Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - News Report: Pope Evokes Spectre Of Ukraine War Sparking Global Conflict

the moral voices come from people, not nations. nations have national security issues, "existential threats" which means threats to the national government, not to the people. they are willing to send the people to fight for the nation, for the people to die for the nation. but the nation is an abstraction taught to children to love, so they will support it.

i feel we live in an age of national domination of our imagination, and are unaware of it, as the ideology has interpellated us and we saluted in return, here, present.

so too with the war. we need people to oppose it; people's voices. you have a voice that carries very far: make a statement, we will sign on, support it, and send it to the heads of state and united nations. some of us will hear you. the nations probably are deaf institutions.

ken

(what sparked this reflection was my just reading putin state he didn't intend to use nuclear weapons, except in the case of existential threat to russia. i can speak to russians; i doubt i can speak to the thing putin thinks he will be protecting with his weapons.)

kenneth harrow

professor emeritus

dept of english

michigan state university

517 803-8839

harrow@msu.edu

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From: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com> on behalf of Toyin Falola <toyinfalola@austin.utexas.edu>
Sent: Monday, March 28, 2022 6:40 PM
To: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - News Report: Pope Evokes Spectre Of Ukraine War Sparking Global Conflict

 

Ken and Baba Kadiri:

Where is the United Nations as we speak?

Where is a moral voice?

TF

Sent from my iPhone

On Mar 28, 2022, at 5:25 PM, Harrow, Kenneth <harrow@msu.edu> wrote:



dear salimonu (sorry when i wrote kadri, instead of kadiri. my brother in law is named kadri, whence the error)

i am very glad you said, in essence, let's not quibble on the small points but get to the gist of it.

i don't see the world as you do, in some respects. in others, we agree.

i absolutely agree that nuclear weapons ought to be abolished.

i don't agree that the warsaw pact, russia, the soviets, or the chinese for that matter, represent victims of imperial endangerment, and thus are merely protecting themselves. not at all. i think they are all bastards. the u.s. has been imperialistic in its sphere, especially in the western hemisphere. but it has also advanced positive democratic values. call it hypocritical? so what, that's what the world is like.

the russians and cubans represented an ideal to my generation and my parents; it failed miserably, became totalitarian, or oppressive. i still believe in the ideals of those revolutions, but not the autocracies that betrayed them.

i agree with moses that democracy is not an easy automatic cure-all. but i want to see things clearly. in your message below you state, correctly, that the sweetmouth democratics are often autocratic, or, i might add, oppressive, as is israel toward palestinians, or the u.s. toward its neighbors to the south--and eventually vietnam and iraq. but that's only part of the story.

you simply sweep aside the soviet occupation and domination of east europe. you want to take its support of good things in africa, the mpla or anc sapc in the past, as sufficient proof of its wonderfulness, when it is monstrous elsewhere, when it is no longer in any way part of a revolutionary ideal, when it is out for itself through power, power, power.

  china, same story. sweet talk of brotherhood; then, let me rip you off. you are oppressing your people? so what, that's realism.

anyway, i march with you for nuclear disarmament, stuart hall's major life commitment. every nuclearized nation is a threat, ultimately, to all of us, regardless of regime.

as for why putin invaded ukraine, he gave a public explanation, which you accept. i don't accept it on the face of it; i believe he probably is using it to legitimize the reconstitution of the soviet union. he is a dumb kgb jerk who understands only force and lies. biden may like u.s. power, but he is not trump or biden or like the other autocrats who plague us.

or who plague me, anyway.

if nato is part of the militarization of the west, let it be dismantled, when others also dismantle their 4500 missiles. let's face it, the missiles are pointed straight at you and me, by the west and the east. once you bomb out the west and the east, aint nothing left.

some might not care, but i have grandchildren who count for me.

ken

kenneth harrow

professor emeritus

dept of english

michigan state university

517 803-8839

harrow@msu.edu

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From: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com> on behalf of Salimonu Kadiri <ogunlakaiye@hotmail.com>
Sent: Monday, March 28, 2022 3:14 PM
To: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - News Report: Pope Evokes Spectre Of Ukraine War Sparking Global Conflict

 

​Let us go to the core of the problem. The war in Ukraine is neither between Putin and Zelensky, nor between Russia and Ukraine, but between Vladimir Putin and Joe Biden or between Russia and the United States of America because the latter wants to place NATO missile base in Ukraine. The U.S., has decided to offer nuclear umbrella to countries surrounding Russia for the purpose of securing first strike nuclear advantage against Russia. Since the conflict in Ukraine is about nuclear weapon which endangers the lives of all of us the petition should be forwarded to all Nuclear Power countries. This is the right time for majority of the people of the world to force the nuclear weapon countries to scrap their life-extinguishing nuclear arsenals.

Those who so often sweet-mouth democracy and condemn autocracy and dictatorship are the worse autocrats and dictators at the United Nations. Let's recall that the United Nations General Assembly, on 27 October 2016, passed a resolution (a binding proposal) to begin negotiation in 2017 on international agreement to prohibit nuclear weapon. Of the 193 UN member countries, 123 voted for the resolution. Conspicuously among the abstentions were nine nuclear-weapon powers namely, USA, Russia, Great Britain, France, China, India, Pakistan, Israel and North Korea. Besides, all members of NATO and even non-members in Europe abstained from voting so as not to cause the wrath of the U.S. A. On July 7, 2017, and after two negotiations, a resolution was approved by 122 countries. On September 20, 2017, Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) was ready for signatures. Fifty countries offered to sign the agreement immediately, while others were to follow later. According to the UN's rules, the treaty must be ratified by the Parliament of the signing countries before it can take effect. Besides, at least fifty countries must endorse the treaty. That limit was surpassed on 22 January 2021 and the treaty came into force. As of date, 86 of the UN's member countries have signed the treaty, while 59 countries have ratified it. According to Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW), it is forbidden to test, develop, possess, produce and use nuclear weapon. The ban also include threat to use nuclear weapon.

Democratically, nine-countries in the UN cannot overrule the decision of 122 members or that of 86 countries that have signed the treaty or the 59 that have ratified it. To resolve the conflict in Ukraine, the intended petition should call all Nations, especially the nuclear weapon possessing countries, to sign and execute UN's Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) immediately.

S. Kadiri  

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From: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com> on behalf of Harrow, Kenneth <harrow@msu.edu>
Sent: 28 March 2022 00:55
To: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - News Report: Pope Evokes Spectre Of Ukraine War Sparking Global Conflict

 

toyin, would a petition using the many many people on this list to add their names, going to putin and zelensky, be a step forward?

ken

kenneth harrow

professor emeritus

dept of english

michigan state university

517 803-8839

harrow@msu.edu

---

From: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com> on behalf of Toyin Falola <toyinfalola@austin.utexas.edu>
Sent: Sunday, March 27, 2022 5:19 PM
To: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - News Report: Pope Evokes Spectre Of Ukraine War Sparking Global Conflict

 

"Negotiate seriously for peace"

Pope

 

This is the only acceptable condition. The rest, on all sides, is satanic.

TF

From: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com> on behalf of Public Information Projects <publicinformationprojects@gmail.com>
Date: Sunday, March 27, 2022 at 4:17 PM
To: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com>
Subject: USA Africa Dialogue Series - News Report: Pope Evokes Spectre Of Ukraine War Sparking Global Conflict

Link: http://www.publicinfoprojectsblog.org/2022/03/news-report-pope-evokes-spectre-of.html?m=1

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