Forget Iraq (for a moment, anyway) – what is going on in Ukraine?
Following the narrow victory (well, 3%, just like in the US election) of Viktor Yanukovich over challenger Viktor Yushchenko, the Yushchenko-ites have adorned themselves with bright orange garments and taken to mass street protests, challenging the legitimacy of the election and demanding a re-vote. Yushchenko even took an oath of presidency, before a group of parliamentarians well short of the quorum he needed.
But here’s a problem: the elections weren’t stolen. So says the BHHRG, one of the few NGOs in the West that isn’t a handmaiden of the Empire.
What we’re seeing is rather a re-run of “revolutions” in Belgrade (2000), Tbilisi (2003) and the attempted coup in Belarus (2001), which prominently features CIA-trained student activists from Serbia, and propaganda and financial support from the Empire.
This isn’t a popular movement, much less a democratic revolution. Commentator Jonathan Steele of the British Guardian calls this circus a “postmodern coup d’etat”. His colleague, reporter Ian Traynor, lays out the facts about the mechanism behind Yushchenko: it’s a must-read.
Lew Rockwell dispenses with the “revolutionary” nonsense on his blog:
“In fact, the US is engaging in an imperial adventure. It is seeking to install its man in office via the CIA, and to have Ukraine join Nato and become a US satellite. This is the equivalent of the old Russia subverting Mexico, and having it join the Warsaw Pact, a very hostile act.
Every neocon in the world is screaming the same line. No rational man could agree on that basis alone.”
Lew also says that because of Ukrainians’ suffering under Stalin and Communism in general,
“…one can understand Ukrainian feelings towards Russia. Still, becoming the agent of a hostile power is not a good idea. In any event, it is none of the US’s business.”
I couldn’t agree more.
And that’s what it really comes down to: becoming the agent of a hostile power. In addition to being a very destructive political system, democracy has become a means of Imperial conquest as well. Any time Washington and/or Brussels want to take over a country, they activate the fifth column of NGOs and “human rights” organizations, print posters and slogans, and threaten violence unless their candidate is elected. For all their shouting about some alleged resurgence of Russian imperialism, it’s the Western Empire that’s behaving like the Soviets now. It would be ironic, were it not so true.