Russia's brutal February 2022 invasion of Ukraine has attracted widespread condemnation across the West. Government and media circles present the conflict as a simple dichotomy between an evil empire and an innocent victim. In this concise, accessible and highly informative primer, Medea Benjamin and Nicolas Davies insist the picture is more complicated.
Yes, Russia's aggression was reckless and, ultimately, indefensible. But the West's reneging on promises to halt eastward expansion of NATO in the wake of the collapse of the Soviet Union played a major part in prompting Putin to act. So did the U.S. involvement in the 2014 Ukraine coup and Ukraine's failure to implement the Minsk peace agreements. The result is a conflict that is increasingly difficult to resolve, one that could conceivably escalate into all-out war between the United States and Russia—the world's two leading nuclear powers.
Skillfully bringing together the historical record and current analysis, War in Ukraine looks at the events leading up to the conflict, surveys the different parties involved, and weighs the risks of escalation and opportunities for peace. For anyone who wants to get beneath the heavily propagandized media coverage to an understanding of a war with consequences that could prove cataclysmic, this timely book will be an urgent necessity.
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" Russian propaganda, feel bad about had wasted money on this RT crap "
— Ronja, 1/26/2024Medea Benjamin is a cofounder of the peace group CODEPINK and the international human rights organization Global Exchange. She has been an advocate for social justice for more than thirty years. Described as “one of America’s most committed—and most effective—fighters for human rights” by Newsday and called “one of the high-profile leaders of the peace movement” by the Los Angeles Times, Benjamin has distinguished herself as an eloquent and energetic figure in the progressive movement. A former economist and nutritionist with the United Nations and World Health Organization, she is the author-editor of eight books. Her articles appear regularly in such publications as the Huffington Post, CommonDreams, Alternet, and OpEd News.
Teri Schnaubelt is a Chicago-based stage, on-camera, and voice actor as well as oil painter and photographer. An Earphones Award–winning narrator, she has voiced over a hundred books for New York Times and USA Today bestselling authors, in addition to helping independent authors get their stories heard.