Russian president Vladimir Putin’s bloody invasion of Ukraine has now entered its second year. The war has developed quite differently from what many expected. The resistance of Ukraine’s people, determined to defend their right to self-determination, has been fierce and shows no sign of ebbing. The Russian military has proven far weaker than many supposed it to be. A year later Ukraine has fought Putin’s invasion to a stalemate.
As Russia’s brutal invasion of Ukraine enters its eighth month, the war shows no sign of ending. However, there is growing evidence that Russian president Vladimir Putin’s belligerence is not matched by Russian military success.To the contrary, Ukraine’s resistance has begun to bear fruit with a series of recent military advances. It seems clear those advances were made with the support of Ukrainians in the most affected areas, and throughout the country.The Ukrainian army is fighting for something it believes in and has popular support. The Russian army — or significant parts of it — is not, while popular support for the war in Russia seems to be on the decline. Ukrainians are fighting for self-determination and independence from Moscow. Russian soldiers have been sent to deny those rights.In response Moscow has taken what seem to be desperate — and increasingly dangerous — steps. They include “annexing” more Ukrainian territory, threatening to use nuclear arms, calling up hundreds of thousands of reservists into military service, ramping up repression against Russian citizens and soldiers opposing its murderous war, and launching new deadly missile strikes into civilian areas in Kiyv and other Ukrainian cities.
This is a statement by Russian freediving champion Olga Davydova opposing Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine. The athlete posted the statement on her Facebook page on March 2, 2022. Sonja Franeta, a writer who has frequently traveled to Russia, translated Davydova’s statement from the original text in Russian and introduces it to World-Outlook readers.
This is a statement the Vienna State Opera issued on March 21, 2022. World-Outlook is publishing it because it addresses an important issue in the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine as well as U.S. and NATO sanctions against Russia. We agree with the Vienna opera’s call to reject demands to exclude Russian artists from performing “as well as a world view that classifies people as ‘good’ or ‘bad’ only on the basis of their origin.” We should note that during the long U.S. war against Vietnam 50 years ago, and during many other acts of aggression by Washington since, such a policy against artists from the U.S. would have been wrong for the same reason. It would also have deprived the world of many outstanding voices opposing that aggression. Any denial of the stage to Russian artists today only makes it more difficult for Russian artists to emulate that example now.
March 28, 2022—In the face of fierce and effective resistance by Ukrainian forces, signs are appearing that the Russian military may be adjusting the goals of its brutal invasion. “Russia says its main goal is Donbass, suggesting scaled-back ambitions in Ukraine,” Reuters reported March 25. Russian president Vladimir Putin originally aimed a substantial military convoy at Ukraine’s capital city with the goal of capturing it and, if possible, installing a compliant regime that would accept his false assertion that there is no Ukrainian nation; that Ukraine is nothing other than a “creation” of Russia. Achieving that goal has proven impossible, for now. Frustrated by the inability to score a quick, decisive military victory, Putin intensified a brutal air and artillery assault on the Ukraine, one that is intended to terrorize the civilian population. That offensive has created an enormous humanitarian crisis, but it has not broken the will of the Ukrainian people despite the fact that one in every four Ukrainians have been forced from their homes.
March 16, 2022—Moscow is escalating its savage assault on Ukraine in the face of worldwide opposition to the invasion ordered by Russia’s President Vladimir Putin. Any idea that Russia’s military could score a quick victory and rapidly impose a successful occupation of the country has proven false. Ukrainian resistance has been stiff and determined. Inside Russia, demonstrations against Putin’s war have occurred in over 150 cities leading to more than 13,000 arrests by Putin’s cops. The population of Ukraine is engaged in a war for national independence against a regime in Moscow that aims to restore in Ukraine the situation that existed under the Russian Tsar, when the Russian empire was a prison house of nations. This explains the fierce resistance that has clearly come as a surprise to Putin, as well as others. Ukrainians will not easily become the subjects of efforts to establish a new Russian empire.
This exchange includes a slightly edited version of a letter Pete Seidman, a leader of the U.S. Hands Off Cuba and Venezuela coalition in Miami, sent to Medea Benjamin, co-founder of Global Exchange and Codepink: Women for Peace, and Nicolas (Sandy) Davies, a journalist and researcher for Codepink. Seidman is responding to the article by Benjamin and Davies “How the US Started a New Cold War with Russia and Left Ukraine to Fight It.” The latter appeared on February 28, 2022, in CommonDreams and is republished after Seidman’s letter. Cassia Laham, a leader of the United National Antiwar Coalition (UNAC), published an article on March 1, headlined “No To NATO,” which expresses views similar to those in the CommonDreams piece. It is also republished at the end of this exchange for the information of our readers. World-Outlook is publishing this exchange of views because of the importance of the issues involved for antiwar fighters and others. The editors of World-Outlook share Seidman’s views.
Moscow’s unprovoked invasion of Ukraine is an anathema to humanity. Russian troops, tanks, air force, and other military hardware should get out now. The Ukrainian people defending the country’s independence deserve international solidarity—already shown by protests condemning the invasion inside Russia, Georgia, and elsewhere. It is also necessary to clearly see Washington’s hypocritical claims that it tried to avert war through diplomacy. We should demand that U.S. and NATO military forces pull out of Eastern Europe and the broader region. The Pentagon has doubled the number of U.S. warships in the Mediterranean, redeployed an aircraft carrier there from the Pacific, and increased the number of U.S. troops in the region. It is opening up new NATO bases in Eastern Europe. The newest, a “highly sensitive U.S. military installation” according to the New York Times, located near the village of Redzikowo, in Poland, is only about 100 miles from Russian territory. These moves are aimed at expanding U.S. military domination in Europe and countering Russian economic interests. They pose a genuine threat to world peace while offering Putin a pretext for his brutal invasion.