Why Do We Keep Feeding the Merchants of Death?

According to mainstream media, the Ukraine war is going well and Russia will be solidly defeated. We just have to give Ukraine the means they need to prevail. However, as reported by Medea Benjamin and Nicolas Davies in an April 24, 2023, article in Salon magazine,¹ based on an “enormous leak of secret documents,” “that now looks like disinformation.” Who is surprised?

“President Biden dismissed the leaks as revealing nothing of ‘great consequence,’” Benjamin and Davies write.²

“What these documents reveal, however, is that the war is going worse for Ukraine than our political leaders have admitted to us, while going badly for Russia too, so that neither side is likely to break the stalemate this year and this will likely lead to ‘a protracted war beyond 2023,’ as one of the documents says.

The publication of these assessments should lead to renewed calls for our government to level with the public about what it realistically hopes to achieve by prolonging the bloodshed, and why it continues to reject the resumption of the promising peace negotiations it blocked in April 2022.

We believe that blocking those talks was a dreadful mistake … and that current U.S. policy is compounding that mistake at the cost of tens of thousands more Ukrainian lives and the destruction of even more of their country.”

False Accounting on Both Sides

According to the leaked documents — allegedly obtained and published on social media by a 21-year-old National Guard member in a foolish attempt to impress friends — both the Russians and the Ukrainians have systematically exaggerated enemy casualties while lowballing their own.

Not surprisingly, the U.S. has publicly promoted the idea that Russia has suffered greater casualties than Ukraine, “deliberately skewing public perceptions to support the notion that Ukraine can somehow win the war, as long as we just keep sending more weapons,” Salon reports.³

Some of the leaked war documents estimate the death toll on both sides of the conflict is upward of 100,000, and when you include the wounded, that number may be as high as 350,000.

The documents also predict Ukraine’s death toll may rise exponentially in May or June because, by then, Ukraine will have used up the air defense missiles provided by NATO, which make up 89% of its air defense. At that point, Ukraine will become vulnerable “to the full strength of the Russian air force,” Salon reports.

What’s more, according to one document,⁴ nine brigades that are being trained in Poland, Romania, and Slovenia for a “spring offensive” scheduled for July or August 2023 had only half the equipment needed and had received only 15% of the necessary battle training by the end of February.

A second document claimed the spring offensive was scheduled to begin at the end of April, which didn’t happen. Either way, if the offensive does get launched earlier rather than later, that would mean many of the troops might not be fully trained by the time they’re deployed. As reported by Benjamin and Davies:⁵

“The leaked documents conclude that ‘enduring Ukrainian deficiencies in training and munitions supplies probably will strain progress and exacerbate casualties during the offensive,’ and that the most likely outcome remains only modest territorial gains.”

That said, Russia still does not have 100% control over Bakhmut despite months of fighting, which suggests Russia is struggling with deficiencies of its own. Taken together, one of the leaked documents predicts the war is “likely heading toward a stalemate” as both sides are becoming locked into a “grinding campaign of attrition.”⁶

Are We Headed for World War?

Another leaked document also reveals NATO countries, including the U.K. and U.S., have sent 97 special forces to Ukraine. This is in addition to the CIA personnel, military trainers and Pentagon contractors sent previously, and the 20,000 troops from the 82nd and 101st Airborne Brigades already deployed to the border of Poland and Ukraine.^7,8

Some U.S. Congress members have expressed worry about the ramifications of continued U.S. involvement in the conflict. In mid-April 2023, Florida Rep. Matt Gaetz introduced a Privileged Resolution of Inquiry^9,10 to force President Biden to disclose the number of U.S. military personnel in Ukraine and the full extent of the administration’s plans to assist Ukraine militarily. As noted in a Congressional press release:¹¹

“… the resolution directs Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin to disclose the number of United States Armed Forces, including special operators, deployed to Ukraine without Congressional authority.

In order to comply with the resolution, the President and Secretary of Defense must send the requested documents to the House of Representatives within 14 days of its adoption …

‘The Biden Administration and other allied countries have been misleading the world on the state of the war in Ukraine. There must be total transparency from this administration to the American people when they are gambling war with a nuclear adversary by having special forces operating in Ukraine …

My Privileged Resolution of Inquiry will better inform the Congress and the country on the true state of our military’s involvement in the war,’ said Congressman Gaetz.”

Biden Displays Frighteningly Poor Leadership

Apparently, U.S. intelligence agencies are also confused about Biden’s plan, if there is one. According to a report by investigative journalist Seymour Hersh, U.S. intelligence sources claim a “total breakdown of trust” between the White House and elements of the U.S. intelligence community:¹²

“The intelligence officials told me that ‘there is no evidence that any senior official in the White House really knows what’s going on in the 82nd and 101st. Are they there as part of a NATO exercise or to serve with NATO combat units if the West decides to engage Russians units inside Ukraine?

Are they there to train or to be a trigger? The rules of engagement say they can’t attack Russians unless our boys are getting attacked.’ ‘But the juniors are running the show here,’ the official added.

‘There’s no NSC coordination and the U.S. army is getting ready to go to war. There’s no idea whether the White House knows what’s going on. Has the president gone to the American people with an informative broadcast about what is going on? The only briefings the press and the public get today are from White House spokespeople. ‘This is not just bad leadership. There is none. Zero.’”

US Taxpayers Bled Dry in Money Laundering Operation

Biden also appears to be completely unconcerned about the fact that the Ukrainian government is stealing from U.S. taxpayers. As reported by Hersh, the U.S. is paying for the diesel the Ukrainian army needs.

But, members of the Ukrainian government are skimming millions of dollars in the process by purchasing discounted fuel from Russia via front companies set up in Poland and Czechia. In 2022, CIA analysts estimated the amount of embezzled funds had already reached $400 million, if not more. Hersh writes:¹³