Ukraine: To The Edge

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“If you want to talk about a nation that could pose an existential threat to the United States, I’d have to point to Russia. And if you look at their behavior, it’s nothing short of alarming.”

Gen. Joseph F. Dunford Jr. Chair U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff



“This is not about Ukraine. Putin wants to restore Russia to its former position as a great power. There is a high probability that he will intervene in the Baltics to test NATO’s Article 5.”

Anders Fogh Rassmusen, former head of NATO

It is not just defense secretaries and generals employing language that conjure up the ghosts of the past. Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton used a “Munich” analogy in reference to Russian President Vladimir Putin, and a common New York Times description of Russia is “revanchist.” These two terms take the Ukraine crisis back to 1938, when fascist Germany menaced the world.

Yet comparing the civil war in the Ukraine to the Cold War—let alone Europe on the eve of World War II—has little basis in fact. Yes, Russia is certainly aiding insurgents in eastern Ukraine, but there is no evidence that Moscow is threatening the Baltics, or even the rest of Ukraine. Indeed, it is the West that has been steadily marching east over the past decade, recruiting one former Russian ally or republic after another into the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO).

https://dispatchesfromtheedgeblog.wordpress.com/2015/07/28/ukraine-to-the-edge/

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1. How the US can respond to Russia's propaganda

In the parallel universe of Russian propaganda, Ukraine is overrun by fascists, the Central Intelligence Agency shot down Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 over Donbass and Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) dictates who serves as Ukraine's minister of agriculture. Well-financed pro-Kremlin media regularly feed gross distortions and downright fabrications to the Russian public, Russian speakers in neighboring countries and people around the world. This propaganda is a direct assault on democratic values and deeply harms U.S. interests. It merits a strong and effective response.

The self-serving narratives on Russian broadcasting crowd out factual reporting and challenge the very idea of balanced, impartial news coverage. They build support for Russia's annexation of Crimea and aggression in eastern Ukraine and fuel hostility toward the United States and European Union.

The United States, along with its European allies, needs to respond to Russia's "information war" less with a focus on countering Russian propaganda than on building attractive alternatives. The U.S. and EU member governments should be cautious about blocking Russian broadcasts. And while they step up their own broadcasting — for instance, by Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) — their main challenge is to compete more effectively for audiences.

Reform of U.S. government-backed broadcasting, as House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Ed Royce (R-Calif.) and Ranking Member Eliot Engel (D-N.Y.) have proposed, is greatly needed and long overdue. But it is not enough.

http://thehill.com/blogs/pundits-blog/international/249426-how-the-us-can-respond-to-russias-propaganda

[dixiegrrrrl]

2. Now that we are on good terms with Iran

we need all the excuses to continue building armaments that we can.
Luckily...there is Putin.

[KoKo]

3. Thanks for the post...

I've been worried about Dunford replacing Dempsey.

I don't know that either one is better than the other ....but the bleatings from Dunford are so WARLIKE....I'm very concerned about the replacement. Although, under Dempsey, we had Kerry raving on about "Striking Syria because the RED LINE had been crossed." That he pulled back from that was interesting. I remember Ray McGovern and others thinking that Dempsey was their "Good Guy" who would keep from escalating war in the ME with bombing Syria

But then, everything Over There is so OTT these days I can't keep ahead of the SPIN, DECEPTION and DECEIT!

I'm probably the only one here on DU who thinks this way these days.

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4. Don't pay too much attention to what they say.

People will say anything to get their way.