This is verbatim from the official report of the UN General Assembly plenary of 16 December 2021:
The Assembly next took up the report on “Elimination of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance”, containing two draft resolutions.
By a recorded vote of 130 in favour to 2 against (Ukraine, United States), with 49 abstentions, the Assembly then adopted draft resolution I, “Combating glorification of Nazism, neo‑Nazism and other practices that contribute to fuelling contemporary forms of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance”.
By its terms, the Assembly expressed deep concern about the glorification of the Nazi movement, neo‑Nazism and former members of the Waffen SS organization, including by erecting monuments and memorials, holding public demonstrations in the name of the glorification of the Nazi past, the Nazi movement and neo‑Nazism, and declaring or attempting to declare such members and those who fought against the anti‑Hitler coalition, collaborated with the Nazi movement and committed war crimes and crimes against humanity “participants in national liberation movements”.
Further, the Assembly urged States to eliminate all forms of racial discrimination by all appropriate means, including through legislation, urging them to address new and emerging threats posed by the rise in terrorist attacks incited by racism, xenophobia and other forms of intolerance, or in the name of religion or belief. It would call on States to ensure that education systems develop the necessary content to provide accurate accounts of history, as well as promote tolerance and other international human rights principles. It likewise would condemn without reservation any denial of or attempt to deny the Holocaust, as well as any manifestation of religious intolerance, incitement, harassment or violence against persons or communities on the basis of ethnic origin or religious belief.
In Ukraine, support for the Ukrainian nationalist divisions who fought alongside the Nazis has become, over the last eight years, the founding ideology of the modern post 2013 Ukrainian state (which is very different from the diverse Ukrainian state which briefly existed 1991-2013). The full resolution on nazism and racism passed by the General Assembly is lengthy, unnzaires but these provisions in particular were voted against by the United States and by the Ukraine:
6. Emphasizes the recommendation of the Special Rapporteur that “any commemorative celebration of the Nazi regime, its allies and related organizations, whether official or unofficial, should be prohibited by States”, also emphasizes that such manifestations do injustice to the memory of the countless victims of the Second World War and negatively influence children and young people, and stresses in this regard that it is important that States take measures, in accordance with international human rights law, to counteract any celebration of the Nazi SS organization and all its integral parts, including the Waffen SS;
7. Expresses concern about recurring attempts to desecrate or demolish monuments erected in remembrance of those who fought against Nazism during the Second World War, as well as to unlawfully exhume or remove the remains of such persons, and in this regard urges States to fully comply with their relevant obligations, inter alia, under article 34 of Additional Protocol I to the Geneva Conventions of 1949;
…
10. Condemns without reservation any denial or attempt to deny the Holocaust;
11. Welcomes the call of the Special Rapporteur for the active preservation of those Holocaust sites that served as Nazi death camps, concentration and forced labour camps and prisons, as well as his encouragement of States to take measures, including legislative, law enforcement and educational measures, to put an end to all forms of Holocaust denial
As reported in the Times of Israel, hundreds took part in a demonstration in Kiev in May 2021, and others throughout Ukraine, in honour of a specific division of the SS. That is but one march and one division – glorification of its Nazi past is a mainstream part of Ukrainian political culture.
In 2018 a bipartisan letter by 50 US Congressmen condemned multiple events commemorating Nazi allies held in Ukraine with official Ukrainian government backing.
There are no two ways about it. The Ukrainian vote against the UN resolution against Nazism was motivated by sympathy for the ideology of historic, genocide active Nazis. It is as simple as that.
The United States claims that its vote against was motivated by concern for freedom of speech. We have the Explanation of Vote that the United States gave at the committee stage:
The United States Supreme Court has consistently affirmed the constitutional right to freedom of speech and the rights of peaceful assembly and association, including by avowed Nazis
That sounds good and noble. But consider this – why does the United States Government believe that avowed Nazis have freedom of speech, but that Julian Assange does not? You can have freedom of speech to advocate the murder of Jews and immigrants, but not to reveal US war crimes?
Why was the United States government targeting journalists in the invasion of Iraq? The United States believes in freedom of speech when it serves its imperial interests. It does not do so otherwise. This is the very worst kind of high sounding hypocrisy, in aid of defending the Nazis in Ukraine.
The second reason the United States gives is that Russia is making the whole thing up:
a document most notable for its thinly veiled attempts to legitimize Russian disinformation campaigns denigrating neighboring nations and promoting the distorted Soviet narrative of much of contemporary European history, using the cynical guise of halting Nazi glorification
The problem here is that it is very difficult to portray the Times of Israel or 50 bipartisan US congressmen as a Russian disinformation campaign. There is no historical doubt whatsoever of Ukrainian nationalist forces active support of Nazism and participation in genocide, not just of Jews and Roma but of Poles and religious minorities. There is no doubt whatsoever of the modern glorification in Ukraine of these evil people.
It is of course not just Ukraine. In Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania the record of collaboration with Nazis, of active participation in fighting for Nazis, and in active participation in genocide is extremely shaming. Throughout Eastern Europe there is a failure in these “victim nations” to look history squarely in the eye and to admit what happened – a failure the United States in actually promoting as “a campaign against Russian disinformation”.
I recommend to you the website www.defendinghistory.com, run by the admirable David Katz, which is a large and valuable resource on this website from a Lithuanian Jewish perspective that cannot remotely be dismissed as Russian or left wing propaganda. The front page currently features the December 2021 naming of a square in the capital after Lithuanian “freedom fighter” Juokas Luksa “Daumantas”, a man who commenced the massacre of Jews in Vilnius ahead of the arrival of German forces.
These are precisely the kind of commemorations the resolution is against. There has been a rash of destruction of Soviet war memorials and even war graves, and erection of commemorations, in various form, of Nazis throughout the Baltic states. That is what paras 6 and 7 of the resolution refer to, and there is no doubt whatsoever of the truth of these events. It is not “Russian disinformation”.
However the European Union, in support of its Baltic states members and their desire to forget or deny historical truth and to build a new national myth expunging their active role in the genocide of their Jewish and Roma populations, would not support the UN Resolution on Nazism. The EU countries abstained, as did the UK. The truth of course is that NATO intends to use the descendants of Eastern European racists against Russia much as Hitler did, at least in a cold war context.
You won’t find that in the Explanation of Vote.
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As usual the BBC et al forget about the past that even they had to report.
100 plus Ukranians shot by unknown assailants – Trades Unions buildings burnt down etc etc.
A fascist State established.
The East (where the real economy lies) is looking for defence from Russia – The West has its pensions paid by by Russia.
I was watching PBS US today about WW1 and the narrator went through the usual Democracy versus non Democracy (Communism – Fascism twins bit) and he used the word “pointless” a lot.
No as far as ordinary humans are concerned it appears that way but to the Bourgeoise it wasn’t pointless – they made a packet – particularly in the USA and WW2 sealed the hegemony and dominance until 1973.
Sine they have been playing a game of divide and rule as most of us should know but the game is up and China is a big worry and Russia is a military worry.
The question is: who do they fight first?
Are they already overstretched?
Who do they take on first?
While they are taking on someone – what losses are they making elsewhere (as in Chile / Venezuela/ East Asia etc) gains and losses?
Will they want to take American casualties or use proxies? (I know the answer).
The US is caught in a bind inherited from WW1 and WW2 – they had the chance to do a Win-Win and they took the road of a We win.
The Chinese are softly softly dong the Win-Win.
That seems to be working rather well.
There are several laughable hypocritical scenarios here:
And so on it goes.
The oil fields of West Asia changed hands as a result of WW1.
“In Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania the record of collaboration with Nazis, of active participation in fighting for Nazis, and in active participation in genocide is extremely shaming. Throughout Eastern Europe there is a failure in these “victim nations” to look history squarely in the eye and to admit what happened”
I would suggest you do your homework before accusing whole nations:
On the Margins: About the History of Jews in Estonia
By Anton Weiss-Wendt
History of Latvian Jews
By Josifs Šteimanis
or Andrew Ezergailis works published by the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
Lithuania (United States Holocaust Memorial Museum)
This link clearly states that 90% of Jews were killed by Germans and Lithuanian auxiliaries in Lithuania.
“The Lithuanians carried out violent riots against the Jews both shortly before and immediately after the arrival of German forces”
If the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum is making fake stories, I would like to hear in few sentences what your books say.
Collaboration with the Nazis wasn’t restricted to Eastern Europe. With the exception of Denmark every occupied country in Europe collaborated with the Nazis, 80% of Dutch Jews were deported 95% of whom died. Tens of thousands of Russian volunteers served with the German military. How relevant is it to base future foreign policy on events that happened 80 years ago anyway?
No Russians served in the German military until the end of the war, when the lack of manpower forced Hitler to give up and he allowed the formation of 2 infantry divisions, known as Russian Liberation Army. Both divisions were incomplete, though. The Germans accepted only the Volksdeutsche and minorities, including the Ukrainians, Kalmyks, Cossacks etc into their rank and file.
‘We’ve heard it all before’: Ukrainians brush aside talk of Russian invasion.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/dec/24/ukrainians-brush-aside-talk-russian-invasion-ukraine-christmas
Perhaps the Ukrainian in the street is not so easily fooled by think-tank propaganda.
I absolutely agree that it’s not so easy to fool ordinary Ukrainians. I watch a lot of reports from there in Ukrainian language, including some professionals who are also Ukrainians, and they say very reasonable things. Unfortunately, they have no power.
Those of power are a very interesting selection, and I would even dare to say that such a selection was most likely made by the Israeli lobby in the United States and Britain. Yesterday one of the Ukrainians joked about a possible war:
“dear America, if you are going to make partisan units out of us on the same principle as you formed the Ukrainian Cabinet of Ministers for us, then please provide a rabbi for each unit.”
Russian invasion is a narrative beneficial for NATO. The war makes it impossible to implement the Minsk agreements. Thus, Donbass will have no right to vote in the Ukrainian referendum, and will not be able to veto Ukraine’s NATO membership, which is scheduled for the spring meeting in Madrid.
During his recent press-conference Putin said it straightforward “there was a promise but you deceived us”. Jens Stoltenberg commented that NATO has never made such promises. To which Russia had to dig these promises out
https://youtu.be/rCfiU4rtBp4?list=FL4WhZsyJPmOPXAA6sc1yaug&t=165
So, today Russia says clearly – we demand legally formalized written guarantees. (I don’t know what he is going to make of written guarantees, as if the West has never violated written treaties, HAHA in a very sarcastic tone.)
US Four Star General and supreme Commander of Nato in Europe Tod Wolters, wants Bulgaria and Romania to backup Ukraine in the event of a conflict between Ukraine and Russia, (Der Spiegel), effectively Wolters is promoting both countries as staging posts if war breaks out. From there the conflict could quite easily move Westwards, if sanity doesn’t prevail in time.
European countries, and European countries within Nato, need to wake up and put a halt to this insane agenda of pushing and goading Russia to the brink of war before its too late.
I’m afraid it maybe too late already. What makes me think so is that we have different views on NATO and different versions of history.
I watched Putin’s answer to Diana Magnay from the Sky News, in Russian. Then I watched the Sky News report on it, in English.
I must say, Diana looked sincere, so I think she is not pretending, just makes her opinions from her version of history.
She said that Putin seem to truly believe in some treaties with NATO. She wrongly interpreted Putin’s reaction, when she asked him to guarantee non-invasion.
I think that Western journalists must now make appointments to interview Gorbachev.
Tatyana. I agree. The US wants another war in Europe. Russia is prepared to go to war to stop and reverse its encirclment by NATO. Just as an example of the numerical and economic advantage the Collective West has over Russia..Finland has ordered 60 F35 fifth generation jets. So just imagine how many fifth generation jets NATO has in total in comparison with Russia.
As any Iranian will tell you: once you have a written promise – a treaty even – from the US, its best use is if you cut it into squares and put it next to the toilet.
Remember the purpose of NATO as defined by Ernie Bevin. It was to keep the Russians out, keep the Americans in, and to keep the Germans down.
As the war in Korea showed that the Germans could be kept down only at increased costs for everybody else, think of Eden’s ‘Chained to a Corpse’ comment, the Germans have long since ceased to be kept down.
Its pretty clear to most that the spectre of Warsaw Pact armoured columns swarming across the North German Plain has also long ceased to be a possibility, so one might reasonably conclude the need to keep the Russians out has also passed into irrelevance.
Just leaves the Keep the Americans in part, although given the demise of two of the three raison d’etre, one might wonder to what end the Americans ought to be kept in.
Clearly NATO is an organisation that is searching for a reason to perpetuate its existence, and given its failure in Afghanistan, whooping up the potential for conflict in the Ukraine is just another means of extending its life, and the position of those who will no doubt be profiting greatly from the public purse.
As for the Ukraine, or Georgia joining NATO, it’d probably be wise to not hold ones breath waiting for such a thing to happen. It may well be a reasonable assumption that even the dimmest Euro Politician will realise that those two nations desire membership in order that they might poke the nose of the Bear with some sort of impunity. I’d have to think that the existing NATO members realise that offering membership to two countries that fall squarely within the Russian sphere of influence is a non starter. That does not mean however that they wont use the possibility to either annoy the Russians, or use as a stick and carrot on the group so eloquently described by Tatyana. 🙂
My father was 19 when WW2 started, was called up, and fortunately for him, survived both mentally and physically. Talking to him and others of his age, it is clear that they truly believe that “our side” was good and atrocities the work of the enemy.
This is clearly not true. There are, sadly, plenty of atrocities recorded for all sides. Perhaps we can learn from the soldiers of 107 years ago who found it possible to celebrate Christmas with “their enemy” on the Western Front. Of course, “the Establishment” made sure that this was not repeated in the following years. It would not do for the ordinary man to realise his enemy was not a man from another country, but his own government and those who sit above the government directing affairs for their benefit.
Reading the comments above, I wonder whether we will ever learn who our true enemy is. Remember, Nazis and Communists are as much victims of propaganda as are you. Merry Christmas!
When the mincing machine technology of the trenches for the First World War was set up in Flanders it was to feed humans into it. – namely males on their teens and twenties – this was to diffuse the threat they were inevitably going to present to the old imperial order and claim to rights and welfare for their daily existence being just mere slaves of the ‘richer’.
The working classes and real wealth creators written about in the Ragged Trousered Philanthropist a couple of decades earlier.
The Rich, Upper Classes and Supremacist Eugenicists and the Masters of Money knew that revolutions would be inevitable as had happened centuries earlier across Europe with the death of the Aristos in France.
The answer was to use modern technology to remove that threat.
The hard part was building the railways to these fields years earlier and infact plant plenty of mustard and build the facilities to create the gasses. At the time they only had Balloons as aerial observation posts the use of aircraft only developed once the war was under way. Airforces which didn’t exist at the beginning were fully underway with mythology by the end (to be used in the next war)
So what happened when the third dimension was introduced to the troops on the ground who went up in balloons overlooking the battlefields? Horror is what was revealed.
The human mincing grounds with train lines leading to them with fresh troops daily, the trenches, the No-Man land where men were no mended.
As these observers descended back to earth with their photos – for the generals, the military industrialists , the Aristo overlords and their Financial Masters to enjoy, from their clubs and temples across the world counting the daily tens of thousands of children and men being minced and their works being preserved from revolution -these observers were mortified that they weren’t fighting an enemy that wanted to invade but were just like each other and the battlefields were designed as the death factories, some went mad, some told their fellow soldiers, many were removed from their fellows. Whilst the magic millions of possible revolutionaries were removed permanently or returned battle scarred to keep the Imperialists dreams alive for a few more decades.
First of all, I want to say a heartfelt Merry Christmas to Craig and everyone on here.
This is a really good article, which cannot be contested because it is the truth, this is important. The reason why it is important, is because the mainstream media will not cover it, because the truth dismantles their lies and agenda.
I wonder how many people realise that in a Ukrainian cemetary in Ontario, Canada, there is a monument celebrating the 14th Waffen Grenadier Division of the SS, which fought against the Soviet red army in WW2.
https://www.straight.com/news/how-did-a-monument-to-a-nazi-ss-division-end-up-being-erected-in-canada
Many nationalities settled in Ontario prior to and after the war, including Brits. Just west of Oakville is the town of Kitchener with many natives of German and Eastern European heritage. Interestingly, Kitchener was originally called Berlin but changed its name due to sensitivities during WW1. Kitchener is very popular for its celebration of Oktoberfest.
No suggestion that its a hotbed of Nazis, its a lovely area, just noting in passing the areas migrant history.
I wish you all have merriest Christmas ever!
ET
You raise a very interesting question
https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2021/12/protecting-the-nazis-the-extraordinary-vote-of-ukraine-and-the-usa/comment-page-2/#comment-1005510
I looked into the issue, and it seems that the United States had a precedent ‘American Nazis, the Skokie Case and the Risks of Freedom’
Whether US law should ensure freedom of speech for everyone, including Nazism?
Aside from all emotions, and looking at the essence, then yes, I believe that this is possible. And especially in the current political climate of the United States.
US law declares the equality of all citizens, while Nazism, racism, xenophobia mentioned in the UN resolution – are precisely the opposite of equality.
Focusing on freedom of speech, they are shifting the focus away from violating the right to equality.
I don’t think the US would make another ammendment to their Constitution because of the UN resolution (especially a Russia initiated one 🙂 ) But they may think of doing so due to what is happening right now inside of their society.
Also, I found a Wiki artickle on human right in the US. It is in Russian, but can be easily translated into English via Google Translate. I just right-click somewhere on the page and choose ‘translate into English’ from the drop-down menu.
You may be interested to see “Participation of the US in human rights treaties”. There are lines in the table marked ‘not signed’, e.g. Protection of the Rights of Migrant Workers and Their Family, Abolish the death penalty, On the enforced disappearance of persons
I had to look this up Tatyana and in learning about it I came across two informative pages from the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), the organisation that took up the defense of the guys calling themselves nazis who wanted to demonstrate at Skokie and written by the lead lawyer handling the case for the ACLU. It’s worth reading both his description of those events and his letter in the second link.
https://www.aclu.org/issues/free-speech/rights-protesters/skokie-case-how-i-came-represent-free-speech-rights-nazis
https://www.aclu.org/letter/goldberger-letter-aclu-members
“On January 27, 1978, the Illinois Supreme Court declared the Skokie ban unconstitutional. And on February 23, 1978, a federal court struck down all three Skokie laws including the $350,000 insurance requirement. We’ve eliminated the ban on everyone’s speech.”
As also stated in that letter the laws enacted by the Skokie authorities to deny the demonstration didn’t mention Nazis at all and was also used to deny Jewish War Veterans a right to parade. One point I try to make is made in that letter. If such laws exist there is no way to limit them and such laws will be used to prohibit whatever is believed to be offensive by those in a position to enforce their belief systems.
“Focusing on freedom of speech, they are shifting the focus away from violating the right to equality.”
We shall have to agree to disagree Tatyana :). I believe the one reinforces the other. I can’t make the argument any more eloquently than David Goldberger does in both those pieces.
Yes, perhaps we will agree to disagree.
You say: “such laws will be used to prohibit whatever is believed to be offensive by those in a position to enforce their belief systems”
This is probably the core of our basic misunderstanding. What we are talking about is not a belief system, it’s an ideology that presupposes certain discriminatory and violent actions. Like terrorism. Racist or Nazi views directly imply violence.
A Nazi march is a way to demonstrate that this ideology is shared and approved by some members of the society. Propaganda. Advertising. Making it visible. Invitation to join. Anyway, it’s not just ‘offensive’, rather it is ‘dangerous’.
If a state officially allows Nazi marches, the state thereby shows that this ideology is supported by the state, and therefore it allows one part of its citisens to show to another part of its citisens that they are not welcome in this state. It’s especially strange when we speak about ethnicity or race, which are visible in a person and make them easy targets.
For comparison, there are other “movements” that unite like-minded people and “prescribe violence” against specific groups. Mafia, or radical religious fanatics. But a state-approved march of jihadists, mafiosi or the Ku Klux Klan is something khm… unusual.
Well, I still find it strange, why appealing to the freedom of speech, when anti-violence or equality for everyone law might be applicable.
An Ideology is a set of beliefs or philosophies attributed to a person or group of persons. An ideology and a belief system are one and the same thing. Definitions aside, I don’t think I expressed myself well with that phrase.
The point is that once you give a state institution (or indeed any other institution) the legal framework to decide what views may or may not be expressed, no matter how vile such views might be to most of us, you give them the authority to decide any view that they don’t like to be prohibited. In the ACLU letter in the second link above David Goldberger explicitly makes the observation that the law enacted to prohibit the nazi demonstration in Stokie made no mention of nazi ideology as a determinant of prohibition and the SAME law was soon after used to prohibit a parade of jewish war veterans. And that is my point, once you concede the right to freedom of expression for one viewpoint, no matter how vile such a view might be, you have conceded that right to express any viewpoint. It is all or nothing, you cannot have the right SOMETIMES depending on the viewpoint you make expression of which is dependent upon a decision by whomever is in a position to prohibit view points at any particular time.
That is why it is in the US constitution and other constitutions so that no administration can arbitrarily change it without putting it to a referendum of the population. In order to protect everyone’s right to freely express their views you will have to tolerate that that allows some vile views to be expressed. It is fundamental. Isn’t that what nazism taught us, that to structure a state where only “approved” views were allowed is a recipe for disaster?
You have confused me. You say “Isn’t that what nazism taught us, that to structure a state where only “approved” views were allowed is a recipe for disaster?” You are not describing Nazism, you are describing Fascism, a totalitarian state.
Hey, I understand your idea of freedom of speech – to allow everyone to say everything, no matter how offensive it might be for someone’s feelings. I agree, to some extent. I can do with my feelings, but I prefer my state to protect me when it comes up to organisations with violent ideas.
My point is that there are other laws that could be used. Let’s leave the freedom of speech aside, we all see how this sacred right was applied to Assange. We see that SOMETIMES this right still depends on the viewpoint, if this is the point of view of the state.
I find it strange the idea that some institutions should decide what things are allowed. I believe that the population of the country should decide what they want in their country, and they write it down in a clearly formulated law.
I see that it’s a common practice for the West to write a vague law, then the court makes decision each time, and people pray that the court is fair and that they have enough money to bring the case to an end. The rule of law is not guaranteed for everyone then.
Yet I see people in the West are too much busy with the courts. Lawyers are probably the most demanded profession.
E. T.
As far as I am aware the United States Constitution does not require that heavy arms and military training be provided to fervent Nazis in Europe or that said Nazis be represented as good people across American politics and media.
But please double check this.
Tatyana
You might like to think about the difference between ‘supported’ and ‘tolerated’. I have a lot of personal experience of having to tolerate things I don’t support.
I have to tolerate the First Past the Post electoral system for UK General Elections, which I have never supported since being a teenager.But short of becoming a revolutionary, overthrowing Parliament and the Queen, I may not be in a situation to support a more proportional voting system before I die. For some reason the majority of the UK populace like FPTP. It just ossifies a two-party system where a ‘majority’ never represents a true majority. A ‘landslide’ is rarely above 42% of those who actually bothered to vote.
I have to tolerate the ignorance of large numbers of people about virology, immunology and vaccinations, but as the power structures are overwhelmingly in opposition to my views, I have to tolerate that. I tend to just say ‘Live and Let Live’ until someone tells me out of ignorance to do something I have no intention of doing.
I have to tolerate Mr Murray calling ‘Brexiteers’ ‘right wing racists’ far too regularly for my liking. I call him out on it, but unless I am petty enough to instigate a private prosecution against him for whatever legal term corresponds to ‘racism against brexit-supporting English human beings’, I will probably have to tolerate him continuing to do so. I absolutely don’t support him on that in any way and I personally don’t think it does any good to the Scottish Independence cause either, as it shows up the Scots to be petty, small-minded and ignorantly vindictive people where Brexit voting is concerned.
So, as far as Governments are concerned, so long as ‘nazi supporters’ march peacefully, do not cause damage to property, do not threaten other members of the public by so doing, you kind of have to tolerate them marching if you believe in their right to associate around a set of beliefs you personally find absolutely repugnant.
What a government can do, however, is to be very quick to take firm and decisive action should such groups start to overstep the mark and carry out violence, robbery, arson or start to conspire to commit murder against targeted groups. Usually, governments use the Security Services to infiltrate every political grouping anyway. After all, the UK Security Services infiltrated the Liberal Democrats in the early 2000s when they were opposing the Iraq war and starting to show that they might possibly represent a credible threat to the old duopoly. So I have no doubt they would infiltrate any parties with nationalist, racist or eugenicist tendencies.
Thank you very much, dear Mods! Wish you happy holiday time!
Tatyana this is the best way to deal with American Nazis by Americans.
https://youtu.be/z75DN5r_6H4
The Blues Brothers at their best.
🙂 I’m ashamed to admit that I’m more bloodthirsty than the filmmakers. The Nazis just jumped into the river, and I was expecting a picture like in a Russian-language meme кровь, кишки, расп*дорасило
Their attempts at revenge are very funny in the film.
In real life they should be made fun of because nazis/fascists are like little children dressing up and playing at being supermen and women.
If you haven’t seen the film – it’s now old, but still very funny and is MUSICAL with classic Blues Performers and songs to sing along with.
Laughing at idiots like the Banderists and Stoltenberg and NSA/CIA the Canadian evacuees, hothoused, preserving the nazi establishment and the the US presidents they have controlled along with thick as mince red necks who under the fake news that the Gubbermint was maybe going to have some gun controls went out and doubled the amounts of weapons they have in their homes! Just so their kids can play with them and end up killing their families or themselves while playing or going into schools or shops and shooting up the place because somebody laughed at them and their delusions.
The funny thing is I am surprised no one has blamed Russia/Putin for these daily avoidable deaths by stupid. Seeing as the US imports $150 million of bullets from Russia annually! Yup it’s true. All these sanctions but can’t upset the dumbf***s wasters of their very little money on their military type rifles from enjoying shooting their hard earned dollars away every week whilst not having enough medicine/food/ houses/ education
They don’t celebrate Dumb And Dumber Americans for no reason ?
I find it difficult to watch comedy films about the Nazis, sorry. I saw the movie “Come and See” (it is available with English subtitles. I give a link in case anyone dares to spoil the Christmas mood).
I don’t find Nazis either funny or infantile. Here in Russia it is not like something distant and funny on the screen, because these were atrocities and death, right here, in every home and every family.
That is why when the Ukrainian Prime Minister calls the residents of Donbas ‘subhumans’, it is taken very seriously here. Especially when he published it on the website of the Embassy of Ukraine in US.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Come_and_See
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NJYOg4ORc1w
“I find it difficult to watch comedy films about the Nazis, sorry…”
It’s one short scene in a great movie which isn’t about nazis at all and definitely worth a watch. The Blues Brothers was released in 1980 and the Stokie events took place in 1977. One of the lines from the scene is “I hate Illinois nazis.” I guess the producers were commenting on what happened in Stokie, Illinois. I never understood the connection until now having no idea that Stokie ever happened until this thread and only because you brought it up Tatyana.
Funny how things work.
Reading the latest from Joseph Borrell’s blog, the vice President of the European Commission, it appears to me that the EU is one hundred percent behind Ukraine, and that the EU is miffed that Russia hasn’t sent extra gas beyond its commitments to the EU, but this matter will be dealt with next year said Borrell.
The EU has sent a thirty-one million in Euro’s support package to the Ukraine it obviously has vested interests such as in business in the country, though the USA’s Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs, Victoria Nuland said on the USA backed coup in Ukraine in 2014, “F*ck the EU” with this in mind.
If Borrell’s blog posts reflect the EU’s position with regards to Ukraine, Russia and Belarus, they are one of a defensive position, laced with possible retribution if Russia decides to take steps, even if those steps are purely defensive in nature to defend itself from aggression.
A war in Europe won’t benefit the EU, so why take such a rigid stance against Russia, yes Eastern European countries have a somewhat checkered past with regards to the old Soviet Union/USSR, and the USA has exploited this, but European nations need to take a step back from the brink and think about where this road leads to before its too late.
https://eeas.europa.eu/headquarters/headquarters-homepage/109145/countering-power-politics-east_en
Look mate, you need to forget the delusion that senior EU officials represent the peoples of Europe. They are Gauleiters who follow orders from Washington.
Everything that is being done is about cutting the EU off from Russian gas and making European peoples pay far, far more for US LNG. It’s basic gangsterism, protectionism and menaces money stuff. All the EU spending on weaponry is now being spent in US factories, when it should be supporting jobs in the EU. You don’t take taxpayers’ money to subsidise the USA, you just don’t. 95% of Europeans would be happy with every US soldier leaving European soil and going back home, after all…..
How dare you!
That’s stewart mcdonald MP’s special friends you are attacking!
The ones who gave him a medal while providing him with some party treats, special friends and a personal photographer.
For shame!
Dear All,
Before any more ‘war’ breaks out between all you bloggers – I offer a peace song.
And – please ensure that after listening to it – you share with the Presidents of the US, Ukraine and Russia.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sJi41RWaTCs
PEACE!
And the Same to you Courtenay… And Everyone Here
I’ve been Following the Peace Pole Project – Allanton Peace Sanctuary Scotland, is a Peace Pole Henge consists of a double circle of 204 Peace Poles, one for every country of the world. –
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dKSn5GG_I9E
The Peace Pole Project –
https://www.peacepoleproject.org/
(Corrected) – first sentence should be
Sad news – Archbishop Desmond Tutu of South Africa passed away this morning.
Day by day, more and more exposés indicate that the UK regime is moving towards a government that has frightening similarities with Nazi Germany. Consider, the Gestapo were the political police of Nazi Germany which ruthlessly eliminated opposition to the Nazis within Germany and its occupied territories. Within the UK now, today, we have ‘political police’ such as “the 77th Brigade, Bellingcat, the Atlantic Council and hundreds of other warmongering propaganda operations,” funded and supported by the UK Government, its security services and the equivalent US bodies. These organisations are being used AGAINST the UK population – we are their enemy !
Now.
“Leaked documents have revealed a state-sponsored influence operation designed to undermine critics of the British government’s coronavirus policies … The project aims to conduct psychological profiling on British citizens dissenting against policies such as mandatory vaccination and lockdowns, then leverage the data to establish a YouTube channel that portrays these critics as dangerous “superspreaders” of “disinformation.””
These operations involve the BBC, Syrian activists, the Royal Institute and others. Valent Projects is a key player, who has its security linked tentacles spread throughout the middle east and now the UK homeland. These players are being used to try and concoct a link between extremist activities and anti-lockdown, vaccine hesitant views – as championed by the likes of Patel.
See the revealing report below. a good read.
https://thegrayzone.com/2021/12/24/leaked-files-syria-psyops-astroturfing-breadtube-covid/
On Ukraine there’s frightening news. 5 days ago Shoigu voiced at a military meeting with the president, I listened. He said that about 120 employees of American PMCs are active in Avdeyevka, unidentified chemicals were delivered to Avdeyevka and Krasny Liman. White Helmets?
Eduard Basurin from the Donetsk Militia was live today in the TV programm. He said that in October an antidote “botuloxin” was delivered to the Ukrainian troops. In November, the chemical itself was delivered.
Basurin described it as ‘packaged in 40mm containers that can be used in grenade launchers and also can be dropped from drones’.
A 300 kg container with a chemical warfare was delivered to Mariupol. All this was moved to the Kharkiv region to warehouses in Balakleia. He also said that the water in the region is taken from the Seversky Donets River, which originates in the Kharkiv region. Residents of the Donetsk region, and later residents of the Ukrainian part, noted a deterioration in the quality and a strange taste of the water.
He also confirmed the presence of the military, who are not subordinate to the command of the armed forces of Ukraine, but receive orders only from certain people.
I read about that some days ago.
It’s a very clear sign saying not only do we know about that, we know where ALL your PMC’s are and they will be easily missiled. No matter where they are lurking behind the front lines.
We are in the Mexican stand off period as the deadline approaches.
> an antidote “botuloxin” was delivered to the Ukrainian troops
Some dude from the Donetsk militia doesn’t sound like a very reliable authority on what has and hasn’t been delivered to Ukraine.
Also, I’m not aware that botulinum toxin is an effective chemical warfare agent. To have its toxic effects, it has to settle on an open wound, or be ingested. This sounds like perfectly ordinary propaganda.
agreed. botulin toxin is scarily toxic but must be very difficult to deliver. An impractically enormous quantity would be required to imagine it being used to contaminate a water supply
We are now on page three of comments and still no end in sight to the confusion over fascism.
Claiming that nazism isn’t the same as fascism is a ridiculous attempt to establish a difference without distinction.
It’s like saying because Hitler, Franco, Mussolini and Pinochet all came to power in slightly different ways it makes them different, it doesn’t…_
Nazism = fascism and antisemitism
> Claiming that nazism isn’t the same as fascism
I was always taught that “fascism” is the ideology of Mussolini; and that Nazism is the ideology of the Third Reich. I don’t like it when those terms are used to refer to some modern ideology that is authoritarian and statist.
The terms “neo-fascist” and “neo-Nazi” are more appropriate; but I don’t like them either, because of the baggage those terms drag along with them. Basically, those terms are loaded. Can’t we just say what we mean?
We should instead talk about authoritarianism; militarism; racism and nativism; and demagoguery. Describing one’s opponents as facists or nazis is simplistic, and paints one as a narrow-minded ideologue.
It is of course people on the left that describe their opponents as facists; I’ve done it myself (to my shame, I once described my father as a fascist, ignoring the fact that he fought real fascists in Italy during WWII). Both nazism and fascism involved large state spending and the dispossession of wealthy capitalists. I’ve never been able to distinguish clearly between nazism and stalin’s policies. And it’s not a coincidence that nazism is national *socialism*. Nazism was redistributive.
“Describing one’s opponents as facists or nazis is simplistic, and paints one as a narrow-minded ideologue.”
Glorification of genocidal Nazis is part of mainstream political culture in today’s Ukraine; read the article. How should we categorise someone who goes to great lengths to try and downplay that fact?
> read the article
My father is dead, Dom; nobody else is allowed to patronise me. I’m on page 3 of the comments; what makes you think I didn’t read the article?
My remarks were about the use of those terms to characterise modern authoritarians. Perhaps a term like “nazi apologist” might fit the bill? It depends what exactly you mean.
“Both nazism and fascism involved large state spending and the dispossession of wealthy capitalists.”
Can you give an example of a wealthy capitalist dispossesed by nazism or facism?
Nope.
And far as I’m aware, many of the Jews disposessed by the Nazis were wealthy capitalists. As far as I’m aware, Jews were not the only wealthy people disposesssed by the Nazis. Are you saying that’s not so?
If that’s your drift, then I can probably dredge up evidence that you are mistaken.
Again I find myself agreeing with you.Using ‘fascist’ or Nazi never advances a discussion. Having been called a fascist for insisting on personal discipline in an education setting. i suppose he meant ‘authoritarian’or perhaps ‘disciplinarian’. The irony is that the individual concerned was attempting to impose his disruptive will upon others by coercive or controlling means, a fascistic trait.
Tribalism, Nationalism and Racism are all the same thing but on different scales. Rather like looking at the same thing through three different focal length lenses from different distances.
Nationalism combined with socialism is the essence of Nazism, but is not the same thing as Fascism.
For example, the US is fascist but not at all socialist. The form and function of fascism is all over the place in the governance of the US. That’s not an accident of history. It’s built into the bricks. The Founding Fathers very deliberately chose the model of Rome and not the democracy of Athens. That’s why you won’t find the word “democracy” anywhere in their constitution or in their declaration of independence. You will, however, find the symbology of the fasces on the wall of the Oval Office and on the walls beside the podium of the House of Congress and on the armchair of the Lincoln Memorial and in the logos of many US institutions. Lots of nationalism too, but no socialism, so no Nazism there though they do behave like Nazis in their dealings with Johnny Foreigner.
No, Nazism had nothing to do with socialism, the nazis wanted to “reform” society by reorganising it on racial lines, despite the spurious and irrational characteristics of racism. Look at the party programme of 1920 and list the items that were implemented. Some people at the time made the same mistake in 1934 and got shot during the Night of the Long Knives for their trouble. When the Jaegerstab was appointed to increase fighter production ten years later, after the US long-range fighters cut the German day fighters to pieces, Germans who complained about working conditions were hung from the rafters; not very socialist was it? Just because socialism was in the name doesn’t mean that it was true.
Squeeth,
> Nazism had nothing to do with socialism, the nazis wanted to “reform” society by reorganising it
(Yes, my quote is highly selective!)
A key goal of socialism is to reform society, isn’t it?
Sure, there was an especially nasty “racial lines” element to Nazism; but Nazism wasn’t just about hating Jews. It was redistributive, as socialism is. It really isn’t very hard to make a case that you can’t have socialism without authoritarianism. Can you offer an example (that isn’t milqtoast)?
it redestributed to wealthy germans and swiss bankers. hardly socialist. first people Hitler went after were socialists.
I should add that the SNP is nationalist/socialist/NationalSocialist, ie nazi, but is not fascist.
The UK is socialist and slightly nationalistic, but has never been fascist. Perhaps it’s a folk memory from the bad old days of the Roman occupation, but even in the most imperialistic days when it was mostly Scots who ran the Empire we never adopted the style of the Roman Empire.
There are some exceptions of course. The railings outside the former HQ of RBS in St Andrew Square are pure fascist, but that because the arsehole who bought the place, Henry Dundas, as a status symbol of his own pomposity, really was a fascist. Nowadays he is excoriated for his involvement in slavery, but he ought to be reviled for his fascism.
There is a lot of socialism here for the rich, paid for with fascism for the poor.
I should add that the SNP is nationalist/socialist/NationalSocialist, ie nazi, but is not fascist.
Ebeneezer Scroggie
Not yet they aren’t but with juryless trials on the cards Sturgeon is moving Scotland towards a totalitarian state, and from there who knows what could happen.
Juryless trials could lead to those seen as speaking or blogging the truth on matters, arrested, tried by a sympathetic judge and imprisoned even though the evidence against the person/persons is not produced, but merely keenly interpreted as guilt in the mind of a judge to be evidence of guilt.
Would Alex Salmond be walking around just now without a jury at his trial, knowing who the judge was chairing it? I doubt it very much.
I think you’ve already reached a totalitarian state, mate.
The only thing missing is the abolition of elections or the banning of certain parties wishing to stand for election.
Sturgeon is playing solely to the Washington audience, clearly wanting a big job sometime.
If you think she cares two hoots about Scottish Independence, you’re sadly deluded.
SNP affiliations with nationalism and socialism and national socialism go back a long way.
I see no irony in the fact that the Murrels made their fortune through exploiting the Youth Wing of a Natzional Sozialismus Partei. It’s what the Romans (y’know, the guys who invented fascism) would have called Sequitur.
Maybe should be more careful of what you post on here…
Ebenezer Scroggie
When you say the Murrells made money from youth work, does that mean that their enthusiasm for LGBT rights is business, not politics, and when Sturgeon says she will defend trans rights , she is actually defending her pocket?
Nazism, racism and xenophobia are different manifestations of the same biological instinct.
It can be roughly described as “I am starving while a stranger is eating the fruit in my pasture.”
In nature, animals occupy a habitat and displace competing species from it, driving away or killing. When the territory depletes resources, the population moves to a new place and fights with those local, driving or killing them.
In humans, this instinct also manifests itself when there is a lack of resources. E.g. This is how the population reacts to migrants when migrants ask for lower wages and deprive the locals of their usual earnings. Normally, our civilised part prevents us from killing.
We distinguish between “us” and “strangers”, the system of friend/foe is one of the basic in all biological beings. You will distinguish representatives not only of race, but also of ethnicity, and even of a small village through your visual and auditory receptors. In conditions of “hunger” you will consider that it is you who must survive, and not the “stranger”.
Humans have a second signaling system, aka language. This means that people are able to experience emotions not only being a participant in events, but also when describing these events. Having experienced emotions, a person is inclined to believe that the events described are true. This is how emotional propaganda works.
All this is very animal and far from humanity and civilization. The animal really has a binary choice ‘starve yourselfe / kill a stranger who eats your fruit’. A human always has more than two choices.
BTW, I watched Alexander Mercouris on current situation with Russia-Nato treaties negotiation. He said a very important thing: Russia talks about (its) security and USA talks about (its) values.
Tatyana, I don’t entirely agree.
I don’t really understand nazism or neo-nazism. I don’t understand why the entire German population went along with the Nazi thing.
People who lean to the right are generally people who are scared. They feel the world slipping away from them. It’s a personality-type; some people are more inclined to be scared than others.
People who are easily scared are usually scared of foreigners, and strangers in general. They are xenophobic. These same scared people also tend to fear change, so they fear socialism (which means change, wherever you are). They fear everyone, so they want strong policing. So they are “authoritarian”. Because they are afraid of strangers, they are nativist – they feel safer among people like themselves.
These are fairly natural things to feel, and it’s not reasonable to hate on those people for their bigotry; they feel that way because they are scared. They need to be educated (or maybe we just have to wait until they die – scared people are predominantly old people).
I’m scared; I’m scared of what seems to be happening in the USA. I’m afraid we’re being dragged into a war between nuclear powers. That’s scary.
The German public never supported Hitler, he and the nazi partei never won a national election. What do you think the police state was for.
Squeeth,
I’m not German, but I married a German once. I’ve known a lot of old Germans. I have had (and have) German friends. I have known Germans and their families since I was about 13. I haven’t interrogated them all about their parents’ attitudes; just stuff has come out over the years – people that I thought were “OK” later came out as former members of the party.
I don’t mean to “incriminate” all Germans; far from it. Most Germans are just like us. Many Germans, perhaps the majority, are strongly anti-nazi. There is even a minority group known as “anti-deutscher” who are rather rabid zionists. They consider themselves to be leftist, I think.
These German “elders” I’ve known have repeatedly told me that everyone supported the party, even if they weren’t a member.
The word “support the party” may well mean “support the idea”, but at the same time it does not necessarily mean “approve of the methods”.
I’m sure that the majority of Germans then supported the party in relation to its openly proclaimed idea – to bring the German nation out of the decline in which it was after the World War I. Something like “make America great again.”
I’m also sure that inhuman methods of cleansing their race of “Untermensch”, like declaring homosexuals mentally ill, sterilizing the mentally ill – these methods were not disclosed, but were done secretly from the general public, or were covered by emotional propaganda and reported by the press in a completely twisted way, like the modern “fight for democracy”.
Jimmeh, what you describe contradicts nearly everything what I learned from my own experience.
On the last part I agree, I’m scared to be dragged into a war. Being a citizen of a nuclear power I feel like some scared old people had some old outdated conflict, and now we are to be victims of it, yet they want us to sacrifice our kids. I feel helpless to stop it.
Tatyana,
> what you describe contradicts nearly everything what I learned from my own experience
Really? All I said was that rightist, authoritarian, xenophobic bigots are that way because they’re scared; and they’re scared because they’re tim’rous wee beasties. I mean, because their personality leans towards being scared. Does that really contradict all your experience?
you are wrong to assume the entire German population was behind the National Socialistische Partei Deutschlands, there were many opposed to them and some, gambling with their lives, were enough opposed to organise clandestine shelters where jewish people on the run, fleeing, could find shelter from the snitches and spies that were giving information to the SS and SA.
Without that support many would not have been able to flee from the third Reich.
But glorifying shisyrrs and murderers has a tradition in many countries that once colonised others, because they could, including this country, the statues erected to them speak volumes.
> you are wrong to assume the entire German population was behind the National Socialistische Partei Deutschlands
Where did I assume that?
My father-in-law spent ten years researching a chap called Adam von Trott zu Solz, who was involved in the the bomb-plot against Hitler. He was an aristocratic German, who opposed Hitler because he thought the war was bad for Germany, not because he loved Jews or opposed those policies we now know as “ethnic cleansing”. I’m sure many working-class Germans found the Reich horrible as well. Von Trott was executed.
Modern Germans *know* that their parents supported the party. That is why so many young Germans appear to be Zionists; modern Germans are ashamed of the impact Germany had on the world of the 20th century.
It’s absurd to deny that most Germans supported the party. That’s some kind of revisionism. It really doesn’t help to try to paper over this.
FTR, I haven’t “glorified” anyone. I’ve just tried to observe that there’s quite a lot of nationalistic hatred being slung around in this discussion of Ukraine, and that’s not constructive or illuminating. It’s a complex situation, and hurling insults at your adversaries, or labelling them as stooges of the USA doesn’t make things clearer.
Again, FTR, I know that there were Ukrainian units in the SS; I know that they were involved in exterminations; I know there are still Ukrainians with Nazi sympathies (as there are in France, Germany, and the UK); and I know there are popular Ukrainian politicians that are authoritarian and nationalistic. There are thick, scared people everywhere.
Was there something new that you wanted to draw my attention to?
I’m not sure if this is entirely correct. “People who lean to the right are generally scared”. I think many on the right are entitled, arrogant, greedy, over-fed and over-monied, and lack empathy – they feel separate and superior from the society that raised them, and dismiss collegiality and common good – this comes through fortunes of birth as well as individual personality traits. They are often not quite as intelligent as they think they are, many suffer the Dunning-Kruger effect, not just intellectually, but also morally. Right wingers are often rigid and uncurious, and an anti-academic trait has become very noticeable – the response to Covid is a classic example. (Not that that’s restricted to the right, many more extreme ideologies become anti-intellectual, because these ideologies are intrinsically irrational and cannot be supported by reasoned debate.) They’re not scared at all. These same attributes often makes them successful in business, the media and politics, which then becomes the self justification “I look at me in the mirror, my success proves my values are the right ones” – and it’s the same self-justification that says “If I can become an xyz, then anyone can” leading to the further thought thought that if anyone can be me, then people who are not like me are lazy, criminal, drink too much, or are stupid, and not worth bothering about. Didn’t Mgt Thatcher once notoriously say “There’s no such thing as society” – that’s the very embodiment of right wing thinking, and she definitely wasn’t scared.
That doesn’t mean lots of people aren’t scared. I’m scared with global warming, ecological crimes, the power of corporations, militarisation, but also crime and over-population and at the age of 75, I am disorientated by rapid change, and I’m not ashamed to admit it. I see so much of “progress” and I see its emptiness and corruption. I see what we call “progress” taking us to a very dark place indeed. It’s often rational to be a bit scared. But that’s not necessarily a right wing thing. Scared people can be manipulated. and that’s where the right wing has the story – constant right wing demonisation of foreigners and other nations, a bloated and distorted patriotism, appeals to self-interest and greed, a disdain for cooperative endeavour, undermining of local democracy, cynical control of the media, persuading those at the bottom that its their own fault so they become powerless to change (the political equivalent of the battered wife syndrome) – that’s all part of the right wing ideology and modus operandi, and for the moment its success is terrifying and I am very scared.
I’m not sure if this is entirely correct. “People who lean to the right are generally scared”. I think many on the right are entitled, arrogant, greedy and lack empathy – they feel separate and superior from the society that raised them, and dismiss collegiality and common good – this comes through fortunes of birth as well as individual personality traits. They are often not quite as intelligent as they think they are, many suffer something of the Dunning-Kruger effect. They’re not scared at all. These same attributes often makes them successful in business, the media and politics, which then becomes the self justification “I look at me in the mirror, my success proves my values are the right ones” – and it’s the same self-justification that says “If I can become an xyz, then anyone can” leading to the further thought thought that if anyone can be me, then people who are not like me are lazy, criminal, drink too much, or are stupid, and not worth bothering about. Didn’t Mgt Thatcher once notoriously say “There’s no such thing as society” – that’s the very embodiment of right wing thinking, and she definitely wasn’t scared.
That doesn’t mean lots of people aren’t scared. I’m scared with global warming, ecological crimes, the power of corporations, militarisation and geopolitical rivalries rather too similar to what happened before the First World War, but also crime and over-population and, I have to admit, the masses of the dispossessed (not because of who they are, but the intractable problems they are the victims of). It’s rational to be a bit scared. But that’s not necessarily a right wing thing. But scared people can be manipulated. and that’s where the right wing has the story – constant right wing demonisation of foreigners and other nations, a bloated and distorted patriotism, appeals to self-interest and greed, a disdain for cooperative endeavour, undermining of local democracy, cynical control of the media, persuading those at the bottom that its their own fault so they become powerless to change (the political equivalent of the battered wife syndrome) – that’s all part of the right wing ideology and modus operandi to mould the scared to a destructive way of thinking, and for the moment its success is terrifying and I am, like you are, very scared.
Tatyana
As the USA hasn’t had 20 million citizens die on its own homeland defending its domestic security, it doesn’t tend to worry about it’s own security. As Russia lost 20 million and more in the War and then plenty starved in the 1990s, it has rather more potent memories of the need for domestic security.
Values are the prerogative of the secure and wealthy, who have the freedom to choose between different alternatives.
Security comes first in Maslow’s hierarchy of needs…..
@Jen
You were right on the gas supply, bookmarked it for you, English subtitles available
https://youtu.be/n0v2zCX9O2s
Putin explains why the pipe is not shipping gas for several days. 1st reason is that Germany and France get gas at contracted price and then resell at market price up to 6 times higher, the 2nd is that they are not placing new orders in Russia currently, the 3rd reason is the pipe works in reverse mode to deliver that resold gas from European gas storage facilities to Poland and Ukraine.
Using a connecting pipeline with a capacity exactly equal to what is being ‘reverse’ flowed!
What a dumb con!
That must have been the reason for the conversation Scholz had with Putin, to explain what was going to happen and how it was going to be misreported.
Let’s not forget who the Chair of Rosfnet is. There are deep commercial links between Russia and Germany. Which the Anglos hate.
It is good in my opinion for the Poles to understand that the only way they will have energy security in the future is through the gas grid. Even as they agitate to carry on the job of BrexShit, to destroy the EU from the inside, so preserving the US Occupation Forces in Europe 75 years after they arrived and 30 years after their reason for staying disappeared. Instead the Poles and other wannabes of Nato are propagandised to return to an even older fantasy of their ancient Aristos Imperial dreams of being masters of Ukraine and Russia! They are poking at both Russia and Germany again afte 100 years – do they really expect a different outcome? It was the US/U.K. leaders of WW2 who betrayed & cheated the Polish fighters of that war against Hitler/Mussolini/Vichy volunteers after all.
Some idiots never learn it’s as if they have it in their dna! They believe in their fairytales of greatness. It’s a big problem for the English too and some Germans, Italians, Spanish. French. Dutch and Scandinavians and of course Hungarians and Poles – all these who had an Imperial past in short.
> It’s a big problem for the English too and some Germans, Italians, Spanish. French. Dutch and Scandinavians and of course Hungarians and Poles
Roughly any people with a national identity and history then?
It sounds pretty silly and reductionist to write these attitudes off as “fairytales of greatness”. What you are referring to is simply a rather natural and understandable impulse. If you want to throw blame around, you should be throwing it at the demagogues that lead them, not the people you are faulting for their “big problem”.
You seem to regard yourself as some kind of vanguard revolutionary, like everyone else has yet to understand the reality that only you understand. To me, you just sound like someone hawking Socialist Worker.
Jimmeh you say
“ Roughly any people with a national identity and history then?”
I actually said.:
“- all these who had an Imperial past in short.”
Did you leave that bit of that sentence out on purpose?
To me, you just sound like someone hawking Socialist Worker.”
Want to dance?
> Did you leave that bit of that sentence out on purpose
No; and I apologise for my rather overheated tone.
I don’t see why, if Germany and France have contracted for supply, they shouldn’t be allowed to resell it to anyone they want. At any rate, strangling the gas supply for the whole of Europe seems pretty unreasonable.
I think it was always unreasonable for the UK to place so much reliance on foreign gas supplies; and in particular, it was unreasonable to rely on Russia not using gas supply as a geopolitical lever. And anyway, we shouldn’t ever have made our energy future so dependent on gas.
Nobody says Germany shouldn’t be allowed to resell. But what do you mean by “strangling the gas supply for the whole of Europe”? Gasprom supplys gas when it is paid. Do you mean that Gasprom should give our gas for free?
Russia doesn’t supply gas to the UK, so I cannot see why at all speaking of the UK or geopolitical levers
http://www.gazpromexport.ru/projects/transportation/
Rebuild your industry for alternative energy and then you won’t be dependant on gas, what’s the problem?
Tatyana – you haven’t really understood what is going on here, which is all to do with capitalism and the free market. The capitalists who control the gas supply want to make a fast buck by raising everybody’s gas bill to astronomical levels. How can they get away with this without getting lynched? They concoct a convincing narrative – which is to blame it on the Russians. The capitalists are (of course) then the innocent victims of Russian sharp practice. Try reading George Orwell – it will give you the basic idea.
🙂 I absolutely understand what is going on there. Russia blaming is for gaining a little more time, to make a little more bucks.
I think nobody would be lynched, I learned a little about how your laws work. Nothing new in this world.
Ukrainian ex-president is wanted now for exactly the same reason, he bought coal from pro-Russian Donbass. Their police consider it terrorism sponsorship and even state treason. Yet they are very much interested to know the buy/sell margin.
Who would have thought that “Sanctions” blockades, declaring economic war illegally would have consequences for USA and EU. Iran and Syria have managed to survive. Russia has become self-sufficient. The last card the US has, SWIFT and the Dollar, will be played, only resulting in its demise.
Wikikettle – well, the whole concept of `sanctions’ might actually make a lot of sense in cases such as South Africa while it was an apartheid country and Israel. Of course, they’ll never impose `sanctions’ on Israel. It might work in these cases, because the white population – in the case of South Africa – and the Zionist part of the population – in the case of Israel are broadly supportive of the ugly policies of their governments – without popular support it might be conceivable that the governments would collapse.
In all other cases where they have imposed `sanctions’ even if they had reason to object to the governments, `sanctions’ invariably hit your average joe, trying to make an honest living, who hasn’t any control over the goons in government.
Of course, in most cases `sanctions’ are motivated by ugly self-interest and imperialism.
If it all comes back to bite them on the bum, then this is wonderful news.
Oh dear.
“You yourself pointed out that Putin’s excuse for not selling gas..”
You think one guy, Putin, controls Russian gas?
Do you?
Really? Jimmeh.
“Am I wrong? Isn’t that what you said?”
I think so Jimmeh, unless I have not read all the comments correctly.
“I’m beginning to think you are a shill.”
Did you just get get a reflection of your self, Jimmeh?
NURSE! Jimmeh’s losing it again, get the meds. ?
Tatyana,
> Nobody says Germany shouldn’t be allowed to resell.
You yourself pointed out that Putin’s excuse for not selling gas on the EU spot market, even though they have gas to sell and the EU has a shortage, was because Germany was reselling gas to Ukraine.
Am I wrong? Isn’t that what you said?
[Note] My original reply ended with fighting words, which the excellent moderator blocked, inviting me to repost in more moderate terms. Thanks, mod!
Everything’s A Rich Man’s Trick
Reading this article made me remember this documentary, and the american corporations and international banking cartel/aristocracy who funded the nazi war machine… They’ve been working away in the background fomenting wars ever since, so as to profit from the conflict and also maintain a certain degree of trauma and fear in the population, to keep everybody distracted and disempowered from their agenda to deconstruct what remains of democracy.
worth a squint… https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sqxq03izxrQ
Thanks Rosemary…looks very interesting, have book marked.
More propaganda:
Ukraine crisis: how Putin feeds off anger over Nato’s eastward expansion
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/dec/27/ukraine-crisis-how-putin-feeds-off-anger-over-nato-eastward-expansion
George Porter – the article (of course) didn’t emphasise the most important point – that Ukraine is a divided country. I’m ignorant of such things – I only know what I pick up on the news – who won elections, the results (indicating the Eastern half of the country decidedly pro-Russian, the western half decidedly pro-Western). Putin says in the article, correctly in my view, ‘For me Ukraine is not a real country’, I note with interest that there has been rigorously zero attempt by the various governments in Kyiv to make it a real country in any meaningful sense.
Clearly there is a strong pro-Russian half of the country, so, y’know, why not try to accommodate them, be nice to them, make them feel like proper Ukrainians who are welcome. At the same time there is a strong pro-EU half of the country – why not try to accommodate them too? The result *could* be a country that has good relations with both sides and is strongly instrumental in ramping down the tension – extremely beneficial to everybody.
Of course, this sort of idea is all very naive – ain’t going to happen – the two sides will continue trying to beat each other to a pulp and only the most patriotic of the Ukrainians will actually choose not to emigrate.
With regard to voting, you need to understand that the eastern part of Ukraine does not participate in elections.
They have been declared a territory of military operations, troops are directed against them, a military administration has been established over them, they are cut off from the country, from banks, from electricity, from mobile communications, the Ukrainian state does not pay benefits and pensions.
The ruling elite in Kiev is promoting division along ethnic lines, this is not even a question of joining the EU.
To overcome this situation, the Minsk agreements were created, the first clause is a ceasefire, then the right to vote. Even the first point has not been fulfilled, the war has been going on for 8 years.
Tatyana – yes – exactly – all goodwill has gone in this situation. The pro-Western government (before 2014) bears a lot of responsibility for the deterioration in the situation and the war that took place. So much enmity has been created and exacerbated that the situation is irreversible – Ukraine will never be a proper country now.
The country is also a total mess economically. I note, with interest, the huge numbers who are leaving Ukraine (people with very good education who prefer to do menial jobs in Poland rather than stay in the Ukraine).
They had Yanukovich, who hesitated of to what side the country is leaning. In fact Ukrainian industry and laws needed reforms to meet the EU requirements, so joining the EU was not an easy-to-do thing.
Yanukovych agreed to the demands of the opposition and an agreement was signed on such reforms, and the plan was confirmed and attested by Germany, Poland and France. But somehow (guess why) two days after the opposition spearheaded a violent coup. Former boxer Klitschko, nazi Tyagnibok and that same Yatsenyuk, who called the inhabitants of Donbass ‘subhumans’ and became the Prime Minister.
Nuland called their names when she uttered her famous “F*ck the EU”, obviously referring to Germany, France and Poland as guarantors of the peace plan of reforms.
The ruling elite in the United States has built a cult of democracy.
They give the status of sacred commandments to their rights and freedoms;
they appointed themselves as priests;
their priests from their altars declare anything “right” or “wrong”;
their well-trained congregation enthusiastically embraces calls for the protection of their religion.
The commandments themselves are not bad and originally had a noble purpose, but they began to be interpreted for their own benefit, and the method of spreading this religion became violent. Like a Crusade or Jihad in the name of what they call democracy.
The way the priests interpret these commandments does not correspond to the real desires of the population, which is clearly seen from their explanation of the voting in the UN – the population does not support Nazism or racism. But the mention of “sacred commandments” serves as a shield and prevents common sense.
They carry this ideology around the world, proclaiming seemingly correct and noble values, only they bring them on the wings of missiles.
As for Ukraine, this is a neighbor that does not consider itself a Nazi. Only every time he says “hello” comes “heil Hitler” from his mouth. And when he says “Good day” it comes out “I hate Russians.”
The collective West proposes to consider this as an accidental slip of the tongue.
Russia believes that there are too many of these accidents, and together with the 8-year war against the Russian regions, and with NATO bases at our doorstep, it is time to resolve the situation now.
So it really is a confrontation between the values of one side against the security of the other.
I share Alexander Mercouris opinion on the situation
https://youtu.be/besY4STCrI8
this is good Tatyana: https://www.middleeasteye.net/opinion/us-suez-moment-strategic-mistake-would-be-its-last
I think that he has got Ukraine just about right.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and the RADA, have voted to allow foreign military exercises, on Ukrainian soil, which could lead to military bases.
Next year will see, the Ukrainian-American Rapid Trident exercises, the Ukrainian-British Cossack Mace, the multinational Light Avalanche, the Ukrainian-Polish Silver Saber, the Ukrainian-American Sea Breeze, the Ukrainian-Romanian Riverine, the multinational Maple Arch exercise and the Viking multinational exercise, all held in Ukraine.
Expect the tension between Russia and Ukraine to be ramped up next year, courtesy of the USA.
https://www.globalresearch.ca/zelensky-opens-way-foreign-troops-permanently-legally-based-ukraine/5765529
If you go around invading and occupying neighbours (Georgia, Crimea) then it’s unreasonable to express surprise wheen the remaining neighbours tool-up.
It says so much about the unaccountability of elites in the US, EU and Britain that their new strategy of damning socialists as anti Semites is being run in tandem with efforts to whitewash and promote actual Nazis in the old E European bloodlands. A startling incongruity that is naturally deemed unworthy of acknowledgement by respectable mainstream journalists. So too Sir Keir Starmer’s recent gushing praise for Desmond Tutu, a man he would have expelled with relish from the Labour party as a disgusting anti Semite. We are so very lucky to have these people.
Greg Park.
You just had to look at the concerted attack against Jeremy Corbyn by the almost the entire establishment, and its media to see it in action, Corbyn was hounded relentlessly day and night, he was called a fascist, an anti-Semite among other things, such was the fear from the right that he might once again try and form and win a GE with a socialist agenda.
The relentless tirade against Corbyn by the media was such that even mining towns in the North of England who had been decimated by Thatcher, that had seen miners and their wives and children go hungry, whilst hard-working pit men were beaten on orders of the Home Office, strange how the memory of this has faded so much in Northern England, and been replaced with Toryism.
The multi-millionaire knight of the realm, Sir Keir Starmer, is in my opinion a Tory in disguise, Labour’s demise in England, has seen the Tories rise in places no one thought they ever would.
Starmer, the zionist pawn, is not in disguise and has no need in the current regime for a disguise. Don’t forget he was instrumental in Julian Assange’s predicament under the tories!
The north of England working class voted against Liarbour for reneging on its EU withdrawal commitments, not in support of the Tories (Officials).
It amazing that in a country who’s institutions have been so openly corrupted that people still believe the election results. The postal ballots were rigged in 2019, the evidence was broadcast on the BBC 48 hours before polling day.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AurLLIYp6_Y
Suggesting that both parties are given ‘indications’ by the private polling company regarding the vote is a lie. It is a criminal offence to even claim to have any such knowledge, let alone use such knowledge to attempt to directly influence the electorate. The media’s 2019 election coverage was all about convincing the UK public that Johnson had won a legitimate election in which the electorate rejected Corbyn and Labour in a free and fair campaign.
It’s Kool Mods..I Knew I was Pushing it.. I Thought Craig would like the Explanation..as it were.
Stay safe
While our politicians practice their wit, I would like to share a simple example of how ordinary people feel.
Yesterday Ramzan Kadyrov published his opinion on what is happening in Ukraine. He said that the problems in Ukraine are our problems, since Ukrainians are our people.
Ramzan has the image of “Putin’s Rambo”, so I’m pleased to note his growth as a professional politician: some macho bravado was immediately softened by the proviso that everything should be decided by law and in accordance with agreements 🙂
People left comments under that YouTube video. One of them was: “At the words ‘Ukrainians are our people’ I felt warm. Thank you and hello from Ukraine.”
This comment had 300 likes and many greeting comments from Russian regions. I also sent greetings from the Kuban and asked to choose the government that would not start enmity. We can live in different houses but remain good neighbors.
Well, I want to say that ordinary peope do not want any wars, definitely.
Tatyana. Let’s hope for everyone’s sake, that Ukraine abides by the Minsk Accords and starts negotiations with its Eastern Donbas areas. Ultimately Ukraine should adopt Neutrality as Austria did. In fact all former Soviet countries would do well to become Neutral and reject NATO bases and missiles. NATO, after the Soviet Union collapsed found its new role as Arms merchant for the US Military Industrial Complex. Even Finland has ordered 60 F35 fifth generation jets fighters, thats on top of all other NATO members. The US tax payer is being fleeced, subsidising most of Eastern European NATO military budgets. While in US there are no high speed trains, no health care, bridges and roads decaying like their international reputation. There is a good interview of Larry Wilkerson on “Why Biden is pushing Putin on Ukraine ” on YouTube the Analysis News channel. Wilkerson has at the heart of US military as Powell’s chief of staff in the early 90’s. He evidences what US promised Gorbachev and is no Russia lover. He concludes that US Foreign Policy in the last two decades has been stupid and self destructive. With the money men having the last say. “Follow the money “….
We’re Lucky to have you Here Tatyana.
I’m so glad to be on Craig’s Blog.
I’m also very glad to be here! I’m grateful to everyone for your contributions and encouragement to learn new things. I’m grateful for your patience in explaining your positions, no matter how far they contradict my own.
I’m especially grateful to the team of moderators for the credit of trust, because looking back I see that due to poor vocabulary and inability to correctly state my position, my comments were largely offensive and ignorant. I’m also infinitely grateful that I wasn’t banned here as an annoying commentator with a lot of off-topic comments, and lots of on the verge of decency jokes. To be honest, sometimes it was quite indecent. And I’m very glad that I was allowed to just be me as I am.
Look now at my progress – not only do I know the difference between whiskey and whisky, I also hit into the right use of ‘a’s and ‘the’s much more often!
Hugely grateful to Mr. Murray for making this possible!
I hope that the new year will bring all of humankind more desire to understand each other and trust each other.
“…due to poor vocabulary and inability to correctly state my position, my comments were largely offensive and ignorant”.
I beg to differ, Tatyana. Your comments have always been distinguished by their civility and moderation, even if (and I can’t offhand recall an example) you may occasionally have fallen foul of the extremely complex English language. Besides which, of course, most of us don’t speak a word of Russian!
“I’m also infinitely grateful that I wasn’t banned here as an annoying commentator with a lot of off-topic comments, and lots of on the verge of decency jokes”.
I doubt if anyone has found your comments off-topic – they are always interesting and usually instructive. As for “the verge of decency”, my rule is that such material is quite admissible if it is funny enough, which your jokes are. And your language is a lot cleaner than that of some regular contributors.
Tatyana, many British jokes can be hugely indecent at times.
And we all make cultural mistakes. I once, through laziness/thoughtlessness, referred to your president as ‘Vladimir Vladimirovich’, which I subsequently learned is a form of expression granted only to those who might be regarded as trusted long-term confidantes. As I have never met the man, that I most certainly am not. So in diplomatic terms, I had reduced myself somewhat close to the level of Dubya saying that ‘the problem with the French is that that don’t have a word for entrepreneur!’……
“many British jokes can be hugely indecent at times.”
I have long considered you to be a Old British Joke n
> infinitely grateful that I wasn’t banned here as an annoying commentator
You’re not at all annoying; your remarks and the attitudes you express here are informative. You anger me from time to time, but I’m just a grumpy old man, and almost anything can drive me to anger.
The basis of post-Maidan governments in Kiev is an absence of democracy – socialist parties are banned, their militants assassinated or jailed, the eastern regions are disenfranchised, the country is run, as are most of these eastern NATO regimes, by emigre fascists, nursed and bred up in the US, Canada and other secure refuges for Nazis. They fear democracy and rightly so – nothing could be more mistaken than to believe that the mass of the Ukrainian population would not turn out the current regime if they could do so without putting their own lives at risk. Ukraine since Maidan has been exactly what it looks like a terrorist government, which came to power by applying terror, has maintained power by terror and can only survive by selling its people to the Empire.
Many either do not know or conveniently disregard the widespread support that was all too extant in Eastern European countries. Countries like Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, all now good European states were all quite pro nazism.
And all these years later the US promotes and supports Nazis in Ukraine as a Force again Russia. In the US playbook, and indeed the U.K. playbook, nazism is good. And let us make no mistake neither the US or the U.K. are beacons of democracy. Far from it they are as odious as the Nazis were in the 1930s in their outlook and methods. It’s just that what they do is now more hidden, more discrete, and of course having won the war, victory is in the tongue of the victor.
The treatment of ordinary citizens fulfilling a democratic purpose, like that of Julian Assange, or to a lesser extent Craig Murray, is an example of political oppression, vindictiveness, cruelty and is it not the action of a rogue Nazi state. Well of course it is.
But too many folks don’t care. They didn’t care in 1930s Germany, or at least didn’t care until it was too late, when their emaciated bodies were put into the gas ovens. Too late then to care to do anything, history reflects the countless millions who were butchered by their caring state.
And could it happen here, happen in Ukraine, or other. Well of course not we live in a democracy. Ask Julian Assange or the millions slaughtered in Iraq.
And as we look forward to the new year, maybe we will have a war, a big war. That will certainly separate the men from the boys. We’re all tooled up and ready to rock. Maybe it’s time for the next real big slaughter. The sheep don’t care, they are in fact up for it.
A rant…….well tell me I’m wrong.
Willie
The war we just lost to Russia, in Syria, and war we lost to China, in Africa, and the war we lost in Iran, in Iraq, are the reason for new and pointless wars breaking out in North Africa, Yemen, and Ukraine. They are pointless in themselves, unwinnable, counter-productive and self-harming. The purpose of such pointless wartalk is to cover up our defeats and our shrinking relevance in the world.
What we actually needed and most likely did win at the last election, were it not for algorithms boosting the Tories, was a Prime Minister who recognised our irrelevance and sought to build new alliances to fit our new circumstances.
I have no idea why the Tories want to ally us with the US, which is absolutely foreign to our European culture, and now to talk about Nazism, which is the topic of relevance of at least 70 years ago. To be honest, this is like the Titanic moment, in which we are obviously destined to lose an unnecessary war against the more powerful Russia and China, and our defeat, if we try to fight them will become the byword for Tory stupidity, reckless jingoism and moral vacuum, by corrupting the democratic choice of the people.
As the ambulance crew will tell you, the only painful bit about falling out of an aircraft is when one hits the ground. We have been losing our way for 70 years now, and if it’s time to hit the ground, now is as good a time as any other.
Giyane. There are no winners in this crazy geopolitical chess game, when our players have the intelect of spivs. “You are with us or you are against us”. How do you ensure your own downfall? You surrender your politics/government to the billionaires, you surrender your media and free press to a handful of billionaires, you surrender your investment into the economy/infrastructure/housing/health and education to non productive landlordism, arms manufacturers and “services”. China, Russia and Iran have to waste huge resources defending their independence. The Belt and Road Initiative would help stagnating Europe and the whole world. Yet we are wasting resources on profits for arms industry instead of improving the lot of the Global South whose resources we’ve plundered for ever. Then we complain when their populations want to leave and come here. Who would have thought that Russia and China together would be such a force for good to “Contain” The Collective West in its Road to nowhere….
“I have no idea why the Tories want to ally us with the US”.
That’s an easy one isn’t it ?
Tories->Corruption->Capitalism->Bribes->Lobbies->Privatisation = USA.
How many Tory politicians have direct links with the US, eg. Big Pharma, MIT, Harvard, Yale, Banking, Media, IT ?
The ‘american way’ is the proven route to excessive personal wealth funded by the exploitation and labours of the ignorant masses.
Go figure. Also see. Craig Murray: Don’t dream the American Dream
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zko4nlFLMX0
Alexander de Peiffel Johnson was born in New York.
Blair as much as any tory tied us in with the US – the Blair and Bill bromance that saved Clinton’s reputation in the midst of Whitewater scandal and sexual peccadilloes enabled the comeback kid a springboard into his second term – the reward for ‘just call me Tony’? – war maker – Yugoslavia destroyed.
Mass casualties and a return of war in Europe.
How many bombs did he drop in that one and start collecting his MIC bonus and massacres and mercenaries in Africa. Which prepped the way to the Big Ones.
‘Educating Dubbya’ – who given his daddy was deep CIA and a scion of a robber baron family involved with Nazis and in promoting the Second World War, curiously claimed he knew nothing of the the rest of the world except Mexico !(today’s report in the Groan) and wanting to take on the presidency in 2000 got a ‘special briefing’ from the FCO and Blair government that turned into a Yo!Blair superbromance between so called lefties and barely disguised fascist yankees – which saw the whole world lit up with death and daily destruction for so far the last 20 years – with even greater MIC earnings.
Arguably, the Tories under Thatcher and Major never caused as much sheer evil and daily deaths and plundering as under Nu-Labour which is now back under the Blairite Bastards control and therefore the CIA’s.
Let’s not pretend that we are not an occupied state by that MIC and three lettered clubs and most of our politicians are as much in their pockets as every single person involved in the Epstein/Maxwell logbooks.
Which in turn directly links Maxwell, Israel, CIA and The White House through the loyal consiglieres Alastair Campbell and arch villiness ‘partner in life’ Fiona Millar, who kept the NuLab back office under strict control from No10 and enabling this great 20 year ripoff of UKs family silver with everything from NHS Trusts / pfi the student loans and Foundations schools and never ending outsourcing and deadly adventuring and deaths and mutilations of ‘our Heroes’ for no benefit to the U.K.
The only thing that held up their plans for a year or two was the election and support by millions of new members of Corbyn, which returned a bit of soul and justice to the Labour Party, but then the Guantlet was launched to remove that democratic grassroots resurgence- not a single whimper by the bought media and politicians. With a barefaced winter election postal vote fraud coup to return the Labour Party back into the bloody hands of NuLabourInc and the hands of the corrupt Great Knight Dope! Who himself was raised into his position by Blair /Campbell to cover up their international crimes. He will soon be tub thumping in fatigues to keep Labour a lackey of the US hedge funds and welcoming the Medical Industrialists to our shores as he approves the crap in Ukraine, Taiwan, XianJing etc.
There is not a cigarette paper between ANY of the controlled political parties or the Mainstream Media as most of us here know.
We are at T minus 33 days.
> Blair as much as any tory tied us in with the US
I believe Blair instructed his ambassador to the USA in the GW Bush times, to “get up the president’s arse, and stay there”.
Ah yes, the “special relationship” – similar of that of a prostitute to her pimp, or a piciotto to the Don, or a performing poodle to its master. The UK’s special relationship to a highly disturbed and abnormal nation, which is willing and able to inflict the same state of dysfunction on the UK. Where is there a single politician in the UK able to say forthrightly “I do not believe the special relationship any longer has any purpose, and this nation will no longer regard its citizenry as powerless stooges to a way of life or politics that are not in its long term interests or that are inimical to social cohesion and equality.” .
The German public always opposed the NSDAP and even in the half-bent election of March 1933, denied the Nazis a majority.
Russia has banned its oldest and only human rights organisation and arrested more of Navalny’s supporters/organisers. Is this a snub to the fake human rights noises from the UN? some sort of snub to balance our own inactions out with their own disregard for human rights?
Fascism and nazis are family like two brothers of the same mother and the only thing that they understand would be to flatten their memorials to these human rights abusers.
Gathering to commemorate their massacres is like laughing at the murdered victims all over again, causing grief and tears in those who survived and their families on an annual basis.
Wow! Can you please give detail on our the oldest and only human rights organisation? What’s the name? Who are the arrested Navalny’s supporters? I haven’t seen anything on it in the news.
Hi Tatyana, this crap story’s been run all day on the radio news as the main item. Try and find it on the BBC site and it’s on page 5 just before the skate-boarding duck story. With the same degree of BS.
BBC News – Russian court orders oldest civil rights group Memorial to shut – by Sarah Rainsford, BBC Moscow correspondent (29/12/2021)
Thank you, Ingwe.
I’m not surprised that BBC does not voice the main reasons for the decision of the Russian court.
One of them is that Memorial refused to mark their reports as a foreign agent’s, which has recently become mandatory by law for all foreign sponsored organizations. Memorial ignored this law and accumulated fines amounting to 2.9 million rubles.
The second reason is that they rehabilitate Nazi criminals. Among them Alexander Riss, who was the commander of the 667 Schutzmannschaft and Dmitry Makarchuk, who executed Jews in the Travniki concentration camp, a branch of Majdanek.
The case against the Memorial was initiated by Veterans of Russia and the Russian War History Society.
Thank you Tatyana for the additional information not mentioned by the BBC.
This morning there is Tony Greenstein’s excellent article contrasting the BBC’s coverage of Memorial with its coverage of Israel’s shutting down of six Palestinian human rights groups.
https://azvsas.blogspot.com/
Ingwe, I tried to find out who is Sara Rainsford, the BBC correspondent.
She was denied a Russian visa in August this year, that means she is expelled from Russia.
I tried to find out why Ms. Rainsford might be supporting those who glorify Nazis.
The only coincidence that I was able to google out is that some Mrs. PM Rainsford donated a Constable painting to Tate gallery back in 1962. In 2013 this painting was claimed by its original holder, as a Nazi loot.
https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-26768932
Dr Piotr Cywinski, the director of the Auschwitz Museum was quoted on their twitter account as saying that ‘A power that is afraid of memory, will never be able to achieve democratic maturity’ in regards to Memorial. Was this, by any chance, a retweet of a quote from January 2020 regarding the exclusion of representatives of the liberating power from the 75th Anniversary Commemoration?
Hi Tatyana. Apparently, according to the Independent, the article was written by Dasha Litvinova in Moscow, ‘Memorial’ is the subject of a petition by the Prosecutors Generals Office, to the Supreme Court, to revoke its legal status.
According to Dasha, Memorial includes 50 smaller groups around the country who will all be affected by this move.
The two allies of Navalny are not named, except that they were ‘Regional coordinators of his campaigns in Tomsk and Irkutsk.
Hope this helps.
cannot find any article belonging to Dasha Litvinova. Found an entry saying she is a Moscow journalist writing for the Guardian and the BBC world news.
Found her Twitter https://twitter.com/dashalitvinovv
Her status says “Tell stories for a living”. Nice 🙂
Associated Press: Russian court shuts renowned rights group, by Dasha Litvinova (28 December)
The article has been syndicated across mainstream news media – e.g. Time magazine, Washington Post, USA Today – as well as most regional newspapers.
Thank you!
“During the hearing, prosecutors also charged that Memorial “creates a false image of the USSR as a terrorist state,” a claim the group said revealed the authorities’ real motive.”
They don’t want to share other prosecutor’s charges, do they?
Not a word about nazis whom they listed as ‘victims of Stalin’s repressions?
The full statement of the prosecutor in the hearing:
“Memorial, speculating on the topic of political repressions of the 20th century, creates a false image of the USSR as a terrorist state, whitewashes and rehabilitates Nazi criminals, on whose hands the blood of Soviet citizens. Why now we, the descendants of the winners, are forced to watch the rehabilitation of traitors and Nazi collaborators. (…) Probably because someone pays for it. And this is the real reason why Memorial is fiercly denying the status of a foreign agent.”
conveniently omitted in the western media, as I see.
The law says that companies sponsored from abroad, and spending this money on political activities in Russia, should mark their materials with a ‘foreign agent’ text. In the case of the Memorial, they are making points on extremism law, on what is going on in Ukraine, etc. Yet the prosecutor noted that Memorial didn’t apply with a request to recognize someone as a victim of repression, for several years already. When they claimed it is their purpose.
on extremism law and Memorial.
Hizb Ut-Tahrir is forbidden in Russia under anti-extremism law.
From Wiki – in Kazakhstan, the activities of “Hizb-ut-Tahrir” were banned by the court in 2005 for extremism. The organization is also banned in Turkey, Pakistan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and a number of other East European, Asian states and in all Arab countries, except for the UAE, Lebanon and Yemen.
In Germany, the organization is banned for non-recognition of the State of Israel.
US government agencies classify Hizb ut-Tahrir as a non-violent group that promotes the spread of extremist sentiments among Muslims.
Memorial works to recognise Hizb ut-Tahrir members as political prisoners.
Here is their page, I see many are Crimean Tatars
https://memohrc.org/ru/tags/hizb-ut-tahrir
Tatyana
The doctrine of Islamist extremism is that they recognise the realpolitik that the West is massively more powerful than Themselves and two things follow from that logic : firstly a request to the West that islamists can be allowed to terrorise Muslims as part of re-educating them into stricter practice of their faith; secondly, a request to the West to work with the colonising armies of the West, to share the booty of their joint violence and do the visible fighting.
Underneath , Hillary Clinton commissioned concrete bunkers for the jihadists in Syria, which in turn Putin bombed with cruise missiles.
Therefore the reason Hisb u Tahrir is classed as non-violent, is because it only attacks Muslims, not state interests. It’s a hate group, and sets out to annoy Muslims.
They once stole my car and trashed it, for disagreeing with their stupidity and arrogance.
I think you will find that the government of the Russian Federation supports and upholds human rights.
Tom – or, rather, they are just like any other government (e.g. UK, USA, Holyrood) who try to put up a façade of supporting and upholding human rights, but trash them whenever they become inconvenient.
I don’t know very much about the Russian government, but I have seen the outrageous way that the USA and UK governments are treating Julian Assange and the outrageous way in which Craig Murray was treated by the Scottish government (erm …. sorry – not the government, the Crown Office, which is – of course – a separate entity, because we do have separation of powers in Scotland, don’t we?)
I simply don’t believe the Russians are any different. This seems to be the nature of government these days.
You will find that the government of the Russian Federation doesn’t interpret human rights as broadly as the beacon of democracy, to allow Nazi marches out of principled commitment to the freedom of speech.
Above, we had an interesting discussion with ET about this.
I suggested using anti-hate laws to prohibit Nazi demonstrations, but it became clear it’s not universal. In this case pedophiles could organize their own pedophile demonstrations, because they do not hate children, but on the contrary, they love them very much.
I thought that maybe an anti-violence law may do. I discussed this with my husband, and he said that this would open the way for the marches of necrophilies, since they not only love, but also do not harm any living creature.
In general, I see that if you support freedom for everyone, and if you want to avoid total anarchy, then you can rely either on the people’s morality or you should limit ‘bad things’ by law. With a long anti-religious history of the USSR, we rather rely on legislative restrictions, and the West probably relies more on morality.
Tatyana
The problem exists in all belief systems of Exceptionalism, the ends justifies the means, which we see in the Taliban , the US, and in Israel .against the Indigenous people. The British Church believes that all your crimes will be placed on the shoulders of Jesus, a mythological deity whose name was taken from a prophet pbuh who was sent to the Jewish people some 2050 years ago.
Russia is so right in excluding politically convenient mythology from its human administration because the excepionalist interests of one group of people always cause damage to another group of people, and therefore always causes an equal reaction of military force
This is the lesson of two world wars that Britons refuse to understand, that my exceptionalism , based on my fake mythology might be attacked by another form of exceptionalism from another fake mythology, such as Nazism, or dare I say it , Communism, or Islamism.
I am not a pacifist, but I do believe that humanity should utilise the intellect they thankfully have been blessed with, to learn from past experience and to listen to advice from others , before fighting.
Islamism , instead of trying to re-educate the weird psychosis of Western exceptionalism, has colluded with the mad dogs of the West, who put dictators in power in the Middle East, against those old dictators, hoping that the mad dogs of the West would accept their Islamism as an alternative form of social oppression to the old dictators. Some hope.
This has pissed off Russia geo- politically , because it threatens their naval bases in the Mediterranean. Everything else , Neo -Nazism, neo-liberalism, LGBT ism is piffle, IMHO. The West simply needs to know, if it does not already know from World Wars 1 & 2, that claiming supremacy under the flag of skull and cross-bones international piracy , will always be countered by an equal opposing force from the flags of swastika or hammer and sickle, if those equally supremacist flags feel threatened. War benefits no-one. Jaw jaw is better, if our diplomats and politicians are capable of using their brains.
Maybe. it is just time we left Town… 😉
“Freedom of speech” is an awkward subject. It seems to take its most extreme form in the USA.
Thing is, as soon as any group’s speech is restricted, the door is open to restricting the speech of other groups. It then comes down to which groups are unpopular (usually the poor and marginalized).
I’m with Voltaire on the matter of freedom of speech; I’d sooner be compelled to tolerate a nazi march, than face the banning of marches against government corruption, war etc.
Jimmeh, here comes another difference that we here in Russia understand: marches against government corruption are little help. People get on the top, start making connections to each other and sooner or later you’ll see another corrupt government. Sometimes you just need a pitchfork to break these centuries old network and build a new one. Then perhaps you are not compelled to tolerate nazi marches, or any other unacceptable things.
You asked above “Putin’s excuse for not selling gas on the EU spot market, even though they have gas to sell and the EU has a shortage”.
Selling gas is not like selling loaves of bread.
It’s a pipeline filled with gas under certain pressure, similar like water pipelines in buildings. Sending amount of gas from Russia means increasing pressure inside the pipe. To do that, Russia must ensure that someone on the other side is ready to open the tap and consume the gas, or the pipe may burst out. Someone on the other side is not ordering Russia to send more gas, because the market price is high and they are busy reselling from their reservoir storage what they have got earlier at lower price.
Unfortunately, Russia can only send gas via pipeline, we are not offering liquified gas in tankers. So, with all Putin’s desire to cover the shortage in EU it is impossible until EU themselves order from us.
Another jury trial of a sexual assault case with multiple victims, many witnesses and going back decades manages to understand the evidence and return a unanimous verdict – someone should tell the Scottish government about it as they erroneously attempt to dismantle it by saying jurors are incapable.
I think we owe it to ourselves to question everything we are fed by the MSM. The case in question seems to me to be very much a case of prosecuting a ‘patsy’ to show that justice is done while the actual perpetrators walk free. If you have ever served on a Jury you will know that the accusers, the evidence submitted, the Judge’s direction and the eventual verdict do not necessarily mean that justice has been served – add in the USA Justice system and questions arise.
I may be wrong, but all along my impression has been that this case stinks !
Hiya Mods. Re. Clark, December 30, 2021 at 15:15, yes, it was deliberate – I was sending the same reply to both, chattering away while assuming that everyone else would have seen the same as they had.
Some links would be nice for those of us who have genuinely weaned ourselves off corporate “news” media “current affairs”.
Thanks to the endorsement of the USA neo-Nazism is now ridiculously overt in mainstream Ukrainian politics.
Here are members of Kiev City Council last month singing «Our father is Bandera» after renaming the WWII hero Nikolay Kuznetsov street into Oles Babiy street – the Nazi collaborator, antisemite and Holocaust perpetrator. Bandera is leader of OUN that murdered tens of thousands of Jews.
https://mobile.twitter.com/edolinsky/status/1456563661896564740
Nazis in Ukraine have some jews on their side! Some Josef Zisels tells in his interview to Deutsche Welle that there’s no problem with nazis in Ukraine. He prevented an appeal of Jewish community to the US congress.
Israeli historian Aron Schneer from Yad Vashem Institute, said: “Zisels is an absolutely courtly, livery Jew who amazes me with speeches and writings that justify Bandera, Shukhevych, and thus other German collaborators.”
It seems to me that US interference in Ukrainian politics has been an absolute godsend to Russian propaganda.
More relevant than Russia are our own politicians and media. It is they who control public perception here along with everything else. They are the ones who portray themselves as ever more solemn remembrancers of the Holocaust while supporting neo-Nazis in Ukraine who celebrate perpetrators of the Holocaust. There is cross party and pan media consensus so no questioning of this absurdity is ever heard. Like so many other things over the past decade or two, it encourages them to believe they can successfully pass anything off on the public. Any dissent to their narratives is these days dismissed as Russian propaganda, ravings of antisemites, etc. They are going to get far worse and will keep getting away with it.
– “More relevant than Russia are our own politicians and media.”
More immediately relevant, I agree.
But look at how the dynamic works to strengthen governmental power over the populations on both, or all, “sides”. Say the Russian government supports cruel, oppressive government in, for instance, Chechnya, and Russian media propaganda creates a good image for it. And maybe the Chinese government and media do likewise for North Korea. That gives “our” ie. Western media sticks with which to beat Western governments’ geopolitical rivals, simultaneously making “our” governments look better by comparison, and diverting public attention from oppression and injustice at home.
Abuse of power feeds abuse of power, through propaganda.
Washington did the Kremlin a huge favour by supporting fascists in Ukraine; a favour against the ordinary population of Russia. The Kremlin returns the favour by interfering in the governments of countries that border Russia. It’s a filthy and dangerous game.
It works at smaller scales too. Western mass media smeared Assange, so now the majority of the Western public ignore the gross injustice he’s subjected to, but RT cover it. Meanwhile, Russian media sexually smeared Navalny who is now imprisoned, but he’s held up as a hero by Western media.
Power uses, deceives and manipulates the people under it, and plays national populations off against each other.
Sexually smeared? Never heard of any accusations of that kind towards Navalny. Financial fraud, yes. Neglecting his suspended sentence conditions, yes. Refusal to mark his work as originating from a foreign agent, yes. Some nazi statements long ago, yes. Even Amnesty International denied him of ‘prisoner of conscience’ title because of those hate statements. But sexual… can you please let me know?
Groping young women; taking advantage of his popularity, allegedly. It was a rather fanatical Putin supporter, a commenter on this site, who linked to the accusations (in English) around the time of the Ukrainian coup; it would take me ages to find it again.
I know very little about politics in Russia. I wouldn’t be able to form an unbiased opinion without learning to read Russian, and languages aren’t my strong point. All power and dominance is unjust, but I don’t blame states for everything; great wealth is also a power, and to some extent states restrain the excesses of great wealth, though not nearly enough, and they protect the wealthy too.
But our world is changing fast and approaching calamity; great powers are opposing each other and abusing the ordinary people, both those around them and those in distant lands, as they try to hold on to their privileges, and this is set to become far worse. We people should prepare for that by learning to organise ourselves.
https://richardheinberg.com/museletter-344-evolution-and-climate-change-through-the-lens-of-power
As human civilisation hurtles into resource depletion and ecological catastrophe, as we accelerate towards societal collapse, most governments will become more authoritarian and dishonest. This has been happening for some time; we see it all around us.
Months ago I read Tatyana’s thread about the chaos, misery and poverty in the decades following the collapse of the Soviet Union:
https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/forums/topic/russia-people-from-the-90s-tell-us-what-it-was-like-really/
Everywhere, the people must learn to self-organise, to minimise such despair. Talk with the people around you, organise people’s assemblies. Extinction Rebellion teach and practice this; it is how XR groups organise their protests, actions and public events.
I’m very careful in expressing my hope for talks between Putin and Biden last night. Yuri Ushakov commented on these negotiations:
“A really important political action took place.
America has shown a desire to understand the logic of Russia’s position on security guarantees.
Biden mentioned possible “large-scale sanctions”, Putin warned that this would be a major mistake that could disrupt the relations.
Putin emphasized that in this rather difficult situation we would behave the way the United States would behave if offensive weapons were deployed near American borders.
Putin has tried in every possible way to convey this key message to the American president. The main thing is to provide ourselves with the security guarantees that we desperately need. This is the meaning of our position. We will strive for this.”
From myself I say, that this is the very moment when advanced age is an advantage, and my hopes are entirely on the vast experience and knowledge of the context that Biden should have. In Russia, the word ‘aksakal’ is widely used, meaning an Elder in eastern cultures. Those are old and wise people who make decisions. Well, Biden is old, now I hope he is wise too.
Thank you, Tatyana.
I believe Putin’s message is also to the countries enthusing about NATO membership.
These countries are buying themselves and constructing at least two large target symbols at home, in the event of formalised hostilities against Russia initiated by Washington. One target being where the US places its nukes on European soil, the other at the capital city of each of these states. All the while US hawks like Nuland and Blinken feel comfortable several thousand miles away. If it all goes wrong, the first victims will be the European NATO proxies, not Washington.
Are these new NATO bases providing protection, or inviting high-risk annihilation in extremis? There is no strategic benefit to Ukraine in joining NATO to become a proxy of the hawks in Washington – there must simply be the promise of large quantities of dollars as had been the case in Afghanistan before the withdrawal.
That would be Midenhall. As well as German bunkers holding nukes. I’m 30 miles from Mildenhall and don’t expect to survive a nuclear exchange.
Tatyana.
Actions speak louder than words and Biden sanctioned JSTAR jets over Ukraine this week for the first time, their remit is to detect, locate and attack enemy armor at ranges beyond the forward area of troops, hardly a sign of de-escalation by the USA. Biden kept reiterating that there would be serious consequences if Russia invaded the Ukraine, it sounded to me as if he (Biden) was stalling for time, for what I’m not sure.
The trouble, of course, Tatyana is that whether or not Biden is wise or not (leaving aside the fact of his dementia) he doesn’t really control the decisions the USA makes. He’s the front man. The real decisions are made by the deep state operatives in the intelligence services and the military. And these totally unaccountable, warmongering, moral pygmies don’t give a fuc* about the carnage their self-interested, budget and profit maximising policies create.
It won’t suffice, when the world is smouldering and consisting of a pile of radioactive ash, for them to go “oops”.
A happy and safe New Year to you all. Said more with sincere hope than belief.