Open letter to my senators Tammy Duckworth and Richard Durbin

 

I’m disappointed you voted to approve $40 billion in military aid to prolong the Russian war in Ukraine. That aid, instead of sensible negotiations to resolve the crisis, will simply bring more Ukraine deaths and more devastation to Ukraine infrastructure.  

Of course the war is criminal. But the U.S. has provoked Russia’s criminal war endlessly beginning with our 2008 call to bring Ukraine into NATO and bring troops and weaponry up to Russia’s borders. That was provocative and totally unnecessary.  

In 2014, we inspired and supported a coup to depose elected Ukraine Victor Yanukovych because he wanted to accept an economic package from Russia that was better than the one offered by NATO. That was unacceptable to the U.S. and NATO so we engaged in criminal regime change which is war on democracy.  

That coup brought into power an ultranationalist regime, including neo-Nazis, that ignited civil war in the Donbas region. The Russian speaking and leaning Ukrainians there now under siege by the new regime, sought independence from Ukraine. Normally, the U.S. supports such peoples’ efforts. Remember Kosovo whom we militarily helped break away from Serbia in 1999? We bombed Serbia for 78 days, killing over 1,000 Serbians to make that happen.  

But with the beleaguered Donbas residents, the U.S. supported the extremist Ukraine government we helped birth to continue their brutal rule over them. In the past 8 years over 14,000 people are dead, in part, from U.S. support and encouragement.  

Is it any wonder that at some point Russia would intervene? U.S. provocations helped fuel an almost inevitable, albeit criminal Russian response.  

The U.S. funnels $40 billion in weaponry while dismissing the urgent need for negotiations to end the war. That weaponry has turned the Ukraine war into a proxy war between the U.S. and Russia that may lead to nuclear confrontation. In the meantime, only Ukrainians are dying in American’s efforts to isolate and degrade Russia from being absorbed into the European community where they belong.  

Only negotiations, not U.S. weaponry, will end the Ukraine war. Your support of that utter waste of U.S. treasure ensures the war will continue until Ukraine simply collapses or the proxy war goes nuclear.   

 

 

Senator, that $40 billion is needed here to shore up a crumbling America. It could be used to fix nearly all 45,586 bridges that need structural repair. It could quintuple the budget of either the Center for Disease Control or the Environmental Protection Agency. It could more than double the budget of both. Are not these better uses of American treasure?  

In closing, please pledge to end support for weapons of death prolonging the Ukraine war, getting more Ukrainians killed for nothing. Please pledge to use this treasure to combat climate change, promote health care, fix crumbling infrastructure, among other items, here at home.  

Along with all people of peace and good will, I await your answer.