A Take-down Of the Media’s #1 Russia Hawk

[W]riting in the New York Times op-ed page Ben Judah boldly claims the west has a stark choice: “Arm Ukraine or Surrender.”

Judah wants nothing to do with surrender; he wants more violence for Ukraine.  We are also told in the most apoplectic terms that the entire geopolitical order is at stake “if the west doesn’t stand up to Putin.”

The entire op-ed reads like a really bad version of “House of Cards.” Let’s have a look at some of Judah’s madness and point out what he should be advocating.

Judah writes: “Ukraine cannot win this war. Mr. Putin has made it clear that the Russian Army will annihilate Ukrainian forces if they attempt to liberate Donetsk and Luhansk. Ukraine’s ramshackle army cannot rout the crack troops and conscript forces of an oil-fueled giant.”

The real question is: Why does the New York Times open its pages to such hysterical, mendacious garbage? Obviously the editors know better.

This is fantasy writing. Russia has no intention of invading Ukraine.  Russia doesn’t have “crack troops and forces” in Ukraine.  The local East Ukrainians are beating the pants off of Kiev pretty much on their own.  What Judah and other so-called Russia-watchers cannot accept is the harsh reality that Ukraine is in the midst of a civil war. The west is responsible for Ukraine’s bloody conflict.

Then we are told of the urgent need of western help for Ukraine: “A few more months without meaningful Western help and Ukraine will have lost the fighting core of its army — and its infatuation with the West.”

Well hasn’t the west already done enough for Ukraine! A year ago Ukraine’seconomy wasn’t doing great, but certainly not the worse performing in the world. A year ago Ukraine was sovereign and at peace. The February coup that overthrew the democratically elected government was immediately recognized by the west. Washington and Brussels should have sanctioned the illegal government until the constitutional order was returned. Instead, Russia is blamed for everything that has gone wrong with western meddling.

Calling Judah and his ilk a prostitute is to defame real prostitutes.

Judah devotes considerable space on how the west should militarily support Ukraine. Let’s face it Judah is a political hack of rank, but his military assessment skills are still in need of honing.  His obsession (assuming it’s for real) with imaginary Russian aggression makes him blind to what should be happening at this moment and that is ending the civil war through negotiations.

The western-backed government in Kiev should be forced to make peace with its own citizens in the east of the country. Washington and Brussels should invite Russia to be part of a process allowing Ukraine to have good trade relations with the EU and the Russia-backed Customs Union.

And most importantly, the west and writers like Ben Judah must stop their zero-sum assessment of the Ukraine crisis. This is the kind of thinking that created this crisis in the first place.