John Chuckman
SLIGHT EXPANSION OF A COMMENT POSTED TO AN ARTICLE IN CBC NEWS (AND REMOVED BY AN EDITOR)
“Trump says he put 'no pressure' on Ukraine president during phone call
“Partial transcript shows U.S. president asked Zelensky for help in investigating Biden”
Of course, when it comes to doing dishonorable things, the entire matter of the coup in Ukraine, carried out with $5 billion in secret American aid - a fact we know from a rather blabby senior State Department official, Victoria Nuland - was about as dishonorable as it gets.
A democratically-elected government was overturned and driven away.
And there is all the hardship and damage that the coup caused. The secession of the Donbass region (part of eastern Ukraine) and a stupidly blundering civil war started by the coup-installed government that has killed thousands. Even a civilian airliner, packed with people, shot down, either deliberately or accidentally, amidst the chaos.
New language legislation, outrageously biased, was a major cause of secession. Ukraine is at least 30 percent Russian-speaking and has been for ages. Indeed, many regard the Ukrainian language as just a dialect of Russian used in Western Ukraine. Whether that is so or not, they are closely related. The two states have a thousand years of inter-related history.
Constant threats, including threats from outfits like the Azov Battalion, a neo-Nazi militia supported by America (there are photos of good old Joe Biden shaking hands with its leader) and used as part of the coup while also serving to keep any subsequent Ukrainian President intimidated into line as well as blunting efforts at reasonable peace with the Donbass. There are several ultra-nationalist organizations and parties serving those purposes.
Installing a man like Poroshenko as President for four years was a disaster. He proved completely inept, with rumors of corruption echoing everywhere he ever stepped. That’s why even a television comedian could handily defeat him in the last election, but the new President, too, faces internal forces of intimidation and great American pressures.
The Ukrainian economy was sent into a terrible crash by the consequences of the coup. No available amount of American assistance could hope to offset it. Ukraine lost many vital long-term relationships with Russia. Supplies. Markets. Ukraine has actually experienced huge losses in population with literally millions leaving to try finding employment and stabile lives somewhere else in Europe.
But it would be hard to name a single American foreign policy measure today which isn't dishonorable in the same way.
Trying to topple Venezuela's twice-elected government? New pressures brought to bear against Cuba? The trashing of the Iran nuclear agreement and subsequent war-like steps? The support of a bloody tyrant in Saudi Arabia? Encouraging the tyrant's ugly war on Yemen? Destruction of the INF Treaty in Europe? Withdrawal from UNESCO? Trade war with China? Russophobia as national policy?
