

The proposals handed to the U.S. and published by Russia’s Foreign Ministry
include a promise for each side to refrain from carrying out activities
affecting each other's security, preventing the North Atlantic Treaty
Organization's expansion further eastward to include Ukraine, and
abandoning any NATO military activities in all of Eastern Europe,
Transcaucasia and Central Asia.

“It is fundamentally important for us that the guarantees of Russian
security are put on paper and [are] as legally binding as possible,”
Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov told reporters Friday.
“There is no other option, since a characteristic feature of the current
stage of relations between Russia and the collective West is a complete
lack of trust.”

The proposals also call for no deployment of additional NATO troops and
weapons outside the countries in which they were stationed before any
Eastern bloc nations joined the alliance in May 1997, unless both sides
agree. Each side should refrain from deploying intermediate and
shorter-range missiles where they can hit the territory of the other side,
and not use the territory of another state to carry out an armed attack
against the other. Among Russian proposals were also an agreement for both
sides to regularly exchange information about military exercises and
refrain from conducting military exercises and other actions with more than
a brigade in the agreed border zone.

The new Russian proposals are a realistic basis for beginning negotiations.
So are the Minsk II Accords (2015) agreed to by France, Germany, Russia and
Ukraine and endorsed unanimously by the UN Security Council, including the
United States. The Accords provided for demilitarization of eastern
Ukraine, restoration of Ukrainian sovereignty over the eastern regions, and
full autonomy for the Donbas region. Despite occasional lip service, they
have been largely ignored by the U.S. and NATO.

It is welcome that the U.S. has agreed to talks in Geneva on January 10,
2022 on the new Russian proposals for legally binding security guarantees.
It is also welcome that on December 30, 2021 President Biden had another
phone conversation with President Putin. But the U.S. has already rejected
several of the Russian security demands, including one that both countries
commit to not stationing nuclear weapons outside of their own territory.
And there are signs that the Russian side is already skeptical of U.S. good
faith. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has stated, “It is important
that our proposals aren't wound up in endless discussions, which the West
is famous for.”

Despite these diplomatic efforts, powerful institutional and economic
forces in the U.S. — the military industrial complex, Lockheed-Martin,
Boeing, Raytheon Technologies, General Dynamics, Northrop Grumman, and
others — are eager for a new cold war with Russia, which would provide them
with boundless opportunities for profitable arms contracts. “The U.S.
military-industrial complex needs enemies like human lungs need oxygen.
When there are no enemies, they must be invented,” an astute writer
observed recently.

The demonization of Vladimir Putin and Russia by the U.S. media is an
integral part of this policy of inventing imaginary enemies, as it has been
done to a long list of foreign leaders and nations whose attempts to pursue
an independent foreign policy, defying the dictates of Washington, have
brought down on their heads the wrath of the Empire. Sadly, given the
silence of all but a few peace organizations, it is hard to avoid the
conclusion that such demonization has had an effect not only on the U.S.
public attitudes, but also on at least a section of the U.S. peace
movement, leading to an unwillingness by some to risk appearing pro-Putin.
But the real question here is not that of being pro- or anti-Putin; it is a
question of addressing the real causes of the escalating conflict with
Russia: U.S./NATO expansion and cold war provocations.

*The U.S. Peace Movement Must Act Before it is Too Late*

To counter those permanent powerful forces will take counterpressure. The
U.S. peace movement should reject demonization of Russian leaders. We must
act urgently to push for immediate de-escalation of this NATO-created
dangerous crisis. We must vehemently demand that:

● The Minsk II agreement serves as a framework for a non-violent,
diplomatic solution to the crisis that also fully involves the United
Nations Security Council.

● The U.S. and its allies cease unnecessary provocations including
increased arms sales to Ukraine and suggested NATO membership.

● Potential threats to international peace be taken up by the United
Nations and subjected to the provisions of the UN Charter and other
elements of international law instead of arbitrary and illegal actions by
any state or regional formation.

The world is faced with an emergency situation. With the U.S. insisting on
expanding NATO to the Russian borders, the danger of a military
confrontation is escalating each passing day. Given the fact that the U.S.
and Russia are by far the two states with the most nuclear weapons, a
conventional war between NATO and Russia could easily escalate into nuclear
war. As the outbreak of the First World War demonstrated, leaders may not
intend to go to war but can stumble into a situation where they are unable
to turn back.

The U.S. peace movement should act together to put maximum pressure on the
Biden Administration to change its dangerous belligerent policy against
Russia. We must act urgently to push for immediate de-escalation of this
NATO-created crisis before it is too late.
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***

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