The Specious Thinking Behind Claims That the U.S. Prevented an Invasion of Ukraine
By Caitlin JOHNSTONE
Back in November The Military Times released a Ukrainian intelligence claim, which was picked up and duplicated by numerous other mainstream publications, declaring that Russia was going to attack Ukraine by the end of January.
Then in late January when the calendar unmasked the Military Times incendiary headline “Russia preparing to attack Ukraine by late January”, that exact same outlet ran a much less viral story with the headline “Russia not yet prepared for full-blown attack says Ukraine“.
Now here in early February, the Murdoch press has put out a spin piece of a sort we’re most likely to see more of in coming days declaring that Russia has not invaded because the United States and its allies have actually “messed up” Moscow’s strategies by informing everyone the intrusion is coming. In a short article entitled “Ukraine-Russia tensions: Moscow’s strategies ‘messed up’ after US and Britain call out possible intrusion“, Ukraine’s defense minister Hanna Maliar informs Sky News that Putin has actually not yet gotten into due to the fact that his homicidal plot was thwarted by a plucky band of royal states who would not be avoided from speaking their reality.
NEW: Discoveries by the UK & US about the danger of a new Russian invasion of Ukraine are “destroying” Moscow’s strategies, deputy defence minister tells @SkyNews
It came as accused ok a fake video attack plot to frame forces & create an excuse to get intohttps://t.co/0jWQJRVbJF— Deborah Haynes (@haynesdeborah) February 4, 2022
“It is necessary to understand that when we or our western partners name the date of the possible invasion, we are ruining their strategies,” Maliar told Sky News. “And the dates that were already informed in public– it’s destroyed strategies, nothing will happen in nowadays. However the danger still exists.”
In the very same piece Ukraine’s info minister Oleksandr Tkachenko was asked if he thought Russia would already have actually attacked if not for all the western talk of an imminent attack, to which he replied, “As a normal burglar, if he does not see defence or at least does not see talking, he will act.”
At no time in the article is any consideration offered to the possibility of a far simpler description for the missing Russian intrusion: that Russia never ever intended to attack. That possibility is just skimmed right over in favor of the apparently far less likely situation that the Russian federal government thought it could orchestrate an enormous invasion without anybody saying anything about it and was forced to desert its plans in dissatisfaction when that nonsensical gamble stopped working to pay off.
And now we’ve currently got western media releasing other Ukrainian military claims that the real intrusion will be beginning February 20th.
“February 20 is noted as a prospective start date for the intrusion: that is when the Winter Olympics ends in Beijing, and President Putin, 69, excited to woo the Chinese, may not want to taint the occasion,” The Times composed in late January.
As February 20th comes and goes without an intrusion and forecasts of incorrect flag operations and Kremlin-backed coups stop working to turn out, we will likely be seeing more such spin tasks from the western media declaring that those things did not occur since of measures that were taken by the United States and its allies to avoid it. It may be used to score political points by declaring Biden “prevented” a Ukraine intrusion with his determination to withstand Putin by putting weapons into Ukraine and sending soldiers to Eastern Europe.
These claims will be developed totally on specious reasoning.
The fallacious nature of the narrative that western powers are preventing wicked plots from the Kremlin with their cold war aggressions is best illustrated in this short clip from The Simpsons in which Homer believes that bears are being stayed out of a normally bear-free neighborhood by the freshly developed “bear patrol”.
“Ah, not a bear in sight! The Bear Patrol need to be working like a charm,” states Homer.
“That’s specious thinking, Dad,” Lisa responds, picking up a stone from the ground. “By your reasoning I might claim that this rock keeps tigers away.”
“Oh, how does it work?” asks her father.
“It does not work,” states Lisa. “It’s simply a stupid rock. However I don’t see any tigers around, do you?”
At which point Homer provides to purchase Lisa’s rock from her, due to the fact that he’s a fuckin’ moron.
The sensible misconception that has affected both Homer Simpson and those who declare the United States power alliance is preventing a Russian invasion of Ukraine is known as cum hoc ergo propter hoc (“with this, therefore since of this”), which is the misconception that correlation implies causation. It’s when somebody puts forward the claim that due to the fact that two things took place simultaneously (or failed to occur as in the examples we’re taking a look at here), one need to have triggered the other. Homer’s bear patrol kept the bears away. Lisa’s anti-tiger rock kept the tigers away. The west’s screaming about an impending Russian intrusion kept the Russian invaders away.
Alternatively, it’s possible that there were no bears or tigers threatening the streets of Springfield, and that there was no Russian intrusion threatening Ukraine. That this was all a narrative utilized to increase cold war escalations, move some expensive military inventory, produce the international agreement that Putin is a Hitler-like menace who should be strongly inspected at all times by all countries, or possibly heaven forbid to lay the groundwork for aggressiveness from US/Ukraine/NATO powers.
Nevertheless this thing unfolds, it’s a sure thing that the rhetoric won’t be getting anymore logically sound any time quickly. So keep that Simpson’s clip useful.