This week, there was major news as the long-awaited Nemtsov report on Russia’s involvement in the war in Ukraine – titled “Putin. War.” – was released in Moscow by colleagues of the murdered Russian opposition leader. The report documents the deaths of 220 Russian soldiers in the fighting in Ukraine’s east – a number that surely represents merely the tip of the iceberg. It was prepared by Boris Nemtsov’s allies, who pieced together information he left behind, even though Russian authorities had seized his computer hard drives and documents, and despite the fact that many sources were not willing to speak with them after Mr. Nemtsov was killed – some say precisely because of his work on this topic.
The report notes that Russia has spent at least $1 billion on the war in Ukraine during its first 10 months, and it documents the use of Russian state funds to pay Russian citizens to fight in Ukraine. The report shows how “the Russian government provided active political, economic, personnel and also direct military support to the separatists.” It notes the types of Russian military hardware used by the so-called separatists in eastern Ukraine and says Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 was downed by these “separatists” with a Buk missile system. In addition, it details how the Russian government paid off families of Russian soldiers killed in the war to ensure their silence. Yet another interesting finding: Russian personnel were compelled to resign from the Russian military before being deployed to Ukraine, thus making possible the deniability of the presence of Russian forces. President Vladimir Putin and other Russian officials have consistently rejected accusations that Russian forces are in Ukraine and have said that any Russians there are “volunteers” or, even more astoundingly, freelancing soldiers “on vacation.”
Opposition activist Ilya Yashin said at the May 12 press conference at which the 64-page report was released: “We want to tell people the truth about what is happening in Russia, about what is happening in eastern Ukraine. We want to catch Putin in his lies. We want to tell people that the president of Russia – a man who controls nuclear weapons and leads an enormous country – is lying to the Russian people and to the entire world.”
But the Obama administration apparently does not care. (We searched for statements in reaction to the Nemtsov report and could find none.)
Meanwhile, Secretary of State John Kerry journeyed to Sochi, where he met on May 12 with President Putin and Foreign Affairs Minister Sergey Lavrov. Reading transcripts of statements in Sochi, one sees nothing praiseworthy about the U.S. position on Ukraine – not even the cursory strong words about the “costs” to be borne by Russia for its annexation of Crimea or “incursion” into Ukraine’s east. Mr. Kerry repeatedly expressed his gratitude and appreciation to his interlocutors, noting, “I was privileged to spend many hours with Foreign Minister Lavrov and with President Putin discussing a number of global issues on which both of our countries are very focused.” (Could this be the same secretary of state who had stated back on February 24 that the Russians “have been persisting in their misrepresentations, lies, whatever you want to call them, about their activities there [in Ukraine] to my face, to the faces of others, on many different occasions”?) Nuclear negotiations with Iran were clearly at the top of his agenda, and what’s worrisome to us is that the U.S. may be ready to sell Ukraine down the river in order to get a deal in Iran with Russia’s assistance.
In “Kerry’s pointless diplomacy in Russia,” an opinion piece published on cnn.com, Leon Aron of the American Enterprise Institute wrote: “Kerry continued the charade of the Minsk-1 and Minsk-2 negotiations, in which an aggressor (Russia) was treated as a peacemaker. In fact, speaking about his forthcoming visit with President Petro Poroshenko of Ukraine, Kerry re-affirmed the charade rules by stating, very firmly, that he would demand that ‘everybody’ abide by Minsk-2. Kerry was courageously holding both the aggressor and his victim to the same unbending standard! (The word ‘aggression’ was never mentioned.)” The Wall Street Journal in its editorial headlined “Kerry is so very nice to Putin” wrote: “Mr. Kerry appears to have given up even asking that Russia exit from eastern Ukraine, much less reverse last year’s illegal seizure and annexation of Crimea. Barely a year ago President Obama invoked the ghosts of World Wars I and II to warn in Brussels that ‘casual indifference’ to Russia’s takeover of Crimea ‘would ignore the lessons that are written in the cemeteries of this continent.’ … As for Mr. Putin, the lesson is that he can grab what he wants, wait out the faux outrage and sanctions, and then consolidate his gains in return for more promises of peace.”
So, what we’ve witnessed this week is that, although Russia’s secret war is secret no more, there are those who would prefer the “secret” not be revealed.