By Natylie Baldwin, OpEd News, 11/16/21

On October 18th, Russia announced it would formally suspend its mission with the NATO alliance, including ending official communication. This is a significant event but not totally shocking to anyone who has been paying attention to post-Soviet Russian relations with NATO.  It’s important to look at what led up to Russia deciding it had enough and that it was no longer worth having an official relationship with the western military alliance as there is a lengthy historical context to the breakdown.

NATO had just expelled eight Russian diplomats for espionage activities but provided no public evidence or details on these serious allegations.  But this was just the immediate event that provided the proverbial straw that broke the camel’s back. 

Post-Cold War Triumphalism

The problem started with the triumphalist attitude that eventually prevailed in Washington after the end of the Cold War.  President Ronald Reagan intentionally took the approach during negotiations with Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev that ended the Cold War that doing so would be in the interests of both countries.  It was characterized at the time as a negotiated settlement that benefited all parties involved and not a defeat.  Reagan’s successor George H.W. Bush adopted the same attitude until it was time to campaign for his reelection, during which he bragged that the U.S. had won the Cold War. 

In the 1990’s, the Clinton administration, encouraged by foreign policy hawks,  greedy defense contractors and domestic reelection politics, expanded NATO to former Warsaw Pact countries Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic.  This was a violation of verbal assurances given by U.S. Secretary of State James Baker, along with other western government officials, during 1991 negotiations with Gorbachev that NATO would not expand “one inch eastward.”  This assurance was made in order to get Gorbachev to accept a unified Germany in NATO given the deep historical memory of the Germans having invaded Russia twice in the 20^th century, the second time resulting in 27 million deaths and destruction of a third of the Soviet Union.  But NATO didn’t stop there and expanded by seven more countries, right up to Russia’s border, by 2004.   

It’s also worth mentioning that the NATO-Russia relationship as it was formulated in 2002 in the form of the NATO-Russia Council was never intended to be a vehicle that would allow Russia to be treated as a respected peer.  Instead it was largely a pretense as admitted by those who came up with the idea, which included then British Prime Minister Tony Blair. As one of Blair’s aides later stated, “even if they [Russia] weren’t really a superpower anymore, you had to pretend they were.”  Russia had a permanent ambassador to NATO and could theoretically participate in NATO discussions, but Moscow complained for years that they were often excluded from informal discussions prior to official meetings and would consequently face a coordinated bloc.

That same year, under George W. Bush, the U.S. unilaterally withdrew from the Antiballistic Missile Treaty – a move Russia viewed as a threat to strategic nuclear stability and a desire by the U.S. to pursue a first strike advantage.  Likewise, the U.S. unilaterally withdrew from the Intermediate Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty in 2018, a decision made by president Donald Trump whom we were supposed to believe was a Russian puppet.  Problems with the INF Treaty had, however, been building for some time and it wasn’t just accusations of Moscow violating the treaty with a certain type of cruise missile.  Starting in 2009, the Obama administration approved the installation of a missile defense system in Romania and then Poland that was a violation of the INF Treaty and was a serious concern to Russia.

In 2014, Washington played a key role in the Ukraine coup when then-Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs Victoria Nuland was caught on a phone call with the U.S. ambassador to Ukraine discussing how to facilitate the removal of the corrupt but democratically elected government of Viktor Yanukovich and install their favored candidate as Prime Minister, Arseniy Yatsenyuk.  It’s very interesting that their desired turn of events actually came to pass.  This was clearly either a provocation or represented profound ignorance of the region by the U.S. State Department.  The latter is a very generous interpretation given the fact that Nuland – a Neoconservative ideologue – was taking the lead on Ukraine.

Washington and NATO Double Down

In the aftermath of Russia’s severing of ties, the U.S. and NATO have doubled down on provocative activities rather than used the rupture as an opportunity for self-examination or an attempt to come up with fresh ideas to slow the spiraling relationship between major nuclear powers. Within the same week, U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin told audiences on his whirlwind trip to Georgia, Ukraine and Romania that the Black Sea was a U.S./NATO military interest.  The U.S. subsequently sent two warships into the Black Sea early this month and members of Congress are now urging the Biden administration to ramp up military support to the area.  Austin also stated that Russia should have nothing to say about whether Ukraine joins NATO or not.  Within days of Austin’s trip, a conference of NATO defense ministers in Brussels revealed a new “master plan to contain Russia.”

As I have argued before, it would not be in Russia’s interests to attack the Baltic countries and it would not pass any remotely rational cost-benefit analysis.  Moreover, military action by Russia in the post-Soviet era has been reactive in nature rather than aggressive.  Its action in Georgia in 2008 was a response to a military attack by Tbilisi on Russian troops in South Ossetia according to the 2009 EU Fact Finding Mission report, and the annexation of Crimea was a unique situation that resulted from Moscow’s genuine perception of a serious national security threat.  NATO officials even admit that they do not think any attack is planned by Moscow on its neighbors.  As Reuters has reported:  “Officials stress that they do not believe any Russian attack is imminent.”

But this didn’t stop the German defense minister from pouring fuel on the fire by stating in an interview around the same time that NATO should make clear that it is willing to use military force, including nuclear weapons, to deter Russia from attacking not just members of the alliance but partners.  Needless to say, this was viewed as very disturbing by Moscow.

It would appear that from Russia’s perspective there has been little to no benefit from the arrangement it had been working under with NATO for the past two decades.  The U.S., which effectively controls NATO, still seems to be suffering from its bout of post- Cold War triumphalism and continues to think that it can treat Russia as a bugaboo to justify bloated military budgets and as a whipping boy diversion from its domestic political problems.  At the same time, U.S./NATO not only expects Russia to act as though it has no national security interests of its own to protect but is also obligated to provide diplomatic cooperation with the west when convenient, such as with Afghanistan and negotiations on the Iran nuclear deal.  It’s no surprise that Russia finally felt it was time to put its foot down.

By Anatol Lieven, The Nation, 11/13/21

…Between independence in 1991 and the revolution in 2014, Ukraine was evenly balanced between supporters of an ethnic version of Ukrainian identity in the country’s western and central regions, and supporters of a civic version (with a strong guaranteed role for the Russian language and culture) in the east and south. The events of 2014, and the conflict with Russia that followed, have led to a situation in which ethnic nationalists (with Western backing) dominate national politics in Kiev. However, their program remains highly unpopular in the Russian-speaking areas and is overwhelmingly rejected in the Donbas.

To bring about a peace settlement, it is necessary to eliminate or discount the factors that brought about a failure of the Minsk II agreement. Chief among these is Ukraine’s refusal to guarantee permanent full autonomy for the Donbas. The main reason for this refusal, apart from a general commitment to retain centralized power in Kiev, has been the belief that permanent autonomy for the Donbas would prevent Ukraine from joining NATO and the European Union, as the region could use its constitutional position within Ukraine to block membership. The official US commitment to eventual Ukrainian NATO membership—however empty in real terms—has in turn inhibited the United States from playing a positive role in resolving the conflict.

These Ukrainian and American arguments are, however, a classic case of circular reasoning: So long as Ukraine is involved in a territorial conflict, it will never be invited to join NATO and the EU. Nor should it be. Even if a US administration were prepared to take such a risk, Germany and France would certainly veto it. And there is no way to solve this conflict on Ukrainian terms without victory in a war against Russia, which is impossible. Realistically speaking, Minsk II’s basic terms—an end to the war and autonomy for the Donbas within Ukraine—are the best deal that Ukraine is ever going to get.

If the United States drops the hopeless goal of NATO membership for Ukraine, it will be in a position to pressure the Ukrainian government and parliament to agree to a “Minsk III” by the credible threat of a withdrawal of US aid and political support. And if Moscow were to reject or sabotage this agreement, or permit the Donbas separatists to do so, then all existing Western sanctions against Russia related to the Donbas and Crimean disputes should not only remain in place but be greatly intensified.

The United States ought to promote the following main terms for a settlement:

§ A Ukrainian constitutional amendment establishing the Donbas region as an autonomous republic within Ukraine (including those parts of the Donetsk and Luhansk provinces currently controlled by Ukraine); and

§ A constitution for the Donbas Autonomous Republic (including its constitutional relationship with Ukrainian national institutions in Kiev) to be submitted to the people of Donetsk and Luhansk in a referendum supervised and monitored by the UN and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe.

If a majority of voters in the Donbas oppose the constitutional amendment, then they will have chosen to remain within Ukraine under its present unitary constitution. But in the likely event of approval in the referendum, the amendment would then be submitted to the Ukrainian parliament. If the parliament rejected it, a new internationally supervised referendum would be held giving the people of the region a straight choice between rejoining a unitary Ukraine and becoming independent, with a future option to join the Russian Federation.

It should be noted, however, that annexation is not Russia’s preferred option for the future of the region. Moscow could have annexed the Donbas (as it did Crimea) at any time during the past seven years but has refrained from doing so. Moscow is determined to defend the Donbas against any attempt at Ukrainian reconquest; but for good political and strategic reasons, it would much prefer that the Donbas remain a pro-Russian autonomous part of Ukraine. However, if Ukraine launches a new war, annexation will certainly follow, leading to a new crisis in Russia’s relations with the West.

In order to secure the establishment and maintenance of autonomy, the referendum on autonomy and the establishment of a regional government under the Ukrainian constitution must come before Ukraine takes control of the border with Russia. The police and courts in the Donbas Autonomous Republic would come under the regional government. Military security would be provided by a UN peacekeeping force drawn from neutral countries outside Europe and established as part of a Security Council resolution in support of the peace settlement. US and NATO forces would not be included, nor would Russian forces or those of countries allied to Russia. This peacekeeping force would also supervise and certify the disarmament of the existing separatist armed forces, the withdrawal of all Russian forces, and the withdrawal of the Ukrainian armed forces from their present positions in Donetsk and Luhansk.

The United States, of course, has a federal system, as do Canada, Australia, Germany, Italy, Switzerland, Belgium, India, and South Africa. There can thus be no objection from democratic principle to a federal system for Ukraine, or to special autonomy for the Donbas. Given the vast differences in language and culture between different parts of Ukraine, a federal constitution would seem the best political system for the country as a whole. Failing that, “asymmetric federations,” in which certain regions enjoy special status or one autonomous region exists in an otherwise unitary state, are also an accepted part of certain democracies…

Read full article here.

By James Dawes, The Conversation

Autonomous weapon systems – commonly known as killer robots – may have killed human beings for the first time ever last year, according to a recent United Nations Security Council report on the Libyan civil war. History could well identify this as the starting point of the next major arms race, one that has the potential to be humanity’s final one.

Autonomous weapon systems are robots with lethal weapons that can operate independently, selecting and attacking targets without a human weighing in on those decisions. Militaries around the world are investing heavily in autonomous weapons research and development. The U.S. alone budgeted US$18 billion for autonomous weapons between 2016 and 2020.

Meanwhile, human rights and humanitarian organizations are racing to establish regulations and prohibitions on such weapons development. Without such checks, foreign policy experts warn that disruptive autonomous weapons technologies will dangerously destabilize current nuclear strategies, both because they could radically change perceptions of strategic dominance, increasing the risk of preemptive attacks, and because they could become combined with chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear weapons themselves.

As a specialist in human rights with a focus on the weaponization of artificial intelligence, I find that autonomous weapons make the unsteady balances and fragmented safeguards of the nuclear world – for example, the U.S. president’s minimally constrained authority to launch a strike – more unsteady and more fragmented.

I see four primary dangers with autonomous weapons. The first is the problem of misidentification. When selecting a target, will autonomous weapons be able to distinguish between hostile soldiers and 12-year-olds playing with toy guns? Between civilians fleeing a conflict site and insurgents making a tactical retreat?

The problem here is not that machines will make such errors and humans won’t. It’s that the difference between human error and algorithmic error is like the difference between mailing a letter and tweeting. The scale, scope and speed of killer robot systems – ruled by one targeting algorithm, deployed across an entire continent – could make misidentifications by individual humans like a recent U.S. drone strike in Afghanistan seem like mere rounding errors by comparison.

Autonomous weapons expert Paul Scharre uses the metaphor of the runaway gun to explain the difference. A runaway gun is a defective machine gun that continues to fire after a trigger is released. The gun continues to fire until ammunition is depleted because, so to speak, the gun does not know it is making an error. Runaway guns are extremely dangerous, but fortunately they have human operators who can break the ammunition link or try to point the weapon in a safe direction. Autonomous weapons, by definition, have no such safeguard.

Importantly, weaponized AI need not even be defective to produce the runaway gun effect. As multiple studies on algorithmic errors across industries have shown, the very best algorithms – operating as designed – can generate internally correct outcomes that nonetheless spread terrible errors rapidly across populations.

Read full article here.

As an American who follows the political and cultural scene here and as someone who writes on Russia, I read Putin’s recent comments on western culture at the Valdai Conference with particular interest. My thoughts are that, overall, I think Putin made some interesting observations about the changes in culture that are going on in the west. However, I would argue that his understanding of the dynamics of what is going on culturally – particularly in the U.S. – is actually somewhat superficial and decontextualized. I found it interesting that he did not make a connection between these cultural phenomena and the elite interests and inequality that he mentioned earlier in his speech.

The US is in decline, not only on the world stage but in terms of the standard of living and stability that it offers its own citizens.  The elites who have benefited from decades of neoliberal economic policies, consequently gobbling up even more wealth at the expense of the majority, obviously don’t have any interest in that majority successfully organizing for policy changes that would improve their material well-being.  It is in the elites’ interest therefore to keep the majority divided and distracted by using elite institutions to encourage a preoccupation with sex (including deviance and pornography) and immersion in gadgets as well as infighting over cultural wedge issues that have become more extreme over time.  A number of these controversial policies represent the views of academics ensconced in their ivory towers with little connection to regular people in the real world.  Interestingly, their bright ideas of progress don’t always align with the views of the groups on whose behalf they claim to be advocating.  For example, the term “Latinx” was coined and is used primarily by the academic community and mainstream media in the U.S., but is very unpopular among Americans of Latin or Spanish descent. 

The mainstream media and social media platforms in the U.S. do their part to keep the pot stirred by giving disproportionate attention to sensationalist issues and not allowing a balanced and nuanced debate on controversial policies.. A small but vocal group of people – usually consisting of obscure academics, media personalities and self-appointed activists – will put pressure on those who express opinions that don’t conform to their dictums about what is correct.  Some of those who have been targeted in such a way have lost their jobs, been doxxed or stigmatized out of the public conversation. This is antithetical to the traditionally liberal values of free speech and confidence that one’s ideas are valid enough to withstand debate.

People who want to see a balanced and reasoned exchange of ideas increasingly have to go out of their way to find independent left or conservative media who give voices to people who have been tarred as deviating from the politically correct “liberal” position on a given topic.  As someone who generally considers myself an independent leftist, I want to see a range of views presented and debated. I have sometimes gained a richer insight on topics from hearing views I don’t necessarily agree with and I can at least walk away with a better understanding of why someone I disagree with sees the world the way they do, which is valuable and contributes to empathy. This is the same reason I have found value in friendships with people over the years that I had political and religious differences with. How stunted would my growth as a person have been if I had only ever associated with people I agree with on everything?

But in today’s cultural environment, I often find that when one is actually allowed to hear what these supposed heretics of “liberal” orthodoxy have to say, it turns out to simply be a more nuanced view or an acknowledgment that there may still be many aspects of an issue that are as yet unknown.  Putin uses the topic of gender as an example of the troubling trends in US/western culture. A good example on this topic recently involved Dr. Lisa Littman, a scientist who specializes in research on this subject  She received major backlash for reporting on her findings regarding the sudden change in the age and sex of gender dysphoric people in recent years and the long-term complicated effects of gender transition among teenagers. 

(We’ve seen similar censorship and shaming of qualified doctors and scientists who report findings that don’t totally agree with the rigid establishment view surrounding the Covid pandemic response.) 

With respect to transgender issues, which took off in terms of cultural prominence around 2015 after the US Supreme Court ruled that same sex couples have a constitutional right to marry, a couple of points are worth noting. First, most minority groups have to build momentum for their cause for years or even decades before they get any traction and realize their political and/or legal goals. Second transgender people have historically composed a very small percentage of the population even counting for underestimation due to taboos. It does make me wonder why this particular group is seeing such vocal prominence given to their struggle so quickly.

Meanwhile, increasing poverty, worsening health and the collapse of small business continues on – affecting far more people than transgender issues – with politicians talking big to get voter support but caving to their elite donors at the moment of truth.  President Joe Biden chose not to fight for a $15 an hour minimum wage within weeks of taking office (a figure which now represents a poverty wage in most American cities with astronomically  unaffordable housing prices).  Free community college, paid family leave and lower drug prices won’t be in the much ballyhooed legislative bill after all.  But, hey, you can still get your daily 15 minutes of hate against your neighbor by watching FOX or MSNBC before you go back to online porn or shouting intolerant outrage on Twitter.  I would argue that the elites are perfectly content with this arrangement as it keeps the masses pacified while their shenanigans remain out of focus.

I think a lot of people grasp that this seems to be a look-over-there-while-I-pick-your-pocket-over-here stunt. Political and cultural liberalism in the US today is not only being used as a form of distraction, it is a very different animal from that of the New Deal era through the 1970’s. It has become more authoritarian, supporting illiberal means for supposed liberal ends.  It is also eating its own as transgender activists butt heads with feminists and gay rights advocates, people of color don’t embrace the latest terms cooked up for them by out-of-touch elite academics, and the working class is ignored and looked down upon.  The liberal label seems to have become less attractive, especially to younger people in the U.S. who are increasingly identifying themselves as independent or democratic socialist.  

I find it interesting that many opinions and analyses I’ve read of Putin’s speech – even by people I consider to be reasonable commentators on the subject of Russia – accept the idea that the policies and trends that Putin is critiquing actually represent genuine liberalism or progress.  The implication often seems to be that Putin and the Russian government may not be able to hold this back, that these attitudes and policies are an inevitability for an advanced and successful nation.  I’m not sure that is at all clear and I’m wondering if they are missing the larger point – that some of these trends, the way they are currently being handled as discussed above, do not represent true liberalism.  Moreover, change is not necessarily a good in and of itself but discernment should be used when determining whether change is constructive and should be embraced and/or to what degree a balance should be struck in the interests of pluralism.