onthebrynk

As we approach the anniversary of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, it continues to be really hard to find out what is going on ‘on the ground’. Not long ago we were hearing that the Russian military machine had stalled and that Ukrainian forces would be building on successes to put their opponents under increasing pressure. Some journalists were even talking of a Ukrainian victory.

Now we are hearing that Russia, on the back of a vast re mobilisation, is about to push again and President Zelensky is doing the international rounds asking / begging for more military hardware and seeking to bolster a Western support that he is concerned is flagging.

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Following the recent blogsite post ‘We are not trying to help Ukraine but rather to fight Russia’, which focussed on an analysis of the military situation in Ukraine provided by Col. Jacques Baud, the following questions were posed by my friend Andrew, a supportive onthebrynker:

‘I ask myself whether the west’s seeming provocation of Russia to the point of precipitating war was deliberate, reckless, or incompetent. It’s hard to think that such carnage and devastation is in anybody’s interests but perhaps it is.

And why are “we” (the west) wanting to fight Russia as opposed to helping Ukraine? I suppose I half know the answer to that given that western governments are in hock to big money and all that goes with it. But I still find myself wondering why!’

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As a non-military theory type and someone who is naturally sceptical of media reports from one side in any war, I have struggled to understand what has actually been going on ‘on the ground’ in The Ukraine. Which is where Jacques Baud and his article ‘The Military Situation in The Ukraine’ comes in.

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Like all of us I suspect I felt sick in the stomach on Friday 25^th February as news came through of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. I felt sick because of what we all know about war: it kills and injures people – combatants and civilians, men, women and children; it tends to take on a life of its own beyond any initial aims; it destroys homes and infrastructure; it often displaces large numbers of people; it impoverishes and degrades lives; and it fuels hate and thoughts of revenge which can fester for years and years.

I met a very dear friend in town that morning – I had wanted to discuss Kier Starmer’s vilification of the Stop the War Coalition and the implications of this for continuing Labour Party membership. This now seemed like a bit of an irrelevance as we sat in silence not knowing what to say about the war.

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onthebrynk apologises unreservedly for misinforming

You know how it is. There you are kicking back after a difficult job achieved – a potentially controversial blog posted and positive responses received. Then the mobile pings and there, right in your face on a whatsapp video call is the Head of Legal.

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Following the post entitled ‘Who is the massive turd Guardian?’ I received the following barrage of questions from a good friend:

What is going on here as far as the much-lambasted Guardian is concerned?  Is there some kind of conspiracy? and if so, how does that work? Or is it sloppiness or laziness on the part of The Guardian and its contributors? Or some kind of malice? Or just crap judgment?

Is there some kind of monolithic control at the top of the Guardian, willfully distorting and slandering because of some shared agenda? And requiring adherence throughout the organisation?

Phew! That’ll teach me to post in a ‘red mist’.

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Most of us, I imagine are Guardian readers.

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This Land, The story of a movement

Owen Jones (2020) Allen Lane

It is a year since Boris Johnson’s Tory Party won the 2019 general election with an 80 seat majority – a ‘landslide’ for the Right and a ‘disaster’ for the Left. In our current covid crisis this all feels a long time ago and rather difficult to think about – but the consequences of the defeat will be with us for a long time and so this seems like an appropriate time to review a book that covers the Left’s leadership of the Labour Party in the five years preceding this.

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