And here we are. This is one outcome of arguing that one imperialism is less bad than another, that some people are oppressed while others either don’t exist (,Putin’s original playbook) or don’t really matter. Palestinians good, Ukrainians, Kurds? Not so much.
Clare Daly (ex MEP; a twice defeated Irish election candidate in 2024) was on the RTÉ 1 TV “Upfront with Katie Hannon” programme on February 17 2025, supporting the Trump-Putin stab in the back of Ukraine. She is like the peace activists who backed the Hitler-Chamberlain 1938 agreement selling out Czechoslovakia. A year later this “peace in our time” deal, promoted by a British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain famously waving a piece of paper, paved the way for World War 2 in Europe and Nazi occupation of France, Holland, Belgium, Poland plus many more.
We also saw the Hitler-Stalin pact in 1939, followed in 1941 by – guess what? – a Nazi invasion of Stalin’s Russia.
Let us recall the various Clare Dalys, spiritual daughters of Stalin – one of whom claimed in 2022 that predictions Putin intended to invade Russia were “insane”.
Pro-Ukraine anti-war activists got it right, for example Donnacha Ó Beacháin :
3 years ago today I was in a TV studio expressing scepticism about Putin’s claim he was withdrawing troops from Ukraine’s borders On the same program Russia’s ambassador said anybody who suggested Russia would invade Ukraine was “insane”. Russia launched its full-scale invasion the very next week
Here is an account of the warnings Stalin ignored prior to the Hitler invasion in 1941.
Unlike the Germans, who saw the Non-Aggression Pact as necessary but temporary, Stalin had illusions that it might be lasting. Owen Matthews quotes from a 1966 interview with Marshal Zhukov, conducted by Lev Bezymensky, a Soviet historian and war veteran. In January 1941, Zhukov and others had warned Stalin of ominous German troop movements. Stalin wrote to Hitler, asking politely whether these reports were true. Hitler replied that they were, but he swore ‘on my honour as a head of state that my troops are deployed … for other purposes. The territories of Western and Central Germany are subject to heavy English bombing and are easily observed from the air by the English. Therefore I found it necessary to move large contingents of troops to the east where they can secretly reorganise and rearm.’ Stalin believed him.
Source : Winston Churchill : His Times, His Crimes, Tariq Ali, Verso Books,
The 2025 Trump-Putin partition policy is a spiritual daughter of the 1922 Treaty which peace politicians used to stab Northern Nationalists in the back by implementing the partition of Ireland. This gave us, in the prophetic words of James Connolly, “A Carnival of Reaction” – 2 sectarian counter-revolutionary states on one small island.
Like James Connolly, Grace Plunkett (widow of 1916 Easter Rising martyr Joseph Plunkett) understood that partition, pretending to be peace, meant a sham freedom for Ireland.
So, today, it should be obvious to all on the left : oppose a peace and partition plan promoted by 2 violent untrustworthy sociopaths.
Ask the people of Canada, of Mexico, of Greenland. Ask the people of Ukraine, of Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, of Poland , of Finland.
A dictatorship hosting another dictatorship to negotiate with an aspiring dictatorship about the future of a democracy that’s not represented.
Two superpowers opening discussions on the future of a country which one of them is still invading, without that country
Are the international pro-solidarity left organising solidarity with Ukraine? Answer Yes
A physical and online conference in support of the Ukrainian people’s national and social rights
No to partition! Russian troops out!
This important conference will address the grave threat posed by the incoming Trump administration’s intention of imposing on the Ukrainian people a deal agreed with Putin’s Russia.
Violating international law, it would partition Ukraine and entrench the occupation of territory annexed since 2014 and expanded by Putin’s full-scale war since February 2022. It would produce a “peace” imposed through Western acquiescence in the dismembering of Ukraine, with parallels to the 1938 Munich Agreement that handed Nazi Germany 30 per cent of Czechoslovak territory.
The vulnerable position presently confronting Ukraine’s war of just resistance is a direct result of the failure to provide necessary aid by key states, despite their boasting that they “stand by Ukraine”.
The dire prospect of a partitioned Ukraine partly under Putin’s control would be the product of the appeasement policy of those sections of big business anxious to restore and develop their Russian commercial ties. In contrast, the Solidarity With Ukraine conference of progressive forces—of trade unions, socialists, social democrats, green, feminists and other social movements—will take place on the understanding that the partition of Ukraine cannot bring peace.
The only road to a just and lasting peace requires the complete withdrawal of Russian forces. While they remain in any part of Ukraine it will be impossible for Ukrainians to freely determine their own future.
Any peace negotiations should be with Ukraine as a main partner: the war should not and cannot be solved as a horse trade between the great powers at Ukraine’s expense.
Against the decline in aid and a possible Trump-Putin deal, the organisers and sponsors of the Solidarity With Ukraine conference advocate a surge in military support to strengthen Ukraine’s position in any negotiations, and to be able to continue its just resistance if no security guarantees acceptable to Ukraine are achieved.
That military aid must be accompanied with unconditional financial support for Ukraine’s reconstruction and the cancellation of its debt. We reject the corporations’ self-interested argument that solidarity with Ukraine’s armed and unarmed resistance must mean accepting the dismantling of social rights and services, either inside Ukraine or in the countries giving it support.
The struggles of Ukraine’s working people and their trade union organisations, and of the country’s feminist, environmental, LGBTIQ+ and human rights organisations have been indispensable to the country’s resistance, primarily against the Russian invasion but also against anti-social policies adopted by the Zelensky government. They are also the best guarantee that reconstruction will be in the interest of Ukraine’s social majority.
The message of representatives of such Ukrainian movements will be a central feature of the plenary sessions of the Solidarity With Ukraine conference.
They will also participate in workshop sessions that will provide an invaluable opportunity to increase understanding of Ukraine’s complex reality and develop practical solidarity initiatives with Ukrainian partners.
The conference will also adopt a final declaration, with the goal of giving as much publicity as possible to its position in favour of a just peace and just reconstruction for Ukraine and its people.
The final text and the Solidarity With Ukraine conference program will be published soon.
Yes, this needs to be said loud and clear, by the principled left. So sad that the neo-Stalinists (Morning Star/CPB, etc) and campists (SWP,Counterfire etc) are, for all practical purposes, backing Putin and Trump.
Tomás Ó Flatharta 
Excellent John, very good.
paulstewart1000gmailcom
Feb 18, 2025 at 7:09 pm
Yes, this needs to be said loud and clear, by the principled left. So sad that the neo-Stalinists (Morning Star/CPB, etc) and campists (SWP,Counterfire etc) are, for all practical purposes, backing Putin and Trump.
Jim Denham
Feb 20, 2025 at 9:54 am