Fascist paramilitaries in the protests that brought down Ukraine's government
A politically sinister propaganda offensive is underway in the media to either deny the involvement of fascists in the US-backed coup in Ukraine or present their role as a marginal and insignificant detail.
The
New York Times, for example, asserted, "Putin's claim of an immediate threat to Ukrainian Russians is empty," while Britain's
Guardian dismissed as a "fancy" claims that events in Crimea were an attempt to "prevent attacks by bands of revolutionary fascists," adding that "the world's media has [not] yet seen or heard from" such forces.
This is an obscene cover-up.
The reality is that, for the first time since 1945, an avowedly anti-Semitic, pro-Nazi party controls key levers of state power in a European capital, courtesy of US and European imperialism. The unelected Ukrainian government, headed by US appointee Arseniy Yatsenyuk, includes no fewer than six ministers from the fascist Svoboda party.
Less than a year ago, the World Jewish Congress called for Svoboda to be banned. But the party's founder and leader,
Oleh Tyahnybok, who has spoken repeatedly of his determination to crush the "Russkie-Yid mafia that controls Ukraine," was feted by US and European Union officials as they prepared last month's coup.
Comment: The significance of this article placed today in the New York Times, lies in the fact that this is the first time this week that an establishment media source has pointed out that the Crimea is really much more Russian than Ukrainian and that it has only been part of the Ukraine for sixty years. Taken together with the fact that the U.S. stock market has risen since the sharp drop on Monday at the outset of the latest phase of the crisis, this indicates that the crisis is settling down and that Russia will keep Crimea, the rest of Ukraine will lean towards the west.
There will be a lot of yelling and stamping of feet among the political and media types in the U.S., but the outline of the deal is clear. The western banks will get Ukraine, the IMF will administer the country and impose austerity, and the inevitable "IMF Riot" once the working class in the Ukraine wakes up to how much they have been fooled will be brutally suppressed by fascist thugs in the new government. Russia will get the Crimea and keep naval access to the Black Sea and the Great Game for control of energy resources in Central Asia and the Middle East will continue.