Paradigm for peace applied to Russia, Ukraine, and the US: Proposal for a peaceful pathway forward – Part 4F

Mental escalators of violence in US policy and media makers- Part 4F. US experts’ lack of empathy and lack of truthfulness cause them to twist Putin’s motives for military action in Ukraine

False Bias #6. Putin Doesn’t Care about Ukrainians’ Lives or Sovereignty. Based on my reading of Putin’s 2007 Munich speech, July 2021 essay, and February 21 and 24, 2022 speeches, and based upon what I know of Russia’s military actions, I would say quite confidently that Putin is absolutely not opposed to democracy and that he invaded Ukraine, not out of any alleged opposition to democracy or sovereignty, but out of his concern for the lives being killed in Donetsk and Lugansk, out of his concern over the violation of Ukraine’s sovereignty and identity and use of its wealth by Western interests, and out of his concern for the safety of Russians given Ukraine’s current collaboration and imminent membership into NATO, a possible US biological weapons program within Ukraine, and the likely consequential deployment of missiles, even nuclear warheads, within close range of Russian cities.

Putin is opposed to a Ukrainian government that, instead of recognizing the right of self-determination that’s guaranteed by international law, calls the people of Donetsk and Lugansk terrorists and goes about killing them, with the help of billions of dollars of US and NATO weapons. In fact, we could more easily say that the US and NATO are opposed to democracy, because they’re providing weapons to be used against two republics which have declared their independence. If the US is so opposed to secession, then why did it support Ukraine’s and Georgia’s secession? Why didn’t it work to keep Ukraine and Georgia together in one federation with Russia?

In his February 24, 2022 speech, Putin explains, as he has done many times for American ears that are incessantly clogged to the point of deafness, that the horrendous violence of the eight-year civil war in Ukraine, a war fueled by the US-supported 2014 coup and then billions of dollars of US and NATO weapon shipments, is the primary factor provoking Russia to take its military action in Ukraine, Donetsk, and Lugansk. Putin states:

“For eight years, for eight endless years we have been doing everything possible to settle the situation by peaceful political means. Everything was in vain.

“As I said in my previous address, you cannot look without compassion at what is happening there. It became impossible to tolerate it. We had to stop that atrocity, that genocide of the millions of people who live there and who pinned their hopes on Russia, on all of us. It is their aspirations, the feelings and pain of these people that were the main motivating force behind our decision to recognize the independence of the Donbass people’s republics.”[1]

But of course, every time Putin spoke of the violence in that civil war, US mainstream media airily dismissed Putin’s words. Journalists always wrote, with insuppressible arrogance and ignorance, that they know Putin was lying, they know not to fall for his pretexts, because they’re so smart.

To US policy and media makers, the only suffering worth talking about was the suffering, not of the 14,000 who died in that civil war and the suffering of their loved ones, not the suffering of those attacked by ultranationalists and neo-Nazis, not the suffering of Russian troops in the military action and Russian troops suffering under Ukrainian capture, but the suffering of Ukrainians killed by Russians. Only their suffering mattered. Why? Because rage over that suffering could be used as an ingredient to cook up anti-Russian hatred, because sorrow over that suffering could be transformed into political and false spiritual ammunition against Russia.

In fact, it’s extremely possible that this is why US policymakers never supported non-violent conflict resolution but instead sent weapons. Perhaps they wanted Russia to invade and kill Ukrainians to then use those killings to fuel hatred against Russia to help give them political cover for their avaricious goals in Ukraine and Russia. For US policymakers, it’s quite possible that dead Ukrainians were a goal to fuel their agenda, and the tears for the dead weren’t even real. I’m not so arrogant and ignorant as US experts to claim something’s true when I don’t know, and I don’t know if that’s true. It’s just a possibility. Their lack of 360-degree empathy may also be due to the lack of empathy that is characteristic of the psychological pattern referred to in the earlier essay, Part 4B, the Prejudiced Personality, as described by Gordon Allport.

For the second concern, in addition to his opposition to the killing of the people of Donetsk and Lugansk in the civil war, Putin is also opposed to a Ukrainian government that is merely being used and shaped by the US government as a tool to fulfill its own agenda, including its agenda against Russia. This may sound strange to US policymaker ears who assume that democracy equates to obeying US policymakers, but most people consider a Ukrainian government that is a puppet government of the US government not to be democratic because it represents the interests of those special social and business circles which are forever ruling the US. Such a government is not representing the Ukrainian population.

Some may not believe that the Ukrainian government is a puppet government or a tool of the US, even though the leaked tapes from 2014 of Biden’s current Undersecretary of State Victoria Nuland in conversation with the US Ambassador Geoffrey Pyatt suggested quite strongly that these two were deciding who would be Ukraine’s next president once Yanukovich was ousted. Rather than blindly believing some information as true and automatically dismissing other information as false, it’s always best to comprehensively evaluate circumstances in an impartial court or hearing. Ideally, the US government’s role in the Ukraine coup could be evaluated in the International Criminal Court, although the US government has refused to join the court because it wants veto powers over everybody’s else’s decisions. Now if that isn’t a sign of arrogance and opposition to international democratic relations, I don’t know what is!

In his July 2021 essay, Putin clearly states his fear that Ukraine’s government is representing, not Ukrainians, but Western profiteers and those who wish to use Ukraine as a a tool for their own national interests, as a “springboard against Russia.”[2] Again in his February 21, 2022 speech, Putin describes how Ukraine has lost its sovereignty because external, foreign powers have turned it into a puppet state that they have privatized.

In international court, we could ask for the evidence to support Putin’s assertion. It’s a very important claim, and frankly, it certainly is consistent with US foreign policy, which, as historical documentation proves, has repeatedly sought to intervene severely in other nations’ internal affairs and push for privatization of foreign resources and utilities so as to give US investors the opportunity to take over and reap profits. Such behavior in US foreign policy, really the signature mark of US foreign policy, is clearly an obstacle to democracy abroad, yet it’s precisely this type of environment that CIA and NED coups create: governments abroad that represent—not the interests of their own people as a whole—but the interests of certain US businessmen and bankers.

For those who actually care about democracy, justice, and peace, I strongly urge the prompt undertaking of national and international evaluations, hearings, and court proceedings into the role of the US government, US businesses, and US private military contractors into promoting or obstructing democracy in Ukraine. After all, we can’t have justice determined merely by the one-sided, partial accounts of US policy and media makers on the front pages of newspapers now, can we? Democracy requires a comprehensive, impartial view of justice. Or are US policymakers opposed to that aspect of democracy, too?

The so-called US “experts” who refer to Putin’s essay and speeches never breathe a word about what Putin actually writes in opposition to. They just make up this lie that he’s opposed to democracy, sovereignty, and borders. I guess we can tell our kids at school that if they’re interested in becoming a journalist, a professor who disseminates his advice to journals, the president of NDI, or the US president, they don’t need to know how to grasp truth. They just need to be good at fiction.

Again, here are Putin’s actual words about this Western violation of Ukrainian sovereignty, a topic hushed up in US mainstream media. Notice that Putin, in fact, takes a strong interest in supporting democracy and the Ukrainian people.

With regard to the 2014 coup in Ukraine, Putin states in his Feb. 21, 2022 speech: “Maidan did not bring Ukraine any closer to democracy and progress.” He notes that the 2014 coup was essentially hijacked by violent ultranationalists, an observation made also by many alternative news US websites, sites that also suggested links between the ultranationalists and the US government and US private military contractors. Putin himself remarks:

“Radical nationalists took advantage of the justified public discontent and saddled the Maidan protest, escalating it to a coup d’état in 2014. They also had direct assistance from foreign states. According to reports, the US Embassy provided $1 million a day to support the so-called protest camp on Independence Square in Kiev. In addition, large amounts were impudently transferred directly to the opposition leaders’ bank accounts, tens of millions of dollars. But the people who actually suffered, the families of those who died in the clashes provoked in the streets and squares of Kiev and other cities, how much did they get in the end? Better not ask.”

With regard to standing up for democracy and sovereignty, Putin’s words clearly show his opposition to a US puppet government in Ukraine. I’ll quote them at length since everyone else on mainstream media is omitting them entirely and concocting their own ideas about what he said:

“It all came down to a Ukrainian economy in tatters and an outright pillage of the country’s citizens, while Ukraine itself was placed under external control, directed not only from the Western capitals, but also on the ground, as the saying goes, through an entire network of foreign advisors, NGOs and other institutions present in Ukraine. They have a direct bearing on all the key appointments and dismissals and on all branches of power at all levels, from the central government to municipalities, as well as on state-owned companies and corporations, including Naftogaz, Ukrenergo, Ukrainian Railways, Ukroboronprom, Ukrposhta, and the Ukrainian Sea Ports Authority.

“There is no independent judiciary in Ukraine. The Kiev authorities, at the West’s demand, delegated the priority right to select members of. . . international organizations.

“In addition, the United States directly controls the National Agency on Corruption Prevention, the National Anti-Corruption Bureau, the Specialized Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office and the High Anti-Corruption court. All this is done under the noble pretext of invigorating efforts against corruption. All right, but where are the results? Corruption is flourishing like never before.

“Are the Ukrainian people aware that this is how their country is managed? Do they realize that their country has turned not even into a political or economic protectorate but has been reduced to a colony with a puppet regime? The state was privatized. As a result, the government, which designates itself as the “power of patriots” no longer acts in a national capacity and consistently pushed Ukraine towards losing its sovereignty.

“. . . There are more and more acts enabling the Ukrainian military and law enforcement agencies to suppress freedom of speech and dissent, and persecute the opposition. . . Ukraine has outperformed its Western masters by inventing sanctions against its own citizens, companies, television channels, other media outlets and even members of parliament.”[3]

In his February 24, 2022 speech, Putin states to deaf American ears the reasons for Russia’s military action: “The current events have nothing to do with a desire to infringe on the interests of Ukraine and the Ukrainian people. They are connected with defending Russia from those who have taken Ukraine hostage and are trying to use it against our country and our people.”[4]

Why do US policy and media makers, supposedly so intelligent and truthful, completely omit Putin’s words which obviously show his support for democracy and for Ukraine’s sovereignty? And why no public hearing into the role of US policymakers in violating Ukraine’s sovereignty not only during the coup but in its aftermath? Why no attempts to investigate Putin’s claim about US masters, including NGOs such as NED, managing Ukraine’s internal political, economic, and perhaps cultural and military affairs?

Why no evaluation of the US control over these anti-corruption organizations and their results? Will no one hold US policymakers accountable? If they’re so innocent, why are they afraid of discussing the matter? Why merely this “send weapons to Ukraine to fight Putin” response? It sounds to me like US policymakers are hiding something. Why else would they respond so unintelligently?

The utter disdain that US policy and media makers have for truth and for digging into the truth is an enormous Mental Escalator of US and US-promoted Violence. It also shows what a huge waste of time the American educational and college system is, at least for those interested in going into government and journalism. Heck, you don’t need to be able to read foreign leaders’ statements! You don’t need to comprehend a thing anyone says! Why bother learning Russian when US experts can’t even understand English? Just make up the fiction that pleases you and your boss and, above all, the weapon industry, because America runs on guns!

While the distorted mentality stemming from black-and-white thinking may be playing a role in US policy and media makers’ failures to honestly represent Putin’s words, it’s highly likely that deliberate deceit is also involved, especially since US policymakers seem to be hiding their aggressive economic and military motives towards Ukraine and Russia. Just notice how nothing about Black Sea fossil fuel or NATO hopes of conquering the Black Sea for itself is mentioned to the American public by our leaders. This omission is silent but it rings loudly in the ears. Putin refers to the “empire of lies” which proceeds by use of force. His evaluation of the dishonesty and violence of the US government is accurate.

Kristin Christman has been independently researching US foreign policy and peace since 9/11. Her channel focuses on US-Russian relations at https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCuNEw9-10lk-CwU-5vAElcg. Kristin graduated summa cum laude from Dartmouth College with a BA in Russian, and she holds Master’s degrees in Slavic languages from Brown University and public administration from SUNY Albany. She has been a guest with former UNSCOM weapons inspector Scott Ritter and UNAC coordinator Joe Lombardo on Cynthia Pooler’s program, Issues that Matter, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QDlaLNJih7U. Peace Review: A Journal of Social Justice recently published her article on suicide, culture, and peace in their special edition on suicide, Vol. 33 No. 4.  [email protected]

[1] Vladimir Putin, “Transcript: Vladimir Putin’s Televised Address on Ukraine,” Feb. 24, 2022, https://www.bloomberg.com.

[2] Vladimir Putin, “Article by Vladimir Putin: ‘On the Historical Unity of Russians and Ukrainians,” July 12, 2021, Permanent Mission of the Russian Federation to the United Nations, https://russiaun.ru.

[3] Vladimir Putin, “Address to the People of Russia on the Donbas Problem and the Situation in Ukraine,” American Rhetoric Online Speech Bank, Feb. 21, 2022, https://www.americanrhetoric.com.

[4] Putin, February 24, 2022.

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