The matter is well known, but now, after it has become apparent that a terrifying nationalist-imperial coalition has begun to form between Russia and the USA, and primarily between their leaders Putin and Trump, it is becoming even more striking.
The point is that many people who consider themselves leftists, anti-imperialists, pacifists, anti-fascists, socialists, etc., actually essentially support these two. And they see no problem or contradiction in that, because these two are destroying the unipolar world marked by American dominance, liberal democracy and neoliberal capitalism, all of which are enemies of the leftist ideology based on socialism, non-alignment and peace between people and nations. And of course, there is NATO as the absolute evil and supreme bogeyman. To make matters more tragic, one can explain to these people for days, drawing them authentic nationalist imperialism, the worst neoliberal and state capitalism that these two represent, deep-rooted Putin's clericalism, ethnic cleansing that both advocate, the idea of a wall on the border and the conquest of other people's countries or wealth. And none of it reaches these people, because "the evil NATO, because the hypocritical democratic America, because the rotten liberal democracy that represents no one, because USAID, because the degenerate European Commission, because the degenerate liberals and social democrats", all of these are the greatest enemies of the working class and the people.
It is, of course, unnecessary to mention that there is a lot of truth in all of what I put in quotes a moment ago, and especially there is truth in the cynicism of the West so far, namely the USA and the European Union, for which it is enough to look at a comparison of the attitudes towards Ukraine and Palestine, or the shameful silence after the ethnic cleansing of Armenians, or the silence regarding the events in Serbia now, when an authentic student-citizen movement is overthrowing the regime of Aleksandar Vučić, which they all support outright.
However, regardless of all this being so, the fact is that a world that ceases to rest on an agreement to prohibit the violent change of borders and begins to be based on the exclusive argument of violence, redrawing borders, ignoring the international order and which essentially despises a free society, democracy as such and fundamental human and civil rights, and then all kinds of minorities and opposition, and finally a world that organically cannot stand the idea of liberal democracy, but also that same left, is a world of fascism. Which is precisely gaining full international legitimacy under the leadership of these two leaders. In such a world, the European Union and liberal democracy as such become real enemies, which also applies to the idea of pacifism and anti-fascism.
The moment we find ourselves in today is actually the moment of 1938. And anyone with any sense can see that. Just as they can see that Ukraine is the new Czechoslovakia and the Palestinians are the former Jews. Pretending that this is not so, all in the name of some general leftist values, is terrifying.
It is even more frightening when this happens in our regions and countries that would not exist at all or would still be occupied by the same nationalist imperialism here, which thought it had an exclusive right to a country because it associated national mythology with it and used the argument of force, if it were not for that same international community and the evil West, which at one point admitted what was going on.
How contradictory and logically untenable this position is can best be seen through an analysis of the speech of Croatian President Zoran Milanović, who uses one logic when talking about the Homeland War and the 1990s, and another when talking about Ukraine.
After all, all those who are now rejoicing, happy about the diplomatic love between Putin and Trump, are certainly not aware that all their writings, freedom of speech and opinion, which they take for granted, have long been outlawed in Vladimir Putin's Russia, while the same would happen in the USA if Trump managed to concentrate as much political power as Vladimir Putin has.
Whatever, in the end, the nature of Zelensky's government and however cynical the European Union, together with liberal democracy, may be, I cannot put myself in the same sentence with what is the reality of Russia, a country and a regime that has been carrying out aggression against a neighboring country for years using all possible arguments that, in fact, boil down to the argument of violence and imperial nationalism according to which Ukrainians do not exist, nor should they exist. Celebrating the victory of this principle over the West is as horrifying as it is stupid.
Bonus video:
