Victoria Nuland Resigns—Not a Moment Too Soon

Arch-neocon Victoria Nuland, who has been discussed many times on TOO, has resigned as the State Department’s Secretary of the Ukraine War. I have seen very little commentary on her resignation, so an article on ZeroHedge got my attention. Unfortunately, the comments are admittedly speculative, but seem at least reasonable.

While there have been rumors that maybe [Nuland] could be in poor or declining health, McGovern has told Russia’s Sputnik that the notoriously hawkish Nuland was a liability at a moment NATO and Russia are inching closer to direct nuclear-armed confrontation.

From the Sputnik article: “The CIA would have, the NSA would have those conversations as well,” said McGovern, referring to leaked recordings of discussions between Nuland and German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius that appeared to reveal plans for an imminent attack on Russian soil. The leaks generated significant embarrassment for German officials as attention was drawn to Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s support for the Ukraine proxy conflict.

[McGovern:] My best guess here is that the CIA and the Defense Department and the NSA got this message around saying, ‘look, Victoria’s got her own agenda here,’” said the analyst. “‘The president doesn’t really want to strike these ammo depots in Russia or knock down the [Crimean] Bridge. So we got to rein her in, I guess it’s time for her to go to early retirement.’”

“My best guess here is that the CIA and the Defense Department and the NSA got this message around saying, ‘look, Victoria’s got her own agenda here,’” said McGovern.

The former CIA official continued to speculate: “‘The president doesn’t really want to strike these ammo depots in Russia or knock down the [Crimean] Bridge. So we got to rein her in, I guess it’s time for her to go to early retirement.’”

Another theory, though not necessarily contradictory to the above, has been advanced by professor of national security at Bowie State University Dr. Matthew Crosston.

He laid out what “a staunch anti-Putinist Nuland was and how fervently she wanted to continue to utilize Ukraine as a platform in which to continue to weaken and/or slight Russia on the global stage — and perhaps even up the ante in that conflict with her support of sending ballistic missiles into Ukraine.” But she also knows the Ukrainian side is losing.

She may have seen the writing on the wall as Ukraine forces are in retreat, and wanted to bail before potential total defeat:

“She undoubtedly understood that if American support lessons or wanes, Ukraine loses, period,” Crosston pointed out. “Perhaps she did not want to be in the Administration that would be responsible for that outcome.”

But both McGovern and Crosston would agree that with Nuland as Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs (in this capacity she basically ran all of US foreign policy in Europe), ceasefire talks between Kiev and Moscow remained an extremely distant prospect or even an impossibility.

“One thing is certain: as long as Nuland remained in that chair, there was literally no chance such talk could even be theorized. Now it can,” Crosston concluded.

ZeroHedge also includes this video of an interview of Glenn Greenwald. Much of this will be familiar to readers of TOO, but there is a discussion of Adam Schiff as a warmonger endorsed by AIPAC and now the presumed next Senator from California. Schiff was buoyed by billionaires, presumably Jewish or at least rabidly pro-Israel, who donated millions to Republican Steve Garvey (who has no chance to win in a very blue state) in order to prevent a runoff between two Democrat candidates. As expected, no mention of Nuland’s strong Jewish connections — also prominent among neocons generally (see here, p. 32ff).