Like many, I’ve agonized over the continuing horrors of war we see each day on television as Putin has turned his wrath on Ukrainian civilians. The words “There but for the grace of God, go I” reverberating time and again, impossible not to feel how privileged I am at this moment, my good fortune reflected back to me from the determined but shell-shocked faces of the women, children, and men of Ukraine, imagining myself forced to join the painful journey they’re compelled to take — whether it’s fleeing their bombed-out homes or returning to take up arms against tanks and artillery fire. All multiplied so many fold, knowing they are the innocent and have done absolutely nothing to deserve this fate. Anyone who has known a bully, appreciates the difference between aggressor and victim.
I have known from my earliest days, there are always those who will take what it is not theirs. On the street. In school. Across our world.
For Ukraine, Putin has come to take their liberty. Their desire to live as they choose. To select a president of their own. A government of their own. And because they haven’t surrendered, Putin, without mercy, will destroy what is theirs. Their homes, their land. He will kill their children. Their parents. And grandparents. He will make it impossible to live in peace.
Fighting back didn’t come easy to me. I was short and baby-faced and both my parents worked. I spent much of my time on the streets of my working-class Bronx neighborhood. I can still remember the moment I went ballistic, turning the stickball bat, a glorified mop handle, into something I could beat the bully with, letting him know he couldn’t mess with my younger brother. I learned there were times a crazed fierceness could come from somewhere deep inside me, and from that moment on I knew when someone tries to take your liberty, you must fight back.
Later on, I learned to practice non-violent civil disobedience during my days in the civil rights movement. But for me it was always a tactic. I marveled at the ability of MLK and John Lewis and so many others who never became as famous to endure the violence and summon a higher purpose. And, yes, it was successful when the world was watching and willing to become engaged. The times when the oppressor could be redeemed. Transformed by love. Or when the oppressor could be shamed. Willing in some sense to acknowledge a shared humanity.
But, unfortunately, there are those like Putin who, with no conscience whatsoever, with absolutely no pause for reflection, no regret, will kill all who oppose them. And if you lie down before his tanks, without a second thought he will drive right over you.
You would think that because theirs has several times been a shared experience, with deep family ties between them, and with the large Russian-speaking population in Ukraine, that the Russian people would feel a deep solidarity with their neighbors, and demand an end to the slaughter. But as Olga Khazan explains in “I Watched Russian TV So You Don’t Have To” in the March 10, 2022 issue of The Atlantic, they have no idea what their leader is doing, what their sons and daughters in the military are doing:
“In Russia’s version of the war, Russians are liberators, Ukrainians are Nazis, and the West is full of mendacious hypocrites. To turn on Russian TV news is to enter a parallel universe, one where even the word war is forbidden. Russian President Vladimir Putin’s government has now blocked or restricted any other sources of coverage, so this is the only version of the world most Russians see.
“Hosts and panelists stick closely to the same Kremlin talking points, lending the broadcasts an endless, looping quality, even by cable-TV standards. One panel of white guys who love Putin dissolves into another, and another. ‘Every third word is Ukraina, America, NATO,’ says Bakhti Nishanov, a senior policy advisor at the U.S. Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe. ‘Even if you were just not paying attention … it’s in your subconscious.’”
Ukraine’s fight is my fight. Our fight. I believe that it is impossible not to be deeply affected by allowing inhumanity to flourish, to leave cruelty to thrive without challenge. Even if we are not conscious of it at the moment, we are slowly and continually diminished by turning a blind eye to genocide. Years ago, Americans became quite comfortable confronting German citizens, asking, sometimes demanding to know why they hadn’t done more to stop Hitler. It’s time to turn the question back on ourselves. Why aren’t we doing more to stop Putin?
Our constant and always unfortunate experience with war has brought humanity to the point where, at least, we try to set some basic limits on our ability to wreak havoc and force compliance. We have finally gotten to the point where we set some basic ground rules, demand we distinguish between combatants and civilians, to declare some actions beyond the pale, some acts of war, war crimes. Here are excerpts from the “Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, Jurisdiction, Admissibility and Applicable Law:”
“Article 82
War crimes
2. “For the purpose of this Statute, “war crimes” means:
(a) Grave breaches of the Geneva Conventions of 12 August 1949, namely, any of the following acts against persons or property protected under the provisions of the relevant Geneva Convention:
- (i) Wilful killing;
- (ii) Torture or inhuman treatment, including biological experiments;
- (iii) Wilfully causing great suffering, or serious injury to body or health;
- (iv) Extensive destruction and appropriation of property, not justified by military necessity and carried out unlawfully and wantonly …
- (vii) Unlawful deportation or transfer or unlawful confinement;
- (viii) Taking of hostages.
(b) Other serious violations of the laws and customs applicable in international armed conflict, within the established framework of international law, namely, any of the following acts:
- (i) Intentionally directing attacks against the civilian population as such or against individual civilians not taking direct part in hostilities;
- (ii) Intentionally directing attacks against civilian objects, that is, objects which are not military objectives; …
- (iv) Intentionally launching an attack in the knowledge that such attack will cause incidental loss of life or injury to civilians or damage to civilian objects or widespread, long-term and severe damage to the natural environment which would be clearly excessive in relation to the concrete and direct overall military advantage anticipated;
- (v) Attacking or bombarding, by whatever means, towns, villages, dwellings or buildings which are undefended and which are not military objectives;”
Minute after minute, day after day, we’re watching the Russians commit war crimes on the people of Ukraine.
I’ve watched as pundit after pundit has weighed in on what America, the UK, the EU, and NATO should and shouldn’t do about Ukraine. About the ways we can contribute or the ways we ought not contribute to the valiant fight of the Ukrainians. Not surprisingly but sadly there is a clear difference between what the Ukrainians are asking for, and what political and military leaders in the West seem prepared to do. It is one thing to be bombed and invaded, and another to watch from safety as it’s happening.
Nika Melkozerova is the executive editor of New Voice Ukraine, and a journalist. On February 25, 2022, she wrote for the New York Times:
“On Thursday, I woke up at dawn to the sound of blasts. I jumped out of bed, puzzled. Maybe it was a dream? But then I heard another loud blast, and then another one. Kyiv was shaking. I reached for my phone and read that President Vladimir Putin of Russia had ordered his army to attack Ukraine. They had started bombarding us.
“My internet went down, and I felt fear crawling in my guts. I had never felt this way before. It was as if someone, maybe Mr. Putin himself, had grabbed my heart and squeezed it. This feeling has stayed with me: It is my new permanent condition.”
In response to the ever-increasing and more desperate pleas for help, these pundits, and many political leaders have instead offered a measuring rod. Sanctions are OK. Stinger missiles are OK. Anti-tank munitions are OK. But providing jets is a provocation likely to spark a World War. It’s an odd calculation with no way of actually measuring its accuracy except by violating it.
Here is how President Biden put it on March 11, 2022, speaking to the House Democratic Caucus:
“The people of Ukraine have demonstrated a remarkable source of bravery and courage. But the security assistance that you’ve provided has been absolutely critical — critical in their defense … When Putin unleashed his assault, he thought he could divide NATO. He thought he could literally divide this country, the West — the United States — in terms of the parties … But he failed. He failed.
“For months, the United States has worked tirelessly to keep our Allies and partners together … As a result, we’ve been able to ramp up our economic pressure on Putin and further isolate Russia on the global stage. This morning, along with the G7 nations — in Germany, Canada, France, Italy, Japan, and the United Kingdom … we moved … on most-favored-nation status — as we call it in the United States, “permanent normal trade relations” — and eliminate them.
“But, folks, I know I’ve occasionally frustrated you, but more important than us moving when we want to is making sure all of NATO is together … They have different vulnerabilities than we do … So it took a long time sitting with my counterparts and saying, ‘Look, we’re going to block oil, but I’m not going to ask you to do it. I’m going to say to you, ‘You do what you can. I’m going to explain why it’s not rational for you to do the same thing. In the meantime, we’re going to help you get energy through liquefied natural gas and a whole range of other things.
“The totality of our economic sanctions and export controls are crushing — crushing the Russian economy. The ruble has lost — and I know many of you know this in detail — lost more than half its value. You know what the value of a ruble is versus a dollar? You need 200 rubles to equal 1 dollar today — 200.
“I want to be clear though: We’re going to make sure Ukraine has the weapons to defend themselves from invading Russian force. (Applause.) And we will send money and food aid to save Euro–Ukrainian lives.
“But, look, the idea — the idea that we’re going to send in offensive equipment and have planes and tanks and trains going in with American pilots and American crews, just understand — and don’t kid yourself, no matter what you all say — that’s called ‘World War Three.’ Okay? Let’s get it straight here, guys. That old expression — ‘Don’t kid a kidder.’”
Add me to the list of those who have no idea what Putin might do. And, of course, there is no way to downplay the consequences of a wider war. But still I want to provide some context. Every moment, the Russian invaders are using, abusing Ukrainian skies to bomb their cities, their hospitals, to rain down terror on ordinary people living normal lives. All the Ukrainians are asking for is help with regaining control of their skies.
Help with creating a no-fly zone. To create safe corridors to allow people to leave, to allow food and medicine to get to the people who desperately need these things.
Could someone please explain to me whatever happened to the notion of self-defense? As long as their skies are controlled by the Russians, the Russians will continue to kill, to pummel, to level hospitals, to bomb apartment buildings. Please enough with “the idea that we’re going to send in offensive equipment and have planes and tanks and trains going in with American pilots and American crews.”
President Zelensky is asking for jets to be flown by Ukrainian pilots. And can someone please explain to me the political/military calculation that somehow counterbalancing Russian tanks and planes is offensive? And how has empowering the Ukrainians to fly their own skies a provocation? Only to Putin and his invaders.
The Russians have already declared they regard the mere existence of Ukraine as an unacceptable provocation. Who regard Ukraine’s Jewish president as a Nazi who requires elimination. When it is Putin who is the illegitimate president. Putin who wouldn’t know a free and fair election if it bit him in the ass. Who imprisons anyone who might gain enough popular support to threaten his reign.
Quite frankly the explanations offered by our leaders and the legion of cable news commentators boggle the mind. Meanwhile, Ukrainians endure an ever-increasing brutality.
So my question: what is gained by surrendering to the conditions of the invaders. By tolerating their skewed interpretation of reality. Their insistence their brutal invasion is but “a special military action.” That a maternity hospital they have bombed really isn’t a maternity hospital, but somehow a hospital that no longer treated the pregnant women we have watched with our own eyes emerge dazed and wounded from the bombed-out building.
I frankly don’t know what to do with the idea that there is some perfectly legitimate but obviously distinct action we might take that will prove to be too much for Putin. I’m reminded of the parents I overhear during the summer at Fuel asking their two-year-olds what they should do with the rest of the day.
Everything Putin has done is already much too much for the Ukrainians. We’ve actually arrived at that insane moment when our political leaders are trying to calculate that odd line when responding to mounting war crimes might be too much of a provocation? How many lives have to be lost before we acknowledge this is in fact a world war. How many miles lost to the invading army? How many towns and villages and cities large and small occupied by the invading army? The Russian world invading the Ukrainian world. I guess Ukraine is not enough of a major power to warrant the use of “world war.”
But really, as much as we want to insist that Russian has limited its action to the borders of Ukraine, Putin has always believed he was at war with us. He waged cyber war to help install Donald Trump. Perhaps Putin was willing to accept a brief detente in his war with us when he was dealing with the embarrassing submission, and constant willingness of the former President to act the fool before him, to tell the world he trusted the Russian tyrant more than his own intelligence services, the very people who knew exactly how the Russians were hacking American computers. The perfect American president, enamored with the absolute power of the autocrat, who openly craved Putin’s ability to silence and jail any of those brave enough to criticize him.
Even now as Putin stands before the world with blood on his hands, Trump can’t help but applaud him. “At a Mar-a-Lago fundraiser Wednesday evening, he continued his praise of Putin, calling him ‘pretty smart’ in ‘taking over a country for $2 worth of sanctions.’”
With Trump gone, it was back to the familiar grievance. And the all-consuming desire to reinstitute and re-consecrate the Russian homeland, to bring the lost territories back into the fold. Territories, it seems, that have developed an appreciation for self-determination, for democracy, for liberty.
As for what constitutes “war,” it’s clear we are looking at two very different definitions. For Putin, it is the action necessary to recreate his imaginary Russia. But everything these nations do, everything the U.S. has done in response to Russian aggression is itself aggression to Putin. Our notion of countermeasures is but our understanding, not his.
A case in point: the sanctions we reluctantly and hesitantly invoked in response to Russian tanks crossing Ukrainian borders, is as far as Putin is concerned “an act of war.” Reuters explains:
“President Vladimir Putin said on Saturday that Western sanctions on Russia were akin to a declaration of war and warned that any attempt to impose a no-fly zone in Ukraine would lead to catastrophic consequences for the world. Putin reiterated that his aims were to defend Russian- speaking communities through the ‘demilitarisation and de-Nazification’ of the country so that Russia’s former Soviet neighbour became neutral and no longer threatened Russia.
“‘These sanctions that are being imposed are akin to a declaration of war but thank God it has not come to that,’ Putin said, speaking to a group of flight attendants at an Aeroflot training centre near Moscow.
“He said any attempt by another power to impose a no-fly zone in Ukraine would be considered by Russia to be a step into the military conflict. Such a step he said would have catastrophic consequences for Europe and the world.”
President Zelensky has from the beginning dispensed with the usual political gobbledygook and reported on what is happening with a directness that is both heartening and occasionally horrifying:
Zoya Sheftalovich, born in Ukraine but based today in Sydney, Australia, editor of Brussels and London Playbooks, and contributing editor at POLITICO Europe, translated remarks made on March 10, 2022 by President Zelensky:
For the United States, it appears the strategy is that as long as the fighting, as long as the death is confined to Ukrainian territory we avoid World War Three. So as long as Russia makes war on Ukraine, and refrains from crossing the border into Poland, well then we will watch and send more guns. It’s an indication of how we have in many ways accepted the mad parameters of Putin’s world. A world where Putin can make war but doesn’t have to defend his own land. And the only civilians to die will be Ukrainian.
James Jeffrey, chair of the Middle East Program at the Wilson Center, has some suggestions that make a lot of sense. He writes in “Put US Boots in Ukraine to Defend a UN-Approved Security Zone. It worked in Syria:”
“The Ukrainian government should be encouraged to appeal to the United Nations Security Council to pass a resolution under Chapter VI, establishing a Humanitarian Safe Zone with a ceasefire regime in Ukrainian territories abutting its Western neighbors.” Jeffrey recognizes that a predictable Russian veto would preclude “A resolution under Chapter VII, which would allow legal enforcement with troops under U.N. control …” But he suggests moving to the UN General Assembly to secure something similar to the Uniting for Peace Resolution passed in 1950 to deal with the Korean War.
Excerpt from Uniting For Peace Resolution, UN General Assembly October 7, 1950
Jeffrey continues: “Such a Zone would allow Ukrainian government and non-governmental organizations, partnered with the international community, to establish camps for internally displaced persons fleeing the fighting without leaving Ukraine, dramatically reducing costs of sustaining and resettling refugees in third countries.”
Also writing for Defense One, Sam J. Tangredi, director of the Institute for Future Warfare Studies, US Naval War College, adds another critical element in “Establish a Zone of Peace in Western Ukraine,” stressing that, “Sending foreign troops to defend so-far-uncontested territory is the only way to preserve a free Ukraine and prevent Putin’s next attack.”
Tangredi writes: “Efforts to provide Ukraine with additional weapons are tactically important, but Ukrainian forces are just too small to sustain a conventional war against Russia. If there is to be any future for the Ukrainian nation, the West must act immediately to establish a peacekeeping and humanitarian relief zone in unoccupied western Ukraine. This ‘Zone of Peace’ would be maintained by fully armed troops, either from NATO, the EU’s ‘Defence Forces of the European Union,’ or—although a difficult aspiration—a coalition of non-European states ostensibly under United Nations General Assembly authority. The zone would be intended to both protect civilians and preserve a semblance of independence for the Ukrainian people. If requested by President Zelensky, such an action would be in full accordance with international law. As Zelensky has repeatedly stated—most recently in the wake of Russian shelling of a nuclear power plant — ‘only urgent action by Europe can stop the Russian troops.’”
I would add that a similar zone, protected by some combination of EU troops, should immediately be established at every nuclear power plant in Ukraine, ensuring that Russian soldiers don’t fire upon or deliberately sabotage these plants, and that the containment vessels and spent fuel rods be secured. An accident would endanger untold number of Ukrainians, Russians and depending upon the winds many innocent Europeans.
All these proposals require a reframing of how we’re talking about Ukraine. All these proposals require a declaration that human safety, innocent lives, territorial sovereignty take precedence over the political aims and military overreach of Vladimir Putin. And require us to take immediate action to prevent additional devastation.
And none of this will happen unless collectively the nations of the world are willing to commit to enforcing the humanitarian zones, these zones of nuclear protection, these zones of peace, with military deterrence.
Are they risky? Of course. But what of the obvious risks we have thus far learned to live with.
It’s time to stop Putin. It’s time to quiet the ravens of Kyiv. It’s time to make and enforce peace.
