Ukraine suspends 11 political parties with links to Russia
I’ve seen the usual suspects claiming that the fact that Zelenskiy suspended parties that support the destruction of Ukraine means he’s a fascist. Let’s look at a little bit of history. Prior to World War II, there was a political party in Britain called the “British Union of Fascists.” What happened when war broke out between fascist Germany and democratic Britain? Britain banned the BUF in 1940 and interred some 700 or more of it’s officials for the duration of the war. Was Churchill a fascist? Nope. Kind of a ruthless bastard to be sure, but hardly a fascist. When your nation is being attacked by a more powerful enemy, you fight them. And that means fighting their supporters within your own borders. During the Cold War, the United States – which is pretty unique in its determination to not ban much of *any* political party – still sicced the FBI on our own commies… and rightly so.
I’ve seen some commentator claim that Zelenskiy has banned all opposition parties. Untrue: unlike the US, where you’ve got the DemRep uniparty and virtually nothing else of any real consequence, Ukraine has a *lot* of parties. See the list on Wikipedia. The only ones that got banned are the pro-Russian parties. For a nation under martial law currently being ground underfoot by a massively larger military constantly carrying out war crime after war crime, this is a perfectly reasonable response to the situation. Is it the *American* response? No. The US did not ban the Commies during the Cold War; did not ban the fascists during WWII (they, unlike the commies, had the good graces to evaporate on their own when war broke out); the US didn’t even ban the Democrats when they started a Civil War. But everyone who is not the US is not a fascist, despite what the lefties and the Putinfluffers will try to lead you to believe.
If the Cold War had gone differently, and “Red Dawn” or something like it had come to pass, it’s interesting to contemplate whether the US would have banned the communists.
