Old Myths Die Hard

Recently I posted something on Facebook about former Presidential candidate, Bernie Sanders. His main point has been that the United States is not a functioning democracy, it is an oligarchy. However, in response to his short talk on Youtube, someone pointed out that ‘Russia invaded Ukraine’ in 2022. The fact that this person had no idea of the context behind the 2022 intervention by Russia shows just how persistent and pernicious Western Mainstream Media lies actually are.

They become taken for granted as myths often have done in the past. In ancient Greece and Rome, and indeed, in Biblical lore, many if not most took it for granted that:

• Zeus and the Gods live on Mount Olympus

• Romulus (whom Rome is named after) was an orphan who got his milk from a wolf

• Eve sprang from the side of Adam

• Moses heard the Burning Bush talking to him

• And perhaps the granddaddy of all myths, that the Earth was created in 7 days in its current form

  
  

While the Greek and Roman myths are no longer believed, many modern people still believe Biblical myths.

However, so called Modern Humans think that they are beyond myth and what they’re told either in school or on the news is actually true, when it’s not. And what’s more astounding, is that a large minority if not majority of people now see the media is unreliable, yet they still fall for the lies they are told. That’s the reason for even highly educated people to remain dogmatically opposed to Russia’s actions, despite the fact they acknowledge being lied to about the causes of:

Here are 13 examples of absurd or misleading lies told to the US public to justify wars:

• 
  

  1. The Gulf of Tonkin Incident (1964)

     
     

     The US government claimed North Vietnamese forces attacked US ships in the Gulf of Tonkin, leading to the escalation of the Vietnam War. Declassified documents later revealed that the attacks were either exaggerated or fabricated.

     
     

  2. Iraqi Soldiers Throwing Babies Out of Incubators (1990)

     
     

     During the lead-up to the Gulf War, a fabricated story claimed Iraqi soldiers killed Kuwaiti babies by removing them from incubators. This was later exposed as a false testimony orchestrated by a PR firm.

     
     

  3. Weapons of Mass Destruction (2003)

     
     

     The Bush administration asserted that Iraq possessed weapons of mass destruction (WMDs) to justify the Iraq War. No such weapons were ever found.

     
     

  4. Grenada Posed a Threat (1983)

     
     

     The US invasion of Grenada was justified by claiming the island posed a military threat and endangered American medical students. In reality, the threat was vastly overstated.

     
     

  5. Spanish “Attack” on the USS Maine (1898)

     
     

     The explosion of the USS Maine in Havana Harbor was blamed on Spain, leading to the Spanish-American War. Later investigations suggested the explosion might have been an accident.

     
     

  6. North Korean Invasion of South Korea (1950)

     
     

     The start of the Korean War was justified by claiming North Korea launched an unprovoked attack. While North Korea initiated the conflict, the complex geopolitical provocations leading to it were downplayed. In fact, the US thwarted Korean aspirations by inserting a dictator in Southern Korea, and thwarted elections that would have unifed the country under a leader the US didn’t like

     
     

  7. Libyan “Hit List” of Americans (1986)

     
     

     The Reagan administration claimed Libya had a hit list of American diplomats to justify bombing raids. This was later revealed to be based on unverified and dubious intelligence.

     
     

  8. The Domino Theory (1950s–1970s)

     
     

     Used to justify intervention in Vietnam, the Domino Theory claimed that if Vietnam fell to communism, all of Southeast Asia would follow. This simplistic narrative ignored local contexts and was proven false.

     
     

  9. “Remember the Alamo” and Mexican Aggression (1846)

     
     

     The Mexican-American War was justified by claiming Mexico attacked American troops on US soil. The truth is that the US had provoked the conflict by moving troops into disputed territory.

     
     

  10. Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait Unprovoked

      
      

      Kuwait was stealing Iraq’s oil by slant drilling into Iraq, and refused to stop. Even the US ambassador to Iraq told him that this dispute was none of the US’s business, but as soon as Saddam attacked, the US feigned surprise and indigation.

      
      

  11. George W. Bush invaded Afghanistan based on 911.                                                                But it refused to provide evidence that Osama Bin Laden was involved.

      
      

  12. In 2003, the US accused Iraq of having ‘aluminum tubes for rockets’, anthrax bioweapon, uranium to make atom bombs. All these charges were discredited.

      
      

  13. . Saddam was in league with Al Qaeda, the accused perpetrators of 911. However, Saddam was a secular leader whose foreign minister was an Iraqi Christian, not a religious extremist like Al Qaeda, whom Saddam opposed.

      
      

More recent blatant lies that have been disproven were that:

1. Bashard Al-Assad of Syria used chemical weapons against his own people. Inspectors on the ground disproved that but were overridden by managers for political reasons.

   
   

2. Russia meddled in the US election of 2016 with fake ad campaigns. When Russia lawyers showed up in a US court demanding to see the evidence, the US Justice Department refused to provide any. The US judge threw the case out immediately

   
   

3. Russia hacked into the computers of the Democratic Party. The US Security Expert, William Binney proved that the data download was to a USB drive, not to an external source via internet

   
   

4. Hamas beheaded Israeli babies—No evidence was ever provided

   
   

5. Hamas attacked Israel out of nowhere, overlooking 70+ years of Israeli oppression, expulsion and expropriation of Palestinian lands, all violating international law.

The Four Myths Fed to the Public about Ukraine

Nevertheless, given the ingrained gullibility of the US and European publics, 4 new myths have been created about the Ukraine/Russia War. These are:

1. The war started in 2022 with Russia’s “unprovoked invasion” of Ukraine

2. Russia has consistently refused to negotiate

3. Russia is so weak, that it equips its poorly armed army with shovels, and has to use computer chips from clothes washing machines to make its missile

4. Russia is losing and has been virtually defeated already.

Reality

1. The West, specifically the US has been provoking Russia and undermining both Russia and the former USSR, ever since the end of WWII. It funded and supported holdovers of Ukrainian Nazi collaborators, and their succeeding generations. CIA internal documents noted that people like Stepan Bandera, now promoted as a hero in 2025 Ukraine, was a terrorist.  “The recent declassification of over 3800 documents by the Central Intelligence Agency provides detailed proof that since 1953 the CIA operated two major programs intent on not only destabilizing Ukraine but Nazifying it with followers of the World War II Ukrainian Nazi leader Stepan Bandera.” The US sponsored an attempted coup in 2004, the socalled Orange Revolution, which failed. And the successful Maidan coup, which even the US private intelligence firm Stratfor, called ‘The most blatant coup in history’. The West, both under Obama, Trump and Biden armed the openly fascist formation which even the US Congress had admitted was terrorist. It bombed the areas of eastern Ukraine, ‘the Donbass’, killing thousands of ethnic Russians for 8 years. And not a peep of concern by the West. With a crushing ethnic cleansing operation planned for March, 2022, Russia preemptively used the West’s own “Responsibility to Protect’ doctrine to prevent it.

   
   

2. Ever since the disbanding of the Soviet Union and unilateral withdrawal of Soviet forces from Eastern Europe, the US and NATO, which promised not to expand NATO broke its promises. Russia has urged negotiation ever since

• Following the failure of Kiev attacks on the Donbass in 2014 and 2015, Russia helped negotiate the Minsk Agreemens, both of which were flouted by Kiev, with the full backing of Germany and France (and secret backing by the US).

  
  

• Notably in December, 2021, after Russia sent draft treaties to the US and NATO, Russia was insultingly rebuffed

  
  

• Following initial success on the battlefield, Kiev and Moscow initialled an agreement to end hostilities. These were vetoed by Boris Johnson of the UK, and one of Kiev’s key negotiators was shot to death in cold blood!

  
  

• The Biden administration has avoided contact with the Kremlin for over two years, insisting that it the US/NATO would win by sanctioning Russia and supplying billions in weapons, intelligence and financial aid

  
  

3.  In the West, there is a serious misconception that Russia is ‘a gas station masquerading as a country’. They thought that sanctions would break the Russian economy, and that Russia would run out of ‘cheap, inferior weapons’. The strategy backfired, with Europe suffering huge increases in energy prices, and Russia’s weapons outclassing the West’s both in quality and quantity, due to an industrial base far higher and a technological base far higher that the entire West combined. This has been documented thoroughly by Andre Martyanov, a military expert trained in the USSR but now a US citizen.

4. The most ruinous mistaken preconceptions still rampant in the West is that Russia is losing. Following the backstab of negotiations in Istanbul in April, 2022, Russia pursued attrition warfare, grinding down Ukraine’s military, taking out its air defenses, killing both Ukrainian regular army, its extremist Nazi battalions, such as Azov, and recently Carpathian Sich. Instead of volunteering, Ukrainian men are being press ganged sent to the front ill equipped and trained. Up to 100,000 or more have deserted, refusing to fight. And every major obstacle and defensive line in Eastern Ukraine has been crushed. Russia is now advancing quite rapidly.

Conclusion

In February, 2022, several of my oldest friends ‘explained’ to me all the above myths. I told them at that time, that Russia was both justified in finally putting its foot down on NATO, and that Russia would win in the end. I was right, they were wrong. And yet, even now, I get nasty messages from presumably well educated people that Russia is the guilty party, to which I say,

“We have met the enemy and the enemy is us”

No less a seasoned diplomat like Ambassador Chas Freeman and intelligence experts Larry Johnson and Scott Ritter are the voices you need to listen to.

Republished from BumbleBuddhist, with thanks!