WASHINGTON—A red flag featuring the communist symbols of the hammer and sickle flew alongside Gadsden’s “Don’t Step On Me” flag on Sunday afternoon. Self-proclaimed socialists have joined forces with the Libertarian Party to organize a peace protest rally, Rage Against the War, organized by the Populist Party (a progressive third party led by disgruntled Bernie Sanders supporters). Machines”, which stood with a common purpose with anarchists.
Despite radically different economic and political views, political parties, along with many conservatives, moderates, and independents, have banded together to support what they see as the most important issues of the day. expressed. Finding a peaceful solution to the war in Ukraine.
The rally featured a variety of speakers, including past US presidential candidates, Iraq War veterans, and comedians. When asked about the conflicting ideologies present at the rally, the speakers stressed the importance of unity.
“Everyone needs to work together for peace,” former Congressman Tulsi Gabbard (I-Hawaii) told the Epoch Times.
Also, comedian Jimmy Dore and former Congressman Ron Paul (Republican of Texas) stressed the importance of working together in an interview with The Times.
“I treat everyone as an individual,” Paul said, adding that he had something in common with the Left.
Dre, paraphrasing black abolitionist Frederick Douglass, said, “I stand with no one to do good and no one to do bad.”
U.S. fault in the aggression
The Biden administration has approved more than $110 billion in aid to Ukraine since the civil war began last February.This overwhelms Russia’s annual military spending budgetAccording to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, it will drop slightly below $66 billion in 2021.
In addition to being costly, the speaker argued that U.S. support would deter the parties concerned from entering into peace talks.
One of the speakers, author Scott Horton, argued that President Biden “sabotaged peace talks in March and April of last year, which could have ended the war.”Horton’s comments are recent interview Former Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett Mediation negotiation Earlier in the war, “both sides very much wanted a ceasefire,” but the United States “blocked it,” he said.
Horton, author Enough: Time to End the War on Terrorlisted several pre-invasion escalations initiated by the Biden administration.
“As President of the United States, he [Biden] In his first year in office in 2021, he poured more weapons into Ukraine and repeated his promise to bring arms to NATO. [North Atlantic Treaty Organization] alliances, and increase military interoperability between their forces and ours, making them essentially de facto members of NATO.
Biden contributed $650 million deadly aid to Ukraine and implementation US-led military exercises with Ukrainian soldiers in 2021, months before Russia invaded. White House Press Secretary Carine Jean-Pierre, May 2021 Said The regime will support Ukraine’s proposal to join NATO, which the Kremlin has long considered.red line.“
“Yes, this war was provoked,” Horton summed up.
avoiding nuclear war
Many speakers expressed sympathy for the Ukrainian people, but said the consequences of a nuclear war would be too great.
In his speech, Mr. Gabbard said that avoiding a nuclear confrontation “is the most important problem we face in the 21st century.”
Gabbard detailed her experience with the 2018 bogus ballistic missile warning mistakenly issued by the Hawaii Emergency Management Agency. The agency broadcast a message to Hawaiians that nuclear weapons could affect the state in minutes, causing severe panic and inciting a desperate scramble to shelters, Gabbard recalled.
“Our leader let us down then and continues to let us down now,” she said.
Gabbard criticized the reckless moves of escalation made by the United States in various wars around the world, done “without regard to the rest of us and the destruction and incineration their wars would cause.” . She hinted that while Washington’s leaders are encouraged by access to emergency bunkers, ordinary people “have no shelter.”
“This proxy war we are currently fighting against Russia could at any moment turn into a direct conflict between the United States, NATO and Russia, the country with the most nuclear weapons in the world. ’” concluded the former congressman, emphasizing the futility of hot war. ‘We can’t win World War III’
Comedian Dre repeated this warning.
“This is really a battle over nuclear war,” he said in his speech. “Today’s bombs are far more powerful than the bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.”
Asked about the conflict’s potential off-ramp, Dre told The Epoch Times, “Peace can happen anytime.”
“It’s only a matter of time before the American people wake up to what’s really going on,” he added. “It’s his one point of these things to raise everyone’s awareness, because this is what CNN can’t see and understand. He spent the whole day without CNN taking up this issue.” .”
Some senior U.S. military officials have also advocated for a peaceful resolution.
in the meantime busy At the Economic Club of New York last November, Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Mark Milley said a military victory may not be achieved in Ukraine. At the meeting, he also emphasized the seriousness of a potential nuclear conflict and suggested that diplomacy might be the best course of action for Ukraine.
“When the opportunity for negotiation comes, if you can make peace, seize it. Seize the moment,” he said.
Millie’s predecessor, Mike Mullen, interview On ABC in October, he called Vladimir Putin “an animal in distress” and warned that he was becoming “increasingly dangerous.” Mullen said it was important for the Biden administration “to figure out a way to bring both Zelensky and Putin to the negotiating table.”
Controversy over rally
MSNBC host Rachel Maddow called the event a “pro-Russian rally.” segment On Monday night, two of Sunday’s protesters pointed to the Russian flags they were wielding.
“I’m not a Putin supporter,” he said. “I am pro-Russian and pro-American.”
De Koken, a self-proclaimed anarchist, said when asked if he was concerned that his flag would be misinterpreted as supporting an invasion, he said he did not support any government and had a flag. He said he wasn’t worried about how he would be judged.
“People can come and talk to me.”