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https://caitlinjohnstone.com/2022/10/02/the-narrative-that-this-war-was-unprovoked-prevents-peace/

The Narrative That This War Was “Unprovoked” Prevents Peace

Vladimir Putin has approved the annexation of four territories in eastern Ukraine, whose addition to the Russian Federation now await authorization from Russia’s other branches of government.

The Zelensky government responded to the move by applying to join NATO, only to be immediately shut down by US and NATO officials. Can’t have sacrificial pawns trying to rise above their station on the grand chessboard, after all.

But the empire’s proxy war against Russia continues, and the Ukrainian government has announced its intentions to drive out Russia from all of the Ukrainian territories it has claimed as its own.

“For our plans, [Russia’s annexation] doesn’t matter,” Zelensky advisor Mykhailo Podolyak told Politico, adding that Ukraine will “protect our land using all our forces” and “should liberate all its territories.”

The plan to reclaim territories annexed by Russia will according to Zelensky also include Crimea, which was annexed in 2014.

All this talk about preparing a massive western-backed counter-offensive to recapture annexed territories from Russia — whose ranks are being reinforced with an additional 300,000 reservists — comes as Putin suggests that nuclear weapons may be used to protect what Moscow considers parts of Russia. Russia, like the United States, is one of the nuclear-armed nations without a No First Use policy.

So we appear to be on a collision course toward a massive escalation between two nuclear-armed powers. The more things escalate the more likely it is that a nuclear weapon may be used, either deliberately or as a result of miscommunication or malfunction as nearly happened many times during the last cold war. Once one nuke is used the odds go up astronomically that a great many more will immediately follow, with variables on this outcome including the location where it detonates and how cool all the relevant heads happen to be at that particular historic moment.

It is therefore no exaggeration to say that the human species has a vested interest in de-escalation and detente right away. Avoiding nuclear war is the single most important agenda in the entire world, without exception. It is the single most important agenda that has ever existed in all of history.

But whenever you advocate for this supremely important agenda in any kind of public forum, you get a bunch of brainwashed empire automatons bleating about “appeasement” and accusing you of supporting a monstrous madman. And they do this because that’s what they were trained to do.

As Noam Chomsky has been pointing out repeatedly, the political/media class have been continually indoctrinating the public with the completely false narrative that Russia’s invasion of Ukraine was “unprovoked”. Every time the war comes up the imperial spinmeisters utter that slogan, in much the same way Michael Jackson had a quota for how often MTV hosts were obligated to refer to him as “The King of Pop Michael Jackson” when his name was mentioned.

But what does it mean if the war is “unprovoked”? It means Putin didn’t invade Ukraine because of anything the western empire was doing, so it couldn’t have been prevented by the western empire behaving less aggressively on Russia’s borders. It means Putin necessarily invaded because he is some kind of evil lunatic who loves to commit war crimes, or a megalomaniacal tyrant who wants to conquer the world because he hates freedom and democracy. Which means he will keep attacking and invading other countries unless he can be stopped. Which means the only answer to the Putin problem is more war.

This is why empire apologists get angry at those who advocate the only sane and rational position toward nuclear brinkmanship by calling for de-escalation and detente. It’s because they’ve been aggressively indoctrinated into the belief that war is the only answer.

The moronic narrative that the invasion of Ukraine was “unprovoked” poses a massive obstacle to peace, because if Putin is just attacking and invading countries solely because he’s crazy and evil it means detente is impossible and he won’t stop until he’s decisively crushed. If it’s accepted that the US empire has played no role in provoking Putin’s actions, that means there’s nothing the empire could do to make continued Russian aggression less likely apart from regime change, or at least severely crippling and punishing Russia militarily.

As long as the fact that this war was provoked remains unacknowledged by the side that provoked it, the sane path of de-escalation and detente will look like reckless appeasement of an irrational madman, and aggressive escalations of nuclear brinkmanship will look like sanity. The absurd position that Putin is an irrational actor with some kind of weird sexual fetish for war crimes is a one-way ticket to endlessly escalating war and eventual nuclear annihilation, because it leaves you with no options but continually intensifying military confrontation.

The claim that peace is impossible and Putin must be crushed imperils the whole world. Even to deliver total victory in Ukraine (pushing Russia back to pre-2014 borders) could easily end up costing millions of lives and trillions of dollars and exponentially increase the risk of nuclear war, with no guarantee of success at all. But even if you did push Putin all the way out of Ukraine, what then? He’ll still be a crazy madman who wants to invade countries because he’s evil and hates freedom. The internal logic of your narrative says the attacks on Russia must continue until you get regime change. There’s no stopping point on your line of thinking until there’s a direct hot confrontation between nuclear superpowers.

Be an adult and engage your critical thinking. Does a madman who goes around invading countries solely because he’s evil and hates freedom sound like a real-life human being to you? Or does it sound made up? Like something you’d see in a Hollywood movie? Like something that was concocted by people responsible for controlling the dominant narratives of our society and funneled into your mind using media?

Marvel supervillains have more depth and complexity than the one-dimensional characters the imperial spin machine concocts to represent its official enemies. Thanos was a more believable character with more understandable and nuanced motivations than the propaganda machine’s fictional representation of Putin. That representation has been overlaid on top of the actual government official who you might not necessarily agree with, but can definitely understand and engage in diplomacy and negotiation.

People who believe the empire’s narratives about its official enemies have fewer critical thinking skills than your average Marvel movie viewer. Think. Be a grown up and think. Someone’s benefitting from the aggressively promulgated narrative that peace is impossible and war is the only solution. And that someone isn’t you.

....

https://www.globalresearch.ca/preemptive-nuclear-war-a-third-world-war-spells-the-end-of-humanity-as-we-know-it/5772695

“Preemptive Nuclear War”: The Historic Battle for Peace and Democracy. A Third World War Threatens the Future of Humanity

At no point since the first atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima on August 6th, 1945, has humanity been closer to the unthinkable. All the safeguards of the Cold War era, which categorized the nuclear bomb as “a weapon of last resort”, have been scrapped.

Vladimir Putin’s statement on February 21st, 2022 was a response to US threats to use nuclear weapons on a preemptive basis against Russia, despite Joe Biden’s “reassurance” that the US would not be resorting to “A first strike” nuclear attack against an enemy of America: 

“Let me [Putin] explain that U.S. strategic planning documents contain the possibility of a so-called preemptive strike against enemy missile systems. And who is the main enemy for the U.S. and NATO? We know that too. It’s Russia. In NATO documents, our country is officially and directly declared the main threat to North Atlantic security. And Ukraine will serve as a forward springboard for the strike.” (Putin Speech, February 21, 2022, emphasis added)

Last July 2021, the Biden administration launched its 2021 Nuclear Posture Review (NPR) to be completed and formally announced in 2022. The 2021 NPR is to include what is described as a “nuclear declaratory policy of the United States”.

It is unlikely that the 2021 NPR will repeal the nuclear options of  the Obama and Bush administrations which are largely predicated on the notion of preemptive nuclear war raised in President Putin’s speech.

The underlying US nuclear doctrine consists in portraying nuclear weapons as a means of “self defense” rather than as a “weapon of mass destruction”. 

Moreover, there are powerful financial interests behind the NPR which are tied into the $1.3  trillion nuclear weapons program initiated under President Obama. 

Although the Ukraine conflict has so-far been limited to conventional weapons coupled with “economic warfare”, the use of a large array of sophisticated WMDs including nuclear weapons is on the drawing board of the Pentagon.

According to the Federation of American Scientists, the total number of nuclear warheads Worldwide is of the order of 13,000.  Russia and the United States “each have around 4,000 warheads in their military stockpiles”.

The Dangers of Nuclear War are Real. Profit Driven. Two Trillion Dollars

Under Joe Biden, public funds allocated to nuclear weapons are slated to increase to 2 trillion by 2030 allegedly as a means to safeguarding peace and national security at taxpayers expense. (How many schools and hospitals could you finance with 2 trillion dollars?):

The United States maintains an arsenal of about 1,700 strategic nuclear warheads deployed on intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) and submarine-launched ballistic missiles (SLBMs) and at strategic bomber bases. There are an additional estimated 100 non-strategic, or tactical, nuclear weapons at bomber bases in five European countries and about 2,000 nuclear warheads in storage. [see our analysis of B61-11 and B61-12 below]

The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) estimated in May 2021 that the United States will spend a total of $634 billion over the next 10 years to sustain and modernize its nuclear arsenal. (Arms Control)....

....The Threat of Nuclear War

The US threat of nuclear war against Russia was formulated more than 76 years ago in September 1945, when the US and the Soviet Union were allies. It consisted in a “World War III Blueprint” of nuclear war against the USSR, targeting 66 cities with more than 200 atomic bombs. This diabolical project under the Manhattan Project was instrumental in triggering the Cold War and the nuclear arms race. (See analysis below).

Chronology

1918-1920:  The first US and allied forces led war against Soviet Russia with more than 10 countries sending troops to fight alongside the White Imperial Russian army. This happened exactly two months after the October Revolution, on January 12, 1918, and it lasted until the early 1920s.

The Manhattan Project initiated in 1939, with the participation of the UK and Canada. Development of Atomic Bomb. 

Operation Barbarossa, June 1941. Nazi Invasion of the Soviet Union. Standard Oil of New Jersey was selling oil to Nazi Germany.

February 1945: The Yalta Conference. The meeting of Roosevelt, Churchill and Stalin.

“Operation Unthinkable”: A Secret attack plan against the Soviet Union formulated by Winston Churchill in the immediate wake of the Yalta conference. It was scrapped in June 1945.

April 12, 1945: The Potsdam Conference. President Harry Truman and Prime Minister Winston Churchill approve the atomic bombing of Japan.

September 15, 1945: A World War III Scenario formulated by the US War Department: A plan to  bomb 66 cities of the Soviet Union with 204 atomic bombs, when the US and USSR were allies. The Secret plan  (declassified) formulated during WWII, was released less than two weeks after the official end of WWII on September 2, 1945

1949: The Soviet Union announces the testing of its nuclear bomb.

Post Cold War Doctrine: “Preemptive Nuclear War”

The Doctrine of Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD) of the Cold War Era no longer prevails. It was replaced at the outset of the George W. Bush Administration with the Doctrine of Preemptive Nuclear War, namely the use of nuclear weapons as a means of “self-defense” against both nuclear and non-nuclear weapons states.

In early 2002, the text of George W. Bush’s Nuclear Posture Review had already been leaked, several months prior to the release of the September 2002 National Security Strategy (NSS) which defined, “Preemption” as:

“the anticipatory use of force in the face of an imminent attack”. 

Namely as an act of war on the grounds of self-defense

The MAD doctrine was scrapped. The 2001 Nuclear Posture Review not only redefined the use of nuclear weapons, so-called tactical nuclear weapons or bunker buster bombs (mini-nukes) could henceforth be used in the conventional war theater without the authorization of the Commander in Chief, namely the President of the United States..

Seven countries were identified in the 2001 NPR (adopted in 2002) as potential targets for a preemptive nuclear attack 

Discussing “requirements for nuclear strike capabilities,” the report lists Iran, Iraq, Libya, North Korea, and Syria as “among the countries that could be involved in immediate, potential, or unexpected contingencies.”  …

Three of these countries (Iraq, Libya and Syria) have since then been the object of US-led wars. The 2001 NPR also confirmed continued nuclear war preparations against China and Russia.

“The Bush review also indicates that the United States should be prepared to use nuclear weapons against China, citing “the combination of China’s still developing strategic objectives and its ongoing modernization of its nuclear and non-nuclear forces.”

“Finally, although the review repeats Bush administration assertions that Russia is no longer an enemy, it says the United States must be prepared for nuclear contingencies with Russia and notes that, if “U.S. relations with Russia significantly worsen in the future, the U.S. may need to revise its nuclear force levels and posture.” Ultimately, the review concludes that nuclear conflict with Russia is “plausible” but “not expected.” [that. was back in 2002] ( Arms Control) emphasis added.

The Privatization of Nuclear War

With tensions growing in major regions of the World, a new generation of nuclear weapons technology was unfolding making nuclear warfare a very real prospect. And with very little fanfare, the US had embarked on the privatization of nuclear war under a first-strike “preemptive” doctrine. This process went into full swing in the immediate wake of the 2001 Nuclear Posture Review (2001 NPR) adopted by the US Senate in 2002.

On August 6, 2003, on Hiroshima Day, commemorating when the first atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima (August 6 1945), a secret meeting was held behind closed doors at Strategic Command Headquarters at the Offutt Air Force Base in Nebraska. Senior executives from the nuclear industry and the military industrial complex were in attendance.

This mingling of defense contractors, scientists and policy-makers was not intended to commemorate Hiroshima. The meeting was intended to set the stage for the development of a new generation of “smaller”, “safer” and “more usable” nuclear weapons, to be used in the “in-theater nuclear wars” of the 21st Century.”

“Nuclear war has become a multibillion dollar undertaking, which fills the pockets of US defense contractors. What is at stake is the outright “privatization of nuclear war”. 

Nuclear War against both China and Russia is contemplated

Russia is tagged as  “Plausible” but “Not Expected”. That was back in 2002.

Today at the height of the Ukraine war, a Preemptive Nuclear attack against Russia is on the drawing of the Pentagon. That does not however mean that it will be implemented.

A Nuclear War Cannot be Won?

We recall Reagan’s historic statement: “A nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought. The only value in our two nations possessing nuclear weapons is to make sure they will never be used.”

Nonetheless, there are powerful voices and lobby groups within the US establishment and the Biden administration that are convinced that “a nuclear war is winnable”....

....The Infamous “WW III Blueprint” to Wage a Nuclear Attack against the Soviet Union (September 15, 1945)

Barely two weeks after the official end of World War II (September 2, 1945), the US War Department issued  a directive  (September 15, 1945) to “Erase the Soviet Union off the Map” (66 cities with 204 atomic bombs), when the US and USSR were allies, confirmed by declassified documents. (For further details see Chossudovsky, 2017)

According to a secret (declassified) document dated September 15, 1945, “the Pentagon had envisaged blowing up the Soviet Union  with a coordinated nuclear attack directed against major urban areas.

All major cities of the Soviet Union were included in the list of 66 “strategic” targets. The tables below categorize each city in terms of area in square miles and the corresponding number of atomic bombs required to annihilate and kill the inhabitants of selected urban areas.

Six atomic bombs were to be used to destroy each of the larger cities including Moscow, Leningrad, Tashkent, Kiev, Kharkov, Odessa.

The Pentagon estimated that a total of 204 atomic bombs would be required to “Wipe the Soviet Union off the Map”. The targets for a nuclear attack consisted of sixty-six major cities.

One single atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima resulted in the immediate death of 100,000 people in the first seven seconds. Imagine what would have happened if 204 atomic bombs had been dropped on major cities of the Soviet Union as outlined in a secret U.S. plan formulated during the Second World War....

....Hiroshima and Nagasaki: Dress Rehearsal for Planned Nuclear Attack against the Soviet Union

Were the August 1945 Hiroshima and Nagasaki attacks used by the Pentagon to evaluate the viability of  a much larger attack on the Soviet Union consisting of more than 204 atomic bombs? The key documents to bomb 66 cities of the Soviet Union (15 September 1945) were finalized 5-6 weeks after the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings (6, 9 August 1945):

“On September 15, 1945 — just under two weeks after the formal surrender of Japan and the end of World War II — Norstad sent a copy of the estimate to General Leslie Groves, still the head of the Manhattan Project, and the guy who, for the short term anyway, would be in charge of producing whatever bombs the USAAF might want. As you might guess, the classification on this document was high: “TOP SECRET LIMITED,” which was about as high as it went during World War II. (Alex Wellerstein, The First Atomic Stockpile Requirements (September 1945)

The Kremlin was aware of the 1945 plan to bomb sixty-six Soviet cities.

The documents confirm that the US was involved in the “planning of genocide” against the Soviet Union. 

Let’s cut to the chase. How many bombs did the USAAF request of the atomic general, when there were maybe one, maybe twobombs worth of fissile material on hand? At a minimum they wanted 123. Ideally, they’d like 466. This is just a little over a month after the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.....

....The Nuclear Arms Race

Central to our understanding of the Cold War which started (officially) in 1947, Washington’s September 1945 plan to bomb 66 cities into smithereens played a key role in triggering the nuclear arms race.

The Soviet Union was threatened and developed its own atomic bomb in 1949 in response to 1942 Soviet intelligence reports on the Manhattan Project.

While the Kremlin knew about these plans to “Wipe out” the USSR, the broader public was not informed because the September 1945 documents were of course classified. They were declassified 30 years later in September 1975

Today, neither the September 1945 plan to blow up the Soviet Union nor the underlying cause of the nuclear arms race are acknowledged. The Western media has largely focussed its attention on the Cold War US-USSR confrontation. The plan to annihilate the Soviet Union dating back to World War II and the infamous Manhattan project are not mentioned.

Washington’s Cold War nuclear plans are invariably presented in response to so-called Soviet threats, when in fact it was the U.S. plan released in September 1945 (formulated at an earlier period at the height of World War II) to wipe out the Soviet which motivated Moscow to develop its nuclear weapons capabilities.

The assessment of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists mistakenly blamed and continue to blame the Soviet Union for having launched the nuclear arms race in 1949, four years after the release of the September 1945 US Secret Plan to target 66 major Soviet cities with 204 nuclear bombs:

“1949: The Soviet Union denies it, but in the fall, President Harry Truman tells the American public that the Soviets tested their first nuclear device, officially starting the arms race. “We do not advise Americans that doomsday is near and that they can expect atomic bombs to start falling on their heads a month or year from now,” the Bulletin explains. “But we think they have reason to be deeply alarmed and to be prepared for grave decisions.” (Timeline of the Doomsday Clock, Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, 2017)

IMPORTANT: Had the US decided NOT to develop nuclear weapons for use against the Soviet Union, the nuclear arms race would not have taken place. 

Neither The Soviet Union nor the People’s Republic of China would have developed nuclear capabilities as a means of “Deterrence” agains the US which had already formulated plans to annihilate the Soviet Union.

The Soviet Union lost 26 million people during World War II.

The Cold War Era

The Nuclear Arms Race was the direct result of America’s September 1945 plan to “blow up the Soviet Union”, formulated by the US War Department.

The Soviet Union tested its first nuclear bomb in 1949. Without the Manhattan Project and the War Department’s September 15, 1945 “World War III Blueprint”, the Arms Race would not have occurred.

The September 15, 1945 War Department set the stage for numerous plans to wage World War III against Russia and China:

The Cold War List of 1200 Targeted Cities

This initial 1945 list of sixty-six cities was updated in the course of the Cold War (1956) to include some 1200 cities in the USSR and the Soviet block countries of Eastern Europe (see declassified documents below). The bombs slated for use were more powerful in terms of explosive capacity than those dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki....

....During the Cold War, the doctrine of Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD) prevailed, namely that the use of nuclear weapons would result in “the destruction of both the attacker and the defender”.

In the post Cold war era, US nuclear doctrine was redefined.  “Offensive” military actions using nuclear warheads are now described as acts of “self-defense”.

Humanitarian Nuclear Warfare under Joe Biden

 US-NATO led military Interventions (Yugoslavia, Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Syria, Yemen) which have resulted in millions of civilian casualties are heralded as Humanitarian Wars, as a means to ensuring Peace.

This is also the discourse underlying US-NATO intervention in Ukraine.

“I just want you to know that, when we talk about war, we’re really talking about peace” said George W. Bush

“Humanitarian Nuclear Bombs”

This kind of window dressing of “humanitarian nuclear bombs” is not only embedded into Joe Biden’s foreign policy agenda, it constitutes the mainstay of US military doctrine, namely the so-called Nuclear Posture Review, not to mention the 1.2 trillion nuclear weapons program initiated during the Obama administration.

The B61 Mini-nukes Deployed in Western Europe

The latest B61-12 “mini nuke” is slated to be deployed in Western Europe, aimed at Russia and the Middle East (replacing the existing of B61 nuclear bombs).

B-61-12 is portrayed as a “more usable” “low yield” “humanitarian bomb” “‘harmless to civilians”. That’s the ideology. The reality is “Mutual Assured Destruction” (MAD).

The B61-12 has a maximum yield of 50 kilotons which is more than three times that of a Hiroshima bomb (15 kilotons) which resulted in excess of 100,000 deaths in matter of minutes.

If a preemptive attack using a so-called mini nuke were to succeed, targeted against Russia or Iran, this could potentially lead humanity into a WW III scenario. Of course these details are not highlighted in mainstream media reports....

....Low Yield Nukes: Humanitarian Warfare Goes Live

And when the characteristics of this “harmless” low yield nuclear bomb are inserted into the military manuals, “humanitarian warfare” goes live: “It’s low yield and safe for civilians, let’s use it” [paraphrase].

The US arsenal of B61 nuclear bombs directed against the Middle East are currently located in the military bases of 5 non-nuclear states (Italy, Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium, Turkey). The command structure pertaining to the B61-12 is yet to be confirmed. The situation with regard to Turkey’s Incirlik base is unclear....

....Upholding WMDs as Instruments of Peace is a Dangerous Gimmick

Throughout History, “Mistakes” have Played a Key Role 

We are at a Dangerous Crossroads. There is no Real Anti-war Movement in Sight.

Why? Because War is Good for Business!

And the powers of Big Money which are behind US-NATO led wars control both the anti-war movement as well as the media coverage of US led wars. That’s nothing new. It goes back to the so-called Soviet-Afghan War (1979-) which was spearheaded by US National Security Advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski. 

Through their “philanthropic” foundations (Ford, Rockefeller, Soros et al) the financial elites have over the years channelled millions of dollars into financing so-called “progressive movements” including the World Social Forum (WSF)

It’s Called “Manufactured Dissent”: Big Money is also behind numerous coups d’état and color revolutions.

Meanwhile, important sectors of the Left including committed anti-war activists have endorsed the Covid mandates without verifying or acknowledging the facts and the history of the so-called pandemic.

It should be understood that the lockdown policies as well as the Covid-19 “Killer Vaccine” are an integral part of the financial elite’s “broader arsenal”. They are instruments of submission and tyranny. 

The World Economic Forum’s Great Reset is an integral part of  the World War III scenario which consists in establishing through military and non military means an imperial system of  “global governance”.

The same powerful financial interests (Rockefeller, Rothschild, BlackRock, Vanguard, et al) which are supportive of the US-NATO military agenda are firmly behind  the “Covid Pandemic Op”.