Who is really responsible for the return of war to Europe? According to the mantra of the dominant Western narrative, there is one and only culprit: Vladimir Putin, the new Hitler, who allegedly invaded Ukraine without any motivation other than that of violent and unbridled expansionism. But, a year after the outbreak of the conflict, it is more than legitimate to ask doubts, selling who the contenders are and how they behave in the field.
In reality – according to the American historian Benjamin Abelow – it is precisely “the United States and NATO that are primarily responsible for the Ukrainian crisis”. Through a thirty-year history of wrong political decisions and provocations, which began already at the time of the dissolution of the Soviet Union, Washington and its European allies (the British in the first row) “have placed Russia in a situation considered untenable by Putin and his military staff”.
Without justifying Moscow’s aggression or exculpating Russian leaders, the scholar Abelow a year after the start of the war gives voice to authoritative political analysts, military and government officials of the United States – including John J. Mearsheimer, Stephen F. Cohen , George F. Kennan, Douglas Macgregor- to convincingly show how the West triggered the Ukrainian conflict, putting not only its own citizens, but also the rest of the world, at the real risk of nuclear war. His book, ‘How the West provoked war in Ukraine’. which is already a bestseller in the USA, Germany and Switzerland, it was also released in Poland and Slovenia and other countries. It will be in Italy, in bookstores, from next Tuesday, February 28 for Fazi Editore.
It is an illuminating examination of the deeper reasons for the ongoing catastrophe. Translated by Valentina Nicolì, the volume has a preface by the historian Luciano Canfora. “The matter dealt with in these pages – the philologist recalls – has sometimes become the subject of media brawls and puffs of intolerance. Studies based essentially on documents are therefore welcome, as is the case with this remarkable essay”. Chas Freeman, former US Deputy Secretary of Defense for International Security Affairs called it “brilliant and compelling,” as well as “easy to read.” “Without an understanding of the history documented here – he says – there will be no easing of the confrontation between the United States and Russia on the eastern borders of Europe”.
“Abelow demonstrates that the crisis in Ukraine was foreseeable, expected and avoidable” comments Richard Sakwa, emeritus professor of Russian and European politics at the University of Kent, while Jack f. Matlock Jr, former United States Ambassador to the Soviet Union (between 1987 and 1991) highlights the brilliant and concise explanation of the “danger created by the military involvement of the United States and NATO in Ukraine. Every citizen capable of thinking rationally and responsibly to American and European security should read it”. Even the linguist Noam Chomsky intervened in the open debate in America, stating that he “presents analyzes that should definitely be better known”.
Abelow, worked in Washington DC writing, lecturing, and lobbying Congress on nuclear weapons policy. He holds a BA in History of Modern Europe from the University of Pennsylvania and a PhD from Yale University School of Medicine. We’ll see if his study will arouse similar clamor in Italy.
(by Rossella Guadagnini)