…and that’s putting it mildly.
I really am finding it hard to believe we’ve arrived at this Hellish, perversely self-defeating juncture in history. At a time when the Western World should be ascendant, when the United States has finally achieved the means to realize the turn-of-the-century conservative think tank dream of a second American century (the prospect of which wasn’t much advanced by the hubristic wars of the Republican idiots who set American foreign policy in the wake of 9/11), corrupt and cowardly monsters who worship at the altar of Trump are intent upon destroying history’s most successful experiment, and halting the unfinished but world-changing project of two and a half centuries of blood, toil, tears and sweat. At every turn, MAGA bends every sinew to sow dissension, foster racist hatred, feed paranoid fever dreams, promote violence, praise pitiless authoritarianism, and undermine vital institutions that have in any case proved sadly incapable of defending the rules and norms of sane civil society.
Here we all are in Trumpworld, denizens of the MAGAverse, numb and indifferent. Once, we cared. Not so long ago, we were still able to get upset. But that was then. It all seems so normal now, doesn’t it? There’s been such a steady stream of outrages and grotesque transgressions, so many crimes, sins, ethical abominations and, when Donald still held power, public policy disasters, occurring not merely daily but multiple times per day, that it’s long been impossible to keep up, or maintain anything approaching even sustained disquiet, let alone shock. Who can process it all? Who can even remember?
The corruption, cruelty, incompetence, and sheer stupidity have woven such a dense tapestry of ignorant malfeasance that it’s likewise easy to lose sight of some really quite crucial aspects of the big picture in all the confusion; the red lights flash, the sirens wail, but we don’t seem to notice. I suppose we can’t. I suppose we don’t have the bandwidth. It’s hard to focus on even the most deeply inhumane immigration policy when a pandemic is being mismanaged to the point that policy failures and outright lies are causing literally hundreds of thousands of preventable deaths. It’s hard to worry about subversion of the Justice Department when the party line is to praise white supremacists brandishing tiki torches and screaming “the Jews will not replace us”. It’s difficult to maintain interest in Russian election interference when the issue du jour is the impeachable blackmailing of a foreign government to fabricate scandal against a political rival. It’s tough to remain angry about blatant corruption when the latest abomination is an attempted coup followed by violent insurrection. In the end, we lose track of all of it.
Thus has an issue of transcendent importance been largely overlooked amid the general domestic chaos of the past eight years: the effect that Trump and Trumpism have had upon America’s posture and standing in the international community, and what this means for the resurgent global power struggle between tyranny and liberal democracy, a conflict that too few seem to realize is not merely ongoing, but threatening to develop into something not seen since the Second World War. In a world in which aggressive and expansionist dictatorships once more face off against flagging democracies, Trump and his brainstem MAGA cultists openly fawn over the supposed prowess of strongmen like Xi, Kim, Orban, and Putin, siding with the modern analogs of Hitler, Tojo and Mussolini.
This is horrifying.
Especially for the people of Ukraine.
You’d barely realize it from watching the news lately, but the Russian attempt to conquer Ukraine is now into its third year, still going strong, even though by any objective measure it hasn’t been going all that well for Putin and his armies. After some significant setbacks, Vlad’s managed to stabilize the front lines, and now hangs on to territory in the east amounting to a little less than 20% of Ukraine, far less than was initially grabbed. In accomplishing this much, the losses have been appalling. After a little more than 26 months of pitched battle, these were Russia’s casualties:
between 90,000 and 120,000 dead;
as many as 300,000 more too wounded to return to battle;
at least 3,000 tanks confirmed destroyed (likely many more);
at least 1,300 other armoured vehicles destroyed (likely many more);
at least 3,800 infantry fighting vehicles (armoured infantry transport) destroyed;
over 300 towed artillery pieces destroyed;
close to 400 mobile rocket launchers destroyed;
over 200 surface-to-air missile systems destroyed;
over 100 jet fighters destroyed;
over 170 helicopters destroyed;
almost 3,200 trucks and utility vehicles destroyed;
and the loss of countless other assets, including the flagship of the Black Sea Fleet and several other naval units. In the fighting to take Bakhmut, the Wagner Group private army lost at least 20,000 men, and probably thousands more, with as many wounded. In the recent battle to seize Avdiivka, the Russian army suffered another 20,000 dead, at least as many wounded, and lost 700 armoured vehicles, all in a span of about six weeks. Consider that during the entire 20+ year effort in Afghanistan, America lost 2,500 men with another 20,000+ wounded, and the scale of the Russian military debacle becomes obvious.
Bear in mind, too, that these are the figures provided by Western intelligence services, making conservative estimates. The Ukrainians insist the true figures are much, much higher:
Ukraine may be exaggerating, sure, but my instinct is that they aren’t wildly off the mark. Day in, day out, the Russians are mounting one “meat wave” assault after another, losing 800-1,000 dead every single day. A total of 450,000 dead and wounded by this point doesn’t seem outrageous, or even improbable. Maybe, too, the Rusians haven’t lost 7,000 tanks, but I bet they’ve lost plenty more than the 3,000 we can confirm. If any Western army suffered such appalling attrition, it would have to be withdrawn from combat.
Yet here’s the thing: despite their losses, they did take Bakhmut. They did take Avdiivka (an objective of true startegic significance). Every night I watch the updates posted by the military YouTubers, many of whom are fully competent at synthesizing and analyzing whats known as “OSINT” (for “open source intelligence”, which is plentiful in the modern world of social media and video uploads), and some of whom are Ukrainians with contacts within the military, the latter taking care not to spill any secrets when describing the day’s events. They all tell an increasingly grim story of relentless, grinding retreat in the teeth of Russian assaults, a few hundred metres here, a half kilometre there, this piece of high ground, that important crossroads, day after day. The Russians pay dearly for every centimetre, but at the moment, they seem to be winning a slow battle of a thousand cuts, even while absorbing punishment that conjures memories of the worst of two world wars.
And it’s all the fault of Donald Trump, the Republican Party, and even, to a lesser extent, the Biden administration’s intermittent slow-walking of certain vital military equipment transfers. We are failing Ukraine, and in the result, failing ourselves just as terribly. There is so much more at stake here than the immediate fate, which anyway ought to be enough, of one mid-sized Eastern European democracy.
I know. I’ve been over this and over this. If anything was changing for the better, maybe I’d stop hollering, but look at where we are: here it is April, and still, that Jesus-freaking Mike Johnson is preventing any Ukraine aid bill from coming to the House floor, taking his orders, as ever, from Donald, who in turn aims, like always, to please Papa Putin. The Ukrainians are rationing artillery rounds and even small arms ammunition, and they’re running out of air defence missiles in the daily effort to blunt the relentless drone and missile attacks. Yesterday, the largest power generating station in Kyiv was destroyed, and if nothing changes, more Russian attacks will soon be succeeding. Ukraine needs a fresh infusion of aid right now. Today. Yet back in the US Congress, the gears are barely grinding. On the House floor, something called a “discharge petition”, basically a document that can be used to override the will of the Speaker if it’s signed by a majority of the 435 Representatives, has been circulating for weeks now. If it attracts enough signatures, a funding bill can be forced down Johnson’s throat, but of course the Republicans of the GOP’s “Putin Wing” won’t sign it, and now there are Democrats expressing reservations because the underlying bill, which passed the Senate months ago, also includes funding for Israel.
God save us. What will history make of this myopic, bad faith nonsense? Ukraine is starting to lose.
Back when this all began, I was saying that Putin couldn’t win this war. In a way, that remains true, objectively, in that no matter what he manages to achieve he will have paid far more in blood and treasure than it was worth – by our way of reckoning – but Putin is going to think he won. It will take him a while to rebuild his forces, but he’ll manage it one way or another, and then look out. I couldn’t see this coming, two years back. I never imagined that the Ukrainians would demonstrate the resolve and the skill to prevail, but wouldn’t get the support they needed. Come November, who knows? Maybe Donald will be back in the big chair, and Ukraine’s fate will be sealed. How can it have come to this? What is wrong with us?
Meanwhile, various Republican wingnuts continue to spew Russian propaganda. The incomparable Senator Tuberville was just heard repeating the transparent lie that corrupt Ukrainian officials are stealing the aid we supply their country, and buying yachts and dachas instead of guns and ammo, which even somebody as witless as Coach Tommy should realize is largely impossible, because in the main we don’t send Ukraine cash, we send them weapons and equipment directly, but you know, that’s our Tommy. Meanwhile, what’s Mike Johnson up to? Well, today, he was bowing and scraping before his Orange God King at Donald’s tacky seaside Florida playpen, kissing the ring, and holding a joint press conference on – get this – threats to election integrity. There they were, a couple of once and future coup plotters, both of whom belong behind bars, talking about how the 2024 election bids fair to be rigged just like the one in 2020, assiduously laying the groundwork for their next attempt to put an end to liberal democracy in America. As the world burns, and a valiant people fight desperately to preserve their freedom, these clowns are trying to turn the United States into the Undemocratic Republic of New Hungary, while Putin smiles quietly to himself, and keeps pitching conscripts into the meat grinder, waiting for the Republican Party to hand him a win he could never earn by himself. At this point, Vlad probably figures he can turn what’s left of America into a vassal state, and it won’t cost him anything beyond maybe a new Trump-branded tower in Moscow.
How did we get here?
Let’s be clear: in siding with Vlad and the enemies of democracy, Donald, Mike Johnson, and the rest of the stooges composing the Putin Wing of the GOP, aren’t merely immoral and beneath contempt. They are traitors. Pure and simple. Maybe we can give our heads a collective shake, re-establish our focus on that one essential truth, grasp the implications, and wake up to the peril. This is a dangerous point in history, maybe a turning point, and things aren’t breaking our way. We’d better stop sleepwalking soon. We’d better start seeing those flashing red lights. What now stands to be lost, if we don’t, exceeds by orders of magnitude my poor powers of description.
the needlefish 