Peace and Provocation: Is Zelensky intent on WW3?

Consistent pacifism seeks to understand the motives of the enemy, but never trivializes the horror of war. Part 1/2.

by Roland Rottenfußer

[This article posted on 9/30/2022 is translated from the German on the Internet, https://www.rubikon.news/artikel/im-zweifel-fur-den-frieden.]

"There are rules to killing in war," said Human Rights Watch conflict researcher Belkis Wille of the fighting in Ukraine. Behind this is the idea that there are "war crimes" on one side - killing civilians or mistreating prisoners of war, for example - and "legitimate," "normal" acts of war. This assumption is a whitewash of horror. War itself is a crime - always. This becomes more of a truth for people the closer they have come to the reality of war. Consistent pacifists, therefore, have always rejected all the facile justifications for acts of war - "I had to do it because ...", "I had to do it so that ..." - have been rejected. They argue from direct humanity and compassion. But pacifism also has a lot going for it strategically and quite rationally: whoever refuses to be an enemy deprives his counterpart of that fear which he himself also feels. War is never in the interest of the ordinary citizens in the countries involved, who would never think of shooting at complete strangers on their own. It always helps only a minority of misguided individuals bent on profit or power. Being peaceful, conciliatory, yielding, is not without risk - but compared to all the suffering and destruction that the opposite attitude causes, it is an option worth considering.

In 1910, in a "daughters' school" in Moscow. At a religious exam, the teacher and the archbishop present tested the girls on the fifth commandment. Typically, religious authorities expected the students to view killing as a violation of God's commandment. With two exceptions: In war and execution, it was okay to take a person's life, he said.

When one student "was asked the additional question whether it is always a sin to kill, the girl blushed and replied excitedly and firmly: always! And in response to all the conventional sophisms of the archbishop, she steadfastly maintained that killing was forbidden under all circumstances, even in the Old Testament, and that Christ had not only forbidden killing, but also doing evil to one's neighbor. The archbishop in all his majesty and eloquence fell silent, and the girl kept the victory."

This is how the aged star author Lev N. Tolstoy reported it to his pen pal, the then very young Indian activist Mohandas Gandhi, on September 7, 1910. In his later years, the author of the monumental classic "War and Peace" wrote a whole series of profound writings against war, such as "War and Reason" and "Thou Shalt Not Kill". His source of inspiration was a radically understood Christianity, with both the fifth commandment and Jesus' call to renounce violence relevant to Tolstoy.

"Thou shalt not kill! This truth says that man cannot or must not kill another under any circumstances or pretext."

Exceptionally killing

The anecdote Tolstoy relates collides two fundamental views of killing: First, there is the conviction that people should not kill their peers "under any circumstances" and "under any pretext"; second, there are all sorts of relativizations of the kind "Well, maybe so, sometimes, if one is forced to ...".

Attempts at justification usually concern either the past - "The other person did ..., that's why I had to ..." - or the future - "If I do not ..., the other will ...". Mankind since 1910 has predominantly not chosen the way of the girl from Tolstoy's story. It has made exceptions, which became the rule over the centuries. Although the death penalty has been abolished in our latitudes, war is still recognized as legitimate in principle: "Because a terrorist attack was carried out on the territory of the USA"; "Because peace cannot be enforced in any other way"; "So that Putin does not triumph"; "Because members of the Russian minority in the Donbass were also killed". And so on.

Usually the approval of belligerent violence follows a certain stereotypical thought movement. First, something terrible is stated. Instead of this resulting in the determination never to do such things themselves, people are eager to do this terrible thing to others themselves. Mostly not the real perpetrators - that would not be very noble, but humanly understandable - but completely innocent and uninvolved people who, however, belong to the collective from which the perpetrators come, their nationality or religion.

What did most people in Afghanistan, what did most war victims in Ukraine do to their murderers personally? Nothing. But as soon as someone utters the slogan "It's war", all rightly established rules of civilized interaction are eliminated from one moment to the next, even humane ways of thinking and feeling fall victim to a rapidly progressing brutalization.

Lev N. Tolstoy also criticizes those contemporaries who are only too happy to gather to witness the spectacle of military parades. These "eagerly run to see their brethren in laced, colorful and harlequin costumes transform themselves, to the sound of timpani and trumpets, into machines which, at the word of a single man, perform the same movement at the same instant, and do not understand what all this means! And yet the meaning of these exercises is very simple and clear: they are preparations for murder! People are put to sleep in order to make them instruments of murder."

Reason and conscience as guiding principles

Tolstoy's language is radical, his reckoning with those in power who unleash wars clear:

"It would suffice if any president or emperor understood that their activity as commanders of troops is not an important and honorable post, as their sycophants would have them believe, but a low and shameless act of preparation for mass murder. it would be enough if every honorable man realized that the payment of taxes with which soldiers are armed and maintained, and, what is more, the entrance into military service, are not indifferent but bad and harmful acts, because he who commits them not only permits murder, but takes part in it. "

If this truth were to come to the attention of many people, Tolstoy said, it could bring down destructive power.

"Then the power of kings, emperors, and presidents, a power that outrages us and because of which we kill them, would collapse of its own accord."

Even the great Russian writer is unable to foresee in detail how a world without wars would turn out. But he knows that war arises from the minds of "lowly" people and transforms most of those who come into contact with it into just such lowly people.

"What form the lives of men will take if they refrain from murder we do not and cannot know, but one thing is certain: that it is more natural for men endowed with reason and conscience to let their lives be guided by reason and conscience than to submit servilely to those who order the killing of one another."

This clarity and radicality of thought is rarely found in published discourse today. It is uncomfortable for almost everyone, because almost everyone does have some sort of "favorite war party" which, if not supported, they excuse.

A proven psycho-technique to avoid internal conflict is to consistently think around the gruesome and repulsive details of warfare.

"Horror can be endured as long as one simply ducks - but it kills if one thinks about it," wrote Erich Maria Remarque in his famous anti-war novel "Nothing New in the West" (1928).

Let's listen to the poets!

Poets and writers have condemned the war with a ruthlessness that journalists and even more so politicians often shy away from. These great minds are able to immerse themselves in the reality of the unimaginable horror, to show unconditional solidarity with the victims, and at the same time to rise above the justification narratives of the perpetrators, which are conditioned by the times. Remarque's novel hero, Paul Bäumer, at one point rues:

"I am young, I am twenty years old; but I know nothing of life but despair, death, fear, and the concatenation of the most senseless superficiality with an abyss of suffering. I see peoples driven against each other, killing each other silently, ignorantly, foolishly, obediently, innocently."

Matthias Claudius, author of the famous poem "The Moon Has Risen," wrote an extremely forceful indictment of war as early as 1778, called "War Song."

"What should I do, if in my sleep with grief

And bloody, pale and pallid

The spirits of the slain come to me

And wept before me, what?

When brave men who sought honor,

Mutilated and half-dead

Rolling in the dust before me and cursing me

In their agony?"

The poem is at the same time an appeal not to get involved in perpetrator structures, neither as a participant nor as a mere spectator, because the agonies of conscience as a result of the confrontation with the victims could be terrible.

In general, compassion, the attempt to really vividly imagine the suffering of those affected and to let it come close to oneself, is the key to peace.

War destroys souls

Bertha von Suttner, author of the classic non-fiction book "Lay Down Your Arms!" appealed specifically to women to let their hearts judge war. In the name of goodness, love, and "the concept of God to which our reverence rises," they should fight war "not only because it no longer pays and is therefore folly - but because it is cruel and therefore a crime." Von Suttner states in her essay "Indignation of the Mind and Our Hearts" (1914):

"Among the feelings which war instills in us is passionate sympathy; for the horrors, the sky-scraping suffering which it causes, already go beyond the limits of the bearable. After all, it increases in dreadfulness every day with every new army reinforcement, every new invention. Let us wait until all the details of the Balkan battles come to our attention - the chased out, the massacred, the starved, the burned alive ... no, we must not close our minds to all this. All misery must be looked in the face, but not to deplore it as misfortune, but to denounce it as wickedness."

The best remedy for any sympathy with war, as it occasionally arises even in the souls of well-meaning people, is to confront the details. Eugen Drewermann, in his "Speech Against War," May 21, 2022, describes a case reported to him:

"For forty years my father said not a word of his life, but then, on his deathbed, he confided to me a secret of what it was like. He had been evacuated from Stalingrad on one of the last planes, two legs amputated. His account: 'In every place we advanced to, there were no people left. Then, all at once, a door opens, and out comes an old man with a small child by the hand. My comrade pulls out his rifle, and I yell at him, 'No!' But he shoots.' My father never stopped crying that day. Forty years later, the trauma of having witnessed a murder."

The moments when the horror of war is directly experienced by those affected are more like the proverbial tip of an iceberg. Beneath the surface lies the mostly undocumented suffering of the relatives, of those waiting and anxious, of those finally brutally confronted with news of death. Likewise, the traumas affecting the war veteran throughout the rest of his life must be taken into account, as is strikingly demonstrated in Drewermann's example.

"We human beings are not set up to be soldiers. If we saw what we were ordered to do, we would not do it," said the pugnacious theologian in his great peace speech. Harold Nash, a British bomber pilot in World War II, described his impression during the air raids on Hamburg thus:

"It lay beneath us like a black ribbon of velvet embroidered with pearls. But we knew that what we were doing down there was worse than Dante's Inferno. But we only saw fires, we didn't see people. Otherwise, we couldn't have done this."

Those who trivialize war do not know it

Cruel acts on a large scale usually also presuppose that the victims remain abstract to the perpetrators, that they are no longer perceived as sentient individuals, but rather as an anonymous mass, hidden from one's gaze. This mentality is further facilitated by the use of modern combat drones.

Approving or trivializing statements about war are often an expression of a lack of knowledge or empathy. Not possessing these skills is a forgivable mistake; it is a different matter if someone does not even try to acquire them but then rants about the necessity of wars.

It is a common mistake to interpret war as an expression of man's inherent "natural" aggressiveness. Rather, it springs from the misguided narratives of a few, which are transformed into the atrocities of many with the help of the brutal exercise of power.

Killing someone because he is a member of a certain people - from whom one assumes that crimes have emanated in the past - is no excuse; it is more reprehensible than even murder as an expression of personal hatred. The latter may be biographically and psychologically justifiable, the former never is. For even if "a Russian" may have killed his own father - it could hardly have been the same Russian who is facing me right now.

"An exciting game of nations".

If we want to explain why people keep giving themselves up for military service, we come up against a toxic mixture of targeted propaganda, the desire to belong to the warring collective, fear of exclusion and punishment, but also sheer heedlessness and thoughtlessness.

In his first work, "Geschichte eines Deutschen" (History of a German), the journalist Sebastian Haffner, best known for his book "Anmerkungen über Hitler" (Notes on Hitler), described from his own experience the rise of a national war hysteria at the beginning of the First World War. In this, Haffner also sees one of the major influencing factors that would later transform Germans into a willing collective of supporters for National Socialist terror.

Haffner writes:

"War as a great, thrilling game of nations, bringing deeper entertainment and more pleasurable emotions than anything peace has to offer, that was the daily experience of ten grades of German schoolboys from 1914 to 1918, and that has become the basic positive vision of Nazism. From this vision it derives its advertising power, its simplicity, its appeal to imagination and the desire for action; and from it it derives likewise its intolerance and cruelty against the internal political opponent: because he who does not want to join in this game is not recognized as an 'opponent' at all, but is simply perceived as a spoilsport."

The hatred of pacifists

We also find here a psychodynamic explanation for the massive hatred that pacifists have experienced in their homelands in every war - today, for example, the hatred against those who, with regard to the Ukraine war, plead for German restraint and a negotiated settlement.

The writer Stefan Zweig also addresses the wartime mood in his literary autobiography "The World of Yesterday" (1941). In it, Zweig describes particularly vividly how his contemporaries changed dramatically to the negative within a few weeks, how even good friends - hardly recognizable to him - turned into patriotic poltergeists, and how he found himself exposed to venomous attacks because of his peace-loving attitude.

"Gradually, in those first weeks of war in 1914, it became impossible to have a sensible conversation with anyone. The most peaceful, the most good-natured were as if drunk on the haze of blood. Friends whom I had always known as resolute individualists and even intellectual anarchists had turned overnight into fanatical patriots, and patriots into insatiable annexationists.

Every conversation ended in stupid phrases like 'He who cannot hate cannot love properly' or in crude suspicions. Comrades with whom I had never had a quarrel for years accused me quite rudely that I was no longer an Austrian; that I should go over to France or Belgium."

As is so often the case, people who have succumbed to inhumanity find it difficult to forgive those who have not for their humanity.

Roland Rottenfußer, born in 1963, studied German and worked as a book editor and journalist for various publishing houses. From 2001 to 2005 he was editor at the spiritual magazine connection, later for the Zeitpunkt. He worked as an editor, book copywriter and author scout for Goldmann Verlag. Since 2006 he has been editor-in-chief of Hinter den Schlagzeilen and since 2020 editor-in-chief of Rubikon.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Attack on Nord Stream kills prospects for dialogue in Ukraine

Posted on September 28, 2022 by M. K. BHADRAKUMAR

https://www.indianpunchline.com/attack-on-nord-stream-kills-prospects-for-dialogue-in-ukraine/

The three leaks that were discovered on Monday at the Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2 gas pipelines connecting Russia with Germany — one after another within hours of each other in the exclusive economic zones of Sweden and Denmark — were caused by blasts. Swedish Foreign Minister Ann Linde tweeted that the blasts “are consequences of detonations, probably caused by sabotage. We continue to collect information and do not rule out any cause, actor or motive.”

Swedish Prime Minister Magdalena Andersson shared the same opinion and described the event as “a matter of sabotage,” adding that no version is currently being ruled out. Prime Minister of Denmark Mette Frederiksen has since been quoted by Reuters as saying, “It is now the clear assessment by authorities that these are deliberate actions. It was not an accident.” Earlier, the Danish authorities issued a statement that the pipeline incidents were not caused by an accident.

Meanwhile, Radoslaw Sikorski, a European Parliament member and a former Polish foreign minister, has thanked the US for damaging the Nord Stream pipelines. “A small thing, but so much joy,” Sikorski tweeted, adding, “Thank you, USA.”

Sikorski cited US President Joe Biden who had threatened on February 7 before Russia began its military operation in Ukraine, that if Moscow acted against Kiev, “there will no longer be a Nord Stream 2. We will bring an end to it.” When a journalist asked Biden to clarify, he said enigmatically: “I promise you, we will be able to do that.”

Indeed, there are reports that two groups of US warships were sighted recently within 30 kms of the site of the incident where Nord Stream was attacked.

According to Sikorski, the damage to the Nord Stream narrowed Russia’s room for maneuver, since Moscow will now have to talk to the countries controlling the Druzhba and Yamal gas pipelines — Ukraine and Poland respectively — to resume gas supplies to Europe.

The German security services are of the opinion that only a state actor could have damaged the undersea pipeline, suggesting “divers or a mini-submarine” could have installed mines or explosives on the pipeline. When asked to comment, the US Secretary of State Antony Blinken was non-committal saying “these are initial reports (of sabotage) and we haven’t confirmed them yet. But if it is confirmed, that’s clearly in no one’s interest.”

From the US perspective, as Blinken put it, while there are “clear challenges in the months ahead” in terms of Europe’s energy supply, “there is also a very significant opportunity to do two things.” The first is to “finally end the dependence of Europe on Russian energy” and the second is to “accelerate the transition to renewables” so the West can address the “climate challenge.”

Clearly, for Washington, going ahead, the priority is to impose a price cap on Russian oil exports and “surge” supplies of LNG to Europe at a juncture when the US became the world’s largest LNG exporter this year, partly due to the embargo against Russia imposed by the West. And the price cap decision needs EU endorsement.

The geopolitical ramifications are self-evident. The attack on the Nord Stream took place even as the referendum got under way on Monday in the Donbass, Zaporozhye and Kherson on these regions’ accession to Russia. On Sunday, Biden had issued a strong statement saying the US will never recognise Ukrainian territory as anything other than part of Ukraine and that “Russia’s referenda are a sham.”

The point is, as Sikorski pointed out, with Nord Stream lethally damaged, if Russia were to resume gas supply to Germany in the conceivable future, it can only be through the Soviet-era pipelines that run through Poland and Ukraine. But Warsaw and Kiev will not be in a mood to cooperate in the prevailing circumstances.

Principally, Russia loses whatever leverage it has over German policies at a juncture when a grave economic crisis looms ahead and there is growing demand to review Berlin’s decision against the commissioning of Nord Stream 2. Last week, large demonstrations took place in Germany calling for the commissioning of Nord Stream 2 to resolve energy shortage.

As for the German leadership, it too no longer has an option to bite the bullet and seek resumption of Russian gas supplies (except by begging Poland and Ukraine to cooperate in the reopening of the Yamal and Druzhba pipelines.) On the other hand, Chancellor Scholz’s trip to the Gulf region (Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Qatar) last weekend seeking more oil supplies failed to produce the results he had hoped for.

Saudi Arabia, which is aligned with Russia on regulating oil output, maintains an ambiguous position on the global stage as the West confronts Russia over total energy independence. In the UAE, Scholz achieved somewhat better results by signing an agreement on energy security, which provides for delivery of LNG before the end of 2022.

From another perspective, the Nord Stream pipelines have been disabled at a defining moment in the Ukraine conflict when a lull is expected through the fall until December. Conceivably, this presents a small window of opportunity for dialogue with Moscow. There are rumours that Scholz’s Gulf tour also aimed at seeking help from Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman who has excellent relations with Russian President Vladimir Putin. (Prince Salman recently got the prisoner exchange arranged recently between Moscow and Kiev where according to a report in the Wall Street Journal on Sept 23, the Russian oligarch and politician Roman Abramovich acted as intermediary.)

The bottom line is, in any architecture for dialogue between Europe and Russia, the resumption of Russian energy supplies to ease the economic crisis in Europe would be a leitmotif. Therefore, whoever struck Nord Stream struck had a perfect sense of timing. This dastardly act is state-sponsored and it only highlights that there are powerful forces in the West who want the conflict to prolong and will go the whole hog, no matter what it takes, to smother any incipient stirrings that aspire for ceasefire and dialogue.

Such a “deliberate act of sabotage” needed much advance planning. Unsurprisingly, the Kremlin says it is “is extremely concerned about the incident.” What has happened is of a piece with the Anglo-American sabotage of the Istanbul agreement between Kiev and Moscow in late March, which extended the war by five months.

In the present case, the war lobby has removed the pontoon bridge and made sure that European countries have no means to retrace now to source Russian gas and salvage their economies. As the Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban remarked sarcastically, the American oil companies have become “war profiteers.” The US not only replaced the Russian energy supplier but is forcing the Europeans to pay 8-10 times the contracted price with Gazprom.