Tag: Russian invasion
Russia’s New Chornobyl Disaster – The Atlantic
This article is based on interviews and research by the Reckoning Project, a multinational group of journalists and researchers collecting evidence of war crimes in Ukraine.
On the afternoon of February 24, 2022, two Russian army commanders, wearing black uniforms with no insignia, entered the office of Valentyn Heyko, the shift supervisor at the Chornobyl State Enterprise. In a room with a window overlooking the decommissioned reactor, General Sergey Burakov and Colonel Andrey Frolenkov told Heyko that they had
Ukrainian Is My Native Language, but I Had to Learn It
Growing up in the bilingual city of Kyiv in the 1990s, I studied the Ukrainian language like a museum object—intensely, but at a distance, never quite feeling all of its textures or bringing it home. Back then, in that part of the country, Ukrainian was reserved for formal settings: schools, banks, and celebrations, often infused with a performative flare of ethnic pride. Russian dominated the mundane and the intimate: gossiping with friends during recess, writing in a journal, arguing with
How the Anti-war Camp Went Intellectually Bankrupt
In 1942, answering a pacifist opponent of British involvement in the Second World War, George Orwell replied that “pacifism is objectively pro-fascist.” There have of course been many times in human history when opposition to war has been morally justified, intellectually coherent, and, in the end, vindicated. But the war to defeat fascism during the middle part of the past century was simply not one of them. “This is elementary common sense,” Orwell wrote at the time. “If you hamper
Inside Ukraine’s Fight for Survival
I had no business going to Ukraine. The country didn’t need another reporter to cover the war. Ukrainian journalists were already doing that much better than I could hope to, and so were plenty of foreigners. I had never set foot in Ukraine; I spoke neither of its languages; I was, my children told me, too old to be a war correspondent again. It would be completely pointless to get killed over there. But selfishness is an underrated motive among
Europe’s Reckoning on Ukraine Is Yet to Come
In addition to fear and horror, the war in Ukraine during its first weeks awakened a strange feeling of self-confidence in Europe. “Solidarity with Ukraine makes democracy cool again,” the Serbian activist Srdja Popovic told the French newspaper Liberation on March 23. Vladimir Putin, through his rhetoric, indiscriminate bombing, and civilian massacres, has taken on a role much bigger than that of an old-fashioned tyrant: that of an openly fascist stateman. At last, after decades of false alarms, the first
Can We Be Worthy of Ukraine?
“Don’t forget about Ukraine,” President Volodymyr Zelensky said last Sunday at the end of an interview with CBS. “We have the same values, we have the same color of blood, and we are fighting for freedom and we will win.”
Less than two months ago, democracy in America and elsewhere seemed to be drifting toward its own expiration. Then the Russian invasion and unbending Ukrainian resistance delivered a shock to the democratic world that restored its heartbeat. Writers and politicians
What Happens When We Back Putin Into a Corner
This is an edition of Up for Debate, a newsletter by Conor Friedersdorf. On Wednesdays, he rounds up timely conversations and solicits reader responses to one thought-provoking question. Every Friday, he publishes some thoughtful replies. Sign up for the newsletter here.
What are your thoughts about the war in Ukraine? What questions do you have? What are your hopes or fears?
Email your answers to [email protected]. I’ll publish a selection in Friday’s newsletter.
Conversations of Note
War is ravaging Ukraine.
How Much Does Ukraine Really Matter to the U.S.?
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Since the start of the coronavirus pandemic, many countries have passed or invoked laws against misinformation. In the United States, content distributors like Spotify and social-media platforms like Twitter are under pressure from one faction to take action against medical misinformation and from another faction to stay viewpoint-neutral and allow all perspectives to be aired.
What should be done about medical misinformation, if anything? Why? What actions would do more harm than good? Why?