Nuclear Powers Must Not Indulge in School-Yard Squabbles

By Eric Margolis

F….Europe!”  Such were the words used in Kiev, Ukraine by Victoria Nuland, the  US Assistant Secretary of State for Europe.

Nuland was referring to the European Union’s reluctance to get too deeply involved in Ukraine’s current strife or to impose sanctions on the former Soviet republic.   But Nuland perfectly captured Washington’s sneering view of Europe as a collection of feeble and irrelevant banana republics.

Nuland is a prominent American neoconservative. Like her fellow neocons, she disdains Europe for being unwarlike,   mildly critical of Israel, and often insufficiently responsive to Washington’s demands -  or even insubordinate, like the awful French.

How delicious was it that Nuland’s pithy reference to Europe and her plans for a new western-confected government in Ukrainian – where the US insists it is not at all interfering – were picked by Russian electronic intelligence and played to the world.   How dim for Madame Nuland to speak so thoughtlessly on her cell phone.

Of late, Nuland and other senior US officials have been blasting Moscow for “meddling” in Ukraine.  The leaked phone recording has Nuland telling the US ambassador to Kiev which of the three opposition candidates Washington wants to run Ukraine.

Nuland’s plans for regime change in Kiev have been a godsend to Moscow, which claims the US and EU are behind the uprising in Ukraine.  She has just undermined the democratic Ukrainian opposition by making them look like American puppets.

Score one for Russia’s spooks.  All Nuland could do was splutter about how Russian intelligence had intercepted her cell phone.  This after the US National Security Agency was revealed to be bugging the phones and email of most of Europe’s leaders.  What goes around comes around.

The loud-mouthed Nuland should resign.

All this was most amusing – except that it highlighted the growing US-Russian confrontation over Ukraine that risks turning very dangerous.

Read the rest here.