We end today’s show with the first — we are going to talk today about what’s happening in Ukraine. We’re joined right now by two people, by a journalist who’s written extensively in The Intercept, a reporter who’s looked at the role of neo-Nazis in the war. The Ukrainian-born journalist Lev Golinkin is also with us. He recently wrote a piece for The Nation headlined “The Western Media Is Whitewashing the Azov Battalion.” The piece looks at the neo-Nazi roots of one of Ukraine’s most heralded paramilitary forces. Earlier this month, Turkey released five former Azov commanders who were being held in Turkey. They flew back on a plane with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.
Meanwhile, The Intercept recently detailed how an anti-Putin Russian militia that carried out attacks inside Russia in May is led by a neo-Nazi who’s maintained links with American neo-Nazis. That piece was written by Ben Makuch, a national security reporter who used to work as a correspondent for Vice News Tonight. Ben has also just written a new piece for The Intercept about an American Army vet, wanted for murder in the United States, who escaped to Ukraine to fight with the Right Sector, an ultranationalist Ukrainian militia. We’re going to get to that in a moment.
Imagine this was the invasion of Afghanistan by Russia in the 1980s - knowing what you know now about 9-11 would you be just as cavalier about accountability with who the United States were training and supplying?
Putin is an autocrat and Wagner are fascists, but the journalists featured here don’t have any influence in the east. They are doing the right thing by demanding Ukraine be held accountable. Both the journalists have clearly stated whose ‘side’ they’re on, and repudiated Putin’s claims. This is no place for Soviet whataboutism.
Mark my words: The next wave of mass shooters and white supremacist terrorists are being trained with American taxpayer money. If they’re so hard up for support, why don’t they permit anarchist battalions? There are veterans with years of military experience in Kobanî who were eager to fight the invasion, and the Ukrainian MOD delayed and stymied their participation. Yet they’re bending over backwards for people who want to cleanse their society of gay people and minority ethnic groups. Anarchists and communists have already given their lives in the defense of Ukraine. Volodymyr Zelenskyy is not a fascist, but wouldn’t it be a great propaganda coup against Putin’s narrative for Ukraine to fight alongside a modern Abraham Lincoln brigade?
Wow… that doesn’t make any sense.
First, even a passing comparison between Afghanistan and Ukraine is absurd. Just take a quick look at Wikipedia’s demographics page (or like, Britannica, etc.?) for both of them.
Second, the crux of the issue isn’t that these journalists aren’t on “our side,” it’s that we’ve been literally bombarded with these sorts of articles since day one, usually something like: “Sure Ukraine has the lowest rate of antisemitism in Eastern Europe, and its far-right political parties have less seats proportionally than the AfD or RN, but here are some marginal dudes who are undoubtedly nazis, localized entirely in places that have no political power.” A lot of these articles are predicated on the patronizing idea that Ukrainian society has no agency and that (justified) American political anxieties about the far-right can be neatly mapped onto Ukraine. I mean, just look at this quote from the article:
LEV GOLINKIN: Yeah. It’s pretty insane that every time Marjorie Taylor Greene sneezes, it’s the second coming of Hitler, and yet here we have two brigades — brigades — of neo-Nazis, and we’re perfectly fine with it.There isn’t an Enabling Act lurking somewhere in the ~4% of far-right Ukrainian voters, just waiting to pounce when us soft Westerners let our guards down. Nor is there some far-right putsch hiding in the perhaps 10k (if you squeeze it) far-right-aligned soldiers out of the 700k soldiers in the army. Because Azov isn’t some rogue militia farming poppy to buy RPGs, it now answers to an elected government with effective control of the armed forces. In a liberalizing society. That launched a revolution against an authoritarian government. Specifically so that it could join the EU.
Lastly, there literally are anarchists groups fighting for Ukraine, just not as a government-sanctioned militia. Most of them take inspiration from Nestor Makhno! As for the Kobanî, just look at their Wikipedia sidebar. Ukraine is fighting for its life and Turkey’s a strategic ally! Knowing how they go apeshit over every issue related to: burning Qurans, Aegean islands with Greeks on them, and the YPG especially, you can’t reasonably blame Ukraine for refusing their support.
The fascists are literally dipping bullets in pig’s blood. Why isn’t Ukraine concerned about losing Turkey as a strategic ally by making heroes out of crusaders, but a situation where there would be less soldiers to check Erdogan’s southern ambitions is going to make him throw away all that Bayraktar money.
If they’re such a minor element of Ukrainian society, why can’t they disband the battalions? You can’t have it both ways. You’re right, it’s not Afghanistan; Ukraine aspiring to EU status makes the threat worse.
Dipping bullets in pig’s blood doesn’t make entire battalions fascist. Even if the Twitter videos are true (why do you think this is?) you wouldn’t fire everyone involved. You’d have to investigate all the members of those units, a process that would cripple morale across the military and play directly into Putin’s propaganda that he’s invading Ukraine to get rid of its neo-Nazis.
Why not wait until after the war is won and then investigate? The problem isn’t going anywhere and it won’t matter at all if Ukraine loses, since everyone involved will be dead at that point anyway.
This isn’t some random twitter user; it was posted by the National Guard of Ukraine, and officially identified as an Azov soldier. It’s a pretty fucking fascist thing to do, but if you think this is the first and only indication that Azov is fascist, you haven’t been paying attention. I bring it up because it’s one of the many ways Azov is undermining resistance against Putin’s fascists by creating propaganda that can be used to alienate Ukraine’s Muslim allies.