This week Arnold Schwarzenegger, the former governor of California, published a “message to the Russian people.” Schwarzenegger pronounced that, “There are moments that are so wrong that we have to speak up” against the flattening of city blocks, the indiscriminate targeting of civilians, and a government that is lying to its own people.

For those like Schwarzenegger who have suddenly found the voice to speak out against war, we should ask where they stood when their own government on the pretext of fabricated lies about “weapons of mass destruction” invaded, leveled, and occupied the country of Iraq?¹

Oh, actually, we know: he celebrated it!

The Iraq war led directly and indirectly to the deaths of 1.2 to 1.4 million people, with more than 4.2 million Iraqis injured and at least 4.5 million driven from their homes. When Schwarzenegger was governor of California, he praised U.S. soldiers for helping “build and nurture Iraq's public institutions.”² When Schwarzenegger was governor of California he vetoed a bill that would have allowed Californians to vote on whether or not “the president should end the United States occupation of Iraq.”³

Like many in the media, Schwarzenegger talks big about supporting the Russian protesters who are standing against Putin’s invasion of Ukraine: “The world has seen your bravery… You are my new heroes.” Here we see an example of a convenient trend among U.S. politicians of supporting protesters “over there” when what they are doing is convenient for U.S. interests, and opposing protesters “over here,” when they act against U.S. imperial interests.

What is important about the Russian protesters isn’t simply that they are opposing the war in Ukraine but at the cost of great sacrifice, thousands of people are standing against the crimes being done in their name, opposing the moves of “their own” imperialists.

It is THIS that is needed here—and any support for Russian protesters from people here which does not at the same time put the principal focus on “our own” imperialists, is a betrayal of the best of what those protests represent. 

As Bob Avakian has written:

Of course, this act of imperialist aggression by Russia deserves to be condemned. But especially for people residing in this country—which, again, by far holds the record for such acts of aggression—it is a matter of basic principle and profound importance not to be echoing the positions and serving the aims of “our” imperialists, and instead to be making very clear our opposition to the aims and actions of these (U.S.) imperialists, who are using opposition to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, not as a way of promoting “peace,” or “the right of nations to self-determination,” but as means of furthering U.S. imperialist interests, in opposition to the rival Russian imperialists. So, in keeping with this crucial principle, any opposition to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, particularly by people in this imperialist country, should be accompanied by a clear and definite stand of also opposing the role of the U.S. in the world, including the wars it continually wages, and other ways it violently interferes in other countries.