5 ms·

A Letter to the Western Left from Kyiv

20 points by walden789 5y ago

throwaway4good 5y ago
Had it no been for the strategic pivot to Asia containment policy of China, that have created a de facto China Russia alliance, then Russia likely would have assessed the cost of invading Ukraine too high.
avs733 5y ago
I’ve seen this narrative start to pop up a lot attacking “the left” about the Ukraine situation. The odd part is I have yet to say anyone saying the things that they are told they should stop saying. This all seems like a really aggressive attempt to preemptively narrow one side of the window of acceptable discourse.
- walden789 5y ago
  It has nothing to do with a general attack on "the left". Bilous himself is a leftist. The point is criticizing a specific part of the western left which understands itself as anti-imperalist but by fully concentrating on the west and NATO totally lost sight of quite real non-western imperalism which manifests itself in Ukraine right now.
  - fmajid 5y ago
    Reminds me of the late socialist former president of France François Mitterrand: "The anti-nuclear protesters are in the West, and the missiles in the East".
  - avs733 5y ago
    >The point is criticizing a specific part of the western left My point wasn't about who said it or what they are referring to...I'm clear on that. My point was I keep seeing critiques of a position I do not see actually existing in discourse. It seems like, since this started, there has been a concerted effort to attack a strawman. 'Focus' is such a strange thing to critique and just rings hollow. I really honestly haven't experienced anyone who talks about just western imperialism...maybe I'm blind and naive here but the fact that this is suddenly a critique is really sketchy to me.
iso1210 5y ago
In the UK the only people backing Russia publiclly were obviously Nigel 'Oswald' Farage, but also Corbyn and co. Corbyn (who led the main opposition party from 2015-2019, nearly becoming PM in 2017, and then falling to a massive wipeout in 2019) has already been fired from Labour, but his "gang" were all there queueing up to worship Putin until they were bluntly told they'd be sacked. https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/labour-labour-mps-mps-stop-the-war-coalition-claudia-webbe-b2022770.html https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/labour-labour... The Stop The War coalition was formed to stop the west attacking Afghanistan and reached its height with Iraq, a reasonable view point. Turns out that it's not Putin's fault Russia invaded, it's all America's fault. Probably Tony Blair too for some reason.
ykevinator2 5y ago
I don't follow, left good or left bad?
- dekhn 5y ago
  no, blogpost bad.

20 points by walden789 5y ago

Had it no been for the strategic pivot to Asia containment policy of China, that have created a de facto China Russia alliance, then Russia likely would have assessed the cost of invading Ukraine too high.

avs733 5y ago

I’ve seen this narrative start to pop up a lot attacking “the left” about the Ukraine situation. The odd part is I have yet to say anyone saying the things that they are told they should stop saying. This all seems like a really aggressive attempt to preemptively narrow one side of the window of acceptable discourse.

walden789 5y ago
It has nothing to do with a general attack on "the left". Bilous himself is a leftist. The point is criticizing a specific part of the western left which understands itself as anti-imperalist but by fully concentrating on the west and NATO totally lost sight of quite real non-western imperalism which manifests itself in Ukraine right now.
- fmajid 5y ago
  Reminds me of the late socialist former president of France François Mitterrand: "The anti-nuclear protesters are in the West, and the missiles in the East".
- avs733 5y ago
  >The point is criticizing a specific part of the western left My point wasn't about who said it or what they are referring to...I'm clear on that. My point was I keep seeing critiques of a position I do not see actually existing in discourse. It seems like, since this started, there has been a concerted effort to attack a strawman. 'Focus' is such a strange thing to critique and just rings hollow. I really honestly haven't experienced anyone who talks about just western imperialism...maybe I'm blind and naive here but the fact that this is suddenly a critique is really sketchy to me.

iso1210 5y ago

In the UK the only people backing Russia publiclly were obviously Nigel 'Oswald' Farage, but also Corbyn and co. Corbyn (who led the main opposition party from 2015-2019, nearly becoming PM in 2017, and then falling to a massive wipeout in 2019) has already been fired from Labour, but his "gang" were all there queueing up to worship Putin until they were bluntly told they'd be sacked. https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/labour-labour-mps-mps-stop-the-war-coalition-claudia-webbe-b2022770.html https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/labour-labour... The Stop The War coalition was formed to stop the west attacking Afghanistan and reached its height with Iraq, a reasonable view point. Turns out that it's not Putin's fault Russia invaded, it's all America's fault. Probably Tony Blair too for some reason.

ykevinator2 5y ago

I don't follow, left good or left bad?

dekhn 5y ago
no, blogpost bad.