Brzezinski Mapped Out the Battle for Ukraine in 1997

[newthinking]

[font size="2"]Brzezinski Mapped Out the Battle for Ukraine in 1997

It's all about maintaining the US position as the world's sole superpower
by Chris Ernesto, March 15, 2014
Antiwar.com

Why would the United States run the risk of siding with anti-Semitic, neo-Nazis in Ukraine?

One of the keys may be found by looking back at Zbigniew Brzezinski’s 1997 book, The Grand Chessboard in which he wrote, “Ukraine, a new and important space on the Eurasian chessboard, is a geopolitical pivot because its very existence as an independent country helps to transform Russia. Without Ukraine, Russia ceases to be a Eurasian empire.”

“However, if Moscow regains control over Ukraine, with its 52 million people and major resources as well as access to the Black Sea, Russia automatically again regains the wherewithal to become a powerful imperial state, spanning Europe and Asia.”

The former national security advisor to Jimmy Carter from 1977 to 1981 and top foreign policy advisor to Barack Obama, Brzezinski wrote that US policy should be “unapologetic” in perpetuating “America’s own dominant position for at least a generation and preferably longer still.”

Full read:[/font]
http://original.antiwar.com/Chris_Ernesto/2014/03/14/brzezinski-mapped-out-the-battle-for-ukraine-in-1997/

[bemildred]

1. Another delusional narcissist who thinks he is the Hinge of History. nt

[The Magistrate]

2. Does That Refer To Mr. Brzezinski Or The Article's Author, Sir?

The article comes under the heading of 'it was his life's work to announce the obvious in terms of the scandalous'.

Mr. Brezinski's observations cited here are exceedingly ordinary, and in fact could have been made just about any time from the mid-eighteenth century on. They are simple facts of geography, apparent to any, and have long conditioned policy by and towards Russian empires. Russia ( defined as Muscovy ), it is worth pointing out, has not always held Ukraine, any more than it has always held the Caucasian tier; Ukraine only came into its hands over the course of the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries. Russia's imperial drive into the Caucasus was a mark of the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, and early in the twentieth century Russia and England essentially partitioned Persia between them: had matters not been interrupted by the Great War, its extinguishing as an independent state would certainly have been on the cards.

A few things seem worth pointing out here.

No state has a right to empire; other states have a right to balk any drive towards empire. Commentators like the above take this principle for granted in regards to the United States, but seem to ignore it in application to anyone else. This is very foolish, and makes those who do it appear naifs and fools at best, and simple partisans of other empires, imperialists of another color, at worst. Russia has no right whatever to impose its economic or political dominion on any people, anywhere, and never has had; any country, any state, has a perfect right to oppose Russian expansion, into any country, and always has had, and does nothing remotely wrong in doing so if it feels this best meets its economic and political interests. It is not just the United States which has no right to do this, or which people have a right to oppose: these things apply to drive toward empire by any state.

[bemildred]

3. Mr. Ernesto seems unlikely to think himself the Hinge of History, Sir. nt

[The Magistrate]

5. Not So Sure Of That, My Friend

He does, after all, seem to be working towards a goal, and have little scruple about means employed for it.

Mr. Brzezinski has certainly had some impact on history, in his work for President Carter, and were he to consider himself a 'hinge of history' would have a better case than most --- history will certainly accord him a prominent place in accounts of the downfall of the Soviet Union, something which is likely to retain the name of a good thing for some while yet....

Personally, I find Mr. Brzezinski an acute and useful observer of the international scene, whose views are always worth some consideration when assessing the likely consequences of some policy or action.

[bemildred]

4. To be clear, Sir, I do not support Mr. Ernesto's theory, either. nt

[The Magistrate]

6. Understood, Sir

[bemildred]

7. I've been watching the Gaza War and reading a book

named "July '14" by a Mr. Emil Ludwig, stirring writer, not sure how much of a historian he is, about a fellow named Berchtold, and it does not get me in the mood for grand movers of pawns on the global chessboard, if you see what I mean?

[The Magistrate]

8. I Understand, Sir

It is a 'game' which can go badly wrong.

That is an interesting old work you are reading. Period histories are very valuable, in my view, for the window they give into the minds of people at the time, even if they may not stand up to modern products of archival research imbued with the balance distance brings.

[bemildred]

9. Yes Sir, this is my second reading of it in translation.

An heirloom. I have found it very illuminating about persons and attitudes of that period, which one gets from literature too, and other sources, like family. My father fought in WWI in the Canadian Expeditionary Force, and he was a sort of window into how people thought back then too, for me anyway.

I am impressed with the translation too, flows very well. A good read.

[Tommy_Carcetti]

10. Again, painting Ukraine as "anti-Semetic neo-Nazis" right off the bat.

Trying to severely twist the narrative against the facts.

[The Magistrate]

11. Especially Since Raimondo, The Site's Proprietor, Is Of The 'Mossad Did It' School Of 9/11 'Truth'

His fall-back position having become over the years that they knew it was going happen but did not tell the U.S., though he was more forthright earlier....

[newthinking]

12. Project Censored highlighted this as one of the candidates for undercovered media stories of 2014

While it is downplayed (it looks bad for our supporting the Kyiv admin) it has been been written about in many media outlets and is extensively covered in many progressive sites.

[font size="3"]Project Censored[/font] has included stories that have been validated and are candidates for inclusion in the top under-reported stories of the year:
http://www.projectcensored.org/category/validated-independent-news/

The fact that Ukraine has a private battalion made up of outward Neo-Nazi's is quite the evidence in itself. How did that happen?

(People here are not stupid, they can put 2 + 2 together. You don't have battalions with Nazi wolfsangel symbols unless there is something seriously awry.)


Ukraine crisis: the neo-Nazi brigade fighting pro-Russian separatists - The Guardian UK -
http://www.democraticunderground.com/1016100360



Neo-Nazi's in executive positions in Ukraine's government (Since January):

Andriy Parubiy - National Security and Defence Council of Ukraine - Co-founder of Social-National Party of Ukraine together with Oleh Tyahnybok
Dmytro Yarosh, second-in-command of the National Defense and Security Council - Right Sector neo-Nazi commander
Oleksandr Sych is one of three Vice Prime Ministers member of neo-Nazi Svoboda
Oleg Makhnitsky Prosecutor-General (Attorney General) member of neo-Nazi Svoboda
Education Ministry Serhiy Kvit member of neo-Nazi Svoboda
Andriy Makhnyk Ecology Ministry, member of neo-Nazi Svoboda
Ihor Shvaiko Agriculture Ministry, member of neo-Nazi Svoboda
Tetyana Chernovol, chair of the government’s anti-corruption committee, UNA-UNSO (half of the organization founded Right Sector)
Dmytro Bulatov, Minster for Youth and Sports, UNA-UNSO

This does not include lower level but still powerful positions which are reported to have many right sector and svoboda members as well.

Ihor Tenyukh was Minister of Defense until he resigned for unknown reasons the day after Oleksandr Muzychko was killed - Svoboda


Foreign Policy: Yes there are "bad guys" in the Ukraine government
http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2014/03/18/yes_there_are_bad_guys_in_the_ukrainian_government

Today, Svoboda holds a larger chunk of its nation's ministries (nearly a quarter, including the prized defense portfolio) than any other far-right party on the continent. Ukraine's deputy prime minister represents Svoboda (the smaller, even more extreme "Right Sector" coalition fills the deputy National Security Council chair), as does the prosecutor general and the deputy chair of parliament -- where the party is the fourth-largest. And Svoboda's fresh faces are scarcely different from the old: one of its freshmen members of parliament is the founder of the "Joseph Goebbels Political Research Centre" and has hailed the Holocaust as a "bright period" in human history.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1014&pid=835803

Right Sector formed from Maidan when several neo-nazi groups collaborated there. It is obvious from the video below that Right Sector is also in Euromaidan PR. Since when would college students embrace them and present them as "OUR Right Sector"?

[font size="3"]EUROMaidan PR video of "Our Right Sector" - [/font]

[Tommy_Carcetti]

13. You keep on posting the same discredited article over and over again and expecting different results

Insanity defined.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/1016100667#post10
http://www.democraticunderground.com/1016100667#post12

The fact of the matter is, of that long list of names you keep posting, only three of those individuals (Sych, Makhnyk and Shvaiko) are currently involved in Ukraine's government. Right Sector and UNA-UNSO have no involvement in Ukraine's government whatsoever. And the Asov Battalion, as disturbing as they may sound, is a small, private paramilitary with no ties whatsoever to Ukraine's government.

[newthinking]

14. You keep posting the same innacurate info and saying it discredits.

People can do their own research and make their own conclusions.

[Tommy_Carcetti]

15. The Pee Wee Herman defense doesn't cut it here.

You gave us a long list of names of individuals who you claimed were both actively members of the Ukrainian government and also members of ultranationalist (and you argue neo-Nazi) organizations.

I did my research. And guess what? Your claims about all but three of those names are flat out wrong. Either they're not currently in the government, or not a member of an ultranationalist group, or both.

I guess you don't want to admit it, but if people do their own research as you tell them to, they'll find you to be peddling highly inaccurate information.