Paul Craig Roberts, chairman of the Institute for Political Economy and who Reagan administration was Assistant Secretary of the Treasury for Economic Policy, wrote an article on Nov. 25 on his website, titled, “It Seems Russia Won’t Require a Winter Offensive To Win the War.” Roberts is a promoter of supply-side economics, has been a sharp critic of the neocons and has opposed the U.S. war on Afghanistan and the 2003 invasion of Iraq. He was also chairman of the Center for Strategic and International Studies for 10 years.
Roberts notes in his article that the fact that Russia is now targeting the infrastructure of Ukraine is an indication that Russia is moving to end the war quickly. “Russian attacks on Ukraine’s ability to function have gradually escalated, resulting in wider and more serious damage. It seems that the Russians don’t want to destroy everything unless the West and its puppet Ukraine government fail to come to their senses….
“[T]he Western peoples have a totally false picture of the situation. Russia could destroy Ukraine in a day without using nuclear weapons. The Kremlin’s restraint—in my view a strategic blunder as it enabled the West to get involved and widen the war—in Ukraine has a number of legitimate reasons. Ukraine and the population there have been a part of Russia for centuries. There is much intermarriage. Most Ukrainians are not favorable to the neo-Nazis who have dominated Ukraine since the U.S. overthrew the government in 2014 and have suffered at their hands. The Kremlin doesn’t want a poverty-stricken ruin of a country on its border, and the Kremlin doesn’t want the responsibility for rebuilding Ukraine’s infrastructure.”
He attacked the “Western whore media” for not reporting the true situation; the Western press is functioning as a “propaganda ministry” and he cited a recent British Telegraph article ("Ukraine Could Reach Crimea by Christmas") as particularly noxious. “It is inconceivable to me that ‘experts’ and ‘reporters’ in the West are so stupid and corrupt to have written the … total nonsense and has encouraged the false belief that Russia can be defeated….
“That such absurd propaganda can be effective can result in the U.S./NATO putting boots on the ground, and then we have World War III.
“From Washington’s standpoint, the more Ukraine is destroyed the better. If Putin finally abandons his half-way measures and gets down to real war, the war will soon be over. If Washington can prevent Zelensky from surrendering until Ukraine is destroyed, Washington gets the benefit of the economic and financial drain on Russia that rebuilding will impose. From Washington’s standpoint, the more problems for Russia the better regardless of the cost to Ukrainians.”
He concludes: “What we are witnessing is the enormous inhumanity of Washington and the NATO capitals. It is unjust that it is Ukraine that is paying the cost of Western inhumanity and not Washington and the European capitals.”
RT’s coverage of Roberts’ article has its own conclusion: “Moscow has repeatedly warned that arms shipments [by the West to Ukraine] will only prolong the conflict and increase the risk of a direct confrontation between Russia and NATO. A number of top Russian officials, including Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, have accused the bloc of waging war against Russia ‘by proxy,’ while President Vladimir Putin has described his country as fighting ‘the entire Western military machine.’” (https://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2022/11/25/it-seems-russia-wont-require-a-winter-offensive-to-win-the-war/ )
