This article appears in the February 3, 2023 issue of Executive Intelligence Review.
Russia-Ukraine and CARICOM
[Print version of this article]
Mr. Ramotar, who was the President of Guyana (2011- 2015) and a Member of Parliament, submitted this article to EIR for publication. CARICOM is the 15-member Caribbean Community organization established in 1973, comprising 14 nation-states and one dependency.
On June 22, 1941, when Hitler’s Nazi hordes attacked the Soviet Union, they did so with all the power of Europe at their disposal. Hitler had already conquered the whole of Western Europe (Italy excluded, but it was an ally of Hitler) and was using its industries and men to attack Russia.
That was a brutal war. However, Russia managed to push Hitler’s hordes out of its territory and proceeded to liberate Europe, including Germany and France. It cost them twenty to thirty million Soviet, mainly Russian, lives.
Today history seems to be repeating itself. Russia is once again in the grips of war; this time it is not confronting only Europe but the United States, the UK and Canada. The consequences of this war can be more devastating than what took place eighty-two years ago.
Indeed, this war is putting the whole world in grave danger. This is because the forces that are arrayed against Russia include three nuclear powers, the U.S., UK, and France. And Russia too has a sizable stockpile of these weapons of mass liquidation.
The west’s military alliance, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), deliberately provoked this war by threatening to expand NATO on Russia’s border with Ukraine. This means that they would station their military bases with nuclear weapons right on Russia’s doorstep.
This they did after the last Soviet/Russian leader, Mikhail Gorbachev, was given the assurance that if Russia withdrew its troops that were stationed in Eastern Europe, NATO would not move troops one inch further towards Russia. This has turned out to be a massive fraud.
We also know now, first hand, that all the negotiations which the U.S. and its allies were conducting with Russia were merely to give themselves time to prepare for a full-scale war with Russia.
That revelation came most recently, from Angela Merkel, former Chancellor of Germany, and from the former President of France François Hollande, who revealed that they signed an agreement with Russia but had no intention of honoring it. Their real intention was to prepare Ukraine to wage a war against Russia. That agreement, known as the Minsk Agreement, was to give the areas where Russian people were predominant in Ukraine some degree of autonomy. Those parts would have remained as part of Ukraine.
The main purpose of the West was to gain time to arm and prepare Ukraine to wage war with Russia. In the meantime, they remained quiet as Ukrainian military kept bombing the Russian people in Donetsk and Luhansk, killing thousands of civilians.
Having fooled Russia with signing accords they never intended to uphold, having refused to say that they would not grant Ukraine NATO’s membership, thereby making her a neutral country, they practically forced Russia to launch a military mission to improve its own security and to defend the Russian people living in Eastern Ukraine.
Now that Russia has managed to almost defeat the fascist forces in Ukraine, the United States, Canada, and Europe are pouring more weapons into Ukraine. They also have sizable mercenary forces in Ukraine as they now openly say that the defeat of Russia is their main goal.
The only voice calling for peace is that of the Pope. The NATO leaders are ignoring him.
What is of great concern is not only the needless loss of lives, Russian and Ukrainian lives, but the danger of a nuclear war. Such a war would mean the extinction of life on our Earth.
Therefore we should all be concerned because we would all perish in such a situation.
Moreover, we are not helpless in these circumstances. It is therefore imperative that we make our voices heard. We are united within our region in CARICOM. We are a fourteen-country alliance. This is very significant. Our collective influence on the international arena is great. Yet CARICOM leaders choose to support the U.S. and NATO by their voting at the UN and to remain sheepishly silent outside the UN.
Whenever they are forced to say anything, we hear the murmuring that “Russia invaded Ukraine.” This of course is ignoring everything that led Russia, a country that knows wars and abhors wars, to take the measures it did.
It is time that CARICOM as a whole and the countries that comprise it individually make their presence for peace felt. They should denounce the escalation that is presently happening by the sending of more weapons, new tanks, etc. to Ukraine.
After all, the alliance has a responsibility for the welfare and security of its peoples! Our leaders must discharge their duty to the Caribbean people.
Let’s call for immediate negotiations and guarantee all countries’ security and peace. One immediate step is to add your name, as I have, to the growing list of international signers of the “Open Letter to Pope Francis” from political and social leaders, supporting the call for immediate peace negotiations with security guarantees for all countries.
