Ding Dong

“What a world, what a world,” Victoria Nuland was supposedly heard muttering as she left the State Department upon offering her resignation. Boy, we got a new/old sanctions sherpa and then the lead US architect of Ukraine/Russian idiocy out the door in a matter of weeks. I guess things going tits-up is apparent even in the White House — maybe.

A lot of people will want to blame Ms Nuland for the whole mess, not that she doesn't deserve a lot of responsibility, but me, I blame her “diplomatic” up-bringing. The AP states as a young State Department staffer, Victoria “served at the U.S. embassy in Moscow in the tumultuous 1990s and was in the city during the attempted coup against former Russian President Boris Yeltsin.”

You remember, as the AP now deems it the “attempted coup,” don't you my fellow Americans? That was in 1993. The Soviet Union had dissolved and the new Russian presidency and parliament were in a continuous tussle about power. Then in September, Yeltsin dissolved the parliament. In an article at the time, the Washington Post reports, “In his decree, Yeltsin acknowledged he was violating the constitution but argued that the April 25 referendum, in which the Russian people supported his rule, had 'supreme juridical power.'"

In turn, the elected members of parliament occupied the parliamentary building. After 13 days, President Yeltsin attacked the parliament building, “tanks punched holes in the Russian White House and left it aflame.” Not less than 100 deaths ensued and the Parliamentarians surrendered, such are AP deemed “attempted coups” in Russia.

“It makes the head spin,” Trotsky reported Lenin saying as they waited to take control of the Duma some 75 years before. How such events must have struck the young Victoria ensconced in the American embassy. Even more, what imprint must have been left on her young mind from the reaction of the yearling American President? Mr. Bill stated, “The United States continues to stand firm in its support of President Yeltsin because he is Russia’s democratically elected leader.” I guess as a president, like Yeltsin, you just disregard those elected parliamentarians.

He added, “I don’t see that he had any choice. . . . If such a thing happened in the United States, you would have expected me to take tough action against it.” Some say he even teared up with this comment, thinking no such chance would ever be afforded him. He then caught himself and added, “As long as he goes forward with the new constitution, genuinely democratic elections for the Parliament, genuinely democratic elections for the president, then he is doing what he said he would do.”

Well the new constitution came, the one Putin uses to run things today. Elections for Parliament were held. Boris backtracked on the presidential election, not holding it until 1996, when the United States helped play a decisive role in Yeltsin's re-election, who four years later would resign months before the next election and appoint Putin his successor – what a wicked web we weave.

Now seasoned, Victoria became a deputy national security adviser to then Vice-President Dick Cheney from 2003 to 2005. That’s right, for the disastrous, illegal, and brutally stupid invasion of Iraq.

It would be under Mrs. Clinton, Mr. Kerry, and the Obama Administration when Victoria bloomed. As Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs, she helped engineer the Maiden coup in 2013 Ukraine, overthrowing the elected government. The Assistant Secretary of State was caught scheming on tape as demonstrators took to the streets about who the next Ukraine leader should be. In response to European concerns, she replied “Fuck the EU.”

Joe Biden brought her back into State, where she helped bring about and vociferously supported the current criminal idiocy in Ukraine, little doubt not just opposing negotiations from the start, but those that sought to avoid the whole murderous affair before it started. You'd hope with her departure some sanity might come, but then we have a National Security State that has been held accountable for nothing in over 75 years. In that tradition, current Secretary State Blinken remarked on her departure, it is her “leadership on Ukraine that diplomats and students of foreign policy will study for years to come.”

So, don't blame Ms Nuland, instead weep for the bright young Victoria, led astray by so many over the years, though I do sure as hell hope she's gone for good.

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