by Stephen Lendman

Film buffs may recall Stanley Kubrick's 1964 dark satire titled "Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb."

It depicted deranged general Jack D. Ripper's obsession to wage nuclear war - despite no Pentagon authorization. Obama may be lunatic enough to launch one.

The film ends ominously - with nuclear detonations accompanied by popular British singer Vera Lynn's famous WW II "We'll Meet Again" recording.

A previous article discussed Ukraine's deputy foreign minister Vadym Prystaiko briefly. He sounds like Jack D. Ripper.

Interviewed by Canada's CBC Radio The House program, he said "(w)e have to stop (Putin)."

"For the sake of the Russian nation…Ukrainians and Europe. (W)e are preparing for full-scale war."

More on what he said below. He's Ukraine's deputy foreign minister. A former ambassador to Canada.

His father, Volodymyr, was Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) General Lieutenant of Justice and Vice Director.

His professional career began in private business. He co-founded Electronni Visti - one of Ukraine's first ISPs and electronic media outlets.

In 1994, he began working for Ukraine's Ministry of Foreign Economic Relations. In 1997, he was part of its economics section responsible for developing Asian trade.

In 2000, he was appointed consul to Sidney, Australia. In 2002, he worked for then President Leonid Kuchma's Foreign Policy Directorate.

In 2004, he was appointed Ukraine's Canadian embassy political counselor. Then acting charge d'affairs in 2006.

In 2007, he served as Foreign Affairs Ministry Deputy Director for NATO. In 2009, he was appointed Deputy Chief of Mission at Ukraine's Washington embassy.

In November 2012, President Viktor Yanukovych appointed him ambassador to Canada.

Last December, Kiev junta officials named him deputy foreign minister. Despite clear evidence reported by OSCE monitors and independent journalists, he irresponsibly accuses rebels of ceasefire violations.

He blames Russia for junta crimes. Ceasefire isn't holding, he claims. "The biggest hub we ever had in the railroad is completely destroyed and devastated."

He ignored his own regime's responsibility. He lied saying "(w)e see (rebels) are not stopping."

"It doesn't take a genius to see what they are trying to do…They are taking more and more strategic points."

False! Video footage and on the ground monitoring show rebels withdrawing heavy weapons and observing ceasefire terms.

Junta forces so far refuse to abide by what they agreed to. "It doesn't take a genius to see" Kiev wants war, not peace.

Putin and Sergey Lavrov more than anyone else have gone all-out to resolve Ukraine's conflict diplomatically. Not according to Prystaiko.

He was in Minsk during negotiations. "Personally I don't trust" Putin, he said. Absurdly he added "(y)ou look at him and you think: Are you serious?"

"Nobody knows what is going on in his head. I believe he is becoming very emotional" over historical Russian/Ukrainian ties…He's difficult to predict."

He's justifiably concerned about not wanting US bases on Russia's borders. Nor would any leader permit foreign combat troops threatening their country's national security.

"The stakes are very high," said Prystaiko. "We don't want to scare everybody, but we are preparing for full-scale war."

Get over your fears, he says. "What we expect from the world is that the world will stiffen up in the spine a little."

"Everybody is afraid of fighting with a nuclear state. We are not anymore in Ukraine. We've lost so many people... We've lost so much of our territory."

"However dangerous it sounds, we have to stop (Putin) somehow. For the sake of the Russian nation as well, not just for the Ukrainians and Europe."

Prystaiko want Canada supplying Ukraine with "lethal weapons…to allow us to defend ourselves," he claimed.

Despite Kiev having no enemies except ones it creates. Conspires with Washington to wage naked aggression on its own people.

Murdered tens of thousands. Maimed countless thousands more. Caused vast destruction and human misery.

Created the worst European refugee and humanitarian crisis since WW II. Established a fascist dictatorship in Europe's heartland.

Threatens war with Russia. Prystaiko represents Kiev's lunatic fringe. He's for possible nuclear war.

Ukrainian officials seek heavy weapons and financing for war while their economy teeters toward collapse.

People are dying in Ukraine for lack of healthcare. A World Health Organization (WHO) report said about 40 mental health institution patients died from hunger, cold and lack of care.

Dozens of frontline villages have no medical personnel at all. Throughout Ukraine, "(u)niversal healthcare exists only on paper, said WHO Ukrainian representative Dorit Nitzan.

Kiev policy is pay or die. "People have to pay for (most) health services, procure their own medicines, and there are no set prices for these essentials."

In war-torn areas, surgeons are nowhere to be found. They're gone, said Fair Aid.

Many other essentials to life are in limited supply or nonexistent. Imagine how much worse things will get if war resumes and continues for years.

If it ends the way NATO raped Yugoslavia. If potentially humanity destroying nuclear war erupts.

Ukraine's crisis began in the mid-1980s, according to former NATO intelligence analyst retired Lt. Commander Martin Packard.

"The real ending of the Cold War was in 1986, when the USSR's leadership resolved on a five-year program to move to a parliamentary democracy and market economy," he said.

"The intention in Moscow was to use that period to achieve a progressive convergence with the EU."

Packard commented on Richard Sakwa's new book titled "Frontline Ukraine: Crisis in the Borderlands."

He said Gorbachev saw the Cold War ending. He wanted a shared victory to build a "common European home."

Washington had other ideas - notions of total victory and Soviet Russia's demise. It planned taking full advantage by expanding east.

It accepts only one superpower. Controlling NATO let it encroach on Russia's borders - despite GWW Bush and Secretary of State James Baker promising "no extension of NATO"s jurisdiction one inch to the east."

Washington co-oped one former Soviet Republic and Warsaw Pact country after another into NATO. It uses them as Russian adversaries. According to Packard:

"The chaos that we now have, and the distrust of America which motivates Russian policy, stems primarily from decisions taken in Washington 30 years ago."

Today's danger is possible humanity destroying nuclear war. The scourge of mass annihilation is real.

America's imperial project threatens everyone. Either we find a way to end its Machiavellian madness or it'll end us.

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Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago and can be reached at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net.

His new book as editor and contributor is titled "Flashpoint in Ukraine: How the US Drive for Hegemony Risks World War III".

http://www.claritypress.com/LendmanIII.html

Visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com.

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