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My attitude to the Ukrainian question is guided by Lenin and Liebknecht in WWI. When the war broke out, neither got hung up on the question of who was the agressor or who fired the first shot. It was a conflict between rival imperialists. This seems to me the case today, even though the US/EU are acting aggressively, and Russia more defensively. There is no longer any question about Russia being a "workers' state", and neither is it an underdeveloped country being victimized by the West. It is another capitalist-imperialist power, and our attitude should therefore be "a pox on both your houses". The only principled question here is the self-determination of Crimea. Criimea was never a part of Ukraine historically, and it seems to me that its people should be free to determine their own national affiliations. I don't think the outcome of the referendum being held this weekend will be any different because of the presence of Russian troops than without them. The troops do guaraantee, however, that such a refrerendum will take place, which would not be likely if Kiev had its way. I also think Lenin's revolutionary defeatism, and Liebknecht's slogan, "The main enemy is at home!" are relevant here. These slogans were meant to ensure that anti-war socialists of the time did not proclaim their neutrality in the war while at the same time tilting toward their own bourgeoisie. The tilt, L & L were saying, should have been in the other direction. Without siding with Russia (and without making any facile comparisons to WWI), we should view our main responsibility as leftists and socialists as countering the anti-Russian propaganda campaign being waged by our own government and its Western European partners.I'm uncomfortable with the views of those who tend to concentrate their fire on Russia and Putin out of some misbegotten faith in the "masses" of Maidan. There is no Ukrainian left to speak of. Whatever tensions may exist within the liberal-fascist coalition of Kiev, it is serving as the internal agent of a US/EU attempt to rip off Ukraine for the IMF and NATO. (An d I'm not saying this out of some "mandarin" disdain for the "masses", but rather because there are many situations in which people in the streets figure less significantly in the outcome than the machinations of big powers; this, IMO, is one such situation) Russia shouldn't dominate Ukraine either. But those whose main thrust is to denounce Russian imperialism come dangerously close to echoing the propaganda of their own ruling class. Jim Creegan ________________________________________________ Send list submissions to: Marxism@greenhouse.economics.utah.edu Set your options at: http://greenhouse.economics.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
