Max is a Co-Editor, with Linda Burnham and María Poblet, of Power Concedes Nothing: How Grassroots Organizing Wins Elections and is on the Editorial Board of Convergence. Max Elbaum has been active in peace, anti-racist and radical movements since joining SDS in Madison, Wisconsin in the 1960s. The third edition of his book, Revolution in the Air: Sixties Radicals Turn to Lenin, Mao and Che, was released by Verso in 2018. 

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By Carl Davidson

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We are horrified by the recent escalation of the Ukrainian Civil War. We stand with the countries from all over the world that reaffirmed their support for the Minsk Protocol at the February 21 emergency UN Security Council meeting in New York, recognizing it as the legitimate framework for diplomacy and peace in Ukraine. Notably, those countries included both Russia and Ukraine, and we call on both of them to live up to their words.

Unilateral diplomatic and military actions like those recently taken by Russia cannot be the solution to this crisis, and risk further and even more dangerous escalation. We must also recognize the dangerous escalation of attacks inside the de facto borders of the Donetsk (DPR) and Luhansk (LPR) People’s Republic that Russia was reacting to. For the four days ending on February 20, OSCE (Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe) ceasefire monitors in Ukraine documented a dangerous increase in ceasefire violations in Eastern Ukraine, with 5,667 violations, including 4,093 explosions. The OSCE’s maps clearly show that most of the explosions were inside the Donetsk (DPR) and Luhansk (LPR) People’s Republics, consistent with incoming shell-fire from Ukraine government forces. 

With nearly 700 OSCE ceasefire monitors on the ground, it is not credible that these attacks and explosions were staged by DPR and LPR forces as “provocations” or “false-flag” incidents, as U.S. and British officials have claimed. The escalation is real, and further escalation endangers 4 million Russian citizens of Ukraine in the DPR and LPR.

This is only one of a series of errors by U.S. leaders that have built up over time to contribute to today’s crisis: broken commitments not to expand NATO into Eastern Europe; confirmation in 2008 that Ukraine would sooner or later join NATO; the significant but still largely secret U.S. role in the 2014 coup; and U.S. failure to support the Minsk Protocol, despite having no alternative plan beyond weapons shipments, sanctions and brinkmanship.

We call on the Biden administration and Members of Congress to fully support the Minsk Protocol, the real path to peace in Ukraine. Now is the time for President Biden to show his leadership, not by escalating the crisis and imposing sanctions that will hurt ordinary Russians and affect the global economy, but by intense negotiations that can bring us back from the brink of a potentially calamitous nuclear war. On the larger breakdown in U.S.-Russian relations, we call for a re-examination of NATO, which has long outlived any good purpose, and holding serious disarmament talks with Russia.

Spokespersons from the United States government and the US corporate media particularly have produced and disseminated stories about aspects of the Ukraine war that together constitute a series of interconnected delusions about the context and causes of the war in Ukraine; the US/NATO response; the deleterious impacts of the war on the Russian invaders; and, most importantly, the immediate and long-term impacts of the war on international affairs. A delusion is "an idiosyncratic belief or impression that is firmly maintained despite being contradicted by what is generally accepted as reality or rational argument."

Delusion number one  is that the United States can reproduce the coalition of hegemonic forces that existed after World War 2. It is clear that the US Cold War international system cannot be replicated. After World War 2, the United States, the overwhelmingly hegemonic economic and military power,  institutionalized a world order based upon economics (the Bretton Woods system, the Marshall Plan, the subsequent development of the European Economic Community and the European Union),  military dominance (from the construction of the NATO alliance to a worldwide network of alliances, bilateral treaties, and military bases), and an ideology (the “free world versus communism” or in our own day “democracy” versus “authoritarianism”). While this hegemonic goal - economics, military and ideological - was never fully achieved it has been whittled away by multiple poles of economic power (particularly the rise of the Chinese economy), a declining ability of the United States to control the world militarily (as evidenced historically by military defeats from Korea, Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq, and even in the Western hemisphere), and growing global skepticism about what the United States means by “democracy.”

Delusion number two  suggests that the United States can remain the global hegemon. Here again any number of writers, and more importantly key leaders from countries in Europe, Asia, and throughout the Global South see the United States as a declining power economically, militarily, and politically. As the Ukraine crisis has unfolded many voices from the Global South have evidenced indifference to what appears to be a “white people’s war” that is being  used  to increase demands for fundamental changes in global economics and politics. Many around the world see the conflicts in Eastern Europe as a manifestation of the breakdown of North American and European power and control of what goes on in their countries. The most significant takeaway from the United Nations General Assembly resolution condemning the Russian intervention in Ukraine is the fact that 35 countries abstained in the vote; not only African and Asian countries but several from the Western Hemisphere. The population of those countries constituted about one-third of the population of the world. Not too long ago a loose coalition of big powers, the BRICS, began dialoguing about making modest demands for changes in power dynamics in global institutions and practice. Witnessing greater underdevelopment in developing countries instead of the promise of development, BRICS began charting a course not entirely dependent on the World Bank, IMF, and World Trade Organizations. While the BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa) talks have stalled, it is expected (particularly after upcoming elections in Brazil) they will resume. Some modest redistribution of decisioning power in major international institutions is in the air.

Delusion number three is that the United States can intimidate China. Since the 1980s, China has steered an economic course that involves encouraging foreign investment, utilizing technologies derived from these investments, and adopting an economic development model incorporating advanced capitalism and appropriate state controls. Not only is China about to surpass the United States in its gross domestic product but in its progress it has lifted 700 million Chinese out of poverty. And in terms of China’s global presence, it is establishing more attractive economic relations with nations all across the globe. Through its Belt and Road Initiative for example, China has already become the largest trading partner with the countries of Latin America. In this context, media reports of US threats if China maintains economic ties with Russia are matters of bluster and of little consequence.

Delusion number four is that the countries of the global south support the United States. Given the declining relative power of the United States on the global stage, the rising economic influence of China on the world stage, and the history of United States interference, (from sanctions to soldiers) in the affairs of other countries and peoples, nations of the Global South see the United States as the latest, perhaps last, imperial power. As V J Prashad pointed out, “all war is criminal” - both ‘hot’ and ‘cold’ wars. Therefore, economic exploitation and political interference in the  Global South is increasingly viewed with disdain and discomfort. Again, this disdain is suggested by the number of countries that refused to condemn the Russian invasion of Ukraine in the recent General Assembly vote. Yet despite such clear signs the US media continues to praise US sanctions against Cuba, Venezuela, Nicaragua, Syria, Afghanistan, Iran, and now Russia, without discussing the horrific impacts these sanctions have on ordinary people in these countries. Nor does the media report that the United States and the European Union currently have some kind of sanctions imposed on 39 nations. Sanctions alone make it very unlikely that victimized people from the Global South regard the United States with respect and admiration.*And alternative forms of payment and paths for international trade will be the logical outcome of weaponizing trade and the banking system.

Delusion number five is that the United States remains the ‘indispensable nation,” the “last resort,” the model of democracy and market economies for the world. For the reasons suggested above and the demonstrable racism, violence, environmental disasters more frequently associated with the United States itself (while admired for certain achievements such as in education and science) most global citizens regard the US as a failed state, surely one not to emulate. More recently the overbearing, unfair, and restrictive moves against Chinese competitive strength in the form of banning Huawei’s 5G technology and Tiktok compromises the notion of free-market fairness and a just global economic world order. The “American Dream” begins to morph into a hollow specter in the global context. Together they mark an unmistakable decline.

Delusion number six is that the United States cannot learn from others: Cuba, China, peoples on the Africa continent and elsewhere. It has historically been central to the consciousness of the hegemonic actors in the world, the imperial powers, that they are and can be the exemplars and teachers; and, the countries that have been conquered and/or been impoverished have nothing to teach the powerful and only have to follow. Meanwhile examples of alternative healthcare delivery systems, adaptations to the natural environment, or forms of workplace democracy in less powerful nations are ignored.

And delusion number seven suggests that global hegemony can be maintained or achieved without major (indeed nuclear) war and/or climate disaster. This is the most dangerous delusion because it suggests that the powerful countries can proceed with their drive to dominate without increasing the risk of nuclear war or speeding up the destruction of nature.

*Countries facing economic sanctions include: 1. Afghanistan, 2. Belarus, 3. Bosnia and Herzegovina, 4. Burundi, 5. Central African Republic, 6. China (PR), 7. Comoros 8. Crimea Region of Ukraine> 9. Cuba, 10. Cyprus, 11. Democratic Republic of the Congo, 12. Guinea, 13. Guinea Bissau, 14. Haiti, 15. Iran, 16. Iraq, 17. Kyrgyzstan, 18. Laos, 19. Lebanon, 20. Libya, 21. Mali 22. Mauritania 23. Moldova 24. Montenegro 25. Myanmar, 26. Nicaragua, 27. North Korea - DPRK, 28. Palestinian Territories, 29. Russia, 30. Rwanda, 31. Serbia 32. Somalia, 33. South Sudan, 34. Sudan, 35. Syria, 36. Tunisia 37. Venezuela, 38. Yemen, 39. Zimbabwe. https://sanctionskill.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/39SanctionedCountries3.pdf

Harry Targ is a long-time peace activist, writer, and teacher of courses on United States foreign policy. Stephen David is also a long-time peace activist, cultural critic, and participant in the struggles against apartheid in South Africa.

Carl Davidson & Bill Fletcher Jr.

reprinted from Truthout

“Modern Ukraine was entirely created by Russia, more precisely, Bolshevik, communist Russia. This process began immediately after the revolution of 1917,” Putin said in a televised address in February. “As a result of Bolshevik policy, Soviet Ukraine arose, which even today can with good reason be called ‘Vladimir Ilyich Lenin’s Ukraine.’ He is its author and architect. This is fully confirmed by archive documents…. And now grateful descendants have demolished monuments to Lenin in Ukraine. This is what they call decommunization. Do you want decommunization? Well, that suits us just fine. But it is unnecessary, as they say, to stop halfway. We are ready to show you what real decommunization means for Ukraine.”

The Nicaraguan Inauguration and Beyond (February)

Honoring Anne and Carl Braden and their stand against white supremacy. January 2022

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Standing Up: Tales of Struggle

reprinted from The New York Labor History Association (NYLHA)

Reviewed by Jane LaTour, a former Executive Board member at the New York Labor History Association, Jane worked on factory assembly lines for seven years and took part in many campaigns in the workplace. Her first job in the labor movement was as a union organizer for District 65. She twice served as the director of the Women’s Project for the Association for Union Democracy (AUD). Her book, Sisters in the Brotherhoods: Women in New York City Organizing for Equality was published in 2008.  

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