Libs and reactionaries will constantly bring up the Wagner group in response to having the existence of the Azovites pointed out to them. This counterargument strikes me as lazy and equivocating, but I’ve always had trouble responding to it.
What would people here recommend I say to this point? Assuming I say anything at all.
When someone starts to bring up Wagner Russonazis I know that I won’t get anywhere with them in terms of the big picture of anti-imperialism. There’s no real point in further discussion. Russiagate brainworms have been incredibly effective in this regard. Even if they admit that mercenaries are and always have been a part of war, they’ll just change their tune to “Putin’s personal Nazi PMC” if they haven’t already.
You could also just respond with something about Blackwater, or the German military’s Nazi infestation. Then they’ll call whataboutism and the conversation will be over, but there wasn’t any constructive dialog anyway and maybe some spectators (if it’s not a private conversation) may turn on their brains a bit and look deeper.
Wagner group has a statue in Central African Republic partially dedicated to them. Try to ask libs to explain how the Wagner group is nazi if Africans consider them partners and equals.
The organization that published that article is essentially NATO itself, which makes simply running that story quite an admission. Even so, I’m a little torn on really using this. I feel like libs could twist it into a statues-of-Confederate-generals type story pretty quick.
I don’t see Africans erecting statues to Europeans or Americans.
Yeah, at some point it’s not even about convincing the person you’re arguing with. Good points.
As far as I can tell, the Wagner PMC = Nazis thing is based on two bits of “evidence:”
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a VK picture of a guy who looks like Dmitri Utkin wearing some kind of Wehrmacht/SS uniform. Problem is, there aren’t many pictures of Utkin around, and his connection to Wagner is kind of hazy anyway. Even Wikipedia calls him the “alleged” founder of the Wagner Group.
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the fact that Richard Wagner, for whom Wagner Group is presumably named, held antisemitic views, and, because he was Hitler’s favorite composer, tends to be liked by neonazis. Of course this doesn’t in itself prove anything either, because Wagner is one of those composers with a pretty massive fanbase; Stephen Fry, who’s Jewish, made a documentary about his love for Wagner’s music. My sense is a lot of soldiers who are into classical music are into Wagner, not neccesarily because they’re Nazis, but because the mythic ethos and the evocation of an heroic death speaks them on a sort of “professional” level.
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I wondered this earlier. Apparently the Russian Natzi thing doesn’t really have a strong factual basis. I actually saw a lecture held by George Washington University referencing this topic before the conflict. The author giving the talk dispelled a lot of the myths and Fabrications about so called Russian fascism. I think her basic point was that while there are pockets of fascist ideologues in Russia (just like almost anywhere) given its history it’s really not widespread. Watching the talk I got the impression that no one in room including the author was a pro Putin ideologue. The author had simply studied the topic at length and determined that it wasn’t really a thing. https://youtu.be/bltcIvJgRaE
Her book is called: Is Russia Fascist? (Cornell University Press)
A YouTube link was detected in your comment. Here are links to the same video on Invidious, which is a YouTube frontend that protects your privacy:
I’ll start saying that the Wagner group is literally a corporation, they’re just mercenaries hired by Russia, instead azov, the right sector etc not only are a key part of the military, but they straight up force the government to do what they want
How does Azov force the government to do what they want? Can you give an example?
Other comrades have suggested watching “Ukraine on fire” it’s hard to find though
Based, even vimeo removed it afaik
Thanks for the link! I’m just gonna go ahead and keep a copy of that. Just in case.
Bring up American Nazis vs. German Nazis
The US army landing in France during WW2? If there was ever a time the US army was ever on the right side of history, it was during WW2. Broken clock is still right twice a day, and to me it doesn’t matter who was shooting at the actual Nazis, as long as at the end of the day you have a dead Nazi.
Plus while it’s not the “glorious” campaign portrayed by the US media, the opening of the Western front still took pressure off of the Eastern front and led to a quicker end to the war with less Soviet casualties.
Which is why even if Wagner are Nazis – and so far, there’s no real factual evidence for this – it still really doesn’t make any difference as to who is on the right the side of history in Ukraine. (Spoiler alert: it ain’t Zelensky and Azov).
I would push back just a tiny bit on America’s role in World War II. In Europe they absolutely took some pressure off of the Soviet Union, and led (as you’ve indicated) to a quicker victory. In the Pacific theatre they also liberated a whole lot of people who were undergoing genocide at the hands of Imperial Japan; but from the vantage point of history, we can see that it was a sort of prelude to the US stepping into Imperial Japan’s role within east Asia. The atrocities which the US committed in Korea, Vietnam, and Cambodia were, at best, only slightly less horrific than what Japan did in World War II. And unlike Japan, the US actually got away with it. This isn’t to say that there was “moral equivalence” between the US and Nazi Germany during World War II – I’d say there’s absolutely moral equivalence now – only that we should see them as the pragmatic and dangerous ally to Moscow that they were.
Oh, I agree with your Wagner sentiment, though I guess I will say that while I don’t believe they are an outright ideological Nazi outfit like Azov, its more then likely you’ll find a few right wing nuts among their ranks. (Because honestly, I don’t trust that most sane or ideologically leftist people would go and fight for money). That still doesn’t matter though, since they are a commercial mercenary outfit for hire, and not a government sanctioned entity.
I also absolutely agree with your statements on the United State’s role in WW2 preluding their Cold War actions, but I will still say that their entrance into the Allies was still the correct, necessary, and morally better option. In the long run, the destruction of Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan, and the saving of hundreds of millions of lives with the defeat of those countries, was the better course of history. As like you said, while the actions of the US military were admirable and many times pivotal during the conflict, they were at best “allies of convenience”.
Though the common US soldier did not view the Soviet Union that hostile way. They saw them as brothers in arms, and cheered on every step the Red Army took. It is sad that relations were perverted in they way they were for nothing more then the behest of capital.
I would ask them for proof since it’s their argument. If they can’t prove it, don’t bother with them
