Between Gulf Wars I and II I clearly remember hearing Harris read from his book Our War on calling Vietnam “a mistake”:

While it may be an accurate conclusion, calling the war a mistake is the functional equivalent of calling water wet or dirt dirty. … In this particular “mistake,” at least 3 million people died, only 58,000 of whom were Americans. These 3 million people died crushed in the mud, riddled with shrapnel, hurled out of helicopters, impaled on sharpened bamboo, obliterated in carpets of explosives dropped from bombers flying so high they could only be heard and never seen (talk about cowards!) they died reduced to chunks by one or more land mines, finished off by a round through the temple or a bayonet in the throat, consumed by sizzling phosphorous, burned alive with jellied gasoline, strung up by their thumbs, starved in cages, executed after watching their babies die, trapped on the barbed wire calling for their mothers. They died while trying to kill, they died while trying to kill no one, they died heroes, they died villains, they died at random, they died most often when someone who had no idea who they were killed them under the orders of someone who had even less idea than that. … All 3 million died in pain, often so intense that death was a relief. This war was about us. We made it happen. It was ours. And, even at this late date, any genuine reckoning on our part must include assuming the full responsibility of that ownership. Nothing less will do.

I think I’m still living with the remnants of the assumption of global respect for the UN that I was raised with. 2024 feels post-international law, post-UN.

Wolfgang Streeck, Frankfurter Rundschau:

Ukrainische Soldaten und ein von Deutschland gelieferter Leopard-2-Panzer in der Oblast Donezk im Osten der Ukraine. © IMAGO/Funke Foto Services

Mit Ausnahme der Ära Brandt galt es in der bundesdeutschen Nachkriegs­geschichte als unbestreitbar, dass es außerhalb der von den USA formulierten Gesamtinteressen eines geeinten „Westens“ ein speziell deutsches Interesse nicht geben könne und dürfe, und schon gar nicht im Bereich der nationalen Sicherheit. Wer das anders sah, wie etwa Egon Bahr, aber auch Genscher, geriet in den Verdacht eines neuen deutschen Nationalismus, geäußert von den Vereinigten Staaten als Mittel zur Wahrung der Bündnisdisziplin.

Dies gilt bis heute, drei Jahrzehnte nach dem Ende des Kalten Krieges, in denen kein Tag verging, an dem die USA nicht irgendwo in der Welt Krieg geführt hätten, und ungeachtet der Katastrophe der amerikanischen Weltordnungs- bzw. Weltbeherrschungspolitik im Irak, in Afghanistan, in Syrien und Libyen und zurzeit in Palästina – Beispiele einer munter-fahrlässigen Interventionspolitik, die nichts hinterlässt als Chaos. Wagenknechts Aufforderung, im deutschen Interesse aus der amerikanisch bestimmten Ukraine-Strategie auszubrechen und das Verhältnis zu den USA, und damit auch zu Russland, grundlegend neu zu bestimmen, gerade auch angesichts der in einem Jahr absehbar beginnenden zweiten Amtszeit von Donald Trump, erscheint unter diesen Umständen alles andere als abenteuerlich, weit weniger jedenfalls als die immer noch blind den Vereinigten Staaten folgende Außenpolitik der Bundesregierung.

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Der Weg zu Friedens- statt Kriegssicherung führt für Deutschland über seine Befreiung aus dem geostrategischen Klammergriff der Vereinigten Staaten – geleitet, statt von Nibelungentreue gegenüber dem weltpolitischen Herrschafts­anspruch der USA, von nationalen deutschen Überlebensinteressen. Genau darauf läuft die Rede von Wagenknecht hinaus.

Thomas Friedman, New York Times:

Opinion _ Conversations and insights about the moment. – The New York Times 5

Seymour Hersh:

Zelensky’s desire to fire his commanding general is the result, some Americans believe, of his knowledge that Zaluzhny had continued to participate—whether directly or through aides is not known—in secret talks since last fall with American and other Western officials on how best to achieve a ceasefire and negotiate an end to the war with Russia. It was those talks that led Zaluzhny to declare to the Economist that the war was stalemated. Zelensky has talked of mobilizing 500,000 more soldiers, via another draft, and to try again this spring to launch another counteroffensive against the Russians.

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Zelensky must be told: “You’ve got to get rid of corruption before we do anything more.” The second step is something that does not exist today in Ukraine: a serious audit of all government funding. The official said Zelensky should consider the billions he needs “as our money, as an investment with all of the rules” for its disbursement “to be laid out. and followed.”

Last year CIA Director William Burns secretly flew to Kyiv to warn Zelensky face-to-face that Washington was aware of his personal corruption and his unwillingness to dismiss any of the dozens of officials—who were named by Burns—known to be deeply involved in diverting defense funds to personal accounts. Burns also told the president, as I reported, that there was anger among some of his subordinates because he was taking too large a cut of the spoils.

“The third step,” the official said, is for Zelensky to use the funds “to build infrastructure and the economy. The fourth and final step is to defend your country.”

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“Of course, Zelensky knew that Zaluzhny was dealing with the West,” the official said. “But Zelensky will be a dead man walking with the army, which is in favor of the general. He’s going to have a mutiny on his hands.“

The current plan evolved among experts in the intelligence and military bureaucracy without input from the White House, the State Department, or the National Security Council. “It stems from the American and Ukraine general staffs and it is putting investments” from private industry, the official said, “and not solely government funding and grants as the ticket out.

“Putin, too,” the official said, “is looking for a way out. And he’s got the message.” The Russian leader has won the four oblasts that formed the core of his battle plan, after earlier losses in the war, and his control of Crimea is no longer an open question. “The strategy now being proposed,” the official suggested, in talks a few blocks from the White House but light-years away in attitude, “is to settle the war and settle the financial plan for Ukraine.”