Rehashing standard talking points on the Russia-Ukraine War

The Austrian commentator Hans Rauscher recently did a piece grumping about an error made by Christian Wehrschütz, who has been the head of the Ukraine news bureau for the Austrian public network ORF since 2015.¹ Wehrschütz was reporting a story about Ukrainian draft evaders and corruption in the Ukrainian military, and identified one video as showing police looking for a draft evader. It turned out it was an older video of police looking for a suspected spy.

Rauscher goes on to draw the conclusion that Wehrschütz is a Russian dupe or something like it. And his style of making that argument is a familiar one now.

Wehrschütz apologized for the mistake, which is what actual journalists do when they make a mistake. I’ve been following his reporting on Ukraine since 2015, and I’ve always found it to be solid. For example, he said two weeks before the 2022 invasion that he didn’t think Russia planned to take over the whole country of Ukraine because they hadn’t assembled an invasion force nearly large enough for such an occupation.²

Aside from the Dr. Strangeloves who are convinced that the “Rooskies“ are always driven by an insatiable desire to take over the whole world, I doubt anyone now would quarrel with Wehrschütz’ early assessment. They made an attempt to seize Kiev and failed, after which they pulled back from Kiev and central Ukraine into the eastern zones they are now occupying.

(Hans Rauscher isn’t the only Austrian journalist who dislikes Wehrschütz. The publisher of the left-leaning weekly Falter, Armin Thurnher, grumped about Wehrschütz’ reporting just after the 2022 Russian invasion,³ focusing on his dislike of Wehrschütz’ style. And earlier in his career, Wehrschütz did seem to be close to the far-right Austrian Freedom Party (FPÖ). But war correspondents have a stereotypical reputation for being pricks. And in any case, my focus in this post is on the arguments Rauscher uses about the Russia-Ukraine War itself.)

Here is the letter Wehrschütz sent to the popular Austrian tabloid Kronen-Zeitung as they published it online:

Dear Readers!

I made a mistake in 'ZiB 1' [ORF news broadcast] on corruption in the Ukrainian armed forces. We showed a video that does not show the arrest of a person unwilling to go into military service, but, according to the SBU [Ukrainian military security service], the arrest of a spy. The mistake was made because we received 77 such videos from a reputable Austrian source and did not check the one used separately. This mistake will be a lesson to me, because it is the first of its kind in 23 years as a correspondent. What has been said does not change the fact that the reporting in 'ZiB 1' about corruption in the Ukrainian Armed Forces was and is correct in itself. Secondly, I have never claimed that corrupt people are not being investigated in Ukraine or that they are losing their jobs.

But a really big fish has not yet been landed [on military corruption charges], and thus a massive deterrent effect is missing - to the detriment of the country and European taxpayers.

Finally, the accusation of a pro-Russian stance is simply false and malicious. We [reporters] are not risking our lives in Ukraine for foreign interests, but to give the Austrian population an objective picture of the situation - and we will continue to do so.⁴

That last part may sound self-serving (and is). But war correspondents do take real risks reporting from war zones.

Ironically, the Kronen-Zeitung’s introductory comments to Wehrschütz’ letter appears to have an error in it. The SBU to which Wehrschütz refers to is a Ukrainian security service; the paper’s introduction refers to it as a Russian service.

Rauscher rants about, well, something …

Rauscher uses another piece he cites by Wehrschütz (which I have not be able to locate online) as a framework to vent in a sarcastic polemic about people whose commentary on Ukraine he doesn’t like:

The fact that [Wehrschütz] has a special inner approach [whatever that is!] to the topic can be seen in his other publications. At the end of July, he published a guest commentary in the Sonntags-Krone, which was titled "From Vilnius to Vassal of the USA". Abstract: Ukraine – and the EU as a whole – has been a vassal of the US for at least ten years. At the 2013 EU summit in Vilnius, Lithuania, the course was set for breaking Ukraine out of Vladimir Putin's sphere of influence. Of course, Putin could not tolerate this – as one has to read Wehrschütz – and so the disaster took its course. As key witnesses, Wehrschütz cites several US authors from the European think tank European Council of Foreign Relations, who warn that the EU is increasingly becoming a "vassal" of the USA as a result of the war.

This is a theoretically conceivable view shared by both far-right and far-left European actors. Rather, it is much more a fact that the concept of a "grand arrangement" with Putin that takes into account "Russia's legitimate interests" has turned out to be a chimera. That Putin is actually waging this insane war against "the West", from which he feels hindered in his ambitions. And that Europe needs the US to block Putin's quest for dominance. [my emphasis]

It’s a bit tiresome to rehash the same polemics over and over again. But that’s what happens during wars. Since I can’t access the particular article Rauscher cites in his rant, I’ll just recite a few basics:

1. The I.F. Stone quote that fits this war as well as all the others since he said it is still relevant: “All governments lie, but disaster lies in wait for countries whose officials smoke the same hashish they give out.” (1967)⁵

2. Yes, Russia has legitimate interests. Do adults still have to have a conversation about something so basic?

3. Yes, Russian concern over NATO expansion dates back to 1989 and the negotiations over German unification. And that has been a big factor om US-Russian relations ever since.

4. Russia’s invasions of Ukraine in 2014 and 2022 were violations of international law, not justified by any kind of imminent military threat from Ukraine. And they do represent a real escalation of the security threat to Europe from Russia. The 2022 invasion in particular also clearly involved some reckless assumptions by Russia.

5. The rest of the world, including the US, needs to find ways to make new, more stable security arrangements with Russia including major reductions in nuclear arms and cooperation on the climate crisis. These things will not be easy but are absolutely necessary.

And to understand what’s happening now and going forward also means that policymakers will have to look carefully at what actually went wrong with those processes in the 1989-2022 period.

The Monterey Initiative in Russian Studies have recently posted a series of presentations on this broad topic. Here this one, featuring Anatol Lieven, Thomas Graham of the (US) Council on Foreign Relations, and Hanna Notte, of the Vienna Center for Disarmament and Non-Proliferation and the (conservative-leaning) Center for Strategic and International Studies.⁶

Also, it’s pretty surprising that Hans Rauscher seems to think the very establishment European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR) is some kind of hippie-dippie peacenik outfit. He seems to have been thrown by a loop by the idea that European have become “vassals” of the US. Here is one recent piece from EECFR co-authored by Jeremy Shapiro called “The Art of Vassalisation”,⁷ a concept to which Anatol Lieven also refers in the video above. Shapiro and Jana Puglierin’s paper makes these five major points:

• Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has revealed Europeans’ profound dependence on the US for their security, despite EU efforts at achieving “strategic autonomy.”

• Over the last decade, the EU has grown relatively less powerful than America – economically, technologically, and militarily.

• Europeans also still lack agreement on crucial strategic questions for themselves and look to Washington for leadership.

• In the cold war, Europe was a central front of superpower competition. Now, the US expects the EU and the UK to fall in line behind its China strategy and will use its leadership position to ensure this outcome.

• Europe becoming an American vassal is unwise for both sides. Europeans can become a stronger and more independent part of the Atlantic alliance by developing independent capacity to support Ukraine and acquiring greater military capabilities. [my emphasis]

It’s obvious right now that the European members of NATO are more closely aligned with the US than prior to the 2022 invasion.

1. Rauscher, Hans (2023): Wenn der ORF auf prorussische Fake News hereinfällt. Der Standard 18.08.2023. <https://www.derstandard.at/story/3000000183464/wenn-der-orf-auf-prorussische-fake-news-hereinf228llt> (Accessed: 2023-19-08). My translation from the German.

2. Wehrschütz, Christian Ferdinand (2022): Facebook 02/06/2022. <https://www.facebook.com/christianferdinand.wehrschutz/posts/478931600471027> (Accessed: 19-08-2023).

3. Thrunher, Armin (2023): Lächerlich löwenherzig. Durch die Krisen mit Christian Wehrschütz. Falter 26.02.2022. <https://www.falter.at/seuchenkolumne/20220226/auf-oesterreichisch-durch-die-krise-mit-christian-wehrschuetz> (Accessed: 2023-20-08).

4. Wehrschütz, Christian Ferdinand (2023): Wehrschütz: „Habe keine prorussische Haltung“. Kronen Zeitung 18.08.2023. <https://www.krone.at/3089792> (Accessed: 19-08-2023). My translation from the German.

Text also at: Wehrschütz, Christian Ferdinand (2023): Facebook 08/18/2023. <https://www.facebook.com/christianferdinand.wehrschutz/posts/pfbid03h3mfbvDz7RMpVxFQ6eZ8H9YN6c8turxE9GAzsURdiwv8d42D33jbinBbW7utiDbl> (Accessed: 19-08-2023).

5. I.F. Stone. Wikipedia 03/19/2023. <https://en.wikiquote.org/w/index.php?title=I._F._Stone&oldid=3294043> (Accessed: 2023-19-08).

6. MSSR 2023 [Monterey Summer Symposium] Panel Discussion: Could the Russian Invasion of Ukraine Have Been Prevented? Monterey Initiative in Russian Studies YouTube channel 08/19/2023 (conference took place in July). (Accessed: 2023-19-08).

7. Puglierin, Jana & Shapiro, Jeremy (2023): The Art of Vasslaisation: How Russia's War on Ukraine Has Transformed Transatlantic Relations. European Council on Foreign Relations April 2023. <https://ecfr.eu/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/The-art-of-vassalisation-How-Russias-war-on-Ukraine-has-transformed-transatlantic-relations.pdf> (Accessed: 2023-19-08).