Daily Times

The shooting down of Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur over Eastern Ukraine, in which 298 passengers perished, has created a ferocious furore with accusations amongst the adversary forces in Ukraine and their western imperialist and Russian backers. This horrific calamity has also brought to the fore the severity of the conflict. Right from the outset the imperialists and their aggressive media have been pointing fingers at Russia for this heinous act long before the investigations had begun. Several analysts have compared the situation with 1914 when the Balkan states were engulfed in similar conflicts and the assassination of the Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria triggered the First World War. However, these speculations are grossly exaggerated as the balance of forces has gone through a sea change and none of the dominant powers of the present epoch can afford or dare to go for another world war.

US imperialism has shown its utter weakness and the same is true for Cameron, Hollande and Merkel. The UK prime minister attacked the French as they signed an arms deal, including an aircraft carrier, for not doing enough against the Russian oligarchs. However, the French press pointed out that most Russian oligarchs live in London and have donated one million pounds to Cameron’s coffers, and that he is reluctant to lose the £ 160,000 promised donation for playing tennis with the wife of a former Putin government finance minister. None of them really want to take hard action as it affects their interests. A very tense situation prevails at present in the Ukraine and threatens to spiral out of control.

All this is covering up news of the ongoing slaughter in Gaza. The leaders of Hamas and Fatah had agreed to Israel’s demands a few months ago. Nonetheless, the Zionists wanted to attack Gaza, to quell discontent at home, increase their hegemony against the soaring Iranian influence in the region and to break up any attempt at the unity of the Palestinians. It is yet another example of extreme instability due to the crisis of capitalism on a world scale. This can have an effect in every country.

The US is impatient with Merkel and the European Union for their timid response to the Ukrainian crisis. The US imperialists have retreated and are indirectly exonerating the Russians of their involvement. The leading neo-con Paul Wolfowitz, in an interview on BBC’s Newsnight programme, made a Freudian slip when he accused Putin of “pouring oil on the crisis”, before correcting himself, realising that far from pouring oil onto Europe and Ukraine, the man in the Kremlin might be tempted to turn off the tap altogether. US intelligence officials believe pro-Russian separatists likely shot down flight MH 17 “by mistake”, not realising it was a civilian passenger flight. Al Jazeera reported, “Speaking on condition of anonymity in Washington, they said the ‘most plausible explanation’ for the destruction of the plane was that the separatists fired a Russian-made SA-11 missile at it after mistaking it for another kind of aircraft. Five days into it, [the crash] it does appear to be a mistake.” The officials went on to say, “There was no explicit evidence of the Russians training the separatists on the SA-11 missile batteries.”

At the same time, the reactionary government in Ukraine and the pro-Russian fighters are not going to back down. Kiev’s so-called ‘Anti-Terrorist Operation’ has intensified after the downing of the aircraft. Provocations and war hysteria are rising. The prime minister of Ukraine, Yatsenyuk, who has now resigned after two coalition partners withdrew from the government, called the downing an “international crime” and a “war against the world”.

Everybody knows that Yatsenyuk is a stooge of US imperialism and his belligerence faithfully reflects the Washington line. However, actually, there is very little substance behind all this. In the words of Shakespeare’s Macbeth: “It is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.” All this is calculated to generate an atmosphere of fear and hatred towards Russia and the insurgents, and win international support for the bloody campaign being waged by the Kiev government against the people of southeast Ukraine. The men in Kiev are actually the only ones with a clear and evident motive for this crime. Did they have the opportunity? Yes, because while nobody can prove that the rebels possess the Buk missiles that are said to have downed the airliner, the Ukrainian army is known to have them. According to the BBC monitoring service, Russia’s military detected an activated radar belonging to a Ukrainian battery of Buk surface-to-air missiles on Thursday. A report to this effect was delivered on Russian state television. If that is true, the finger of suspicion points not to the rebels but to the Ukrainian army itself.

It is possible the Ukrainians shot down the plane themselves, thinking it was a Russian warplane, as they have complained repeatedly of Russian violations of their airspace. This, however, seems unlikely since there are electronic signals that automatically identify a civilian airplane. The alternative is that they shot the plane down deliberately. At first sight this might appear so monstrous that it is almost inconceivable. It is indeed monstrous, but it is not at all inconceivable. Russia’s attitude will of course be crucial in this situation. Putin seems to have rejected the idea of direct military intervention, at least for now. Public opinion in Russia obliges him to keep up tacit support for the rebels with supplies of arms and volunteers but the Kremlin is pursuing its own cynical interests in Ukraine. Putin intends to keep the rebels afloat by sending just sufficient arms to prevent them from being defeated in order to weaken the Kiev government and force it to come to terms with Moscow. The west accuses Putin of encouraging the rebels but in fact the very limited nature of his assistance is provoking discontent among the fighters who were looking to Russia to support their struggle against the onslaught of government-sponsored fascist shock troops. Some simple-minded people imagine that Russia is acting in the interests of the people of East Ukraine. In their confusion, they identify the Russia of Putin with the Soviet Union of Lenin. That is a vain illusion! They overlook the fact that Russia today is a capitalist country ruled by a corrupt and rapacious oligarchy, just like Ukraine.

On the road of nationalism and chauvinism there is nothing but ruin for all Ukrainians. These lying politicians who wrap themselves in the flag of nationalism are really the agents of the oligarchs and many are oligarchs themselves! Their only loyalty is to themselves and their criminally acquired wealth and power. The sinister bosses in Washington, Berlin and Moscow are only pursuing their own selfish interests. The only solution is to unite the working class for the overthrow of the capitalist oligarchy, for a united, independent, socialist Ukraine. That is the only way forward.

The writer is the editor of Asian Marxist Review and international secretary of Pakistan Trade Union Defence Campaign. He can be reached at ptudc@hotmail.com