UK MEDIA DEMONIZING RUSSIA AS ‘GUILTY’ OF DARING TO RESIST US EMPIRE
February 19, 2015 12:44
The demonization of Vladimir Putin and Russia by the British political
establishment and media has never been as intense as in the wake of
the recent Ukraine peace talks in Minsk, Russia Today reports.
STEPANAKERT, FEBRUARY 19, ARTSAKHPRESS: Rather than preparing British
public opinion for peace and a negotiated settlement to a conflict
which thus far has cost the lives of over 5,000 people and seen over
a million displaced, the opposite has been evident: British public
opinion is being prepared for a continuation and intensification of
the conflict. The characterization of the Russian leader has been so
off the scale it is hard to imagine anyone being naïve enough to take
it seriously.
When he’s not being compared to Hitler, an especially offensive
caricature for historical reasons, he is being accused of harboring
ambitions of forging a ‘Russian Empire.’ That such accusations stem
from a nation whose government has played a key part in reducing
Afghanistan, Iraq, and Libya to a state of chaos in recent years,
a consequence of the UK’s attachment to Washington’s brutal and
disastrous assault on the Arab and Muslim world, only makes them all
the more hypocritical if not downright noxious. But then this should
come as no surprise, as we’ve been here before, haven’t we? Remember
when Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez was being similarly demonized and held
up as a dictator? His crime when he came to power and remained there
on the back of numerous democratic elections was his refusal to allow
Venezuela’s wealth to continue to be shipped out of the country, as it
had been for decades, by a small group of Western-supported oligarchs.
What the crisis and conflict in Ukraine has done is remind us that
we live in a unipolar world in which the West’s interests and rights
are the only ones deemed legitimate. This is what drives the repeated
attempts by Washington and its allies, especially the UK, to push a
hegemonic agenda. And whether in the Middle East or in Europe, it is
this agenda that has been the root cause of instability, conflict,
and human suffering across the world that we have seen unfold in
recent times. And this is without taking into account the decades of
mayhem that has ensued before that. The US is a global hegemony. With
over 1,000 military bases covering the planet, 11 navy battle carrier
groups, and a military budget currently exceeding that of every other
major industrialized nation combined, the challenge facing the world
is how to resist a US Empire that, to paraphrase the Roman historian
Tacitus, is intent on making a desert and calling it peace.
The British political class and its media allies have made a virtue out
of attaching themselves to the US Empire’s coattails. It is a sordid
and eminently dishonorable relationship that has allowed the UK to
parade itself as a first rate power when in truth it hardly qualifies
as third rate. While Britain may no longer have an empire, an empire
attitude towards the rest of the world continues to poison the minds
of its leaders and proponents of the ideology of ‘democratization’,
which is not to be confused with democracy.
Vladimir Putin and Russia’s crime is to dare to resist this US
Empire, taking a stand against the hypocrisy, double standards, and
complete lack of respect for other countries, cultures, and values
it represents. The concerted attempt to expand NATO and an ever more
militant EU all the way up to Russia’s border has nothing to do with
democracy and everything to do with the projection of imperial power
masquerading as democracy. An escalation of the conflict in eastern
Ukraine benefits no one, least of all Russia. But the principle at
stake is one that must be upheld – namely an end to the West dictating
orders to the rest of the world and thereby spreading destabilization
rather than peace, war instead of peace, and chaos at the expense
of order.
At some point a viable political solution to the Ukrainian crisis
will have to be agreed. But only equals can reach such an agreement,
which will require an end to the infantile Russophobia that has become
a feature of political discourse in the UK. Russia is not an enemy
of the British people. The irresponsible and reckless disregard for
European stability based on mutual respect is. The UK has long been
the cat’s paw of Washington within Europe. When the US sneezes it
is ready with a handkerchief to blow its nose. In fact it would be
more apt to replace the word ‘alliance’ in Atlantic Alliance with
‘dependence.’ Meanwhile, when it comes to the British press, the
poet Humbert Wolfe said it best: “You cannot hope to bribe or twist,
thank God, the British journalist. But, seeing what the man will do
unbribed, there’s no occasion to.”
http://artsakhpress.am/eng/news/12725/uk-media-demonizing-russia-as-%E2%80%98guilty%E2%80%99-of-daring-to-resist-us-empire.html