A Dyke A Broad #72 Ukraine Edition
Why Putin will fail in his bid to conquer Ukraine and re-make a Soviet empire. Plus Paris demo photos. And a tiny bit of personal good news.
Hello from Paris!
Today is the third sunny day in a row, so there’s that.
It’s also the 5th day of Russia’s attack on Ukraine which is resisting much more fiercely than Putin expected. Or anybody, really. I check the news every couple of hours expecting to hear that Kyiv has fallen. Though now, I suspect that won’t end the resistance. As Yuval Noah Harari writes in the Guardian, Putin may well “win all the battles but lose the war.”
The problem? “Putin’s dream of rebuilding the Russian empire has always rested on the lie that Ukraine isn’t a real nation, that Ukrainians aren’t a real people, and that the inhabitants of Kyiv, Kharkiv and Lviv yearn for Moscow’s rule.”
He may have miscalculated.
Every day there are more stories of Ukrainian heroism, like when soldier Vitaly Skakun Volodymyrovych blew up a bridge, so that Russian troops couldn’t advance, even if it cost him his own life. When I saw it on the news, I flashed back to those movies about World War I or II that even French TV broadcasts on Saturday afternoons, in which some grizzled soldier smokes a last cigarette then heroically scrambles to set the charges on the bridge or the dam or whatever, which explodes just in time, but sadly takes him out with it.
These days, reality feels like some bizarre do-over, a re-make. It is, in a way, on all sides, with Putin trying to recreate the Soviet empire, and the allies re-fighting WWII, this time with countries like Britain less eager to appease the tyrant, who they’ve finally understood will always be hungry for more—a lesson they should have remembered when Putin swallowed Crimea in 2014 and began nibbling away at eastern Ukraine. Or, even better, when Russia ripped out 20% of the Republic of Georgia’s territory in 2008. Predictably, Putin’s Georgia Playbook is now at work in Ukraine.
Volunteers have been key on the Ukrainian side, with many women among them. And they’re dying just like men. The resistance doesn’t have the arms they need, just rifles and bottles. They make Molotov cocktails and, like generations ago, try to bung them in the openings of the tanks. Which actually works if you hit them just right.
Their own president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, a former comedian, has risen to the occasion providing determination, seriousness, and one-liners, like when he refused the US offer to evacuate, saying 'I need ammunition, not a ride', which immediately went viral.
He may actually get it—ammunition.
Sunday, following Putin’s threats to launch a nuclear war (and massive, emotional marches across Germany demanding Ukraine be supported), the European Union announced they would close air space to Russia, cut off access to Putin’s media, and also bankroll weapons for Ukraine—a big first. But of course, the stakes are so incredibly high they’ve united the European Union where there are still plenty alive who remember the reality of Soviet and pro-Russian dictatorships. The Berlin wall just fell in 1989, the year after I graduated college.
I went to a demo on Thursday at Place de la République. There were many more on Saturday and Sunday all over France. One of them with language—used by organizers, but largely ignored by the participants— declaring them "pro-peace, antiwar”. I used to think I understood that concept, antiwar, but it really only makes sense if your own country is the aggressor in the fight—like the U.S. was in Viet Nam, and the Iraq war I marched against. Like Russia is against Ukraine.
It’s more difficult to understand what antiwar means when a foreign invader crosses the border of your country with his tanks and bombs, and they’re falling on your apartment building and you’re bundling up your kids to flee. Or at least go down into the underground, into cellars like the Brits in World War II.
Of course, you’re antiwar, then. Of course, you’re for peace. Who wants to die, be maimed, become a refugee?
But I can’t help thinking antiwar is a meaningless position when bombs are already falling on your head, because the only questions that remain are: do you flee, resist, concede? Will your neighbors turn away or get their hands dirty and help? Or get their hands dirty by sitting on them as Putin slaughters his way to a new empire? Nobody gets to stay clean. Nobody gets to be pure.
One thing that interests me, though, about the demos I’ve seen, is that most of the banners and chants aren’t too anti-Russia (so far), but against Putin—“assassin” (murderer). People are clear who the real enemy is.
I was happy to see this borne out by those Russians who are risking their own freedom to march against the war, for peace. There have already been thousands of arrests.
There’s not much we can do from Paris, except march whenever we’re called to, fight back against Russian propaganda which is already swamping Twitter and Facebook, and of course, give a thought to refugees.
The EU estimates there will be as many as 7 million Ukrainian refugees by the time this war ends. If you can, consider donating to a group like the International Rescue Committee, or another on this short list “based on their mission, commitment to helping refugees, and their transparency ratings.”
Worth Checking Out
Calamity Again, the Anne Applebaum piece in The Atlantic offering a quick overview of Ukraine’s history and national identity.
Mr. Jones, the 2020 film based on the real story of how the USSR-engineered a genocidal famine in Ukraine that killed almost 10 million people, in case you wonder why Ukrainians might be resisting a Russian occupation particularly fiercely. That alone would persuade me to take up arms.
Anonymous is #StandingWithUkraine, Claire Potter’s piece on how the hacker collective is giving a hand to the Ukraine resistance.
Zelenksyy : Mensch, a piece by Suzanne Moore on the Ukrainian president and the big shifts in the new world order.
This video in French talking about how Putin’s magic because in only 4 days he’s managed to: transform a comedian into a resistance leader, get all Europeans on the same page, destroy Russia Today [propaganda], make Greens think about energy independence, and expose the Putin-philia of [French candidates] Zemmour, Le Pen and Mélenchon. See? Magic!
And this in English…
Good News
Last and least, and I already got the grade for my French Test. I squeaked by, and can now apply for citizenship. So yay!
Well, that’s it for this time,
Semi-Disgruntledly Yours,