[Podcast] Gaza, Ukraine and world relations: the truth behind the headlines This Thursday, comrades Jorge Martín and Hamid Alizadeh of the International Secretariat of the Revolutionary Communist International recorded a special podcast episode on Gaza, Ukraine and world relations. Instead of our regular format, this one addresses the burning questions of the day in a slightly different format.
Ukraine has lost: but the bloodshed continues The US has just announced another $8 billion tranche of deadly aid to prolong the war in Ukraine. Even though it has long been clear that Ukraine has lost, a section of the western imperialists are determined to fight to the last drop of Ukrainian blood. Meanwhile, Zelensky, for his own political reasons, like a gambler doubling down, has opened a new, bloody front in Kursk.
Lunacy in London, or Starmer’s Washington disaster “‘Curiouser and curiouser!’ Cried Alice (she was so much surprised, that for the moment she quite forgot how to speak good English).” (Lewis Carol, Alice in Wonderland)
Are we facing World War III? As I write these lines, the headlines of the newspapers are dominated by the shock announcement that Russia would be “at war” with the United States and its allies if they lift restrictions on Ukraine’s use of long-range western missiles for the purpose of deep strikes on Russian territory.
Who blew up Nord Stream? The mysterious sabotage of the Nord Stream pipelines has all the elements of a Hollywood crime drama: conspiracy, cover-up – and betrayal. A new series of revelations from the German police, published in the American press, purport to blow the case wide open. But when it comes to the Ukraine War, where lies have played an enormous role, we can accept nothing at face value.
Mr. Volodymyr Zelensky’s amazing Kursk adventure “It is a taleTold by an idiot, full of sound and fury,Signifying nothing.”Shakespeare, Macbeth, 5.5.16-27)
Ukraine: America is playing with fire “Can a man take fire to his bosom, And his clothes not be burned? Can one walk on hot coals, And his feet not be seared?”(Proverbs 6:27-29)
Ukraine: call for solidarity – repression of Marxist in Mykolaiv Oblast A local Marxist in the southern Ukrainian city of Pervomaisk, Bogdan Syrotiuk, was arrested by the SBU on 25 April. He is being held in a high security prison in Mykolaiv under poor conditions under charges of treason and aiding the Russian invasion. Some of our comrades have known Bogdan for a number of years, and it is clear that these are made up charges by Ukrainian state security against a known left activist in the area.
New report exposes 12 CIA bases in Ukraine: so much for national sovereignty! A recent New York Times article, “based on more than 200 interviews, current and former officials in Ukraine, the United States and Europe” has laid bare some aspects of US imperialism’s intervention in Ukraine. It details a collaboration between the CIA and Ukrainian intelligence services stretching back to the aftermath of the 2013-4 Euromaidan movement, and continuing up to the present war, including the construction of 12 “forward operating bases constructed along the Russian border.”
The fall of Avdiivka: the beginning of the end The announcement by the Russian Ministry of Defence that its forces had full control of the Ukrainian town of Avdiivka represents a devastating blow to Ukraine and almost certainly a decisive turning point in the war.
NATO staring defeat in the face in Ukraine As the year comes to a close, the complete failure of the much-hyped Ukrainian counter-offensive has opened a chorus of mutual recriminations within Ukraine and between Kyiv and its imperialist puppet masters. Funding for the proxy war against Russia is drying up in Washington, Brussels and Berlin, and so western imperialism is now pushing Zelensky into a course of action which he is resisting as it spells his political (and perhaps physical) death: peace talks with Putin.
Poland-Ukraine trade war: an end to the honeymoon The war has come to Poland! However, it has not arrived in the form that the media parrots and paid hacks have been threatening for years: i.e. of Putin’s tanks rolling up to the Vistula to restore the Russian Empire. Instead, the borders of Poland are being guarded against fleets of grain coming from Ukraine, which threaten something at least as precious to every capitalist as independence: the market.
West faces humiliation in Ukraine If the meeting of the Group of 20 (G20) major economies in India was intended as a show of unity against Russia, it succeeded in producing precisely the opposite result.
Britain: TUC Congress – solidarity with Ukraine, or support for NATO imperialism? A motion is up for discussion at this week’s TUC Congress, calling for ‘solidarity with Ukraine’. Instead of backing the Tories and their imperialist aims, the labour movement must fight for an internationalist, class-based position.
As Ukraine’s offensive stalls, are negotiations on the agenda? The failure of Ukraine’s counter-offensive has brought to the fore all the contradictions in the Ukrainian war effort. Disaffection is spreading in the army and among civilians, while at the same time Ukraine’s western allies are getting cold feet and starting to talk about negotiations.