Many westerners have been brainwashed into preferring World War III to peace

Snapping them out of this mindset is going to be a challenge

We have a problem. That problem is a huge number of people who are so brainwashed, they prefer the idea of World War III to the idea of peace. It seems ridiculous when you type it out, and those people who cheer for World War III would no doubt accuse me of a strawman.

“Of course we would rather have peace!” they would say. “All good people want peace!” And they would be absolutely sincere as they argued back. Yet those same people are furiously arguing against peace and in favour of continued war with Russia.

They are arguing that we can’t let Putin win, that he can’t come out of this with any sort of victory. What they mean is the status quo, which includes Putin controlling slivers of Ukraine populated by ethnic Russians, is unacceptable and this land should be won back. Most of them mean this as a minimum. Many want to go further and see the collapse of the Russian Federation. They are calling for World War III.

What this boils down to is that in spite of everything, many fundamentally see the world in terms of the goodies (freedom-loving, mostly white, democracies) and the baddies (Putin and everyone else). Strangely, these people will sometimes concede points that undermine this position.

Many will concede that we are supporting a genocide in Gaza. Many will concede that we are involved in constant wars to control global resources and maintain western hegemony. Many will concede that we overthrow leaders who disobey the empire and install puppets. However, they switch that thinking off when it comes to Ukraine.

They will glare like you have committed a heresy if you point out the West helped overthrow two democratically-elected leaders in Ukraine. They will think you have committed treason if you point out we built 12 spy bases in Ukraine to wage a covert war on Moscow. And until recently, they would have lynched you for using the term “proxy war” because - and this is the most liberal phrase ever - using that term robs Ukraine of its agency!

Well, Boris Johnson, the man who chose to prolong this war instead of stopping it early, is now admitting to robbing Ukraine of its agency. He is openly using the term “proxy war” because that’s exactly what this is. We are fighting Russia with Ukrainians as our soldiers - and our rulers don’t give a fuck about their proxies. I do, and that’s why I want this to end.

The anger that we see from World War III supporters stems from something called cognitive dissonance, which is when incompatible ideas collide in your head. People don’t like confronting the incompatibility of their ideas and will often lash out, rather than reconsider their position.

Anyone who has read Orwell’s 1984 will understand the concept of double-think, which in this case means forgetting the lessons you’ve learnt about the empire and resorting to binary, team sport thinking. It means compartmentalising your flawed ideas so they don’t collide. It means hating anyone who rationalises and treating those people as the enemy.

If this applies to you, my only ask is that you stop reacting with emotion and carefully process all positions until your conflicting ideas are resolved. This is the only way to escape the team sport mindset and move closer to the truth.

In the team sport mindset, everything your side does becomes justified and everything the other side does becomes automatically wrong. There is no room for neutrality or nuance as those things mean treason. All that matters is victory for your team. You fail to see the world in shades of grey, and you forget your side has historically been the darkest shade of grey; the side that built a global slave trade, conquered 3/4 of the world, and is never not at war. The side that spent 35 years engineering the current war.

I asked one World War III supporter the question: if Putin’s invasion of Ukraine justifies us waging war against Russia, what does our genocide participation and all our wars justify doing against us?

The answer I was looking for was not declare war!

It was nothing.

I would not expect any country to invade the US or Europe to stop us doing our endless wars. Not one of us would think this was a reasonable response. We would understand bringing war to our doorstep would mean our people paying an unacceptable price for the crimes of our rulers. We would understand a peaceful solution would be better all round.

“Ah, but you can’t negotiate with Putin,” they say. “We will never get him to stop.” But when does our war machine ever stop? It fights two or three wars simultaneously, and as soon as one war is done, it moves onto the next. Perhaps China should continue its rapid military development, and then give us one of those wars of liberation we pretend is so brilliant? You see the problem? Wars of liberation sound great when other people are the victims.

I was accused of inconsistency by someone who was well-intentioned but hadn’t thought through their position. Their argument was that I support Gaza, therefore I should support the derailing of peace in Ukraine. However, my position has been entirely consistent: I want negotiations to lead to peace. I want to stop arming parties in the conflicts and exacerbating the death and destruction. I want us to contribute towards stability and prosperity.

The people who argue we support Gaza, therefore, we should equally support Ukraine, are missing an important point: they are not equally supporting Gaza and Ukraine.

They are not demanding we arm Palestinians up to the eyeballs. They are not demanding we send troops to fight for Palestine. They are not demanding 15% inflation across Europe to save Palestine. They are not prepared to start World War III for Palestine. None of them are saying that Israel can’t come out of negotiations with any sort of victory. None of them are saying we should keep Palestine fighting until it has reclaimed all of its land. They understand that negotiations will not be great for Palestine, but are still better than the alternative. They understand negotiations are largely driven by realities on the battlefield.

I would therefore turn the tables and ask the World War III supporters why the inconsistency? I assume they would agree such warmongering would be insane in one instance, but it’s more insane in the other, because we are talking about a military superpower.

There is no universe in which Ukraine accomplishes what they want militarily, yet it is unthinkable to them to accept less. The only thing that comes into the equation here is victory over Russia. There seems to be no consideration of the realities on the battlefield. There seems to be no consideration that 52% of Ukrainians want a negotiated settlement. Indeed, they are foaming at the mouth at the very idea of negotiation. To reject the terms of an agreement before it has even been reached is not rational.

The question they ask is something like “yeah, we might have peace with Putin, but at what cost?” When they should be saying, “yeah, we could continue war with Putin, but at what cost?”

The cost would be hundreds of thousands more Ukrainian men and boys thrown into a meat grinder without training, emerging at the other end, either dead or horribly mangled. More destruction of Ukrainian infrastructure. More economic damage that will take generations to recover from. And that is just the price Ukraine would pay.

The rumour is the EU is ready to print 700 billion euros to fund war, which would lead to about 15% inflation. This war has already ravaged European economies and no one can afford a further 15% drop in living standards, but this would likely be the tip of the iceberg.

Europe’s armies have been stripped to the bone, and if you think conscription sounds unthinkable, one Labour MP was talking about conscription a matter of days ago, even though only 11% of our young people would agree to fight. So much for freedom, eh?

There is a staggering inconsistency in the message of neoliberals which is that Russia can simultaneously conquer Europe and be defeated by a war-ravaged Ukraine if only we give them more support.

About that support… the media has been telling us that a few hundred pro-war protesters in London somehow represent the wider public. Some of those pro-war protesters were waving signs saying “give nukes to Ukraine”. This is the insanity we’re dealing with.

Putin holds many advantages in this war, but he is still suffering the same problems the West does. He still has his limitations. While you might think Putin simply ignores his people, this is not true, he feels the pressure at home like any leader. The longer the war continues, the more difficulties he is likely to face. Indeed, the West’s strategy has been built around keeping Putin fighting until the pressure gets too much and his leadership collapses.

The problem here is Putin is more resilient to pressure than European leaders who are being rejected across Europe for warmongering and authoritarian measures that are impoverishing their people. Continuing to fight hurts both sides, but it clearly hurts Ukraine and Europe more.

The answer is to make peace easier than war. To find an imperfect solution and stick to the deal in a way we never stuck to the Minsk Agreements, or the deal to not expand NATO “one inch eastward”, or the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, or the Intermediate Nuclear Force Treaty. How can we say Russia is not prepared to accept peace if we’re not prepared to accept it ourselves?

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