Why is Russia always the bad guy?

Re Russia, America and the case for a looming war, Oct. 15 Tony Burman’s column is a lone call to the public to attend to imminent military threats. Yet he omits critical information.

Most concerning, and perhaps controversial, is the representation of NATO and its member states as responding to Russian sabre-rattling by “embarking on their own military buildup, particularly in countries neighbouring Russia.” Yet NATO has provocatively encroached ever closer to the Russian border since the end of the Cold War, despite the U.S. promising not to expand “one inch.”

James Bissett, a former Canadian ambassador to Yugoslavia, Albania and Bulgaria, wrote of this same situation during the Ukraine-Russia crisis: “Sadly, the crisis is completely unnecessary and the responsibility lies entirely in the hands of the United States-led NATO powers. The almost virulent propaganda onslaught blaming Russia for the instability and violence in Ukraine simply ignores reality and the facts.”

It is the U.S., not the former U.S.S.R. or the current Russia, that consistently provokes a nuclear arms race, developing weapons systems long before the Russians, including the atom bomb, ballistic-missile-launching submarines, multiple warheads on mis- siles, computerized guidance on missiles and ballistic missile defence systems.

In 2003, then president George W. Bush unilaterally pulled out of the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, the cornerstone of nuclear weapons deterrence and international security. Burman does not mention current President Barack Obama’s $1.1-trillion investment in “updating” nuclear weapons.

Most ominous though is the belief among NATO members, based on confidence in missile defence, that a nuclear war is winnable and that it can be fought like a conventional war. Canadians especially need to know that the Trudeau government voted against the UN open ended working group (2016) on nuclear disarmament’s proposed plan to eliminate nuclear weapons. Judith Deutsch, Toronto