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I'm thinking Louis is smarter than this, and this is aimed more at Clay Caiborne's poorly thought-out perspectives on Ukraine: Apparently Clay is unaware of the multinational character of the present Ukrainian state, including Crimea as there is no principled reason to accept the Russian annexation. That only further reinforces its multinational character. It should be noted that, according to the Ishchenko NLR interview, the people of the Eastern oblasts including Karkiv are neither Ukrainian or Russian in any strict "national" sense, but are of a specifically "Soviet" creation, rather like California is a "federal" state, made of internal migrants from other parts of the USA, except for the Latino population. Hence Clay seems unaware that advancing a slogan for Ukrainian national self-determination - in abstraction from any context a perfectly principled position from a Marxist perspective - is in practice a call for the breakup of the *present Ukrainian state*. Since one suspects that is not what Clay intends, he is (also unintentionally it is presumed) practically calling for the subordination of the non-Ukrainian peoples to the real Ukrainian nation, which is centered in the Western half of the state, with even Kiev city possessing more of a multinational character than the West. Now if West Ukraine wants to break away and form a "pure" Ukraine nation-state, that's every bit their right as it was for the former Czechoslovakia or Yugoslavia. They even have the right to install a fully-fledged far right "Banderista" regime in power if they want, and it would serve the cowardly, pusillanimous and irresponsible EU right for having to deal with it. The practical result is that an abstract call for a 'defense of Ukrainian national self-determination' is really immediately a cover for support of the "ATO" military operation in the Donbass, and is substantially a call for the oppression of non-Ukrainian peoples by the Ukrainian nation. As things stand AT PRESENT, that is exactly what we face in the Donbass, the national oppression of the people there by the newly dominant Ukrainian nation, thanks to the results of the Maidan, primarily an expression of Ukrainian nationalism centered in the West, politically led by the broad Right, and egged on by the EU and especially the US. That could all be quickly reversed, of course, by an overt Russian intervention aimed at toppling the Kiev regime, but I judge that event highly unlikely. Nobody "wants" the Donbass, including Putin, who otherwise should have no compunction against dealing with the far right in Ukraine as he does elsewhere, including in Russia itself. But therefore alongside its character as a form of national oppression carried out by the US-backed Ukrainian nation we must add that this is also an inter-imperialist proxy war on the part of the US and Russia. As I said, alas we'll never learn from Marxmail, UM or Linux Beach why the US would be interested in a proxy war with Russia in Ukraine. Sheer stupidity, or the effects of a long-running robo-policy in the "hands off" Obama Administration is always a possible factor. The third and final aspect of the real situation that falls from sight of the Clay perspective is the political nature of the newly installed Kiev regime and the newly formed Ukraine "National Guard" that is presently walking point in the Donbass for the ATO. The regime is of course not a "fascist" or "neoNazi" regime; but neither was the Pinochet regime in Chile. I define one of the core attributes of "fascism" to be restricted to the politics of *imperialist* countries - it is a phenomenon of imperialist politics, recall that Franco began in Spanish Morocco, while neither Chile or Ukraine are imperialist countries. Fascist regimes appear in non-imperialist countries only when a hegemonic imperialist country itself is Fascist. Neither is Syria, btw, and the Assad regime is not "fascist". Let's not bandy around the "F" and "N" words in the manner of our pro-Russian imperialist opponents. But POLITICALLY AND ECONOMICALLY, the Kiev regime combines elements of the Pinochet regime in the 1970's at the top with elements of the US-backed regimes of Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras at the bottom in the 1980's, including the Nicaraguan Contras. At the top, the Kiev regime embodies the standard "neoliberal" counterrevolutionary program pioneered in the laboratory that was Pinochet's Chile; Ukraine is simply the latest application of the same. At the bottom, due to the political unreliability of the regular Ukraine military - a key difference with Pinochet's Wehrmacht-imspired military - the new regime, beginning from the first days for the transitional coup phase, moved with alacrity to form a paramilitary organization of Ukrainian nationalist volunteers (including no doubt some 'volunteer' convicts) called the "National Guard". Note that it does not have to be assumed that all volunteers are "neo-Nazis", though according to Ishchenko units such as the "Azov Brigade" specialize in recruiting from the right wing (!) of Pravy Secktor, if one could be further right than that. The speed of its formation indicates to me some pre-planning, and direct US involvement in organizing the "rollout", and nowadays National Guardsmen can be seen strutting around in full NATO/US uniform. The absurdly absolutist statements on the ATO being constantly barked out by the Kiev authorities, the continuing incidents of shelling across into the Russian side of the border, etc., are also evidence of US involvement. No one acts this foolishly unless they think "the world's superpower" has their back, wait until the fools find out otherwise. A quite detailed BBC report: http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-28209170 that mentions, "In fact Ukrainian National Guard volunteer units are playing a significant role. They are ideologically motivated, better paid than the army, and evidently making the armed forces more effective." and, "In 2003 the Americans were so daunted by the task of assaulting Baghdad that they studied how the Russians stormed Grozny - and that attack on the Chechen rebels was certainly no great success." (They likely applied this to the storming of Fallujah). The job of this National Guard is of course to act as a terror death squad against the civilian population, and possibly also to attempt to provoke a more overt Russian intervention, always possible. The two goals are closely intertwined. It has the added benefit for the Kiev authorities of siphoning off the neo-fascist troublemakers away from the centers of power, for the time being. That's quite a risky gamble. Poroshenko better hope that that is a very long time indeed, for if the they achieve "victory" too quickly, the Azov Brigade may want what would be due to them: a victory march through the Kiev Maidan with full military honors. Can't wait for the YouTube video of that! So if Clay wants to sleep in the political bed first made by Augusto Pinochet and Ronald Reagen, be my guest. I'd remind him of Leon Trotsky's approach to the 1911-12 Balkan Wars as a journalist. These certainly had aspects of Greek, Serbian and Bulgarian "national self-determination" in relation to what remained of the Ottoman Empire, but Trotsky did not hesitate to document the oppression launched by the forces of these "formerly oppressed nationalities" against others, Jews, Turks, Albanians, Roma and even against each other, knowing full well that the imperialist power that stood behind in support of Greece, Serbia and Bulgaria was that of his own "home" country, Russia. What's your "home" country, Clay? -Matt ________________________________________________ Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.csbs.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.csbs.utah.edu/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
