Chas Freeman: The Many Lessons of the Ukraine War

I want to speak to you tonight about Ukraine – what has happened to it and why, how it is likely to emerge from the ordeal to which great power rivalry has subjected it; and what we can learn from this. I do so with some trepidation and a warning to this audience. My talk, like the conflict in Ukraine, is a long and complicated one. It contradicts propaganda that has been very convincing. My talk will offend anyone committed to the official narrative. The way the American media have dealt with the Ukraine war brings to mind a comment by Mark Twain: “The researches of many commentators have already thrown much darkness on this subject, and it is probable that, if they continue, we shall soon know nothing at all about it.”

Chas Freeman: The Many Lessons of the Ukraine War

The Palestinians’ inalienable right to resist

In December 1982, following Israel’s devastating invasion of Lebanon six months earlier, the United Nations General Assembly passed resolution A/RES/37/43 concerning the ‘[i]mportance of the universal realization of the right of peoples to self-determination’. It endorsed, without qualification, ‘the inalienable right’ of the Palestinian people to ‘self-determination, national independence, territorial integrity, national unity and sovereignty without outside interference’, and reaffirmed the legitimacy of their struggle for those rights ‘by all available means, including armed struggle’. It also strongly condemned Israel’s ‘expansionist activities in the Middle East’ and ‘continual bombing of Palestinian civilians’, both said to ‘constitute a serious obstacle to the realization of the self-determination and independence of the Palestinian people’. In the four decades since then, Israel’s violence against the Palestinian people and its colonisation of their land has not ceased. Up to the present moment, all over historical Palestine, from the Gaza Strip to Sheikh Jarrah, Palestinians are still under that same occupation, subject to suffocating control over virtually every aspect of their lives – and the sadistic, unaccountable violence of the Zionist state.

The Palestinians’ inalienable right to resist

How A Fruit Juice Company Forcefully Stole The Hawaiian Kingdom

Why did the US want Hawaii? With even a glance at its sensual beaches and lush jungles, it’s no surprise that the scenic islands have always been desirable. But as with any story of settlement, the development of Hawaii didn’t come about as peacefully or honorably as its sumptuous vistas would have you believe. For American lawyer and entrepreneur Sanford Ballard Dole, Hawaii was a gold mine — or at least a pineapple one — and he used his government influence and self-appointed position in Hawaii to push the US toward taking over the islands in the late 1890s.

The Insane Story Of How A Fruit Juice Company Forcefully Stole The Hawaiian Kingdom

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How Native Hawaiians have been pushed out of Hawai’i

How Canada emerged as a haven for Ukrainian SS “Galicia Division” veterans and other Nazi accomplices and war criminals

Aided by the corporate media, Canada’s political establishment is trying to claim that parliament’s honouring last Friday of the 98-year-old Nazi Waffen SS veteran Yaroslav Hunka was the result of an unfortunate gaffe—a gaffe for which the House of Commons Speaker, Anthony Rota, is exclusively responsible.

The World Socialist Web Site has already exposed this false narrative at length.

Here we are republishing an article that first appeared on the WSWS on July 29, 2019. It discusses how and why Ottawa threw open its doors to Hunka and some 2,000 Ukrainian SS veterans. As the article explains, this was part of a broader policy of providing a safe haven to the Nazis’ Ukrainian fascist allies, so as to use them to advance Canadian imperialism’s interests at home and abroad.

Working in concert with the Ukrainian Canadian Congress (UCC), which had been founded at the government’s behest at the beginning of World War II, Ottawa used the Ukrainian fascists to combat left-wing influence among Canada’s large Ukrainian worker-farmer population and the labour movement more generally. The government also worked with the UCC to foment a rabidly anticommunist, virulently anti-Russian Ukrainian nationalism in collaboration with the CIA and British intelligence.

In recent decades, as Canada’s government under Liberals and Conservatives alike has worked with Washington and its NATO partners to harness Ukraine to NATO and the European Union, Ottawa’s alliance with the UCC and the Ukrainian far right has become an ever more important element of Canadian foreign policy.

A more extensive examination of the alliance between Canadian imperialism and the Ukrainian far right can be found in the May 2022 WSWS series “Canadian imperialism’s fascist friends,” including its fourth part: “How Ottawa provided the Ukrainian fascists refuge and incubated and promoted far-right Ukrainian nationalism.”

How Canada emerged as a haven for Ukrainian SS “Galicia Division” veterans and other Nazi accomplices and war criminals

Canadian Parliament Gives a Standing Ovation to Yaroslav Hunka, Who Fought for the 14th Division of Waffen SS

On 22nd September, the Canadian House of Commons gave a standing ovation to Yaroslav Hunka, a World War II veteran who fought for “Ukrainian independence” against Russian aggressors. This is how the speaker of the House, Anthony Rota, introduced him. The 98-year-old war veteran, however, was a member of a SS unit established in 1943 by the Nazis. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy was also present during the occasion.

Canadian Parliament Gives a Standing Ovation to Yaroslav Hunka, Who Fought for the 14th Division of Waffen SS

Who was Hardeep Singh Nijjar, Khalistani terrorist at centre of India-Canada tussle?

Who was Hardeep Singh Nijjar, Khalistani terrorist at centre of India-Canada tussle? All you need to know

Who is Hardeep Singh Nijjar?

Canada-based pro-Khalistan terrorist Hardeep Singh Nijjar was shot dead by two unidentified gunmen at the parking lot of Guru Nanak Sikh Gurdwara in the Punjabi-dominated Surrey city of Canada’s British Columbia province.

Born in Jalandhar, Punjab, Nijjar moved to Canada in 1997 and worked as a plumber. He was married and had two children. His wealth rose suddenly due to his involvement in pro-Khalistan activities. He joined the terrorist group Babbar Khalsa International and went on to establish his own group – Khalistan Tiger Force (KTF).

Nijjar was also associated with the separatist organisation, Sikhs for Justice (SFJ), which is banned in India. He is accused of being proactively involved in recruiting, training, financing and operationalising pro-Khalistan terrorist modules for spreading terror in India.

The Khalistani terrorist was wanted in several cases, including a blast in 2007 that killed six people in Ludhiana. The National Investigation Agency (NIA) filed a chargesheet in 2022 against the KTF chief over a conspiracy to kill a Hindu priest in Jalandhar. A cash reward of Rs 10 lakhs was declared against Nijjar by the NIA.

Nijjar had been accused of killing Ripudaman Singh Malik, the man who was acquitted in the 1985 Air India terrorist bombing case, in Surrey last year. He was designated as an ‘individual terrorist’ by the Union Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) in July 2020.

India has repeatedly asked the Canadian authorities to take action against Nijjar for his alleged involvement in terrorist acts in Punjab. Last year the Punjab Police had sought the extradition of Nijjar on charges of reviving terrorism in the state.

‘India is behaving like a rogue state’: Dissident’s death drags Narendra Modi into global row

Nijjar was not a random target, but a prominent advocate for the creation of Khalistan, a Sikh ethno-religious state carved out of areas including India’s Punjab region.

The Khalistan movement is banned in India, where officials deem it a national security threat, but it has some support in the country’s northern regions, as well as among the sizeable Sikh diaspora in Canada and Britain.

Pakistan, India’s chief foe, is widely suspected of fanning the movement.

Related:

What is Khalistan separatist movement, how did the ideology travel from India to Canada?

Land of the Pure: The Khalistan Movement in India

Secret Intelligence Leaks vs. Basic Common Sense

Historical Examples

During 1940 the determined efforts of President Franklin Roosevelt to involve America in the war against Hitler’s Germany were blocked by the overwhelming opposition of the American people, running at 80% according to some polls. A group of young Yale Law School peace activists had launched the America First Committee and it quickly attracted 800,000 members, becoming the largest grassroots political organization in our national history. The leadership of the AFC included many of our most prominent business and journalistic figures, and famed aviator Charles Lindbergh, one of our greatest national heroes, served as its top spokesman.

Secret Intelligence Leaks vs. Basic Common Sense

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