Capitulation and Quiet Piggy
As the COP ends in another abject failure the wider geopolitical world seems to also falter into complete madness. A ‘peace plan’ emerged last week that was at first purported to be an American proposal but was quickly revealed to be really a Russian wishlist, originally written in Russia, by Russians.
What’s Your Response to Your Proposal?
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This leaves us with the bizarre spectacle of the Russian’s being asked to have input on a proposal they themselves created, while the Ukranian’s are being urged to sign quickly, in time for Thanksgiving. The ‘deal’ is being energetically pursued by Trump, who increasingly looks like a sociopath staggering into dementia and completely untethered from reality. The Russian plans are demanding an abject capitulation. It is an extraordinary wishlist in which the roles are reversed and Ukraine is cast as the aggressor to be punished and have their military curtailed. If you are watching this through the filter of disinformation, it is worth looking at the actual words of the proposal. Here is the Russians’ proposal, verbatim:
1. Ukraine’s sovereignty will be confirmed.
2. A comprehensive non-aggression agreement will be concluded between Russia, Ukraine and Europe. All ambiguities of the last 30 years will be considered settled.
3. It is expected that Russia will not invade neighboring countries and NATO will not expand further.
4. A dialogue will be held between Russia and NATO, mediated by the United States, to resolve all security issues and create conditions for de-escalation in order to ensure global security and increase opportunities for cooperation and future economic development.
5. Ukraine will receive reliable security guarantees.
6. The size of the Ukrainian Armed Forces will be limited to 600,000 personnel.
7. Ukraine agrees to enshrine in its constitution that it will not join NATO, and NATO agrees to include in its statutes a provision that Ukraine will not be admitted in the future.
8. NATO agrees not to station troops in Ukraine.
9. European fighter jets will be stationed in Poland.
10. The U.S. guarantee:
— The U.S. will receive compensation for the guarantee;
— If Ukraine invades Russia, it will lose the guarantee;
— If Russia invades Ukraine, in addition to a decisive coordinated military response, all global sanctions will be reinstated, recognition of the new territory and all other benefits of this deal will be revoked;
— If Ukraine launches a missile at Moscow or St. Petersburg without cause, the security guarantee will be deemed invalid.
11. Ukraine is eligible for EU membership and will receive short-term preferential access to the European market while this issue is being considered.
12. A powerful global package of measures to rebuild Ukraine, including but not limited to:
— The creation of a Ukraine Development Fund to invest in fast-growing industries, including technology, data centres, and artificial intelligence.
— The United States will cooperate with Ukraine to jointly rebuild, develop, modernise, and operate Ukraine’s gas infrastructure, including pipelines and storage facilities.
— Joint efforts to rehabilitate war-affected areas for the restoration, reconstruction and modernisation of cities and residential areas.
— Infrastructure development.
— Extraction of minerals and natural resources.
— The World Bank will develop a special financing package to accelerate these efforts.
13. Russia will be reintegrated into the global economy:
— The lifting of sanctions will be discussed and agreed upon in stages and on a case-by-case basis.
— The United States will enter into a long-term economic cooperation agreement for mutual development in the areas of energy, natural resources, infrastructure, artificial intelligence, data centers, rare earth metal extraction projects in the Arctic, and other mutually beneficial corporate opportunities.
— Russia will be invited to rejoin the G8.
14. Frozen funds will be used as follows:
— $100 billion in frozen Russian assets will be invested in US-led efforts to rebuild and invest in Ukraine;
— The US will receive 50% of the profits from this venture. Europe will add $100 billion to increase the amount of investment available for Ukraine’s reconstruction. Frozen European funds will be unfrozen. The remainder of the frozen Russian funds will be invested in a separate US-Russian investment vehicle that will implement joint projects in specific areas. This fund will be aimed at strengthening relations and increasing common interests to create a strong incentive not to return to conflict.
15. A joint American-Russian working group on security issues will be established to promote and ensure compliance with all provisions of this agreement.
16. Russia will enshrine in law its policy of non-aggression towards Europe and Ukraine.
17. The United States and Russia will agree to extend the validity of treaties on the non-proliferation and control of nuclear weapons, including the START I Treaty.
18. Ukraine agrees to be a non-nuclear state in accordance with the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons.
19. The Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant will be launched under the supervision of the IAEA, and the electricity produced will be distributed equally between Russia and Ukraine — 50:50.
20. Both countries undertake to implement educational programs in schools and society aimed at promoting understanding and tolerance of different cultures and eliminating racism and prejudice:
— Ukraine will adopt EU rules on religious tolerance and the protection of linguistic minorities.
21. Territories:
— Crimea, Luhansk and Donetsk will be recognized as de facto Russian, including by the United States.
— Kherson and Zaporizhzhia will be frozen along the line of contact, which will mean de facto recognition along the line of contact.
— Russia will relinquish other agreed territories it controls outside the five regions.
— Ukrainian forces will withdraw from the part of Donetsk Oblast that they currently control, and this withdrawal zone will be considered a neutral demilitarized buffer zone, internationally recognized as territory belonging to the Russian Federation. Russian forces will not enter this demilitarized zone.
22. After agreeing on future territorial arrangements, both the Russian Federation and Ukraine undertake not to change these arrangements by force. Any security guarantees will not apply in the event of a breach of this commitment.
23. Russia will not prevent Ukraine from using the Dnieper River for commercial activities, and agreements will be reached on the free transport of grain across the Black Sea.
24. A humanitarian committee will be established to resolve outstanding issues:
— All remaining prisoners and bodies will be exchanged on an ‘all for all’ basis.
— All civilian detainees and hostages will be returned, including children.
— A family reunification program will be implemented.
— Measures will be taken to alleviate the suffering of the victims of the conflict.
25. Ukraine will hold elections in 100 days.
26. All parties involved in this conflict will receive full amnesty for their actions during the war and agree not to make any claims or consider any complaints in the future.
27. This agreement will be legally binding. Its implementation will be monitored and guaranteed by the Peace Council, headed by President Donald J. Trump. Sanctions will be imposed for violations.
28. Once all parties agree to this memorandum, the ceasefire will take effect immediately after both sides retreat to agreed points to begin implementation of the agreement.
This is a travesty and a farce, and a deal that Zelensky can only sign under threat from both Trump and Putin. It’s basically a geopolitical extortion racket only made possible by the complete collapse of European power and influence [no better exposed by the bizarre situation of Nicolas Guillou]. It guarantees Russia everything and Ukraine nothing, completely exonerates Russia for any of their actions and vilifies Ukraine for being invaded, It is beyond incredible.
This is the European counter-proposal:
As Kenneth Roth writes [Trump’s Ukraine peace plan is a gift to Putin]: “Betraying his real-estate background, Trump continues to treat the Ukrainian conflict as a mere territorial dispute, as if handing Putin a chunk of Ukrainian land will satisfy the despot. But Putin’s war is not about controlling a charred swath of deindustrialised territory in eastern Ukraine. It is about Ukraine’s democracy – and Putin’s desire to snuff it out so it no longer serves as an enticing model for the Russian people of the accountable government that Putin’s deepening dictatorship denies them.”
“While freezing in place the divided Ukrainian provinces of Kherson and Zaporizhzhia, Trump’s plan would force Ukraine to abandon all of Donetsk province. Beyond rewarding Russia with territory that its forces have been unable to seize in more than a decade of fighting, this surrender would leave Ukrainian defenses perilously weakened.”
“Donetsk is the location of Ukraine’s much-vaunted “fortress belt”, the entrenched defensive positions that are a key obstacle to Russian advances. Trump would have Ukraine abandon these defenses, leaving Putin a clear path to Kyiv should he later choose to resume the war.”
Then, in a move that would make renewed fighting easier for Russia, Trump would require Ukraine to diminish the size of its armed forces from their current 800,000 to 850,000 troops to a maximum of 600,000. Trump’s plan places no such limits on Russian forces.”
In short, the plan would leave Russia with no consequences for invading a sovereign European democracy, no consequences for war crimes in Ukraine and actually award Russia for their actions. The 28-point plans move toward lifting sanctions against Russia and readmitting it to the Group of 8. The removal of sanctions would make it easier for Putin to rebuild his military for a possible next invasion. The protection of Ukraine to future aggression is nil.
It’s difficult to overstate the extent to which the Russian deal would set a dangerous global precedent if accepted.
Slow and unsure, the Europeans have a counter-proposal in which negotiations over territory should take place after a ceasefire is agreed and should start from the line of contact – the existing frontline. Unlike the White House text, the European alternative does not call for Kyiv to withdraw from cities it controls in eastern Donbas.
Trump in Crisis
The ease at which Trump has capitulated to all of Putin’s demands, despite all of the talk of the ‘Art of the Deal’ is unsurprising. America and its leader look hopelessly confused and disorientated. What is their geopolitical interest, beyond the vagaries and ramblings of their Chief?
As this debacle unfolds, Donald Trump looks increasingly isolated and desperate after being forced to accede to the release of the Epstein Files. Into this abyss stumbles the President – this week shocking even his most stalwart defenders with his erratic behaviour.
Catherine Lucey, who covers the White House for Bloomberg News, was aboard Air Force One during a ‘gaggle’ (an informal media question session) and asked the President why Trump had been stonewalling over the Epstein Files, “if there’s nothing incriminating in the files?”
He pointed straight at Lucey and told her “Quiet. Quiet, piggy”. Even for all of us desensitised to the weirdness of Trump’s America, it was a shocking moment of cruel misogyny. As has been pointed out, the craven response of the rest of the press pack to the comment is a great part of the problem. The moment came just after the President had lauded the Saudi crown prince, who, according to a 2021 US intelligence report, approved the killing of a Washington Post journalist, Jamal Khashoggi. The US president gave him a hero’s welcome to the White House and used the opportunity to insult and threaten ABC News reporter Mary Bruce for questioning the event.
“I think you are a terrible reporter. It’s the way you ask these questions,” Trump said. He called ABC a “crappy company” and said its license “should be taken away from ABC because your news is so fake and it’s so wrong”.
So far, so predictable. Trump’s attacks on the media are routine and entirely normalised, rationalised by his supporters through the lens of an ‘attack on elites’ and on the idea of ‘fake news’.
But across the water, things are also unravelling for the UK part of the Trump network. Nigel Farage is facing pressure after his close colleague and friend Nathan Gill was imprisoned for ten and half years for taking Russian bribes to promote Russian talking points. Are we really to believe that Nathan Gill, who spouted the same lies, is the only Russian asset in Reform UK?
Farage is under further pressure for conspiracy theories linked to antisemitism he voiced in US media, and for accusations of racism and antisemitism from his school-age [what Nigel Farage is a racist!).
Bannon, Farage and Epstein
Other evidence is emerging linking Farage to Epstein that would be far more damaging than the idea that he was and is racist (that’s the thing he’s built his entire political career on!)
As Peter Jukes writes [Dinner with Mr Brexit: Bannon’s European Revolution – Planned with Farage, Backed by Epstein]: “Anyone who’s seen Alison Klayman’s 2019 documentary The Brink will remember the scenes where Steve Bannon and Nigel Farage sit together discussing a pan-European nationalist populist “Movement” – with Bannon calling Farage “the face” of Brexit while they talk about stitching together far-right parties across the EU. Bannon tells Farage that he’ll “fund it somehow”.
“What those scenes didn’t show is that the Brussels vehicle Bannon was about to claim as his own – The Movement – had actually been created out of Farage’s network and that, in the background, Jeffrey Epstein was quietly helping Bannon plan, protect, and track his “European revolution”.
Jukes concludes: “What the newly released Epstein files do show is this: the European revolution Bannon boasted about – the one Farage helped to engineer and front – was supported and shaped in important ways by Jeffrey Epstein.
“Farage’s politics did not sit outside this system. His Brexit was at its centre. Farage’s partner built the Brussels foundation; Farage brokered the partnership with Bannon; and Epstein advised on the money, the law, the logistics and the strategy that allowed that project to grow.”
Farage’s partner, Laure Ferrari, she of the house in Clacton, literally co-founded the Brussels organisation (“The Movement”) that Bannon used to build a European nationalist network.
But if both the Trump and the Farage end of the network is unravelling, it should not be underestimated the extent to which they have operated in plain sight for a long time, without consequence.
The new platform The Nerve has laidout the full timeline in place of much other media coverage:
It’s interesting that none of the Scottish media (that I’m aware of) has picked up on the Scottish angle, that the former Member of the European Parliament (MEP) for Scotland from 2014 to 2019 David Coburn (who was the leader of UKIP Scotland from July 2014 until December 2018) is deeply implicated in the activities of Nathan Gill.
In the same session that Gill is indicted for here:
11 Dec 2018: Following a vote in October by the Ukrainian parliament to close Channel 112 and NewsOne as “aggressive influence[s] of destructive propaganda”, Gill gives a speech in the European parliament: “We’ve seen activists and journalists alike being violently attacked by radicals … How can this be, that the president of Ukraine can potentially close down independent media just before an election?”
At the same session, Coburn and Arnott give similar speeches. Coburn says: “… No government can stand by and do nothing while its journalists are being attacked and murdered. This is thoroughly unacceptable …. The president of the Ukraine and the Rada parliament are, uh, plotting to close TV channels 112 and Channel One [sic]. Can this chamber truthfully say that Ukraine, which behaves this way, is ready for EU entry?”
Read the full account here: Reform UK and Russian bribes: a Nathan Gill timeline.
Given that Reform UK are supposed to be making great inroads in Scotland its astonishing that the Scottish media have ignored this. Coburn, famous for his audio problems during a live broadcast quit the party in 2018 over ‘extremism’.
It’s difficult to see how the Russian and European plans for a settlement to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine are remotely resolveable. It’s also difficult to see with such an incurious and captured UK media how the behaviour of key figures within Reform UK will be properly investigated. Action without impunity or consequence seems to be the watchwords of this whole era.
Good piece, Mike. But you didn’t include item 26 of the Russian/US so-called plan, maybe because it is unclear who proposed it.
It reads, ‘All parties involved in this conflict will receive full amnesty for their actions during the war and agree not to make any claims or consider any complaints in the future.’
In other words, nobody will be held accountable for any war crimes, regardless of whether evidence is produced to demonstrate that such crimes took place. Forget Bucha, for example. So, in essence, this is an attempt by Putin and/or Trump to overrule and ignore the international order that, since the Second World War, has said that nobody is absolved from being held responsible for crimes against humanity that they may have committed.
If this clause is not explicitly challenged and removed then we can say goodbye to anybody being held responsible, now or in the future, for genocide, war crimes, crimes against humanity, state-sponsored assassinations and so forth. Trump has already put in place the ‘principle’ that no US president should be held culpable for anything he or she does while in office. This is a charter for gangsterism.
You’re quite right James, I somehow missed out several of the final points, updated now.
The European counter-proposal has removed the amnesty item, quite rightly. If the US/USSR try to reinstate it, that will tell us all we need to know. However, it is inconceivable that Putin will agree to the European version.
Yeah I dont really see how Ukraine agrees to a deal which is “Here’s nothing, with no guarantees for the future”. But what the hell do I know (anyone know really)?
Btw I think its generally accepted that Kirill Dmitriev wrote the whole thing
Hi Mike there’s a repeat of items 16 – 20. Thanks for this article.
Fixed now. Having a bad day : (
Thanks for review.
USA now appear to be trying to be a neutral broker on this issue when historically they have been a strong ally of Western Europe. Throughout the last year Trump has appeared more aggressive to Zylensky and more sympathetic to Putin. This would indicate to me that Trump (& in all probability Farage) have for more in common with the authoritarian Putin’s Russian regime than the democratic governments in Europe. Trump’s actions in USA since being elected last year provides strong evidence to demonstrate this.
The Trump – Putin axis has one merit: to deal a terminal blow to the campist analysis whereby Russia’s invasion of Ukraine was the result of Western capitalist expansionism: Trump has made it abundantly clear that he would be perfectly happy with Putin gobbling up Ukraine. And it’s been obvious for some time that Putin does not want any kind of ceasefire that would deprive him of the territorial gains he seeks.
NATO expansion east is, as I understand it, generally seen across all of Russian society as unacceptable, and at the very least it gave Putin a casus beli which a more subtle approach to Russia after the fall of Communism might have avoided..
As for the situation in Ukraine and the Dombas, it is one Europe’s fault lines, there was a majority Russian speaking population in most of the Dombas, and the pivot in Kiev towards the EU meant that the trade deal with Russia Ukraine would have to be rescinded…
I’m not justifying Putin’s invasion in any shape or form, and now he has done it, Ukraine must be defended by the rest of Europe at all costs, but Putin couldn’t remain in power if he didn’t have any kind of argument at all to put to Russian society… millions of young men killed, I mean he has to have a narrative and the West hardly went out of its way to try and assuage the fears of a country brutally invaded by both Hitler and Napoleon, and by Britain too in the Crimean War, where a certain Florence Nightingale found fame…
“Putin couldn’t remain in power if he didn’t have any kind of argument at all to put to Russian society… millions of young men killed” – I mean he remains in power as a dictator who brutally suppresses dissent and kills political opponents?
Absolutely true as well, of course, but I’m not saying anything controversial, you could say the same about Hitler. How did he stay in power right to the end of WWII? Because most Germans believed in his lunatic project to great a German Reich which would stretch from the Rhine all the way to Asia…
The Germans felt they were due an empire like Britain and France had at the time, and as most of the world had been divided up at the Berlin Conference in the 1870s (I think), they looked to the East and the mass liquidation of what they called “inferior races”…
The Russian 19th century thinker, Herzen, who features in Isiah Berlin’s brilliant book of essays, “Russian Thinkers” , described History as the autobiogrpahy of a madman…
Exactly my feelings… the horrors of the last century in Europe are just overwhelming… Putin the latest in a long line of psychopathic leaders…
Sometimes you get the despairing feeling that war is an integral part of human nature… just as integral as the positive stuff… some people seem to really like it…
Sure, the West are not blameless, though I disagree that Putin ever had a casus belli. And sure, Putin has a narrative. Here it is: http://en.kremlin.ru/events/president/news/66181
In brief, it’s a highly partisan assertion of Russian ethnic nationalism and imperialist domination of Ukraine. As for the suffering undergone by Russia during WWII: no-one could or should dispute this. However, Ukraine also bore a huge toll from war, famine, and ethnic cleansing, under the Tsars, under Stalin, under Nazi occupation. And now under Putin. No wonder they want out.
I tend to agree with you, Paddy, I tend to think Putin would have eventually done it anyway, ie, invade Ukraine. The first thing he did when he became President was restore the old Soviet national anthem!!!
But it’s not exactly the point I was making. Without NATO expansion, it might have been a harder sell in Russia? It’s a nuance of course…
It’s a bit like the Yugoslavia War. You can argue there was maybe something inevitable about it, but the West again really, far from trying to stop the war erupting, did all they could to provoke it.
The Chicago Boys, in both Russia and Yugolsavia, wade in there and cause absolute chaos with free-market, neo-liberal economics, removing any kind of safety net for millions of people, wining and dining Putin and the oligarchs in London and elsewhere, and as for the Germans, they stated a vested interest in an independent Croatia which was a massive factor in the break down / up of Yugoslavia…
I think you are overplaying the degree and the nature of the support that Putin has in Russia, and the extent of disinformation within Russia about the war. All that stuff about a fascist regime in Kyiv threatening Russia is frankly ridiculous.
On the contrary, I think that Putin is well aware of NATO’s weakness, whatever he says about the threat it poses. NATO sat on its hands when he invaded in 2014, and has remained ineffective since then: it is profoundly divided, with several NATO members siding with Putin (Hungary, for one), and far-right leaders (Farage included) that back Putin on the up. With Trump now in power, it’s questionable whether NATO remains credible as a defensive alliance for Europe: I doubt that Article 5 of the NATO Charter is worth the paper it’s written on these days.
An important question, and a tricky one for the Left, is how should Europe defend itself without relying on the USA. The issue is particularly potent in the UK where our so-called independent nuclear so-called deterrent (as Wilson called it) is an appendage of US military power. Just as ineffective and pointless are those big aircraft carriers that the UK sends now and then to the other side of the world for no good reason – even if they actually had planes on them.
But what is NATO expansion? It is sovereign countries wanting to be in NATO. Should they be denied that due to fear of what Putin might do? People talk of NATO’s weakness and that surely would have been a weak thing to do because of Putin’s paranoia.
Over the years, Putin has instilled great fear in his people and eliminated / literally killed all political opposition. Anyone who now sticks their head above the parapet is either killed or gets a very lengthy prison sentence. Remember all those protests in Russia a few years back (some associated with Navalny), then at the start of the war? Where are they now? Brutally suppressed is the answer and this is how Putin is still in power. And the Nazis, they ruled with a reign of terror, murdering thousands of internal opponents.
Niemand – you are correct in pointing out that democratic countries have chosen to join NATO. Indeed some of the Nordic countries which have previously not been members of NATO have applied for membership post Russia’s latest invasion of Ukraine in 2022. Not too difficult to understand why they have done so.
Mind you the question about NATO now is how much does Trump’s USA believe in it and would USA actually engage if Russia invaded a NATO member?
I think the terrifying thing, Bella and Paddy, when you look at the history of 20th C Europe, is ideology…
You know, all these sophisticated Germans fall for Hitler, and there must be millions of Russians you could say the same about…
As for the Americans, they have been led to believe they are the exemplers of freedom, when they belong to a State founded on slavery, genocide and grand theft…
All this talk about AI… people are like walking robots already, totally pre-progammed…
And with reading in a very steep decline across the West according to the OCDE, in Britain too, the future for democracy, even our shitty first past the post old boys club wheeze, looks very bleak I think…
The whole rules-based post-war order is falling to pieces, and what’s worrying is that the UK must take its fair share of responsibility for that, because we tore up the rules when we backed an illegal war in Iraq and an illegal occcupation of Afgahanistan and then, to make matters so much worse, abandonded the EU and its myraid institutions, inevitably leaving us more vulnerable and dependent on the good old USA with their long list of criminally insane presidents and never ending foreign wars…
I agree with Paddy that Putin has no interest in peace, he’s got himself into a situation in which the only way he can survive is by waging war, but the US military industrial complex, which former president Eisenhower warned the world about 70 years ago, also has no interest in world peace either and the annual budget of the Pentagon has now surpassed one trillion dollars… there is a whole new generation of “smart” weapons which theu are dying to try out…
I think it’s a fair argument to say that so long as the arms trade is as profittable as it is, there will always be war… the US govt hands billlions to the Israelis who then spend the money buying US made arms and use them to kill Palestinians or Syrians or Lebonese, and there seems to be no end in sight…
The EU is so lacking in so many ways, but in a world run by Trump, Putin and Starmer, it is a beacon of light, an organization, which due to the way it is set up, cannot fall into the hands of a dictator, and even with the far right in power in Italy and Hungary, it is still more than holding together…
I dare say accepting Russian money to advance Russia’s interests in Europe was a bad thing to do.. In the US every Senator and Congressman accepts ten times this much to advance a rogue and terrorist foreign nation called Israel. All our MPs accept donations from self interested parties including foreign corporations to advance their interests. To be honest, Israel lobbies and provides political donations and freebies, including travel to Israel, to around half of the UK’s MPs. I can’t see much difference, except that Nathan Gill came rather cheap. And to gaol him for ten years is ridiculously excessive, the cost to the country is immense, the prisons are over crowded, under staffed and falling apart, he’s not violent, and has suffered mostly from being found out and his reputation shattered. Six months in prison would be salutary enough for anyone, a steep fine would actually hurt more, and two years of community service might be the icing on the retributive cake, But ten years in gaol? Utterly pointless. .
. In regard to Ukraine, I don’t know what to say, I’d disagree with almost everything you’ve written, which is disappointing, as I would have assumed you’d have had a more nuanced and informed opinion. The conventionality of your thinking is really surprising. If you wish me to explain further, I’d need many more words, but here is are two e-mails sent to news organisations in NZ – the first in 2014, and the second in early 2022. There are many more such e-mails over years, but these two will give the flavour of my understanding of what is actually happening.
4/3/14 To Nine to Noon current affairs programme, Radio NZ Dear Kathryn and team,
I was interested to hear your interview this morning with Louisa but if you’d hoped to enlighten your audience about this matter, it was a bit of a failure. You can’t talk about the Ukraine without considering:
—-that Ukraine is a failed state, basically a kleptocracy which controls and corrupts every aspect of life in that country,
—-nor that fanning the flames, as usual, is the USA, who have spent at least $100 million (27/11/25 not sure where I got this figure, because the actual figure was $5 billion) in so-called democracy movements in Ukraine,
-nor ignore the contempt the USA has shown to the more measured response from Europe as revealed in the phone conversation between Victoria Nuland, a right wing neoliberal, and Geoffrey Pyatt,
—nor that both walked in the Maidan Square, handing out leaflets to the protestors, many of whom belonged to fascist and neo-nazi style extreme parties,
—that the so-called “government” in Kiev is unelected and has no democratic basis
—and that Crimea was until the 1950’s part of Russia, and the tensions between Crimea and Ukraine have existed for many years
—and that Russia has a reasonable interest in preserving its interests in the Crimea, both its naval base, and the majority of its citizens, who see themselves first as Russian – its is after all, Russia’s back yard.
—That the USA and the West has no right to interfere in Ukraine, other than through the UN and other international bodies they belong to, and the calls for more direct action from right wing zealots are yet further destabilising this situation.
It’s a bit of a shame that this perspective was missing in this interview, I wonder why?.
Nor should you consider that the USA’s reaction is self-righteous and dangerous humbug,; that country having meddled in the affairs of so many countries for so long, often with tragic results, it seems to be the usual order of things, and not even remarked on by the media, including yourself. The USA has the Monroe doctrine, perhaps Russia now has the Putin doctrine, they don’t seem that dissimilar to me.
And lastly perhaps you could remind your listeners that 2014 marks the centenary of the First World War, which arose in not such dissimilar circumstances as today, with failing historical powers jostling for supremacy and the tragic consequences that arose. It seems to me that the powerful and privileged who run the world, as they’ve always done, have learnt very little from the last hundred years of history. We should be more worried by our own leadership than we should by Russia’s.
When you read the Colin Power has said “The U.S. will stand strongly and proudly with the people of Ukraine as they chart out their own destiny, government, future” then you know they truly are mad. .
Yours faithfully,
19th March 2022 To the Wellington paper, The Post
Von Clausewitz famously wrote (1827~) “War is merely the continuation of politics by other means”. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is Clausewitz writ large. Russia, unable to gain over many years a single diplomatic concession from the US and its puppet regime in Ukraine, as to Russia’s red-lines: no further eastward expansion of NATO, a neutral Ukraine (like Finland), observing the Minsk agreement re Donbass, and recognising Crimea as de-facto part of Russia, it has gone to war. That is totally tragic and totally barbarous. The intransigent, reckless failure of the West to recognise and address Russia’s rational security concerns, swayed by rabidly anti-Russian US neocons, is a failure of diplomacy of historic proportions, noted by many commentators including US generals. The US and NATO have led Ukraine up a garden path to ruin with promises of an anti-Russian sovereignty and a NATO protection which could never be kept, as this war so tragically confirms. For Russia this war is their Clausewitzian diplomacy, but again, even more disastrously, the West and Ukraine still refuse to engage, as if we actually have a choice. WW3 because Ukraine cannot be neutral?. I am truly fearful, why isn’t everyone?
there are many more e-mails in the same vein, many predicting accurately that we will ultimately betray Zelensky and Ukraine, all pretty prescient in predicting the unfolding of events.
This was must stop, and sadly it will stop on Russia’s terms, because they are winning on the battlefield and we have no leverage or means to stop them short of declaring war ourselves and mobilising say 2 million troops and their arms. Something like half a million Ukrainians have died, and will continue to die. At the beginning of the war I said this “The trite expression – we’re with you as long as it takes – is meaningless humbug, as long as it takes to what….? To fight to the very last Ukrainian presumably, and then what?
Sorry Mike (and I hate to write this because for the most part I find your writing and opinions valuable) you are in this falling well behind the progress of history but no more than most of the West’s politicians and political movers, If we didn’t want the result we’re now getting it would have been wiser to have dealt to Russia’s rational concerns from the start, even in 2014 I had suggested abandoning NATO and constructing a Europe-wide security umbrella, not with the US, who should leave Europe but with the biggest country in Europe, Russia,, There is no security for Europe without Russia being involved, not doing this is just infantile Russophobia and bellicose projection on Putin and his country.
“Trump is capitulating to Putin” you write – this would be more accurate and helpful “Trump is capitulating to reality” It’s more than a pity, but seriously dangerous, that European leadership and the media cannot see this. The idea that Putin is then going to start marching his armies in to the rest of Europe is delusional, all the claims that Putin is going to do this, going to do that…… All I know I cannot read Putin’s mind, and so can no-one else. Has Starmer visited Putin and the leadership there? Why not. Did Churchill and Roosevelt have to meet Stalin in Yalta and give up on the sovereignty of half of Europe? It must have stuck in Churchill’s craw that he had to but he was showing us true statesmanship which does sometimes mean “capitulating” to reality…
Thanks for your time.
John – I will pass your comments, written safely from the other side of the planet, to the Ukrainian family(including 3 young children) we hosted for a year, after they had to leave their home in Ukraine due to the imminent danger posed by invading Russian troops on 22nd February 2022. They have subsequently found out that the block of flats they called home had been flattened by Russian bombing.
This is from the same parallel universe as that inhabited by the likes of Steve Witkoff.
“nor that both walked in the Maidan Square, handing out leaflets to the protestors, many of whom belonged to fascist and neo-nazi style extreme parties,”
We hosted a Ukranian mother & daughter for 3 years & we now regard them as family. Her husband (a vet, like she is) was at Maidan along with people who would be classed as democrats – but who you – Monro – chracterise as fascist & neo-nazis – whilst using bullshit qualifers “many”. I have the advantage of knowing large numbers of Ukranians – they are not happy with the levels of corruption, but to claim it is a kleptocracy is yet another “tankie” talking point. & as for “that the so-called “government” in Kiev is unelected and has no democratic basis” – how much does Putler pay you pal? Putler’s “L:ord Haw Haw” but in NZ.
Mike – this very much mirrors my experience talking to Ukrainian’s we have hosted.
Mr Monroe may wish to reflect upon the following facts:
Compare numbers of Ukrainian civilians killed and injured by Russian attacks with Russian civilians killed and injured by Ukrainian attacks.
Compare number of Ukrainian civilians forced to flee Ukrainian invasion by Russian soldiers and vice versa.
Compare the number of Ukrainian children abducted by Russian soldiers and vice versa.
Compare the damage and destruction to Ukrainian infrastructure from Russian attacks and vice versa.
Perhaps Mr Monroe and Donald Trump would like to reflect upon these hard facts and humanitarian consequences while they blame Ukraine.
Dear John
I make no apology for the ‘the conventionality of my thinking’.
I think you’ve swallowed wholesale a number of Putin talking points which you seem to regurgitate without a blush.
I’m not sure where to begin?
21 April 2019 Volodimir Zelensky, received 73 percent of the vote to Poroshenko’s 25 percent in the biggest landslide victory in Ukrainian presidential elections and was elected President of Ukraine.
Ukraine is not a failed state, though I’m not sure why that would be a reason for military invasion.
The Russian invasion was an unprovoked aggression that has cost an estimated 14,200–14,400 military and civilian deaths during the War in Donbas,and between 400,000 and 1.5 mln. estimated casualties (killed and wounded) during the Russian invasion of Ukraine from February 24, 2022 till November, 2025.
No-one is responsible for this other than Vladimir Putin.
Much of your narrative is indistinguishable from Farage’s and his former colleague, who you so strongly defend.
Thanks
Mike
Military alliances are fundamentally anti-democratic and undermine sovereignty. They are exceptionally dangerous and deadly: see WW1+. Modern state-centralised weapons of mass destruction are fundamentally anti-democratic, and such regimes are riddled with secrecy, corruption, waste and incompetence. Militarism itself is typically undemocratic, even in mass-participation societies like genocidal Zionist Israel (where curiously some zealots don’t want to serve). And democracies can be extremely belligerent (see Ancient Athens).
Not that we have any actual democracies. The belief that NATO is some kind of guardian of democracy is a symptom of idiocy. NATO, the greatest World Evil we have on record, which has planned the destruction of our living planet for decades, is nevertheless too incompetent or unwilling to defeat enemies like the unpopular Taliban. Or maybe NATO’s special interest in making war against women and children suggests they deliberately lost to their Taliban allies.
The MoD and the British military is more of a threat to the British public and its own serving personnel than Russia. This can be measured empirically in injuries, abuses and deaths. The British military establishment, whose long-term goal seems to have been to produce an officer caste that can move freely into political office (as indeed the Duke of Wellington did, though publicly reviled), is laughably and ineptly corrupt, as illustrated by the blundering, venal, shameless ex-head of British army Lord Dannatt: https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2025/nov/25/how-lord-dannatt-used-his-peerage-to-open-doors-for-business-interests
But you have to look at the royal prerogatives (for war, treaties, annexations etc) to track the biggest stench. Follow that to some problematic allies.
This is very interesting indeed, extremely comprehensive, very absorbing. Thank you very much indeed!
Slainthe, Roddy.
Maybe this deeply moving and inspiring recent documentary about the resistance of ordinary Russians to Putin’s reign of terror might blow away the cobwebs from John Munro’s mind, and other like him…
https://youtu.be/qUY5slpcUf0?si=02SdQHkTtxIO3el_