On February 24, 2022, Russia invaded the neighboring country of Ukraine. This was a war crime, and Russia’s continuing occupation of parts of Ukraine is a war crime. The U.S. and its allies in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) had been provoking Russia for over a decade at the time of the invasion.1 But after the Russian invasion, the U.S.-NATO greatly expanded and elevated the lethality of the massive amounts of military equipment they had already been sending to Ukraine—also a war crime. The fighting very quickly became a proxy war between rival imperialist powers—Russia on one side and the U.S.-NATO on the other.
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A Death Match
Last week Joe Biden and Vladimir Putin, Russia’s president, threw themselves into preparations to escalate, wage and win the next phase of warfare in Ukraine.2 They preened like WWE wrestlers pacing around the ring before a title bout. Biden put on shades and, with a heavy security entourage, strutted through the central square of Kyiv (Ukraine’s capital) as if to announce that a “new sheriff’s in town.” Putin rallied crowds chanting patriotic slogans in a football field in Moscow (Russia’s capital). Both denounced their opponent as the “bad guy,” declared themselves the “good guy,” and worked to build more support for their side in the fight.
But this was no clown act. This is deadly serious. Biden and Putin each head empires based on exploitation of billions of people, enforced by brutal oppression. They are the commanders-in-chief of enormous modern armies. They have the world’s largest arsenals of nuclear weapons under their control.
The war in Ukraine is an imperialist-created hellscape of destruction and human suffering. Tens and perhaps hundreds of thousands of people have died. Millions more are refugees. Countless more have been maimed, raped, and otherwise traumatized. Hospitals, schools, workplaces, and entire cities have been laid to waste. Now, both sides are actively preparing to inflict even greater and more widespread violence in the weeks and months ahead. And through it all, the possibility of nuclear war has grown.
The war in Ukraine is an imperialist-created hellscape of destruction and human suffering. Tens and perhaps hundreds of thousands of people have died. Apartment buildings in Dnipro destroyed by Russian rockets, January 2023. Photo: AP
“Every Inch of NATO”
On Tuesday, February 21, Biden and Volodymyr Zelensky, Ukraine’s president, met in Kyiv for several hours. After that, Biden went to Warsaw, the capital of Poland, a NATO country which borders both Ukraine and Russia, and met with Poland’s president. He ended his stay in Eastern Europe by meeting with leaders of “the Bucharest Nine”—countries on the eastern flank of NATO, several of which border Russia. The entire itinerary was meant to steel NATO for the next stage of the war against Russia. At the end of his trip, Biden told the Bucharest Nine (and the world) that “We (the U.S.) will defend every inch of NATO. Every inch of NATO.”
Jake Sullivan, Biden’s national security advisor, said that Biden and Zelensky “spent time talking about the coming months, in terms of the battlefield, and what Ukraine will need in terms of capabilities to be able to succeed on the battlefield.” In a speech at the end of their meeting, Biden said the U.S. has sent tens of billions of dollars’ worth of advanced military support to Ukraine, and announced it is sending an additional half billion dollars of artillery, ammunition for Javelin missiles and HIMARS rocket launchers, as well as anti-armor systems and air surveillance radars.
Biden claimed Russia is waging a “war of conquest” and told Zelensky that the U.S. is providing all this weaponry in the service of “freedom,” which he said is “priceless,” and “worth fighting for, for as long as it takes. And that’s how long we’re going to be with you, Mr. President: for as long as it takes.” He repeated the theme, that Putin is evil and the U.S. is leading the fight for “freedom,” at all his East European meetings. As the world heads into year two of the imperialist created bloodbath in Ukraine, people should ponder an article Bob Avakian wrote in April 2022 in which he said:
Today we hear Biden and other “legit gangsters” who rule this country, and their media mouthpieces, chanting a constant chorus about Putin as a “war criminal” because of the destruction and carnage Russia is responsible for in Ukraine. This is like the biggest mob boss (or head of a criminal cartel) self-righteously condemning the crimes of a rival, but less powerful, gangster.
Let us not forget: The U.S., a country founded on slavery and genocide, by far holds the record for invasions, coups, and in other ways violently interfering in countries whose governments it does not like—slaughtering huge numbers of people in the process, far beyond what Russia has done in Ukraine.
“Support the Troops”—Russian Style
Vladimir Putin was also busy as the anniversary of Russia’s invasion neared. Throughout the week, Putin claimed Russia’s war in Ukraine is against “western elites” out to crush Russia and dominate the world. He portrayed Russia as a victim. He orchestrated and whipped up support for the war in Ukraine from the Russian people.
On Tuesday, at about the same time Biden and Zelensky were in Kyiv, Putin was about 500 miles northeast, in Moscow, giving a major speech on the war. He told Russia’s parliament, “This is a time of radical, irreversible change in the entire world, of crucial historical events that will determine the future of our country and our people, a time when every one of us bears a colossal responsibility.” He said leaders of the U.S. and NATO “… make no secret of their goal, which is, I quote, ‘Russia’s strategic defeat.’… This means they plan to finish us once and for all. In other words, they plan to grow a local conflict into a global confrontation. This is how we understand it and we will respond accordingly, because this represents an existential threat to our country.” Take note—“respond accordingly” is a veiled threat to use nuclear weapons, a threat understood by Biden, Sullivan, and other architects of the U.S. side of this war.
Putin announced that Russia is strengthening its nuclear forces, developing hypersonic weapons, and suspending Russia’s involvement in the START treaty, the last remaining treaty intended to reduce the number of nuclear weapons held by Russia and the U.S. Biden called Putin’s decision to suspend START a “big mistake”—but neither Biden nor most of the U.S. media mentioned that the U.S. ended two other nuclear treaties this century, in 2002 and again in 2019.
On Wednesday, Putin made a brief appearance at a patriotic, war-mongering extravaganza called “Glory to the Defenders of the Fatherland.” Tens of thousands of people rallied in Moscow’s Luzhniki stadium in temperatures below 10 degrees. The event was broadcast across Russia. Putin told the crowd that Russia’s military in Ukraine is fighting “… heroically, courageously, bravely. We are proud of them. Today they are supported by the whole country. When we are together, we have no equal. To the unity of the Russian people!" The crowd waved Russian flags, sang patriotic songs, and chanted “Russia, Russia.”
It Is Imperialism That Must be Overthrown
Change the chants to “USA, USA,” and switch the Russian flags to the American stars and stripes, and the repulsive Moscow rally could have been a repulsive July 4th celebration anywhere in the U.S. This similarity is no coincidence. Both the U.S. and Russia are thoroughly reactionary imperialist powers, fighting to impose their will on the other. Both empires are based on ruthless exploitation of billions of people, and driven by the fundamental capitalist logic of expand or die. Both seek to advance the interests of their global empire at the expense of the other. Both countries whip up frenzied patriotism in service of empire.
And right now, both of these imperialist monstrosities are locked in a deadly struggle to see who will come out on top. Right now, to advance their imperialist interests, they are preparing to inflict even greater death and destruction in the weeks and months ahead, possibly all the way to using their enormous arsenal of nuclear weapons. They, and the capitalist-imperialist system they represent, must be overthrown.
As Bob Avakian said in his interviews on The RNL—Revolution, Nothing Less!—Show:
We can no longer afford to allow these imperialists to dominate the world and to determine the destiny of humanity. They need to be overthrown as quickly as possible.