Combating Putin’s Terror-State

War crimes committed by Russian forces in Ukraine are numbing — but this numbing should be resisted. “The Russian missile that struck Wednesday in eastern Ukraine turned an outdoor market into a fiery, blackened ruin where weeping civilians looked for loved ones among the mangled, burned bodies scattered across the ground.” That is the beginning of an Associated Press report.

Update: And yet, this appears to be a fog-of-war disaster. From the New York Times:

Throughout its invasion of Ukraine, Russia has repeatedly and systematically attacked civilians and struck schools, markets and residences as a deliberate tactic to instill fear in the populace. In Kostiantynivka in April, they shelled homes and a preschool, killing six.

But evidence collected and analyzed by The New York Times, including missile fragments, satellite imagery, witness accounts and social media posts, strongly suggests the catastrophic strike was the result of an errant Ukrainian air defense missile fired by a Buk launch system.

The attack appears to have been a tragic mishap.

That report, in full, is here.

The Russian state has imposed war on Ukraine — a war of survival. Right and wrong; cause and effect; aggressor and aggressed against — all of this should be borne in mind.

• Here are a few headlines that get one’s attention: “Russia is turning to old ally North Korea to resupply its arsenal for the war in Ukraine.” (Article here.) “North Korea’s leader is in Russia to meet Putin, with both locked in standoffs with the West.” (Article here.) “Top Israeli spy warns Iran plots to arm Russia with extensive missile arsenal in addition to drones.” (Article here.)

The United States and the Free World may not want to deal with such an axis. But, when it comes to international affairs and the reality of them, wanting has little to do with it.

• Here is Simon Sebag Montefiore, the Stalin biographer (and author of other first-rate books as well):

For years, people have said to me, “Today’s Russia is not the Soviet Union, you know!” Does the Kremlin?

• People in the West ought to be aware of what Russians see and hear from their state media day after day.

What the deputy speaker says, below, is utterly typical:

Mr. Tolstoy, by the way, is a descendant of the great novelist.

I remember what Myroslava Luzina told me, in January 2022, as Russian troops massed on the border of her country, Ukraine. Russia was once in possession of Ukraine. Russia is now like an abusive — indeed, homicidal — ex-. If the ex- can’t have her, he will kill her.

In the following video, Professor Timothy Snyder explains the genocidal impulse with great clarity:

• Here is one story — just a single story — but one that says a lot about an invasion and the determination of the invaded:

When Iryna returned to her village in eastern Ukraine following the Russian invasion, she discovered her colorful family home in ruins. Under the rubble of her neighbor’s house, she found her son’s remains. Despite the immense hardships, Iryna and her husband are determined to rebuild.

For the article — from Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty — go here.

• Another story — about how a society is coping with brutalization and trauma:

• If you know about the history of Ukraine — and the region generally — the below is astounding:

This is something perfectly predictable: “Putin: ‘West installed Zelensky to cover up Nazism in Ukraine.’” That is the headline over an article in the Times of London.

• There is a lot to say about Boris Johnson’s premiership in London. But one thing I will always honor him for is his understanding of Russia’s assault on Ukraine — and his determination to back the Ukrainians. He traveled to Ukraine to stand with President Zelensky and express Britain’s solidarity with the Ukrainians very early. And he did it again, two months later.

This month, he has published an article: “Why aren’t we giving Ukraine what it needs?”

I further recommend Luke Coffey, of the Hudson Institute: “The Top Myths about US Aid to Ukraine.” (Coffey is one of the many analysts who once worked at the Heritage Foundation and now work elsewhere. There is a Heritage diaspora, if you will.)

Also, Walter Russell Mead, in the Wall Street Journal: “How to Help Ukraine Win the War of Attrition.”

Evan Gershkovich, a correspondent for the Journal, remains a hostage in Russia — a hostage grabbed by Putin. As this report says, our ambassador in Russia is able to visit Gershkovich, which is positive.

• This is ghastly, and typical:

A Russian Court decided to detain mathematician Azat Miftakhov until November 3 on new charges of justifying terrorism. The district court of Kirov issued its ruling on September 5, a day after Miftakhov was detained as he exited a penal colony where he had just served a six-year sentence after being found guilty of involvement in an arson attack. He rejected the charges, while rights groups noted his body showed signs of torture from interrogations.

Yeah, of course. That’s the way it goes in Putin’s realm. (Full article.)

• An urgent point, from Bill Browder:

You may recall that Senator John McCain asked Kara-Murza to be a pallbearer at his funeral, when the time came. (McCain died in 2018; Kara-Murza was imprisoned in 2022.) The senator had two reasons for this: He wanted to acknowledge freedom advocates generally — people struggling against dictatorship; and, with some added visibility, he wanted to increase Kara-Murza’s chances of staying alive. The Kremlin had already tried to murder Kara-Murza twice, with poison.

• The other day, I was writing about “tempest-tossed lives.” Here is the opening of a story in the Wall Street Journal:

The first time that Kateryna Lihusha fled a murderous Kremlin effort to tighten its grip on Ukraine, it was 1932 and she was a baby in her mother’s arms. Her parents ran to the eastern Ukrainian city of Horlivka from a nearby village where Soviet security officials were seizing grain. Many of her relatives who stayed would die of hunger.

In 2023, Lihusha died at the age of 91 in a Polish village where she had sought refuge from the Russians again, this time with her own daughter. They were two among the millions of Ukrainians displaced by Russia’s war without a clear prospect of returning.