We end today’s show with the first — we are going to talk today about what’s happening in Ukraine. We’re joined right now by two people, by a journalist who’s written extensively in The Intercept, a reporter who’s looked at the role of neo-Nazis in the war. The Ukrainian-born journalist Lev Golinkin is also with us. He recently wrote a piece for The Nation headlined “The Western Media Is Whitewashing the Azov Battalion.” The piece looks at the neo-Nazi roots of one of Ukraine’s most heralded paramilitary forces. Earlier this month, Turkey released five former Azov commanders who were being held in Turkey. They flew back on a plane with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.
Meanwhile, The Intercept recently detailed how an anti-Putin Russian militia that carried out attacks inside Russia in May is led by a neo-Nazi who’s maintained links with American neo-Nazis. That piece was written by Ben Makuch, a national security reporter who used to work as a correspondent for Vice News Tonight. Ben has also just written a new piece for The Intercept about an American Army vet, wanted for murder in the United States, who escaped to Ukraine to fight with the Right Sector, an ultranationalist Ukrainian militia. We’re going to get to that in a moment.
That Twitter video was posted by the Ukrainian National Guard.
There are also many photos of members of the Azov Battalion with Nazi insignia (them being neo-Nazis in the past is 100% not propaganda), these people don’t just stop believing this stuff cause someone told them to.
And no offense but what you describe is insane - there’s no reason (and no way) a military would do that. I said I don’t want to be condescending in my previous comment because I do have military experience, and militaries don’t operate in the way you described at all (especially during a war).
These aren’t civilians, they don’t get the same rights, and you don’t need to “catch” all of them (or even most of them) to send a message that neo-Nazis aren’t welcome. Just arrest or at least remove some prominent ones, maybe spread current Azov members across various units, and the situation will improve dramatically.
But so what? Does that make it true? Why do you believe it? Ukraine was governed by a pro-Russia Putin stooge less than a decade ago. Do you think it’s possible there are people still in Russia (and outside it) that would push this angle as hard as possible even if it might not be factual? How would you determine what’s true and not? Why are you using Twitter videos to do it? You accuse me of naiveté but there is simply not very good evidence for this, and extremely good reasons to be skeptical of it.
What I describe is the only workable method of doing this. “Oh, just remove them” is magical thinking. How are you supposed to even find them? What do you do if some of them claim they’re not? Obviously they’re not civilians, but you still don’t want to get it wrong because you’ll alienate large swathes of your own (well-armed and well-trained) armed forces… and, again, for what? Why do it now when you can just do it after the war? Since if Ukraine loses, this debate won’t matter at all anyway since everyone involved will be dead.
I see no point in continuing this discussion since we obviously disagree and I believe some of your points are based on a lack of experience w.r.t military operations. I guess we’ll just have to disagree.
I didn’t mean to paint you as naive, I’m not a native English speaker (and I do come from a culture which is sometimes described by others to be “direct” or “rude”), so I apologize.
But just know that I hold this opinion because I want to see Ukraine succeed in the long run, it does not come from some cynical place.
You keep saying I don’t have military experience, but how is any of what I’ve said wrong? How do you propose to find and filter out neo-Nazis? Do you truly believe all (or even most) of them are wearing their affiliations literally on their sleeves? Even if they are, how do you then suggest removing them? How will those actions help Ukraine rather than hurt it?
If you truly want Ukraine to succeed in the long run, why not tackle this after the war is over? As I’ve said, if you truly believe this is a problem then it certainly isn’t going anywhere. And if Ukraine loses the problem is solved since the neo-Nazis will be dead regardless, having died in the fight against Putin’s army.
I said arrest or remove prominent neo-Nazis, not all of them. They need to send a message, not go on a crusade.
It really shouldn’t be hard to figure out who they are, militaries know a lot about their soldiers and they can get more information pretty easily.
And what do you mean how to remove them? By force if necessary, this is a military not a company.
The reason I think this is important is I fear is the Azov battalion being hailed as heroes - which can easily lead to a rise in far right sentiment in Ukraine after the war. Not to mention preventing any war crimes they might be committing (we won’t know how much of this is propaganda and how much is true until the war is over).
This is the kind of magical thinking I called out earlier. What happens if a member of the military accuses someone else of being a neo-Nazi because they simply don’t like them? What recourse does that person have? Why wouldn’t Russian agents inside the Ukrainian military simply accuse high-ranking members of the military of being neo-Nazis? You asserting that it’s easy does not actually make this problem easy, and saying “just do it” ignores huge amounts of complications.
Okay, except they’re probably armed and well-trained. What happens if they resist, or, even worse, band together and resist?
I just don’t understand how these problems can’t be tackled after the war. Again, the problem solves itself if Ukraine fails to win. If Ukraine does win, this can all be tackled then and it won’t impact Ukraine’s ability to resist Russia’s aggression.
I didn’t work in intelligence or for the military police during my service, so I don’t know their exact methods.
But I did have access to a lot of information about soldiers as part of my position, so I know the extent of what they know is huge. And it’s not like we were routinely questioned or something.
Not to mention, they might already know who many of those people are since they didn’t really hide it in the past.
I understand your point about a possible resistance - but I honestly think they only need to grab a few prominent members (catch them at an unsuspecting moment, that’s what they did during my service) just to send a message that neo-Nazis are not tolerated.
The main goal here IME should be to deter neo-Nazis from banding together in the first place, and display to the public that neo-Nazis aren’t accepted.
I honestly think the remaining neo-Nazis will see it in their best interest to just keep their heads down - they know they won’t win a war against the rest of the army.
I do agree that an actual “purge” should only come after the war.