Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Re: Today's Quote

dear cornelius,

i don't have anything much to say about zellensky. under the circumstances he has very little choice. he could surrender, but i don't get the impression that's what ukrainians now would accept. they'd save lives, lose much of their territory, and i suspect lose their sovereignty., we all know of african cases where this was not acceptable, and bitter wars ensued, like etritrea or biafra, or sort of parallel south sudan. taking his defiant speeches, under these circumstances, as literal indications of anything makes no sense.

i favor peace and surrender over do or die, but that's not my core reaction here.

i honestly believe putin and his military goons are monsters.

kadri would have us love russians for their roles/ambiguous actually, in liberation struggles. but even accepting that (which is truly mixed in angola, say), and worse in algeria; even accepting that, does that give him a pass today to commit any atrocity he wants?

'one of the very worst scenarios of slaughter in recent years was the russian bombing of a peaceful decent opposition movement in syria. russian involvement in c.,a.,r. is not as bad; just bad. there is no argument i can imagine that condemns french barkhan in the sahel and accepts the wagner group that is willing to commit atrocities and is rapacious for african mineral wealth. at least the chinese, who are indifferent to authoritarian rule in africa, haven't lent their troops to rapacious practices.

but syria is the true mark of the policies.

americans have also committed their atrocities. nothing in that excuses the russians who bombed enormous numbers of civilians in syria.

and the takeover of crimea, the attack in georgia, and now this reveals putin's colors.

why strain so hard to rationalize or excuse this inexcusable action?

why should we care?

as you said, we care about ethiopian lives, even if we aren't living there, and the ehtiopian govt is not bombing civilians daily. we all have a stake in this madman's war; the threat of the use of nuclean weapons touches on all of us, everything on earth. it is intolerable that someone with thousands of missiles can leverage that to threaten not only nato or the u.s., but all of us as a consequences. all of us. swedes; ethiopians, nigerians, south africans; algerians, australians, etc. the atomic fallout circles the planet, our planet.,

it is time we vote putin out. he broke the agreement that even the nutty north koreans have kept, which is to respect the pact called mutual shared destruction.

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 Cornelius Hamelberg <corneliushamelberg@gmail.com>
Sent: Monday, March 21, 2022 4:44 PM
To: USA Africa Dialogue Series <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Re: Today's Quote

 

Shalom!

Is it true that some people want to nominate Zellenskyy for the Noble Peace Prize?

I just did a double check

If it's true that "The first casualty of War is Truth" then some of the opinions and "facts" presented in this BBC clip must not be viewed as entirely devoid of propaganda.

"Oh, freedom,

Oh, freedom,

Oh freedom over me.

And before I'd be a slave

I'd be buried in my grave

And go home to my Lord and be free." (Oh Freedom)

Does the Ukraine - Russia imbroglio boil down to the battle cry

"Give me liberty, or give me death!"?

That bad? Was Ukraine not living in peace and tranquillity as part of the USSR?

Using that emotionally charged word FREEDOM, Professor Harrow is manifestly appealing to everyone in Africa, every African whosoever supported an African Liberation struggle. As he says, "the ukrainians might wish to continue to fight. this seems like a struggle of a people for their freedom. everyone in africa knows the meaning of those words."

What about the Africans not currently in Africa, and the non-Africans outside of the old and new borders that enclose today's Ukraine?

For people born in Freetown, Sierra Leone the idea and reality of Freedom has a special resonance that cannot be underestimated.

Your man Zellenskyy doesn't sound too compromising here.

It's not a matter of Kiddush HaShem, and since some comparisons are inevitable, nor is it on the same scale as any of Israel's Wars of Liberation or any of the African Liberations struggles such as Haiti, Algeria's, Kenya, Angola, Namibia, Mozambique, Zimbabwe, South Africa, Guinea-Bissau, to name just a few...

My only fear is that bristling with illusions of uncompromising grandeur in that CNN clip, Zellenskyy might even slip into the phase that for lack of a better term I'll dub a Masada complex and that is, assuming that all the old men and women who are over 70 years of age and the children below the age of 17 years are therefore not liable to military conscription in defence of "every inch" of what Zellenskyy believes was given to him for all eternity by God - that they have all left Kyiv – and instead of making some reasonable concessions those who remain are prepared to follow their leader and, as Professor Harrow suggests, "to be willing to fight to the death "thereby defining the blurred line between martyrdom and suicide, in the name of some kind of " national-ism"

Still praying for peace, to seek it and to pursue it. It's a Divinely sanctioned imperative!

On Sunday, 20 March 2022 at 18:54:40 UTC+1 Kenneth Harrow wrote:

perhaps so. the ukrainians seem to be willing to fight to the death in order to resist the russian invasion and takeover.

it is hard to say how many ukrainians from crimea or the east desire that; perhaps a small number. the rest are either fleeing, and not to russia, or arming themselves to fight.

that tells us that even if zelensky capitulated, the ukrainians might wish to continue to fight. this seems like a struggle of a people for their freedom. everyone in africa knows the meaning of those words.

ken

kenneth harrow

professor emeritus

dept of english

michigan state university

517 803-8839

har...@msu.edu

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From: usaafric...@googlegroups.com <usaafric...@googlegroups.com> on behalf of Cornelius Hamelberg <cornelius...@gmail.com>

Sent: Saturday, March 19, 2022 7:59 PM

To: USA Africa Dialogue Series <usaafric...@googlegroups.com>

Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Re: Today's Quote

 

Since, at the end of the day when the dust of battle finally settles, Ukraine will agree to all of  Russia's demands, the delay in acceding to Russia's demands is tragic

On Saturday, 19 March 2022 at 19:41:31 UTC+1 Kenneth Harrow wrote:

all right, here's my idiot take, a la dostoyevski

when massacres occur, the really horrible, villainous types who are guilty of mass crimes blame the victims:

--they should have surrendered, it's not my fault

--they would have used these weapons against me, so i am entitled to use them against them

--they would have threatened me by joining my enemies in the future

you can go on. the most open face of aggression, masquerading as defense in our times, is occurring now as thousands are dying. the evil thinking that dreams up excuses for it has no end.

now, that's really idiotic.

oh, i forgot the master idiocy: you did all this before, so you have no right to criticize me for doing it now.

ken

kenneth harrow

professor emeritus

dept of english

michigan state university

517 803-8839

har...@msu.edu

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From: usaafric...@googlegroups.com <usaafric...@googlegroups.com> on behalf of Cornelius Hamelberg <cornelius...@gmail.com>
Sent: Saturday, March 19, 2022 8:49 AM
To: USA Africa Dialogue Series <usaafric...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Re: Today's Quote

 

"Between the idea
And the reality
Between the motion
And the act
Falls the Shadow" (The Hollow Men

Chidi says that "The idiots far outnumber the non idiots. They (the idiots) are in the majority."

Where? Ukraine? Utah? NATO? North Korea?

Don't forget that between the idiots and the non-idiot there are the semi-idiots and a good number of educated, over-educated, under-educated idiots who by definition must belong to one of those two categories (idiots/ semi-idiots) - unless you want to add a third category – "Full idiot" – like "Full Professor", not half-professor or what in Victorian English is referred to as "half-idiot"

I intuit where you are heading, dear Chili, because I've heard it plenty of times from e.g. the kinds of Anglo-Sierra Leoneans and semi-Anglo Sierra Leonean Missionaries and allied Creole petty bourgeoisie (usually with estates and "farms"), the intelligentsia, the lumpen proletariat. the shoemakers  who say that the Colonial Brits did a huge disservice to the Creoles when they amalgamated the Creoles' Crown colony – I, e Freetown and the Western Area, with the Protectorate, that is, "the hinterland" and then extended franchise to all and sundry, so that from then on it became "one man, one vote";  as a result of which they (the Creoles, both Yoruba and igbo Creoles)  became "outnumbered".

 It was from then on and with a gradual increase in vehemence  and frustration that you heard them complaining so wistfully, or bittrely, that "The country has gone to the dogs"

 "They (the illiterates) will soon be electing your houseboy and your former gardener as their next Prime Minister, Minister of Finance, Minister of Foreign Affairs,,  Director-General of the Central Bank andChief Justiceof the Supreme Court !"

On Saturday, 19 March 2022 at 10:21:36 UTC+1 chidi...@gmail.com wrote:

The idiots far outnumber the non idiots. They (idiots)are the majority. The reason it is like that, I do not know.

-Chidi Anthony Opara (CAO)

--
Chidi Anthony Opara is a Poet, IIM Professional Fellow, MIT Chief Data Officer Ambassador and Founder/Publisher of, www.publicinformationprojects.org)

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