PETER HITCHENS: Sending Ukraine our tanks could turn Europe into one big radioactive graveyard

DailyMail.com ^ | 1/21/2023 | Peter Hitchens

[Nextrush]

This was the moment at which we began the unstoppable descent into terrible danger which so many of us will bitterly regret in times to come.

I won't waste time here going over the question of who started the Ukraine war, or even why. Most people don't want to know and refuse to think about it, or look up the facts. They defame and abuse anyone who tries to tell them. So to hell with that. I'm bored with trying.

The Government claims to be in favour of free debate in universities, so all the stage army of "Right-wing" thinkers and scribblers whoop with admiration that we can now perhaps discuss the transgender issue. Well and good.

But the Government and its tame thinkers are not in favour of free debate on crucial national policy...

When the Defence Secretary announced that British tanks were going to Ukraine, not one MP raised any doubts or opposed the move. Not one. To read the record of the non-debate is like reading the proceedings of some Communist fake parliament...

What we have just decided to do is to prolong and deepen the war. Maybe Ukraine's new tanks will sweep all before them. Maybe they will bog down. Maybe they will try to take Crimea. Maybe they will soon be taking part in a Victory Parade on Red Square. I don't know. But if they cross into what Russia regards at its own territory, then do not be surprised by anything which happens...

But why is Britain in this affair? I know that a lot of voters in key states in America hate Russia because their forebearers came from lands Moscow had oppressed. I know that some neo-conservative fanatics in Washington have long desired to dismantle Russia and ensure that is never an important...

[tlozo]

“Are there any “MEN” in Europe that WILL fight or are they all pussies and cry babies!!!? Some of us believe the latter.

Ukrainian men are fighting and dying in defense of their European country.

[ansel12]

The left has always used that attack against America, that we are an empire, we aren’t of course, but leftists keep pushing that theme.

[wildcard_redneck]

750 military bases around the world and we are not an empire. Right.....

[wildcard_redneck]

Let them fight on their own dime and not on the American taxpayers’ backs.

[ansel12]

“”Ukrainian men are fighting and dying in defense of their European country.””

Doing it so well that the world is in awe of their warrior spirit and battlefield success against the world’s 2nd most powerful nation known for their brute force and battlefield mass tactics.

[Southside_Chicago_Republican]

Bookmark

[ansel12]

Renting space for that nation’s security is not an empire, do you really think that having a few advisors helping a country means we own it and take its resources and enslave its people?

Empire is more like what Russia does, conquer to own and enslave into an empire, which Russia rules with rulers for life.

Look at the nations that just escaped the Russian empire and what life for them was like, and why they sought to join NATO.

[tlozo]

Let them fight on their own dime and not on the American taxpayers’ backs.

Yes, and the US could have said that in WW2, though appeasement tends to lead to greater conflicts.

[JGPhila]

It seems the visceral hatred of all things Russia by the Democrats is an extension of the “Russia Russia” hysteria that dogged President Trump’s time in office. Since the Democrats sought to convince the rest of us that Russia was an evil presence that tried to subvert our democracy, they had no choice but to take the side of Ukraine. To have done otherwise, such as to suggest that Ukraine bore some blame for violating the understanding with Russia that it would not be a threat on its border, would have given further lie to the fabrication used in an effort to destroy President Trump. As the saying goes, “in for a penny, in for a pound.”

[caww]

He said.....”I know what tanks are for, and it is not defence..... if they cross into what Russia regards as its own territory, then do not be surprised by anything which happens.”

He further states.....”Two countries are in a furious grapple because their deep, hard and unalterable interests conflict.........The sane and decent policy for any outside power is to help push them into a lasting compromise, as the world did to France and Germany after 1945..... Instead, we send tanks. It is as if the fire brigade went about starting fires.”

[caww]

Professor of International Relations, John Mearsheimer, in 2015:

" The West is leading Ukraine down the primrose path and the end result is that Ukraine is going to get wrecked. "

Fifty American foreign policy leaders wrote to President Bill Clinton in 1997 that pushing NATO’s borders eastward would be “a policy error of historic proportions. ..... that NATO expansion will decrease allied security and unsettle European stability … In Russia, NATO expansion, which continued to be opposed across the entire political spectrum, would strengthen undercut those who favor reform and cooperation with the West, bring the Russians to question the entire post-Cold War settlement, and galvanize resistance in the Duma …” (and here we are today)

[caww]

in Mearsheimer’s 2014 article, he wrote

“it is the Russians, not the West, who ultimately get to decide what counts as a threat to them.” .......But of course the same thing could have been written about the U.S. before the invasion of Iraq. ...the only question about that war was whether it was wise or foolish for U.S. power, not whether it was right or wrong.

[caww]

[ansel12]

So, no link.

If Zelensky said that then you should be able to show me where, I searched and couldn’t find it, it wasn’t in his July 20 speech, and I didn’t see it elsewhere.

[tlozo]

[caww]

There is no need for us to get involved in what is a unresolved Cold War drama between the USA and Russia. It is nothing to do with us what goes on in Russia or Ukraine. Let Europe handle...

Does Europe think since the shale gas worth $10Billion in Donestk/ Donbass deal was signed in 2013 between Royal Dutch Shell and Kiev that they’re going to somhow get that land back under Ukrains Gov?

[EQAndyBuzz]

“ Supposedly our admin is supporting Ukraine, yet we do nothing about Iran shipping weapons to Russia?”

Probably because it isn’t the US that is being attacked. Ukraine should be stopping those Iranian shipments. Not our job.

[caww]

In 2022, the US spent $113 billion on the war in Ukraine. This is more than what major military powers like India and Russia spend on their military each year!

[Redmen4ever]

paranoia: Ukraine independence is poking Russia with a stick

When Reagan was around, the Soviet Union + its vassal states were pretty strong. Maybe stronger than NATO. I was in the army back then, and we trained how to fight while giving ground. We hoped to stop the communists prior to the Pyreness.

Things have really changed since then.

Russia = Soviet empire LESS its vassal states of eastern Europe LESS the Baltic states, Ukraine, Armenia, Azerbaijan and the Central Asian states. Russia is less than half the size of the Soviet empire. And, the west has picked up a lot of what Russia lost.

Russia is no longer a peer or even a near peer, but a regional power with nuclear weapons. The fact that Russia has nuclear weapons isn’t nothing. But, to allow Russia to invade foreign countries because it has nuclear weapons (a) won’t satisfy Russia and (b) will encourage every authoritarian ruler in the world to go nuclear. With nuclear proliferation, nuclear war will become inevitable.

It’s one thing for Putinbots to promote Russian aggression. That’s what they’re paid to do. But, I ask my fellow Americans, especially my fellow veterans, to think about this: If you were in the army during the Cold War and served in Europe, as I did (and also Elvis, so we were in good company), consider the tactics you were trained: An active defense. Fight, withdraw, and then fight again. You know we weren’t planning on attacking. You know the Russians are either paranoid or just lying all the time.

Look at the map. How much of Germany or of Japan did we take after WWII? None. In fact, we worked with those countries to rehabilitate them, and to turn them into prosperous, democratic countries.

Now, look at the map again. How much of Germany or of Japan did the Russians take? They took half of Poland and let Poland take a big chunk of eastern Germany in compensation; and, the Russian took half of East Prussia. The Russians also took the Sakhalin Islands from Japan. With regard to the countries of eastern Europe, the Russians turned them into communists countries, using force as necessary to suppress the local population.

Now, look at the map a third time. What happened in South Viet Nam, Iraq and Afghanistan? We did not take over any of them, but tried to set up democratic countries that could defend themselves. I’m sorry, but those people weren’t able - even with our help - of defending themselves. And, this is the way of the world since forever: those who will not defend themselves will become the slaves of others. My point is that we, the U.S., did not annex those places.

Now, look at the map a fourth time. How many places has Russia invaded recently? Syria, Armenia, Azerbaijan (via Armenia) and Ukraine. Thanks to the dictator of Belarus, we also saw a map showing that it intended to conquer all of Ukraine and also Moldova, except its invasion of Ukraine was thwarted.

You might wish, like the yellow-belly Peter Hitchens that all this would go away. That the kind of evil people that have ruled the world forever are no longer around. But that isn’t just wishful thinking. It’s dangerous. Douglas McArthur once put it this way, “wars are caused by undefended wealth.” He also said, “only a soldier knows the horror of war, and only the dead know its end.” That is why the only realistic alternative to war and slavery is “peace through strength.”

[Hiddigeigei]

"Western Europe is committing economic suicide to what end?"
To what end? Perhaps the "Great Reset" of a depopulated world controlled by a global dictatorship. Ask Schwab.