Although he had stiff competition Sunday, NBC’s Chuck Todd won this week’s Oscar for supporting functionary of the the Military-Industrial-Congressional-Intelligence-MEDIA-Academia-Think-Tank complex (MICIMATT).

When President Putin talks about Nazis in Ukraine he is talking about Andriy Biletsky, the 42-year-old founder of the Azov Battalion, who is thought to be fighting against Russian troops somewhere near Kyiv.

One of the greatest tragedies as Russia continues its illegal assault on Ukraine and as Ukrainians continue to die is that it should never have happened. The US and NATO knew what had to be done, but no one did it.

One thing that we can confidently predict is that, as a result of this invasion, Ukraine’s tragic cycle will continue.

I did not expect Russia to invade Ukraine. I was quite definite about it several times: “Russia will not invade Ukraine” I said. I envisaged several possibilities but nothing like what we have seen in the last weeks. My argument was based on the assumption that Moscow did not want to take ownership of, in Åslund’s words, “the poorest country in Europe“. I still do not think that it does – I believe that Moscow wants a neutral and de-nazified Ukraine that is a buffer between it and NATO. I am also coming to believe that Novorossiya, more or less in its historical borders as formed by Katherine when recovered from the Ottomans, will be independent. The chance that it would remain part of Ukraine has probably passed. As I wrote in 2014 “In short, the West broke Ukraine, it now owns it. Or, to put it more precisely, it owns that part that Moscow doesn’t want. And what part that is is entirely up to Moscow to choose“. Moscow is choosing now.

In this noteworthy article, written exclusively for the NewColdWar website, Slava Myrolub describes another war. A quiet but nonetheless horrific war, it is one in which critics of Ukraine’s regime are being kidnapped by the country’s security services and, while their whereabouts remain unknown, they are being forced to make statements on social media contradicting their widely known, respected and firmly held beliefs.

Those of you who followed the link on my essay of yesterday and watched the 10 minute interview with Kiev mayor Vitali Klitschko on TRT World’s “Newsmakers” program will surely agree that this high visibility Ukrainian politician is leading the remaining residents of the country’s capital and the broader population of Ukraine straight to disaster in the name of patriotic self-defense.

‘I support everything that is for victory and for Putin,’ one villager said

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has, in the context of the tragic conflict now raging in his country, been propelled from the most unlikely leader of a country mired in corruption with a parlous economy into something approximating to Marvel superhero, doughtily defending Ukraine against an implacable Russian bear in the cause of Western values of democracy, human rights, the rule of law and, well, by now we all know the script.

Far rightist Azov troops’ mobilization of potent Nazi symbols muddies the waters of Western support for the Ukrainian resistance