Harry J. Bentham

As the US supports warlords in Ukraine, its absurd theories of democratization collapse into folly.

In all International Relations (IR) classrooms throughout the English-speaking world, something called the democratic peace theory is taught. The theory holds that countries are less likely to go to war if they are democracies, and that installing democratic regimes is therefore the path to peace and security in the world. Paradoxically, the theory is more often applied to justify wars than to end them.

Democratic peace theory is a large part of the underlying rhetoric behind the United States’ commitment to “democratization” in the world’s conflict zones, particularly the Middle East and the former Soviet Union. While the US supplies arms to dictatorships it falsely labels “democracies,” it works to overthrow governments that were actually democratically elected.

Hurling feeble accusations that truly elected rulers are sliding into autocracy, the United States continues on a slippery slope of its own by arming some of the world’s most sordid military dictatorships. It is astonishing that anyone can really be convinced by their reasoning.

In Ukraine, the United States proved its hypocrisy more clearly than in any other relationship it managed to strap together. Its initial cause for involvement in Ukraine was about “democratization.” Accusing democratically-elected President Viktor Yanukovych of sliding into autocracy, the United States favored violent protests to overthrow this regime in the name of US-guided democracy.

Yet, for all its theories about democratization, look what the US did to Ukraine. Now, we have a good part of the country in a state of insurrection against the central government, and a military dictatorship using tanks, and even white phosphorous and cluster bombs against its own people.

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Harry J. Bentham

With phantom Russians haunting the shores of Sweden and Britain, NATO still can’t explain its cavalier 70% of global military spending.

We can expect more Russian specters to haunt British shores in the coming years, as the valiant so-called “west” wages a fevered and completely unjustified Cold War 2.0 against enemies who don’t exist.

Recently, on 29 October, the Royal Air Force swept to the rescue when a supposed Russian bomber came into British airspace. The bomber, which the RAF even threatened to destroy, turned out to be a Latvian Soviet-era cargo plane, on a routine flight.

Latvia, which used to be part of the Soviet Union, is officially a member of NATO. Officially, that means, an ally of the United States and the United Kingdom. This seems to have been of little interest to the RAF, who threatened to shoot down the poor plane and thereby do more damage to their own supposed ally than the Soviet (now Russian) menace ever threatened to do.

The incident in British airspace follows a similarly pointless chase in the Baltic Sea for a Russian submarine that never materialized. Foolishly, Sweden’s navy wasted huge amounts of military spending chasing a supposed underwater intruder due to rumor and hearsay.

Media were quick to identify the intruder as a Russian vessel, despite there being no evidence to support the existence of any vessel whatsoever, and no reason for a dispute between Russia and Sweden. The sole beneficiary of the entire situation is the United States, which seeks to enlarge and continue its military occupation of Europe and will invent any excuses and any enemies it needs to justify its presence.

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