by Bruce Gagnon, published on Organizing Notes, March 6, 2022
Much to my astonishment I am getting emails from long respected ‘peaceniks’ passing on information that says there was no coup d’etat in 2014 (which was orchestrated by the Obama administration). The emails often suggest that there are also no Nazis in Ukraine.
How is this possible that otherwise experienced activists could come to this conclusion? Is it because they have not been paying attention to this issue the last eight years? Or the demonization of Russia is so great across the west that most people’s minds are set on ‘default’ and swing right into the ‘Russia is evil’ stance?
Could it be that they are listening to the corporate mainstream media and believing it? One email came today from a longtime Veterans For Peace leader on the west coast who wrote, “With all its faults I will take our MSM, NPR, PBS News Hour with the exception of Fox News over the state controlled lies put out by the Putin controlled media.”
It might help to know that this VFP member is a loyal Democrat – it seems that when a Democrat president pushes Russia into a corner (which then hits back) there is shock, surprise, outrage and horror.
Sure if you want to know the truth just turn to American media. Remember how they told us the truth about Iraq in 2003, or Libya, Syria, Yemen…..?
Luckily there are some journalists out there telling the truth. One clear example is this article by Alexander Rubinstein and Max Blumenthal called: How Ukraine’s Jewish President Made Peace With Neo-Nazi Paramilitaries: While Western media deploys Volodymyr Zelensky’s Jewish heritage to refute accusations of Nazi influence in Ukraine, the president has ceded to neo-Nazi forces and now depends on them as front line fighters.
The Nazis would not let them leave. Of course Russia was blamed by the media.
I know we are not supposed to talk about Zelensky in this way (by telling the truth about him, after all he will likely be named Time Magazine’s ‘Man of the Year’ for 2022).
But I tend to be a person who does not follow the maddening crowd.
I must admit I find it exceptionally difficult to cheer for Ukraine knowing that the Nazis are not allowing Russian-ethnics in big cities they control to leave via humanitarian highways. Just yesterday it was reported that the Nazis killed 200 people (including children) in Mariupol in eastern Ukraine when they forced them into the basement of a building and then blew it up.
The last Ukraine-Russia negotiations in Belarus agreed to allow humanitarian corridors from where the Nazis had created ‘strongholds’ in the city centers. But the Nazis have been refusing to honor the agreement. Nothing new there – although not reported by MSNBC, NPR, PBS News Hour, CNN, BBC, Washington Post or the NY Times.
Have people forgotten about Operation Mockingbird – the CIA control of western media?!!
I am at a loss for words to describe the severe disappointment I feel towards alot of the ‘peace movement’. I don’t expect true pacifists to agree with Russia’s military operations in Ukraine. But I do expect them not to be sharing BS emails denying the 2014 coup in Kiev and the presence of Nazis in the Ukrainian army!
It is just irresponsible to distort reality and mislead the public.
“Nothing in all the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity”, warned Dr. M. L. King.
Unbelievable.
Bruce Gagnon has been working on space issues for the past 30 years and helped create the Global Network Against Weapons and Nuclear Power in Space in 1992. His book, called “Come Together Right Now: Organizing Stories from a Fading Empire“, was republished in 2008. For 15 years he coordinated the Florida Coalition for Peace & Justice. He was trained as an organizer by the United Farmworkers Union and is also a member of Veterans for Peace