Now the worst outcome is unfolding with Russia invading Ukraine. An unyielding horror unfolds before our eyes. Is there anything we ordinary citizens can do to circumvent what is happening? Where do we go from here?
Peace groups the world over are now calling for an end to NATO expansion and for Russia to withdraw. While this is the ideal we can urge for, in all likelihood the West will keep arming an insurgency, even if peace is established. To understand the root causes of this invasion we need to honestly ask ourselves WHY this has happened?
This is explored in the blog ‘Don’t Look Away’.
What can we do now?
Detente 2
During the height of the first Cold War a burgeoning peace movement grew to become so successful in influencing government policy that people like Dr Helen Caldicott were able to pull the world back from a nuclear catastrophe. In what seamed insurmountable odds: advisors to presidents, decision makers, key bureaucrats, became influenced by peace activists. Detente became synonymous with bringing like minded people together from both the US and USSR who wanted the same things:
to live in peace without the threat of nuclear war and to roll back its threat,
to develop academic, cultural, R & D partnerships,
to grow trading relationships
This can happen again. Already sporting relationships, competitions and organisations exist. The organs of various institutions still exists like the UN and WHO.
So how do we progress this on the ground? Any ideas are most welcome.
With the unthinkable happening with Russia’s invasion, a hellish nightmare so close to Europe, this will effect us in ways we would not have thought possible months ago.
While those who subscribe to the dominant Western narrative on Russia’s invasion of Ukraine are given space to air their views in our media, those with a differing point of view are left out. Case in point is when I tried to get Dr Helen Caldicott, an internationally renowned and multi-award winning anti-nuclear campaigner and author on air in Australia. Only one commercial radio talk-back station FIVEaa in Adelaide, would interview her and 3cr community radio in Melbourne.
Award winning journalist and author John Pilger likens our Western media to ‘Raw Propaganda’. Right across the media spectrum stations and platforms are being silenced and shut down that hold different points of view to the dominant narrative. This is a deeply troubling development for anyone concerned about the state of free speech and democracy.
A new McCarthyism may be about to rear its ugly head again as all those who do not subscribe to the NATO/Western paradigm are silenced and ignored. What next?
If this can happen to journalists, paralleled with the persecution of Julian Assange, then this can happen to anyone. Our media has got the message and they will tow the line bar for a few brave individuals who still have traction.
George Galloway is one such commentator with his ‘The mother of all talkshows’ on youtube. He is a vociferous and outspoken critic of the NATO and the West and how they coerced Russia into unleashing this hell on Ukraine. He is almost a lone voice surrounded by a sea of Russia-phobic hate and Western sycophants
Below illustrates a farcical discourse, from the absurd to the frightening, demonstrating just how out dangerously vacuous the dominant narrative is becoming.
C-SPAN3. March 8th, 2022, Washington, DC. Russia and Chinese claims that the US has biological and chemical weapons laboratories in Ukraine were dismissed as propaganda, until one of the architects of the 2014 US lead Ukraine coup admitted that “biological research facilities” do in fact exist.
Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs Victoria Nuland testified before a Senate Foreign Relation Committee hearing on Ukraine.
US admits they were developing biological & chemical WMDs in Ukraine?
ABC, March 4th, 2022. Stan Grant, host of the popular Q & A kicks out an Australian Russian student for asking a question challenging the Western narrative on Ukraine, on live television:
Global News, March 2nd, 2022. Claims made by Ukrainian president that thirteen border guards on Snake Island died bravely defending Ukraine from Russian invasion have been found to be false. Ukraine had to admit that all soldiers are now prisoners of Russia.
Independent Australia. 18th Febraury, 2022 John Pilger. Western coverage of Ukraine is ‘Raw Propaganda’. As someone who was left waiting for over 80 minutes on ABC’s afternoon drive talk back program, hoping speak with Rafeal Epstein about the coming Ukraine disaster; I had to wait on the line & listen to some silly half hour conversation about the latest banana recipes. So Pilger is right on the money here when he says it is next to impossible to get an alternative point of view in to our hyper controlled mainstream ‘free speech’ media: https://independentaustralia.net/politics/politics-display/john-pilger-war-in-europe-and-the-rise-of-raw-propaganda,16065
Saturday 26th February, 2022, Solidarity Breakfast, 3cr, hosted by Annie McLoughlin, interviewing Dr Helen Caldicott about why we are so close to a nuclear war.
Annie McLoughlin interviews Dr Helen Caldicott on 3CR’s Solidarity Breakfast, Melbourne, Australia
Monday 21st February, 2022, ABC Radio National, Big Ideas, hosted by Paul Barclay interviews former senior Australian diplomat, and author of Return to Moscow,Tony Kevin
Paul Barclay interviews Tony Kevin on ABC Radio National Big Ideas
Tuesday 15th February, 2022, FIVEaa, 1395, hosted by Graeme Goodings, interviewing Dr Helen Caldicott, on how the Ukraine NATO crisis could unravel into a nuclear war.
Graeme Goodings interviews Dr Helen Caldicott on FIVEaa
Tuesday 1st February, 2022, 3Way 203.7 FM, hosted by Gillian Blair, interviewing Alan Griffiths about his Don’t Look Away blog.
Gillian Blair interviews Alan Griffiths on 3Way FM
Monday 31st January, 2022, 96.9 Plains FM, Earthwise, Christchurch, New Zealand, hosted by Lois Griffiths interviews Bruce Gagnon, founder and coordinator of the Global Network Against Weapons and Nuclear Power in Space. Bruce speaks especially on the Ukraine crises and how the fault of this crises lies squarely on the US, not Russia.
Lois Griffiths interviews Bruce Gannon on Earthwise, 96.9 Plains FM, Christchurch, New Zealand
Saturday 29th January, Solidarity Breakfast, 3CR, hosted by Annie McLoughlin, interviewing Alan Griffiths about his Don’t Look Away blog.
Annie McLoughlin interviews Alan Griffiths on 3CR’s Solidarity Breakfast, Melbourne, Australia
The Age Editorial 27th January, 2022. While this is a move in the right direction, the joint Australia US Pine Gap spy base is pivotal in the US military machine. So long as it is on Australian soil we are involved in any future US conflict.
The publishing of this youtube link is not an endorsement of the Australia Citizens Party, but an acknowledgement of their stance against the Ukraine stand-off.
Critics slammed Don’t Look Up for its views on mass media. Some likened this film in trying to get the world’s politicians to seriously tackle climate change before it is too late. The same can apply to the very real risk of an accidental nuclear war.
Two inconvenient truths on Ukraine compromise world peace. The Western narrative on the Ukraine, NATO and Russia crisis fails to acknowledge that we are on a nuclear knife-edge.
First inconvenient truth
If Ukraine joins the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO), this could lead to a nuclear disaster as:
Ukraine could install NATO nuclear weapons on Russia’s borders. This is a Red Line that Russia demands the West not cross. As the recent NATO Russia negotiations failed to solve this outstanding issue, Russia has declared it will not back down.
Article 5 of NATO’s founding treaty stipulates that if any NATO member country is attacked, all member countries are bound by collective defense.[1] If Russia does invade Ukraine to stop nuclear weapons being installed on its borders, the whole of Europe could erupt in to a conflagration not seen since World War 2.
Russia has every reason to distrust the West. In 1990 US Secretary of State James Baker promised that NATO would expand “not one inch eastward”. Since then, former Soviet states joined NATO, drawing closer to Russia.
Having nuclear weapons on Russia’s borders severely reduces the time Russia’s military can assess whether they are under attack, or if it is a false alarm. This happened during the height of the first Cold War during Ronald Reagan’s presidency.
Deciding with only minutes to spare: Nuclear attack, or false alarm?
On 26th September, 1986, Stanislav Petrov did not inform his Soviet military command of a multiple missile attack. Thankfully for the world, Petrov judged that it was a false alarm.[2]
With NATO nuclear weapons on Russia’s doorstep, and both US and Russian nuclear missiles on “hair trigger alert”,[3] we are entering a period not seen since the Cuban Missile Crises.[4]
As eminent American scholar on Russia, the late Professor Stephen Cohen, explained: “We’re on a razor’s edge of an accidental nuclear war.” (See 21:11)
As Stephen Cohen used to say, the confrontation line during the Cold War between the Soviet Union and the West was Berlin, one thousand miles away from Moscow. That line has shifted literally to the Ukraine Russia border.
Is Australia immune from nuclear attack?
The Joint US and Australian Pine Gap spy base in Central Australia is 18 kilometers outside of Alice Springs. As Pine Gap is able to detect early nuclear attack giving the US an edge over its adversaries,[5] this makes Pine Gap a likely first target.[6]
Pine Gap is central to the US Nuclear Missile Defence Program (NMDP). Tensions with Russia are at an all time high and the Doomsday Clock is at its closest point to midnight. The theoretical point where nuclear war destroys everything. One would think that the US would have a foolproof NMDP. However Russia’s new hypersonic nuclear-armed missiles avoid detection.[7]
Both the ALP and Coalition support Pine Gap. One would hope with a federal election looming that Pine Gap would be an issue for concern.
Second inconvenient truth explains how the West allowed Nazism to flourish in modern Ukraine. Since 2014 neo-Nazis flocked from abroad to train in Ukraine and fight in volunteer battalions against Russian backed Separatists. This suited the West so long as they fought the Separatists in Donbass, (east Ukraine).
One such battalion, the notorious neo-Nazi Azov Battalion was armed by Israel[8] and the US, (see 00:38).
Azov is now an international hub for far-right extremism.[9]
The West’s stoking of far-right fanaticism reached Australia. Australian far-right terrorist Brenton Tarrant, who murdered 48 Muslims in Christchurch, New Zealand, claimed to have trained in Ukraine. He sported the Nazi Black Sun symbol used by Azov in his online rampage.
ASIO spends a large amount of time investigating far-right domestic terrorism. Thanks to the ABC’s investigative reporting we know about this threat. However, the West is reticent in covering human rights crimes committed by the far-right against the Roma and ethnic Russian minority.
History of Ukraine Nazism
To explain the appeal of Nazism in Ukraine, one needs to know its history. Ukraine was part of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) up until June 1941. Ukraine’s hatred of the Soviet Union is inter-generational. Millions starved to death under Stalin’s 1930s collectivization policy. Known as the Holodomor, it is seared into Ukraine’s consciousness.
Furthermore, the Soviet Union’s feared secret police the NKVD committed a horrendous mass murder of up to 100,000 prisoners in Poland, Ukraine and other states. The NKVD did not have enough time or resources to transport all these prisoners into the Soviet Union as they were planning to flee the Germany’s invasion of the Soviet Union. So over seven days they murdered the lot of them, including many Jews. This became known as the Prisoner Massacre.
When Nazi Germany invaded the USSR in Operation Barbarossa, history’s largest invasion, ethnic Ukrainian nationalists embraced the Nazis as their liberators. Cities like Lvov had prisons in the city. The stench of the rotting bodies of the victims of the Prisoner Massacre was discovered by Germany’s Wehrmacht, who orchestrated, with the Ukraine Insurgency Army (UPA), the Lvov Pogrom. The blood letting on the streets of Lvov was committed with such zeal by the Ukrainian nationalists, the Germany concluded that the most effective way to kill Ukraine’s 1.5 million Jewry was to involve Ukrainian nationalists.
Many nationalists openly collaborated in Hitler’s Holocaust and slaughtered up to 300,000 Jews, Poles and Russians.
Ukraine, a divided country
Ukraine is a divided country. The ethnic nationalists live mostly in West Ukraine with Lvov as its centre. The ethnic Ukrainian Russians mostly in the East in Donbas. After the Soviet Union ceased to exist in 1989, Ukraine gained independence in 1991. Since then they had peaceful transitions of government from one side to the other. This all changed in 2014.
2014 US Ukraine coup
The ‘Revolution of Dignity’, or the Maidan protests, was hardly dignified. Beginning peacefully in Ukraine’s capital Kiev in late 2013, the Maidan protest was infiltrated by the ultra-extremist Right Sector, who ironically, does not support the EU. Right Sector got involved to pursue their own agenda of a “national revolution”.[10] They provoked violence against the police, who then retaliated against those protesting peacefully. This so incensed many Ukrainians that they came out and stayed on the streets until the government was overthrown. (See 39:21)
NAZIS involved in 2014 coup
Along with Right Sector, outright Nazi Andriy Parubiy played a crucial role in organising far-right violence in the Maidan protests. He is renown for helping found the ultra-nationalist Svoboda party; which was condemned in a 2012 European Parliament motion for its “racist, anti-Semitic and xenophobic views”.[11] Parubiy was in charge of Maidan’s heavily armed “self defence units”.[12]
Not hiding in plain sight, but in plain sight, various Nazi groups openly displayed insignia used by Ukraine’s collaborators in the Holocaust.
While Western media mostly played dumb, the eight million Ukrainian ethnic Russian minority seethed. Never again would a peaceful transition of government occur. How did democracy die?
US invested $5 billion in interfering in Ukraine
US Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs Victoria Nuland stated at a Chevron sponsored talk; that the US had invested $5 billion in Ukraine’s transition to Europe.
see 07:43
Nuland’s husband Robert Kagan is a powerful lobbyist and long-term advocate for forceful interventionist US foreign policy.[13]
As riots raged on Kiev’s streets, a secret phone call leaked by Ukrainian secret service (SBU) spies, loyal to Russia, revealed all. Nuland and US Ambassador to Ukraine Geoffrey Pyatt discussed whom to install in their new Ukrainian government. Only two seconds from this recording made headlines, when Nuland declared, “Fuck the EU”. See: 03:02
Who Benefited From TheMaidan Massacre?
Remember the 2014 images of hundreds of protestors injured by gunfire and the many killed on the streets of Kiev? Remember the responsibility for this slaughter placed squarely on the Ukrainian government of Yanukovych?
Another bugged conversation refuted Yanukovych’s responsibility. Urmas Paet, Estonia Minister of Foreign Affairs, was briefing EU’s Catherine Ashton. Paet outlined evidence of snipers on the Maidan side targeting protestors and the police.
see 02:34
Two leaders of the far-right Svoboda party stated that a few weeks before the massacre, a Western government representative had informed them and other Maidan leaders, that the West would stop recognising Yanukovych after protestor casualties reached 100.
The slain protestors were all called the “heavenly hundred” even though 49 died.[14]
After Yanukovych fled, Obama quickly endorsed the new minority coalition government, see 29:00
Prof Stephen Cohen 29:00
The new government went about establishing a new Ukraine based on far-right nationalist ideals. They passed the “decommunisation law” banning the largest political party of East Ukraine condemned by Amnesty International.[15]Parubiy signed the “Language Law” banning Russian language in the public service, whilst a majority of Ukraine speaks Russian.
They also passed a law glorifying Ukraine’s Hitler collaborators,[16] making a public holiday to remember the UPA (Ukrainian Insurgent Army). Oligarch and billionaire President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko said that he considered the UPA as heroes and role models for todays’ patriotic Ukrainians. [17]
The Ukrainian Institute of National Memory published “Ukraine in the Second World War”, a history school textbook distributed by the Ministry of Education and Science glamorizing the UPA.[18]
After much EU pressure the government launched a criminal investigation into the Maidan massacre. This excluded evidence of snipers shooting from the Maidan controlled protest areas.[19]
However, two Georgians, Alexander Revazishvili and Koba Nergadze, agreed to testify from Tblisi, Georgia, as they feared travelling to Kiev. Their revelations confirmed that foreign snipers were involved in a shoot to kill campaign and committed a majority of the murders.[20]
Many eyewitness accounts and a lot of mainstream media footage clearly showed snipers shooting from Hotel Ukraina. The BBC filmed one sniper shooting in their direction at the Maidan protestors, see: 09:21
Sniper in Hotel Ukraina shoots in direction of BBC film crew
As Parubiy was in control of the Maidan security he was going in and out of Hotel Ukraina during the massacre.[21]
International criminal lawyer Christopher Black, wrote that the “clear objective of the Maidan massacre in Kiev on February 20, 2014 was to sow chaos and reap the fall of the democratically elected pro-Russian Yanukovych government”.[22]
Odessa Massacre
Opposition to Kiev’s agenda spread. The ‘Separatists’ are not Separatists at all. This is a convenient label the Western media placed on them to suit their narrative. These Separatists like to refer themselves as Rebels. They rebelled against Kiev by lobbying for a federal system of states similar to the US. As the strategically important port city of Odessa looked like it was going to rebel, Kiev had to stop this, as they did not want Odessa to join with the Separatist uprising in Donbass. Andriy Parubiy was in Odessa before an important Ukrainian championship soccer match.
On May 2nd, 2014, as peaceful protestors at Odessa’s Kulikovo Square were collecting petitions for the federal system, a massive contingent of Maidan protestors arrived from west Ukraine.
After the soccer match they caused riot and converged at Kulikovo Square, baying for blood. The petitioning protestors sheltered in the five story Trade Unions House. Two Maidan protestors were photographed on the roof with Molotov-cocktails ready. The building was set alight. Those trying to escape the flames by jumping out of windows were shot at from outside; including by a gunman who had previously met Parubiy.
see 1:18:31 gunman meets Parubiy day before shooting unarmed protestors
The Odessa police let this siege unfold as victims inside the building were shot in the face and set on fire.
A fire station less than a mile away took almost half an hour to respond.[23]
Alexei Goncharenko, Member of the Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly and Deputy of President Petro Poroshenko’s party was there. Later, Goncharenko was inside the building posing in photos with some of the dead.[24]
Considering that Yanukovych was universally condemned for the Maidan massacre, what was Nobel Peace laureate President Obama’s response? Nothing. 48 perished. European Parliament’s condemnation of the Odessa massacre said up to 150 could be missing.[25] Not one person was charged. Who did Parubiy blame? Putin, see 1:19:25
see 1:19:25 Parubiy blames Putin for massacre
On Right Sector’s facebook page it announced: “May 2nd, 2014 became another proud moment of the national history”.
Is it any surprise that the Rebels had revolted in Donbass?
For over 300 years Russia shared a close kinship with its ethnic Ukrainian Russian neighbours across its border. With Russian memory of World War 2 still strong, Russians refused to stand by and do nothing.
Kiev’s response to the Rebel revolt was to launch an Anti-Terrorist Operation. But Kiev had to be careful. Ukrainian President Poroshenko said: “IMF cannot give money to countries in ongoing war”.
See 01:14:30
Donbass schools, hospitals, streets, town and cities were indiscriminately bombed. Thousands of civilians have died and two million have fled. Russia accepted 814,000 refugees.
Both sides committed horrible crimes. The UN Subcommittee on the Prevention of Torture believes that the most heinous crimes were committed by the SBU.[26]
The Minsk II Accords negotiated in Belarus without the US, stipulates how to stop this civil war. Ukraine’s president Zelensky was voted in after promising to adhere to the Minsk II Accords, agreeing to allow the rebels to have their own federated state within Ukraine. Where they can live in peace, decide their own economic future, practice their culture and speak their native Russian language. Putin has repeatedly called on the US and Ukraine to follow this accord, after Minsk I was undermined by Ukraine. Everyday Donbass has been bombed by Ukrainian forces, still killing civilians.
The rebels committed the worst crime by shooting down Malaysian Airline passenger flight MH-17. Putin was immediately blamed and Bellingcat had persuasive evidence showing that a BUK missile used to shoot down MH-17 came from Russia.
However, Germany’s foreign spy agency the BND concluded that the rebels most likely stole the BUK from a Ukrainian military base.[27] Did the West politicize this horrific tragedy? (See Part 2).
While Ukraine honoured its Holocaust collaborators, Prince Charles compared Putin to Hitler.[28] Taking this opinion as fact dictates that Putin must be stopped, at all costs. While Russia was accused of invading Ukraine, vast amounts of devastating weaponry entered from the US. Its navy presence is in the Black Sea and its long-range air-force bombers repeatedly conduct bombing exercises close to Russia’s borders.
The West consistently lies in justifying its wars; like Iraq’s Saddam Hussein’s planned use of Weapons of Mass Destruction;[29] and Libya’s Colonel Muammar al-Qaddafi’s plans for bombing civilians.[30]
The West’s most audacious lie:
Russia invaded Crimea.
How could Russia invade Crimea when they were already there in a legally binding agreement with Crimea? Russia negotiated the very expensive 2010 – 2042 Karkiv agreement to lease ports in the Crimea Peninsular for its Black Sea Fleet consisting of:[31]
25,000 personnel including marines
41-43 surface warships (surface combatants, amphibious, mine warfare) plus support and auxiliaries
6-7 submarines
Rear Admiral Denys Berezovsky of the Ukraine Navy defected to Russia in 2014. Russia therefore absorbed 75% of Ukraine’s navy in the process and most of its helicopters and ship maintenance capacity.[32]
70% of Ukraine’s navy personnel defected to Russia.
Conclusion
As Henry Kissinger warned: “the demonization of Vladimir Putin is not a policy. It is an alibi for not having one.” [33] To our peril, the forces against Putin and Russia have achieved Machiavellian results. Putin’s justifiable Red Line must be respected for the gravity it deserves.
Call to action
Talk about this with your friends.
Call these politicians below demanding that Australia not become involved in any armed conflict against Russia, and demand that Pine Gap be shut down.
Labor shadow Foreign Minister Penny Wong (08) 8212 8272
Alan Griffiths is a Melbourne peace activist. In 1943, the Gestapo in Przemyśl, Ukraine, murdered a large portion of the Polish side of his family tree. He can be reached at STOPUSRUSSIAWAR@gmail.com