A Dispatch from Ukraine

used to thinking. As I say this. Russian troops have just moved in to two regions in eastern Ukraine that have been occupied by what are generally called Russian backed separatists since two thousand and fourteen. Vladimir Putin gave a speech that I will be we'll be talking about a bit with our guest um and announced his intention to

recognize those breakaway sections of the country as independent republics. UH. And the area that he has chosen to recognized includes about s territory that is currently occupied and held by the Ukrainian government. So it's a big mess. Uh. This is some have said like a soft version of the invasion that people were expecting. I think it's probably more

accurate to say it's a slow start, um. Compared to what is potentially possible and very likely coming in the future to talk more about this and about being an anarchist kind of trapped in between you know, NATO and Russia and everything that's flinging around right now. Is Ukrainian journalist Romeo Kokratski, Romeo, welcome to the show. Thanks a lot, Thanks for having me, been a big fan of yours. So it's an honor to be here. And you are in your in Kiev right now, right? Yeah? Correct? And

and how is everybody keeps asking this all around? But how is the mood? Um? As you know, to the extent that there's a way of saying that, like I've i've you know, have things kind of take gonna turn since Putin actually made his first big play. I mean, as much as journalists like to say, there is no magic mutometer to check to instantly bull every resident in the city to find out walk around and talk to everybody, just like all the four million or whatever citizens of

the city. Let me just let me just ask him. Um. But like there definitely has been a turning point. Um. Like one of the big refrains that I've seen, like personally and everyone has been saying, right, is that Ukrainians are so calm. Look at these pictures of them, like shopping in malls and like going to school? What else are you supposed to do? What else are we supposed to do? But I mean that this true. People have been calmed. But since yesterday evening there definitely has been

a shift. Um. And even casual conversation uh in key of like I was sitting to paraphrase a famous columnists usual framing, I was sitting in a cafe and overhearing the wait staff chat amongst themselves. Um, and obviously the the the whole conversation is oh is Putin going to push into Kiev? And anecdotally we're semi anecdotally, I guess um, apartment prices in the western cities like in Leviv and nus Worod have really spiked up, like incredibly, um, so

that people are I wouldn't call that. That's a depressing way to pay attention to, that a reason to pay attention to that, Like, I wouldn't call it a mass panic. Um. They're no like bank runs, No, like all the stores are stocked. No, one's like hoarding. Um. But at the same time, there is a study trickle of people going west and kind of making plans at this point. Yeah, and UM, so this to kind of give people a little bit more context before we get into some of

the more citical dimensions of this. UM. Right now, there has not been a massive escalation um of violence outside of the areas where there have been fighting for several years. You know, there has been an escalation on the front line that's existed since UM, but there has not been like, you know, troops pouring across the border in other areas

and stuff. And that's obviously probably the number one worry. UM. It looks like what's about to happen is or at least it's hard to say, because Putin has recognized the borders of this breakaway part of Ukraine as significantly larger than the area they actually control, and he has moved troops, Russian active duty troops into that area. Now, Russian troops, I'm from what I've heard about three thousand have been in the breakaway areas for years now, UM, but a

significant yeah, a significant number have been added now. And obviously the fear is that because he has recognize the territory of these these quote unquote in his terms, breakaway republics is being much larger than what they control, that Russian troops are going to participate with the separatists, um in attacking and taking those territories from the Ukrainian government. Um,

that's one concern, obviously. The the concern attached to that is that it would be not at all inconceivable for a conflict that started that way to spread to a much wider part of Ukraine. Um. This is all coming alongside a speech Putin gave that, unfortunately, is going to be one of those things people here about in history books. Um. Yeah, out of its god damn mind. And it's one of

those things. We will talk some more about how the Western left sometimes I don't want to be like because this is also largely the the online left, but how the online left talks about Putin sometimes. This was not a I want to return to the Soviet Union at speech. This was I want to return to Czarist Russia's borders type speech. Like the guy has the Czarist imperial crest emblazoned on the gates to his palace. So I'm really

not sure what people would have expected. And unfortunately he's better at his job than any of the last Tsars were because he's he's achieved a notable amount of success towards that goal already. Um, and yeah, he he a number of things that were It's one of those, Like one of the things he said, which is a line that folks like him in Russia have been saying for a while, is that Ukraine, the existence of Ukraine as

an independent polity is a mistake. And as an anarchist, you know, there's this like, well, yeah, I don't I don't like the Ukrainian state. I don't like any state in particular. But if you're if your only disagreement is with the statehood of Ukraine and you're fine with the statehood of Russia, you know, then then perhaps what you actually think is that people in Ukraine should not have any autonomy to disagree with the government and moss scal um,

and I think that's the case here. Um. There's a there's similarities between how Putin and those like him in Russia treat Ukrainians, um with how, for example, the Turks treat Kurds in the southern part of the country. There's this this thing you'll hear a lot from Turkey, where like there's no Kurds in Turkey. They're they're mountain Turks

who have lost their their language. And there's this denial from Putin and the Russians that Ukrainians are a people, that they exist, and there this this is something that

has translated. Most people have heard versions of this, and just any of the coverage you've heard of Ukraine, if you've ever heard of it referred to as the Ukraine, what that is is part of a very old um line that kind of exists to allow Russians to deny the existence of Ukrainians as a people and make it make it seem more like it's just kind of a geographic region, which is not the case. And why you wouldn't refer to you wouldn't call it the Ukraine anymore

than you would call it the Canada. Um. It just isn't the way you you say, should say that. But um yeah, So I think that's at least enough of a background to get into the real media what we want to talk about. So and I'm just gonna kind of open this up to you to chat about what you'd like to say and what you think needs to be gotten across to the international left, because internationalism is something we value a lot here and it has been

hard to find in this conflict. Yeah, Like growing up in New York in the nineties, one of the core values I kind of absorbed, I guess through cosmosis is the value that every single person I met, regardless of whatever corner of the world they came from, is the exact scene beings me UM. And it wasn't. And and that kind of realization was one of the things that I guess, I wouldn't say pushed, but UM conspired to to turn me into a leftist, a socialist, Marxist UM.

And part of that, especially when I was learning about what the hell all these isms were UM, was internationalism, the idea that well, our struggle isn't within the the fabricated borders of whatever UM polity has has decided to impose their their authority UM. But internationally, every single workers the same as every other worker. We're all struggling with the same issues, We're all fighting the same forces UM,

and generally speaking, we have the same enemies. A. Now fast forward to h I go online and what do I see? Well, ukraineans are all Nazis or Ukraine shouldn't exist, or how can we support either of those. It's two fascist states fighting each other. And I'm sorry, Ukraine has got a population of forty four million. You want to tell mean that every single one of those forty four million or Nazis. Like, people didn't even say that about Germany.

They were literally the Nazi state. I mean the United States, um for that man, Like, we had four years of Trump, an openly fascist, authoritarian leader, and no one seems to say, well, I guess the US should be bombed. Well, I guess there are some. I mean, there's definitely there's definitely people who say that, but yeah, but generally speaking, that's not exactly the view that people take, right. Um, So it's

it's been a long process of disappointment. Well, I say, long, Um, there's always been the kind of well what are these people really think about Ukraine? But breaft of such a strong impetus to take a side, I guess, um that

hasn't been in the forefront. And now every day I see people that I would have considered comrades, that I would have considered um friends and brothers, just kind of turned their back on me because I live here, right, Any any aggression, any action that's taken will literally affect

me physically sitting here and you UM. So it's been it's been really really immensely disheartening to see that every single value UM that I thought the Left was supposed to value, that that I thought the left was built on um bet by people with throws emojis or hammer and sickles in their user names or whatever the hell it is. And we should probably talk about some of why this is and what the what the history is here.

So the most kind of direct thing that people can point to when they when they call Ukraine a fascist state or when they talk about this is the existence of the ass Off Battalion, the as Off Battalion as

a paramilitary organization. That means it's it's not officially a part of the gun a mental military structure, but it it does receive, has received arms from the government and it UH functions as part of Ukraine's defense forces UM for the for the purposes of of fighting off the Russian back separatists UM and the as Off, Italian and Nazis.

There's there's you know, the you can there's been a tremendous amount of reporting on that on that matter, it's a big problem in the Ukrainian government deserves a significant amount of criticism for the degree to which as off

has been allowed to continue existing. UM. But there's also a lot that gets left out when people focus on that, including the fact that, for example, the political wing of as off right sector, which is kind of the that it would be fair to call it the umbrella term for like the far right parties in the Ukraini Ukrainian government have been pretty effectively siloed away from political power through very active measures to about like what is one

percent of um like representation, and so it didn't actually pass the threshold tantor the new parliament. Yeah, they're they're nonentity politically, they're just non popular there. UM campaigns failed, their models failed, their agitation fails. Ukrainians do not want to vote for Nazis. Yeah, and it's it is. It

is a an ugly situation. And I remember talking with when I was reporting on the might On uprisings, which is when, again for people who aren't up on recent Ukrainian history, they had a president who tried to do a dictatorship UM, and people rose up and fought him in the streets. UM. It was a very gnarly time,

about two hundred people were shot by government forces. Um. And eventually the president was forced to flee the country, which is what precipitated everything that's happening now, because that president was pretty closely tied with Putin and the people fighting him. UM. We're not all they were not pro NATO rebels, but they were more definitely more supportive of closer ties with Western Europe than they were with Russia. UM. And that again, those are kind of the precipitating events

for everything that happened that's happening now. Um. And some of the people who were fighting the president's forces were fascists. Um. And it's one of those things. I remember talking with protesters at the time who were like, well, am I supposed to get in fight with them at the same time as I'm trying not to get shot by riot police, Like what what do you expect me to do? And

it is a nasty situation, and it's one of those things. UM. I don't know, like I don't know what to tell people about that because it's it's it's ugly, and it's uncomfortable and it's messy. And that's also Ukrainian history. There's a lot of ugly, uncomfortable, messy things here is there's with every country's history. It doesn't mean people in Kiev deserve to have their housing blocks pounded by Russian artillery. Doesn't mean that people in Nevdivka deserve to have their

homes pounded by artillery. Um. And whatever criticisms you want to make about how the Russian or had the Ukrainian government has handled as Off, and there are many criticisms to make, that's not really relevant to the people living in these areas having their homes destroyed on a daily basis by mortar fire. I just want to make like a couple of things really clear. The as Off Battallion

is like a thousand guys like Max. And the reason, one of the reasons at least that they rose to such prominence in the beginning wasn't only there um ability to to mobilize in the early stages of the Russian war against Ukraine. It was also because they had very strong financial backing um from the former Interior minister m Arsenivakov and Ivankov is no longer in power, uh. And one of the things you can see immediately was the like almost Noah eying of fascist street marshes and fascist

demonstrations UM in Kiav outside the president's office. That all vanished because more like in Ukraine, ideology is not very strong. And this is something UM that I've noticed a lot of people, uh from the US in your have trouble understanding about Ukrainian politics. People here are not really ideological. Our parties don't map UM. Aside from a couple of outliers like rights actor UM, it doesn't really map to

any left right access UM. People typically will always want the same policies, like they always want a pension, they always want UM universal health care to be better, they always want the roads fixed. UM generally policy something most Ukrainians actually agree on UM. As a result, most of our elections are purely personality based. That's one of the reasons Zelenski Voladaimur's Lenski, our current president, one was because

he was a well known comedian. Yeah, and people liked his personality, and he put out a whole TV show as a PR stunt before launching his campaign, and people voted for that personality these on screen h and so when there was far right activity, and again I wonder stress that that activity, even the street activity, has almost disappear. It's because the far right is typically used in Ukraine as a political tool by one oligarc were one interest

group against another. That's why when the money disappeared, they disappeared. Because the leaderships, the leadership of these batist groups typically speaking, we're not um that ideological themselves. But they did like having usuvs, and they did like buying guns and um, hiring hookers and doing drugs. Like they liked the money and that's why they did it. And they would convince a bunch of teenagers to go out and wave a couple of torture is in march or chance. But these

guys were really purely for the money. Um. And again you can tell that because when their financial backward disappeared, then in order to be found. Yeah, and it's one of those one of the things that is very frustrating to me. I can't remember one of the earliest projects that I did that was like a four belling cat. As we were there was a Pride march in Kiev

that got attacked by Nazis. This was a couple of years back, and we were kind of trying to identify the individual fascists who are like beating people in the street, and it's spending hours pouring over that footage. It makes it incredibly frustrating that there are people outside of the country boiling it down to while all of those people are fascists, all of those people are part of a fascist state. It's like, no, a lot of those people, quite a few Ukrainians have fought Nazis in the streets,

you know. Um, that's a reality of the situation. And it's it's um and it it's it's ugly in heart because if you actually want to look at what's been happening, uh with the Russian back separatists, there's a lot of fascists over there. Um, there's a lot of paramilitary organizations and like far right groups that have been used by the Russian government. Yeah yeah, literally literally named because they're

fascist leader yeah Liken like many Nazis. It's it's it's hard to to understand, honestly from my perspective, um, because not only is Russian fascism have far more influence on Russian policy than any Ukrainian fascists has ever had Ukrainian policy. Um, it's also that the Russian project and the narrative they use. Um, there there's this joke they call are not really joke,

a slurred they call they call Ukrainians Nazis. Been derrists um for those who don't open Darrow was a Ukrainian national leader of partisan fought against the Soviets UH and he his organization was implicated in quite a few war crimes,

significant number of war crimes, war crimes. UH. So clearly been near himself, probably not a great guy, yeah, but to delegitimize all Ukrainian kind of independence movements that I've propped up over the years, the Soviet government and now the Russian government has always always insisted that there is no legitimate way for Ukraine to be independent where all Natzi been Darists no matter what. And that's why you

had Um. There's a picture a couple of days ago of a solidarity marshan Kiev um with UH some of Kiev's LGBT community holding up Bandaris flags. Not because they're gay Nazis, because it's a way of yeah, retaking this

slur back from the Russians. And it's all part of the complicating factor here is that because of how geo politics worked out, in that period of time, there are very uncomfortable but kind of inextricable ties between uh Ukrainian the basic idea of Ukraine being a nation independent from Russia and anti communism, And because of what was going on in anti communism in that period of time we're talking the thirties and forties, it means that a decent

number of those early Ukrainian nationalists were either directly implicated with the Nazis like Bandera, or at least had uncomfortable ties. And that's a messy part of history that shouldn't be shied away from. But for example, the same thing is

true of Finland. Like you can say the exact same thing about sucking Finnish nationalism, Finnish sovereignty and whatnot, um, And people don't call Finland a Nazi nation um even though Yeah, the fact that they were stuck between the U s SR and Nazi Germany means that there were a lot of Fins in that period of time who

made some real fucked up choices um like. But also there's a lot that has to be like, you can't adequately discuss why those choices were made if you don't talk about, for example, the holodomor you know, which was the starvation genocide of several million Ukrainians by the Soviet government. Like and honestly, to go back even further, um and to I don't know, burnished my left its promountion a little bit if you go back to the civil war itself, where UM a lot of this started. Most of the

nationalist groups, I would say nearly all of them. There were one or two monarchists minor monarchist groups in Ukraine. The grand majority of them were in fact socialism or socialist. They had like the hammer and sickle and wheats on their currency and everything, because at the time that was

what one votes uh from the basm tree. But when the Bolsheviks crushed every independent Ukrainian social movement in exchange for bureaucrats that they imported from the Empire and just shoved into Ukrainian cities, well then you had Ukrainians that wanted to be independent and wanted to have a better life than under the Tsar. Well now suddenly they don't

even have that support, um from the Bolsheviks. Uh. And obviously as a Ukrainian, UM, I can't talk about this without bringing up Nestro Macnu who was a anarchist leader, the leader of the Ukrainian Black Army UM during the Civil war, and what happened to them, Well, the Bolsheviks betrayed them and killed all of them and curus the movement UH and then smeared them all as um how

to file rapist cannibals if I remember correctly. Yeah, yeah, there's a lot of of of disinformation you can find about that time, just like today, you know, only the names have changed exactly. So if there is no other outlet for Ukrainian nationalism and the group that you thought maybe an ally in UH destroying the empire in granting you self determination turns out to be a continuation of that exact empire, well it's pretty logical. Maybe not right, but it is pretty logical for people go to the

for people to go to the other extream. And it's one of those One of the things I think that should be noted more, as we talked about earlier, is that one of these stories of Ukrainian politics, particularly in the last got close to a decade since the Maidan, is that mainstream Ukrainian political leaders and Ukrainian voters have overwhelmingly rejected that sort of nationalism this time around, UM and have gone out of their way to silo it

out of active political power. UM in a way that one could argue is more successful than has been done in the United States. UM. And absolutely we didn't get Trump. Yeah, no, you get you guys basically elected John Stewart. UM pretty much. I mean that was his UM. Yea, it was his whole thing. He put on satirical political sketches, that was the entire show. Um. We did basically elect John Stewart. And you know, I have my criticisms of Zelenski, um

as a lot of people do. Uh. And one of the things we love saying in Ukraine whenever people are like, oh, look at all the look at all the Nazis there, We're so not We're so anti semitic that we elected a Jewish comedian. That's how. That's how anti semitic we are. That we have huge minoures standing in the middle of Kiev during the high holidays, that's how. That's how anti

semitic we are. Yeah. And and Zelenski's uh Prime Minister is also a Jewish Man, which makes ukrain in the second country in the world to have a Jewish President and Prime Minister. Um. Yeah, like we don't care because it's not it doesn't even come up in campaigns like what even when Romney was running unc democratic campaigns painting is a scary Mormon or the ads implying and you don't even have that level of religious antipathy in Ukraine.

It's it's it's just a much more complicated We're actually talking about the problems of the far right and and a fascism, you know, in Ukraine. It's a much more complicated story than a lot of people on you know, social media or whatnot want to give it credit to because it's just easy to some things up in one sentence and not have to care about a looming humanitarian catastrophe. But that is what we are looking at. If this invasion,

it will be bad. If Russia uses active forces in order to take the remainder of those two provinces from the Ukrainian government, it will be a nightmare of almost unimaginable consequence. If the invasion proceeds on the wider scale that is possible at this point. Um Um. I've been a dummer on this basically since I first heard about the build up, um because Putin has made it very clear over the years what he considers Ukraine to be. Like you mentioned, he doesn't think that Ukraine should exist

as like a polity. UM. And as a result, I have pretty much this whole time been pretty sure that he's gonna attack you. UM. And now we're coming to a very definite tipping point. Um. Just today, Putin's made a lot of moves UM. Like you mentioned, he authorized military force to be used um in the Damas and

actually he's gone further. He's authorized military forced to be used abroad, UH, which I mean obviously that means Ukraine where else that's where is like the about I think seventy of the entire Russian army is currently around Ukraine or close enough that they can reinforce um without a lot Yeah, at least of the active duty, because the Russian military there's a smaller actually competent right yeah yeah, yes,

but the professional the contract soldiers yes, um. And especially on the northern border, Uh, there are a lot of battalion tact groups that are basically sitting and waiting, I

guess for whatever the order will be eventually um. And in Belarus, and since Putin has given this authorization to operate abroad, and he stated that he recognizes these puppet authorities as I qual him um that he recognizes their borders as the entirety of the Donetsk lukonsk o BLUs, which again only a third of those territories are under the de facto control of public authorities. Two thirds of both provinces are still um andre Ukrainian government control, including

the the critical port city of Marieuple. And now that Putin has authorized forced to be used abroad, well it's kind of I mean, at least it is incredibly obvious to me what the next steps are from the Russian perspective, if I want to subjectate you right, um, And I think a big failing here is people in the West, especially the western left. Um no very little of for example, the Chechen wars, especially the Second War, and what happened to Rosnie yeah after during that war, and what the

Russians did the subjects that population. And if anyone thinks that Putin treasures Ukrainian lives any more than he did Chechen lives, then I've got a bridge of the rod to sell them. Though you should act now because the

valley's gonna drop real fast. Yeah. And it's one of those if you, as a good leftist, have spent a significant amount of time reading about the horrific crimes of imperialist nations in Africa and Southeast Asia in the America's UM, what the Russian Federation did there is on that scale. It's it's absolutely on that scale. It was. It was a titanically ugly war. UM, and any modernly we can look at what they did in Syria or what they

are doing in Syria, what they continue to do in Syria. UM. But as it turns out, UM, Syrians learned this lesson that I am learning now about big portions of the um Western left a long time ago, yeah, which is that if you can find, for example, some Syrian rebels who are shitty and Islamists or whatever, you can tar every single person whoever stood up against Bashar al Assa as a as a terrorist UM, which is really easy, especially if you're getting paid Kremlin money to advance that

line and you your name is Ben Norton. This brings us to the place where there really aren't clear answers, which is like what can be done? And it is one of those things where it's like, well, uh, that's not an easy question because you do have to when you start grappling with like all right, well, like should what should NATO do? What should other European non NATO

nations do? Like what what? What is actually capable of like potentially altering or disrupting the courses of action here while we're talking about the Russian state which has a lot of nukes, Um, we're talking about a situation that could spiral out of control in a way that very few sitch c Asians globally are capable of potentially spiring

spiraling out of control. And so it is a not a situation where anyone who tells you this is clearly the thing to do that will work, is I think trying to is probably full of ship and a little unhinged um because this is a real fucking ugly one. Um. But some of what has been done, Um, we just got the news today that I think we both found surprising, but it is very positive that the Germans have canceled construction of the Nord Stream to pipeline, which is a

gas pipeline from Russia into the EU. Um that a lot of folks were saying Germany was not going to take any sort of stances, solid stances on Ukraine's behalf because of that pipeline, because of how Germany, along with a lot of Western Europe, is tremendously reliant upon Russian gas exports, um for just like keeping themselves heated in the winter. UM. So that's a positive move. I I tend to be critical of the ability of sanctions to

do much um. And if we're looking historically at sanctions, particularly how they're most often implied, they have a tendency to just harm regular people more than they have to do it. Like we can look at the sanctions in Iraq right which which we're part of why something like a million people starved. UM. We are talking about different kinds of sanctions in general, and we're talking about the sanctions being imposed by NATO countries against the Russian state

right now. They're largely sanctions against members of the Duma. UM. There's there's a lot. It's not the same as looking at like what was being done to Saddam's Iraq. That said, I'm still very hesitant to say I think that sanctions are going to disrupt Putin's course of action. I'm curious what you think can and should be done here. You know, like what is do you have any kind of clear idea in your own head about what might have a

disruptive effect on on what Putin is doing? Learn a tele important shoot Putin in the head with a nimillionator. I mean that would be that'd be great. There's can we that had we that teleportation capacity, there would be a list, you know, put my skill points into that. UM. But realistically speaking, the Russian state is authoritarian. It doesn't really care what its own citizens think. It definitely doesn't care what other people think. However, UM, Russia has been,

at least in um the modern realm, relatively image conscious. UM. Which is why I think one thing that could work, for example or not, could work, but would perhaps force the Russian state to consider its actions a little bit more carefully. And I want to be very clear when I talk about the Russian state, I'm talking about Putin himself. Yeah, the government, he has no there's no like other decision

makers in Russia. And that was actually perfectly encapsulated um during his speech the other day where he just outright, um like eviscerated the head of his foreign intelligence service. I'm live TV for the whole world to see, just utterly humiliated the guy for no real reason, just because he can and you could see that. And we're talking about Russia's top spy. I mean beyond Puttin himself stammering like a frightened school child when Puttin addressed him, just

with just a hint of sharpness. Um. So when I say to the Russians, say, I'm referring literally to the body in person of of of Vladiman Puttin. Um, And like, honestly, yeah, I would love to see people pick itt Russian embassies and make demonstrations and marches and so on. Um. Do I think that will have a practical real effect, to be honest, No, saying with the sanctions, Um, I'm sure Putin's pet oligarchs and members of his party and the

uh the people that in theory keep him in power. Um, the oligarchs, the the Polmentarians, the mafia lords and so on, I'm sure they're gonna be pretty mift if their yachts and their multimillion dollar properties in Miami and New York, in London and the villainism the French riviera. When when all that gets taken, I'm sure, they'll they'll be pretty annoyed. Um, But I don't think Putin cares. I think that he

has a really irrational um desire to subjugate Kiev. Specifically, Um, he sees Kiev as um what we call in Russian the mother of all Russian cities. Yeah, it's the um the place of the Kivan Ruce. Yeah, the word Russian comes from Kievan Ruce, you know, exactly exactly. And I just don't think that Putin is going to turn away from that goal because a couple of his buddies are complaining that they're mega yotts got taken in by the British authorities or whatever. Nor do I think they're gonna

care that. You know, there are a couple of marchers outside of embassies in New Yorker or something. Um, but that may help spur the world as a whole, the international community into taking a harder line stance against because timey con time and again, Um, like the guy's a gangster,

he's he's like a security service thug. If you've ever like interacted with like a petty like sergeant, police sergeant or something that has just a bit of authority and pretty much shown comunity that that's put into a te um. The dude thinks he's over educated. Uh and the cleverest manble Yeah, I think. But really, the way he talks,

in the way he's acts, he's just a bullief. He's he's he's got the same basic personality as like Villan Weather, you know, the fucking head of the Los Angeles sheriff Department. He's like, not like a beat cop, but like one of the cops who rises to run a union or run a city police department. Yeah, he's good at consolidating power. He's good at at exercising organizing others to exercise violence on his behalf. But yeah, at the end of the day, he is primarily a bully. And it's one of those um,

I don't know. Like when it comes to arms shipments, that is a historically Again, if you look at the history of partic like let's just say specifically NATO shipping arms places most of the time that does not improve the situation for people in that country. That that has been a historical reality of arms shipment. It's not just with NATO as a general rule, everywhere, when you ship more guns into an area that that rarely improves quality

of life. Um. But we are not talking about a country that has had any kind of centralized political legitimacy or what not collapse. You when not talking about a country that is in the middle of tearing itself apart between thirty or forty different sides. Um, it's not the same situation as well. Let ship a bunch of guns to Libya, you know. Um, it just isn't there different histories,

different political realities on the ground. I don't know that I actually think any amount of arms shipments would dissuade Putin from advancing either. Um, But I I don't know what else to do. I certainly am not against the idea of like, Okay, guys have some a G T M s, you know, have some wire guided missiles, have some javelins, um, Because like what else are you gonna do? Um? I mean we're not going to and I'm certainly not saying we should send US troops in um, because again

we have to consider the nuclear situation too. Um. What do you think is where? Where are your thoughts there? Um? Because this is something that I'm very I'm very mixed on, although and I'm broadly fine with Yeah, I mean at least give people the ability to fight back. Yeah, it's a difficult one, especially like you noted, the military industrial complex has very rarely improved any situation in the world anywhere. Yep.

This might be one of the few exceptions, um, because the fact is that Ukraine doesn't really have the tools to defend these to defend ourselves we have, um, or at least our government claims that we have the strongest army in Europe, which, to be honest, with all the defense cuts that Europe can come in made years, that may be true, um, at least on the ground sense. Certainly the most combat experienced army in here. Yeah, absolutely, UM. But what we lack entirely is air power and air

defense UM. And what Russia has in spades is air power and air defense. And as we saw UM when the US invaded Rock Well, you can destroy conventional army in a couple of days by just bombing the ship out of it uh. And the Russians have quite a few missiles UM aimed straight at Kiev UH and quite a view planes waiting on standby. I presume to bomb the ship out of Kiev UH. And it would be nice to have some way to to defend ourselves against that. Um.

But again there's there's not much that can be said. Yeah, of course stingers and javelins and so on, Um, that will all help raise the costs of the occupation that follows the initial bombardment. But if Putin goes for the strategy that ASSAD has used in Syria, which is bomb the living ship out of every civilian residential area in the city until the people just submit or are all dead, um, well, there's not really too much we can do about that.

And that is like, there is a lot that individual that that trained and motivated soldiers with small arms and munitions like javelins can do, even to resist a country with with overwhelming air power. The corollary to that is that in doing that a lot of stuff, everyone around them dies. The city has turned into a graveyard. Um.

I've I've seen that with my own eyes. And that's that's I mean, got to be the thing if you're looking at this with any kind of reasonable lies and not just like trying to find a political angle to support, that has to be your main concern is that the potential here is for a tremendous loss of life and

also for the creation of millions of refugees. Um. And this is something in another of audio clip that you published a bit earlier on Twitter, you say, which is that like, if this goes as badly as it can, no matter what your politics are, this will become your problem one to present. Yeah. I stand behind that absolutely, because there are a lot of Ukrainians and while most of us have no desire to live under the Russian yoke, the majority of us are not trained fighters. Were just people,

just regular people. And I know, especially in the US, um, with our like out of control gun culture, imagining like they're the singular guy, you know, they're they're the macho man, uh, with with all the guns, they take down the government all by themselves. I'm sorry, it's a fantasy. It's a fiction. Um, that is not how things work. Uh. And quite frankly,

most people are not psychologically suited to combat. That's why armies take so long to break soldiers down to teach them to murder people, because that is not something humans do naturally. And the majority of people subjected to that kind of violence will run. And again they're forty million of us, and they will run and run and run. Pretty much everyone in the world. You saw this with Syria,

all this with Libya. Um, you've seen this pretty much with every single place that has experienced massive violence in the modern world. Um, that's the reaction. Yeah, and that's when we run. We bring all of our biases and problems and cultural predilections to you m hm. And it's yeah, I mean, that's that's really the note to end on.

And it is you get a lot of folks you know who who rightly you know, focus on and think a lot about revolutionary struggles in places like Vietnam and um in an Afghanistan and will point out that like, well, you don't need to have as advanced to military as your opponent to win. And again, just the corollary to that, all, Yeah, the corollary to that is that, like, yeah, but millions of people die. Millions of people die in Afghanistan, millions of people died in Vietnam. Um, that's that. That is

the reality. Yeah, you can resist an imperial power with minimal technology, but you're not going to leave that fight with a family alive still, you know, Like that's that's how it goes. Um, So let's all say a little prayer for I don't know, peace. Uh, I hope the

worst doesn't happen. Um. What has there been kind of mobilization that you've seen within the the activist the anarchist community in in Kiev, Um to you know, any kind of mutual aid stuff like or is it just one of those situations where it hasn't started happening yet and nobody really knows what would even be useful to do if it does. I'll say this, Um, it may come as a little bit of a shock, but anarchies not

typically the best of organis yeah. Um. Specifically, like a lot of my uh, the friends who are active in the interchist Um movement in Ukraine have simply joined the territorial defense battalions or the regular army and will simply fight as soldiers. Um. There has been a very strong I don't know if you called denial. Um. A colleague of mine used the term doomed optimism, and I really like the sound of that, so let's go with that.

There's been this really strong doomed optimism amongst Ukrainians that the worst will not happen and there's no real reason to prepare for anything because well, things are going to be fine. Um. And that's what our government tells us as well. Things are going to be fine. They don't see any massive attack groups or I mean I feel like that's contradicted by the the open source intelligence that I've been looking at. But I I am just one guy.

I obviously don't have intelligence apparatus of the nations eight Um. So I mean maybe they're right, um, but generally speaking, people have just been joining the army, going to um tactical trainings. Um. But this is all very basic stuff like go in the woods, learn how to set up camp and you know, clean a rifle kind of kind of things. UM. Nothing like combat training, because where would you get that except by joining the army and going

to the front. Yeah, it's the kind of training that might keep in the event of a full conflict when out of ten of those people alive long enough to learn how to fight, and and that might be worth it. Yeah, I mean yeah, if you're talking about like, yes, not not to say people shouldn't be doing that, because people should do whatever they can. Um, how are you kind of a close out like as this like doom scrolling is the thing we all talk about, and there's there's

plenty image sitting here in Portland. We just had a mass shooting in a protest this week again, and so there's a lot of doom scrolling going on in my community. But we're not staring down the barrel of a hundred and nine soldiers, you know, potentially uh, hitting us from the air and ground simultaneously. How do you How are you like focusing on the stuff that you can do anything about and the stuff that you can productively handle

without losing yourself in that opious amounts of cannabis. That's good. I'm glad you guys have decent pod access. Yeah, I actually don't know what I'll do if, um, if my current supplies got out to be quite honest, um, But I mean it's been definitely a struggle. Um. And the past couple of days, especially my mental health has not been especially great. Um. But again, I'm one dude. Like, I'm not in very good shape, i have or vision,

one of my eyes don't work, I'm diabetic. Like, I'm not gonna go out and grab a rifle and start killing every rooskie I see you know, um. But at the same time, I've got a job to do. I as an English language journalist, in Ukraine. Um, I have this is your busy season. Yeah, it's my busies. Like one of my jobs is to counter Russian distant information and too like tell people the truth of what is going on here um, and that role will only get more important if the the conflict expands, um from from

the scope that it is now. Uh So how am I doing? Well? I'm still alive, um, having off myself and uh I'm still I'm still working. So I think as as good as I can be under the circumstances. Yeah. Yeah, um, well I hope your weeds supply stays stable um at the very fun fingers yeah. Um, all right, well, thank

you so much for coming on the show, Romeo. Do you have anything you want to plug kind of as we as we go out here, um, just if you really want to know about what's going down in Ukraine, I am co host of the podcast called You Bring Without Hype and find it on any podcast platform um. And if you really want to get a look out what's going on in English um with only a tinge

of leftist bias, um, then tune in. You can follow us on Twitter, Hype ukrane um and again on any podcast platform that you you so desire awesome, Well, check out Romeo there, check out this podcast, and you know, just try to keep your eyes on the situation and don't let yourself be uh overwhelmed by what's Some random person on Twitter tries to sum it up, as you know, people are more complicated than that. It could Happen here

as a production of cool Zone Media. For more podcasts from cool Zone Media, visit our website cool zone media dot com, or check us out on the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts. You can find sources for It could Happen Here, updated monthly at cool zone Media dot com slash sources. Thanks for listening.