Glory to Ukraine!
In Ukraine, to live is to be victorious; Unconquered in the face of horrors and the ruthless brutal conquest by an enemy who does not regard us as fellow human beings and wages a campaign of terror, genocide, and erasure against a whole people.
We celebrate on this day the independence of Ukraine from Russia, but also the liberty and independence of all humankind, and the solidarity of all who stand together to resist oppression.
The glorious defiance and unity of purpose of Ukraine has reminded us all of a great truth; of the precarious, ephemeral, transitory, and fragile nature of our existence as imposed conditions of struggle to become human together.
We are become a precariat of all humankind under threat of nuclear annihilation, and as this theatre of World War Three threatens to engulf the whole of Europe in a total war of destruction and civilizational collapse, any who believed themselves safe must reconsider the human condition and what it means, for only solidarity of the international community and of peoples as a United Humankind, a free society of equals and our universal human rights, can stand against the darkness of the global Fourth Reich which threatens to devour and enslave us.
For a vision of our future and our world should our solidarity and duty of care for others fail us, we need only look to Mariupol.
To quote the lines of Winston Churchill in the magnificent film Darkest Hour, which the historical figure never said; “You can not reason with a Tiger when your head is in its mouth.”
Why is it important to resist our dehumanization and those who would enslave us, and to reply to the terror of our nothingness with refusal to submit and solidarity with others, regardless of where or when such existential threats arise, who is under threat or any divisions of identitarian politics weaponized by conquerors to isolate their victims from help?
As I wrote in my post of April 20 2022, What is the Meaning of Mariupol? Address to the Volunteers in Warsaw; As we gather and prepare to take the fight to the enemy in direct action against the regime of Russia itself, against Vladimir Putin and his oligarchs and elites who sit at the helm of power and are now complicit in war crimes and crimes against humanity both in Ukraine and her province of Crimea in the imperial conquest of a sovereign and independent nation and in Russia in the subjugation of their own citizens, and in the other theatres of this the Third World War, Syria, Libya, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Nagorno-Karabakh, and in the capture of the American state in the Stolen Election of 2016 which put Putin’s treasonous and dishonorable agent and proxy Donald Trump, Our Clown of Terror, in the White House to oversee the infiltration and subversion of democracy by the Fourth Reich, we are confronted with countless horrific examples of the future that awaits us at the hands of Putin’s regime, and we have chosen Resistance as the only alternative to slavery and death.
As we bring a Reckoning for tyranny, terror, and the horrors of war, in the crimes against humanity by Russia in Ukraine which include executions, torture, organized mass rape and the trafficking of abducted civilians, the capture of civilian hostages and use of forced labor, cannibalism using mobile factories, genocidal attacks, erasure of evidence of war crimes using mobile crematoriums which indicates official planning as part of the campaign of terror and proof that the countless crimes against humanity of this war are not aberrations but by design and at the orders of Putin and his commanders, threats of nuclear annihilation against European nations sending humanitarian aid, and the mass destruction of cities, we are become a court of last appeal in the defense of our universal human rights and of our humanity itself.
The Russian strategy of conquest opens with sustained and relentless bombardment and destruction of hospitals, bomb shelters, stores of food, power systems, water supply, corridors of humanitarian aid and the evacuation of refugees; anything which could help citizens survive a siege. Once nothing is left standing, a campaign of terror as organized mass rape, torture, cannibalism, and looting begins, and any survivors enslaved or executed. This is a war of genocide and erasure, and to fascism there can be but one reply; Never Again!
In this war which is now upon us, Putin’s goal is to restore the Russian Empire in the conquest of the Ukraine and the Black Sea as a launchpad for the conquest and dominion of the Mediterranean, Europe, Africa, and the Middle East; but he has a parallel and far more dangerous purpose in the abrogation of international law and our universal human rights. The true purpose of the Fourth Reich and its puppetmaster Vladimir Putin in this war is to make meaningless the idea of human rights.
This is a war of tyranny and fascisms of blood, faith, and soil against democracy and a free society of equals, for the idea that we all of us have meaning and value which is uniquely ours and against enslavement and the theft of our souls.
Within the limits of our form, of the flaws of our humanity and the brokenness of the world, we struggle to achieve the human; ours is a revolution of Tikkun Olam, a Hebrew phrase meaning repair of the world which refers to our interdependence and duty of care for each other as equals who share a common humanity.
I’m sure all of us here know what Shlomo Bardin meant when he repurposed the phrase from the Kabbalah of Luria and the Midrash, but what do I mean by this?
There are only two kinds of actions which we human beings are able to perform; those which affirm and exalt us, and those which degrade and dehumanize us.
We live at a crossroads of history which may define the fate of our civilization and the future possibilities of becoming human, in the struggle between tyranny and liberty and between solidarity and division, and we must each of us choose who we wish to become, we humans; masters and slaves, or a free society of equals?
As you know, my friends and I come to you from the Siege of Mariupol, a battle of flesh against unanswerable force and horror, of solidarity against division, of love against hate, and of hope against fear.
Here, as in the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising which we celebrated yesterday, the human will to freedom is tested by an enemy who exults in the embrace of the monstrous, whose policies and designs of war as terror gladly and with the open arrogance of power instrumentalize utter destruction and genocide, a war wherein atrocities and depravities are unleashed as tactics of shock and awe with intent of subjugation through learned helplessness and overwhelming and generalized fear.
In Mariupol now as in Warsaw then, we affirm and renew our humanity in refusal to submit or to abandon our duty of care for each other. The Defenders of Mariupol who have sworn to die together and have refused many demands for surrender make their glorious Last Stand not as a gesture of defiance to a conqueror and tyrant, or to hold the port to slow and impede the Russian campaign in the Donbas now ongoing and prevent the seizure of the whole seaboard and control of the Black Sea, though these are pivotal to the liberation of Ukraine, but to protect the hundreds, possibly thousands, of refugees who now shelter in the tunnels of the underground fortress at the Azovstal and Ilyin Steel and Iron Works, especially the many children in makeshift hospitals who cannot be moved.
This is the meaning of Mariupol; we stand together and remain human, regardless of the cost. This is what it means to be human, how it is achieved, and why solidarity is important. Among our values, our duty of care for others is paramount, because it is instrumental to everything else, and all else is contingent on this.
To paraphrase America’s Pledge of Allegiance not as an oath to a nation but as the declaration of a United Humankind; We, the People of Earth, pledge ourselves to each other, as one humankind, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.
This brings us to my purpose in speaking to you today, for one of you has asked a question which is central to our mission of the Liberation of Russia and Ukraine, and to the solidarity of the international community in this our cause; how can ordinary people like ourselves hope for victory over the unanswerable force and overwhelming power of tyranny, terror, and war?
There are two parallel and interdependent strategies of Resistance in asymmetrical warfare; the first and most important is to redefine the terms of victory. This is because we are mortal, and the limits of our form impose conditions of struggle; we must be like Jacob wrestling the angel, not to conquer this thing of immense power but to escape being conquered by it. We can be killed, imprisoned, tortured; but we cannot be defeated or conquered if we but refuse to submit.
Power without legitimacy becomes meaningless, and authority crumbles when met with disbelief. This is why journalism and teaching as sacred callings in pursuit of truth are crucial to democracy, and why the Four Primary Duties of a Citizen are Question Authority, Expose Authority, Mock Authority, and Challenge Authority.
What of the use of police in brutal repression by carceral states? The social use of force is hollow and brittle, and fails at the point of disobedience. When the police are an army of Occupation and the repression of dissent, they can be Resisted on those terms; my point here is simply that victory against unanswerable force consists of refusal to submit.
Who refuses to submit and cannot be compelled becomes Unconquered and is free. This is a kind of victory which cannot be taken from us.
Second is our strategy for survival against an enemy who does not regard us as human, and will use terror to enforce submission through learned helplessness. By any means necessary, as this principle is expressed in the famous dictum of Sartre in his 1948 play Dirty Hands, quoted by Frantz Fanon in his 1960 speech Why We Use Violence, and made immortal by Malcolm X.
In Mariupol I began referring to this in its oldest form, war to the knife. Its meaning for us is simple; those who would enslave us and who abandon all laws and all limits may hide behind none.
The question to which I speak today in reply intrigued me, because it was nearly identical to a line which sets up one of the greatest fictional military speeches in literature, Miles Vorkosigan’s speech to the Maurilacans in The Borders of Infinity by Lois McMaster Bujold.
In this story, Miles has just led a mass prisoner of war escape, from a prison which like all fascist tyrannies is fiendishly designed to produce abjection, as described by Julia Kristeva in her famous essay, in circumstances of horror such as those which my friends here and I have just survived, and in which we now find ourselves like the Marilacans having achieved an army, and about to take the fight to the enemy on his own ground.
One of the volunteers says, ”The defenders of Mariupol had those crazy Cossack warriors, swearing an oath to die rather than surrender, professional mercenaries from everywhere, all of them elite forces and utterly fearless. We just can’t fight on those terms; its been seventy years since we fought a total war of survival, and most of us here are professionals and university intellectuals. Poland is civilized, maybe too civilized for what’s coming our way.”
To this I answer with Miles; “Let me tell you about the defenders of Mariupol. Those who sought a glorious death in battle found it early on. This cleared the chain of command of accumulated fools.
The survivors were those who learned to fight dirty, and live, and fight another day, and win and win and win. And for whom nothing, not comfort nor security, not family nor friends nor their immortal souls, was more important than victory.
They were not supermen or more than human. They sweated in confusion and darkness.
And with not one half the resources Poland possesses, Ukraine remains unconquered. When you’re all that stands between liberty and tyranny, freedom and slavery, life and death, between a people and genocide, when you’re human, there is no mustering out.”
To this wonderful speech of a fictional hero who simply refuses to stay down to the fictional survivors of the very real horror of being held captive and powerless by a tyrant, whether as prisoners of war or citizens of an occupied city, I must add this; how if Poland and Ukraine stand together, with all of Europe and America united in Resistance?
And if you are telling me you could not today fight a Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, this I do not believe. Nor would you do so alone, for during this Passover as the Jewish community remembers the story of the Exile, the world also remembers; we watch it in our news every day, enacted once again in Ukraine. This, too, is a Haggadah, in which all of humankind can share, and which yet again teaches us the necessity of our interdependence and solidarity.
As written by Alan Moore in V For Vendetta; “Since mankind’s dawn, a handful of oppressors have accepted the responsibility over our lives that we should have accepted for ourselves. By doing so, they took our power. By doing nothing, we gave it away. We’ve seen where their way leads, through camps and wars, towards the slaughterhouse.”
Here is a truth to which all of us here today can bear witness.
But there is a thing which tyrants never learn; the use of force and violence obeys the Third Law of Motion, and creates resistance as its own counterforce. And when the brutality and crimes against humanity of that force and violence are performed upon the stage of the world, visible to all and a history which cannot be erased, part of the story of every human being from now until the end of our species, repression finds answer in reckoning as we awaken to our interdependence and the necessity of our solidarity and duty of care for each other.
And so I offer to all of you the Oath of the Resistance as it was given to me by the great Jean Genet on that fateful day in 1982, in a burning house, in a lost cause, after we refused to surrender; “We swear our loyalty to each other, to resist and yield not, and abandon not our fellows.”
An unusual fellow, but behind the concealment of his literary notoriety he remained the Legionnaire he had once been, and after spying on the Nazis in Berlin in 1939 had returned to Paris to make mischief for her unwelcome guests, and there in 1940 repurposed the oath of the Foreign Legion for what allies he could gather. He said it was the finest thing he ever stole.
My hope is that I have lived and written at the beginning of the story of humankind, and not at its end.
What is the meaning of Mariupol?
Here we may look to its precedents as Last Stands, battles, and sieges; Thermopylae, Malta, Washington crossing the Delaware and the Battle of Trenton, Gallipoli, Stalingrad, and its direct parallel the Siege of Sarajevo. Moments of decision wherein the civilization of humankind hung in the balance, and with it our future possibilities of becoming human.
Who do we want to become, we humans; slaves and tyrants or a free society of equals? And how much of our humanity are we willing to trade for the chance of such futures?
What of ourselves can we not afford to lose, without also losing who we are? How much of our humanity can we claw back from the darkness in refusal to submit to those who would enslave us, and in solidarity with each other?
We must each of us face our own Gate of Fire, as did the Spartans at Thermopylae, and choose.
What are we worth, if we permit ruthless bandit kings to commit atrocities, plunder, and enslave others?
What is western civilization worth, if we will not live up to our fine words? And fine words they remain, such as these written by Thomas Jefferson in the Declaration of Independence in 1776, a synthesis and revisioning of ideas from Hobbes, Locke, Montesquieu, Voltaire, and Rousseau; “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, and endowed by their creator with certain inalienable rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.”
What is America, if not a guarantor of democracy and our universal human rights, and a beacon of hope to the world?
Let us reply with the words written by J.R.R. Tolkien between 1937 and 1955 in his luminous reimagination of the Second World War and the conflict of dominion which immediately followed it between tyranny and democracy, first against fascism and then between the allies who defeated it as spheres of dominion and systems of economic and political organization but both for different dreams of a free society of equals, in the iconic speech of Aragorn at the Black Gate in The Return of the King which unites ethos, logos, pathos, and kairos; “A day may come when the courage of men fails, when we forsake our friends and break all bonds of fellowship, but it is not this day. An hour of wolves and shattered shields, when the age of men comes crashing down, but it is not this day. This day we fight.”
Join us.
As President Biden wrote in his Statement on Ukraine Independence Day;
“ Today, the people of Ukraine are once more marking their Independence Day, while suffering the all-out assault of Putin’s craven war for land and power. For eighteen months, Ukrainian families have lived under the daily threat of Russian rockets and the reality of brutal attacks. But the people of Ukraine have refused to break.
On this Independence Day, as they have since Russia first invaded Ukraine in 2014, brave Ukrainian women and men are defending Ukraine from assaults on fundamental principles essential to every nation on the planet – sovereignty and territorial integrity. They are showing the world once more that freedom is worth fighting for.
Independence means the freedom to choose your own future. It’s precious. Each year on July 4th, Americans celebrate our Independence Day as a time to remember the price we paid for our freedom and all the blessings that flow from it. So today, as Putin continues his brutal war to erase Ukraine’s independence and redraw the map of our world by force, Americans all across the country stand united with the people of Ukraine.
The United States will continue our work, together with partners all around the world, to support Ukraine’s ability to defend itself against Russia’s aggression, to uphold the foundational principles of the UN Charter, and to help the Ukrainian people build the secure, prosperous, and independent future they deserve.
Our commitment to Ukraine’s independence is unwavering and enduring. That’s why the United States and other G7 nations issued a joint declaration in Lithuania last month pledging to help Ukraine maintain armed forces capable of deterring Russian aggression in years to come, a declaration which over 25 nations have now joined. Together with our partners in Europe, we are supporting Ukraine in their fight for freedom now and we will help them over the long term.
We are also working with nations everywhere to hold Russian forces accountable for the war crimes and other atrocities they have committed in Ukraine. That includes the forcible removal of thousands of Ukrainian children to Russia. These children have been stolen from their parents and kept apart from their families. It’s unconscionable. And today, we are announcing new sanctions to hold those responsible for these forced transfers and deportations to account, and to demand that Ukrainian children be returned to their families.
I sincerely hope that next year, Ukrainians will be able to celebrate their Independence Day in peace and safety, knowing how their extraordinary courage inspired the world. May Ukraine’s Independence Day be a reminder that the forces of darkness and dominion will never extinguish the flame of liberty that lives in the heart of free people everywhere.”
As I wrote in my post of June 3 2022, One Hundred Days of the Invasion of Ukraine; For one hundred days now, a great struggle between democracy and tyranny, love and hate, hope and fear has been raging in Ukraine, where the fate of humankind hangs in the balance and our future possibilities of becoming human are being chosen in the great game of chance that is war.
Here, as in far too many times and places, a few unconquerable heroes and those who stand with them in solidarity as a band of brothers against the darkness of barbarian atavisms of brute fear and force and a nihilistic regime wherein only power has meaning and fear is the only means of exchange, die in the forlorn hope of buying with their lives time for civilization to awaken to the threat of fascist tyranny and imperial conquest.
How will we answer the test of our humanity in this moment of existential threat? Who do we want to become, we humans? A free society of equals or a world of masters and slaves?
For these are the stakes of this game in which we now play, the Third World War; liberty or tyranny.
When those who would enslave us come for us, as they always do, let them find not a people subjugated by learned helplessness nor divided by hierarchies of belonging and exclusionary otherness, but a United Humankind unconquerable in solidarity and refusal to submit.
To tyranny and fascism there can be but one reply; Never Again!
Herein is my witness of history and truth telling in this, the First General History of World War Three. As with all things human, it is also fiction except when it is not, myth when it can be, poetic vision and the reimagination and transformation of human being, meaning, and value and of our limitless future possibilities of becoming human.
Are we not the stories we tell about ourselves, to ourselves and to others?
Always there remains the struggle between the masks we make for ourselves and those made for us by others.
This is the first revolution in which we all must fight; the struggle for ownership of ourselves.
Herein I offer apology for my digressive ars poetica; once I sailed on the Lake of Dreams, was wooed by Beauty but claimed by Vision; and in such visions I fell into a sea of words, images, songs, histories, layered and interconnected with one another like a web of reflections and the echoes of voices lost in time, a wilderness of mirrors which capture and distort and extend ourselves infinitely in all directions.
Here is a shadow self of our histories which we drag around behind ourselves like an invisible reptilian tale, legacies from which we must emerge to create ourselves anew and those which we cannot abandon without losing who we are.
Here my intertexts are manifest, seize and shake me with tumultuous voices and untrustworthy purposes, for where do our histories end and we begin?
We cannot escape each other, my shadows and I.
War transforms the question of our authorship of ourselves with existential primacy; where do we ourselves end, and others begin? How may we negotiate this boundary of the Forbidden and interface with alien realms of human being, meaning, and value, with division and hierarchies of belonging and exclusionary otherness or with solidarity, diversity, and inclusion, with fear or with love?
In the end all that matters is what we do with our fear, and how we use our power.
There are no Ukrainians, no Russians; only people like ourselves, and the choices they make about how to be human together.
As written by Nataliya Gumenyuk in The Guardian, in an article entitled Ukraine’s independence day was always important. Now it is a matter of life and death. In Kyiv, we are marking the day under the constant threat of Russian attack – and facing a watershed in the course of the war; “A year ago on 24 August – the 30th anniversary of Ukraine’s independence – a new generation of pilots were leading the Ukrainian air forces flying over Independence Square in Kyiv. The fighter jet column was headed by Anton Lystopad, who was recognised as one of the country’s best pilots. He was 30 years old, born in the year of independence. Almost a year later, in August 2022, Lystopad received the Order for Courage from the president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy. A few days after the ceremony, he was killed in combat.
Lystopad’s story may sound almost too symbolic, but Ukrainians have become used to such tragic symbolism. Six months on from the start of the Russian invasion, with its indiscriminate bombardment of peaceful towns, the atrocities and horrors of Bucha and Mariupol, but also the solidarity, resilience and sacrifices we have experienced, everything feels sharper and deeper. The bitterness of losses and the joy of survival.
Even before the full-scale war, for Ukrainians, Independence Day was the most important holiday of the year, the brightest day, when we thought not about the death of tyranny and the Soviet empire, but the rebirth of the state and of freedom. Amid the war, a military parade in the capital is not an option – soldiers and equipment must be on the frontline. A civilian gathering may put people in danger. There are concerns that Vladimir Putin’s airstrikes will punish those celebrating something he wants to destroy. But doing nothing would feel like a defeat. Not letting Russia destroy our usual way of life is a form of protest. The installation of destroyed Russian military equipment along Kyiv’s main street, Khreshchatyk, has been applauded by many. It offers an ironic commentary: on 24 February, Moscow wanted its armoured vehicles trundling into central Kyiv.
After Russia’s defeats in Kyiv, Chernihiv and Sumy, and later its slow advance in the Donbas, the Kremlin changed its strategy. Instead of battles, Moscow makes random missile strikes on peaceful towns such as Kremenchuk in June, where 21 people were killed in a shopping mall, and Vinnytsia in July, where 27 lost their lives.
Many of us have got used to air-raid sirens; some have even stopped hiding in basements. But this possibility of attack at any place or any moment is cruel. It remains invisible to foreign visitors, who are often surprised by how normal life in Kyiv or Chernihiv has become.
Yet we still hope Independence Day will be a perfect sunny day. The start of a new season, when many return after a summer break. Many Ukrainian women and children will return home from their refuges abroad. For some, the financial means to be out of the country are exhausted, while others just want to go back to their homes. Unless, of course, they are places under occupation such as Mariupol or Severodonetsk.
I used to have my concerns about military parades and public demonstrations of military pride. But not today. I am no longer worried about a burst of militarism. Those on the frontline dream about returning to their families and careers. Their service reminds me more of the duty of firefighters or rescue workers.
Half a year has turned out to be enough to understand the war: to see its ugliness, but also its banality. It is not a force of nature, and it’s not inevitable. Victory depends not just on heroism or might, but on strategy and the capacity to use resources wisely.
Independence Day also feels like a watershed: we need to consider what has happened and what to expect next. Major battles will be impossible in winter, so the next three months will be decisive – a chance to counterattack and liberate as many towns as possible before the stalemate starts.
That’s another reason why these days our thoughts are mainly with those who are on the frontline. There will be other days to mourn the fallen. Myself, I think first of a friend – a former publisher of a glitzy lifestyle magazine, with whom I reported on Kharkiv in March, and who was mobilised this summer. Now he commands a paratroop company. He can’t leave his gun even while asleep on his post in Donbas, for fear of saboteurs.
During a recent phone conversation, I asked how his fellow soldiers felt these days. He said that despite many battles and great exhaustion, their determination was strong. Everybody understood what they were doing there: while they held the line, the invaders wouldn’t enter their home towns. Recent attacks on military targets in Crimea have cheered people up – both in the capital and on the frontline.
I also think of the 8,000 Ukrainian prisoners of war. If the Kremlin can’t hurt Ukrainians at home, PoWs may become a target. My thoughts are with two friends captured this summer in the battles in Ukraine’s east, whose stories can also tell the story of the country. The first – I won’t publicise his name for security reasons – has spent the past eight years in conflict resolution talks in the Donbas, talking to his Russian counterparts and to separatists, genuinely hoping for a breakthrough . In vain. Then, after 24 February, he decided to take up arms.
The second, Maksym Butkevych, is a known anti-fascist, a pacifist who believed in nonviolent resistance, a human rights defender who fought against any kind of discrimination and supported people displaced from the Donbas. For this he was labelled “neo-Nazi’ by Kremlin propaganda, and called a spy – because he worked as a journalist for the BBC and UNHCR. Despite his history of pacifism, he came to believe that fighting was the only remaining way to defend human rights when his country was under attack.
We had not heard from him since June, but he recently appeared in a Russian propaganda video of PoWs captured in Luhansk. He looked disturbed and worried, thin, grey, silent. But still this video was welcome – he’s alive. I want another video of him. Archival footage exists of Maksym in 1990, still a pupil, calling for Ukrainian schools to support the student movement for independence. Back then it sounded like a dream, but our experience from the past 30 years, including eight years fighting in the east and six months resisting an invasion, shows that we reach our goals not because we hope but because we work and fight, exhausted but determined.”
Here follows the complete transcript of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s speech at Sophia Square Kyiv on the 32nd Ukrainian Independence Day: “Dear Ukrainian people! Dear guests of Ukraine, our friends. Dear Presidents! Dear Prime Minister! Representatives of the diplomatic corps!
Today we are all celebrating the 32nd anniversary of Ukraine’s independence. 32 years of uninterrupted independence, which will endure. Which we will not allow to be torn apart. And which Ukrainians will not lose grip on.
Here, in the very center of our capital, there is a lot of evidence of how old the history of Ukrainian statehood is. Unfortunately, there is no less memory of how Ukrainian statehood was lost.
How Ukrainians had to fight for freedom and independence against invaders. How our people always had enough heroism and courage, but sometimes lacked unity. How Ukrainians had to fight against the invaders. How, unfortunately, sometimes the invaders managed to become occupiers. How they destroyed the lives of entire generations of our people. And how Ukrainians fought for their land and freedom for generations. And how they gained their freedom. How they prevailed. How they preserved themselves. Preserved Ukraine. And managed to make Ukrainian independence uninterrupted.
Dear attendees!
Please observe a moment of silence in memory of Ukrainian heroes of different times who fought for the freedom and independence of Ukraine and gave their lives for it.
Thank you.
Dear people! We will not lose grip on Ukrainian independence. We are all united by this feeling.
We remember what the Ukrainian people went through. We see the threats. We are fighting the enemy. And we know what we are capable of. We are capable of winning! And we will prevail! Ukrainian children in Ukrainian squares and streets will celebrate Ukrainian independence in the same way. Our grandchildren will celebrate. And their grandchildren. Together with the friends of our state. With Ukraine’s allies and partners. The ones Ukraine will choose for itself. Always freely. And there will never be any more pauses in Ukrainian history.
We will give Ukraine the strength it needs to always prevail. And we will be tough on anyone who tries to undermine, trade, or weaken Ukraine’s power from within. And there will be appropriate legislative initiatives. In the near future.
We will cherish our unity. When Russia invaded with a full-scale war, there was not a single day that Ukraine lacked unity. And so Russia had no opportunity to use anything against us, against Ukraine. Everything is only for Ukraine now.
The world hears and supports Ukraine. The world’s majority stands with Ukraine and helps. But no matter what happens in the world, Ukraine must be able to defend itself. Always. For a long time, our country did not have the necessary defense production, and now it does. I thank everyone who is developing them today. And we will create more. For a long time, the bravery of our warriors did not have the experience of using the world’s best weapons, and now our state gives Ukrainian warriors such weaponry. And I thank everyone who helps us with it. For a long time, there were attempts to artificially divide Ukraine into camps to make it impossible for our country to join the right alliance. Ukrainian courage deserves to be in the world’s best alliances only. Ukraine deserves to be among the leaders of the world. And it will be! Our country already guarantees common European security. This security is impossible without your strength, Ukrainian warriors. Without the potential of Ukraine. Without the freedom and labor of our entire country, all our people. Without Ukraine, our common European home can only be an unfinished construction project. And I thank every leader who understands this.
This morning in my address on Independence Day, I thanked everyone who makes Ukrainian independence so strong that it is one of the foundations of European independence. I thanked our warriors. Every citizen of Ukraine – everyone for whom citizenship is not just a passport. Those who work for the sake of Ukraine and our people. I thanked our Ukrainian teachers, medical workers, combat medics, volunteers, rescuers, sappers, firefighters, police, and power engineers. All those who support the morale of Ukrainians. Our talents. Everyone who produces weapons for Ukraine. Who provides transportation for Ukraine. Who prays for Ukrainians. Our farmers. Ukrainian businesses that pay taxes and create jobs. Ukrainian strength always lies in people. In adults and children. In everyone. In everyone who cares about Ukraine. About each other. And about independence. And it is impossible to gather all our people in one square to thank them. But today, here, in this square, there are Ukrainians who deserve personal gratitude. And it is an honor for me to present you with the state awards of Ukraine on the occasion of Independence Day.
Dear attendees!
Dear Ladies and Gentlemen!
Ukraine’s partners are here with us today. Gitanas, Mr. President of Lithuania. A powerful friend of Ukraine. A defender of freedom. Jonas, Mr. Prime Minister of Norway. A leader who deserves to be a role model for other heads of state. Mr. President of Portugal. I thank you, Mr. President, for the truly heartfelt warmth with which the Portuguese people sheltered our people at the beginning of the war. Mr. Chairman of the Presidency of Bosnia and Herzegovina. For the first time in Ukraine, but sincerely with Ukraine. East, north, west and south of Europe. Our common home.
Our Europe is indeed united by many things. But the key thing is respect. Respect for people. Respect for freedom. Respect for bravery. And respect for Ukraine.
Congratulations, Ukraine, on your Independence Day!
Glory to Ukraine!”
And how has Ukraine given form in action for this glorious Independence and unconquerable will to be free? As written by Emma Graham-Harrison in The Guardian, in an article entitled Ukraine celebrates independence day with first raid into Crimea: Troops landed in western tip of territory and raised Ukrainian flag before returning home safely; “Ukrainian forces marked the country’s independence day with a naval raid into occupied Crimea, and President Volodymyr Zelenskiy praised Ukrainians for the defiance and courage that has won them global support in the fight with Russia.
The national holiday celebrates Ukraine’s independence from the former Soviet Union in 1991, but this year it also marks 18 months since Vladimir Putin’s full-scale invasion plunged the country into a war for survival.
Ukrainian troops landed on the western tip of Crimea, near the village of Olenivka, in the early hours of Thursday, defence intelligence said in a statement. They fought Russian troops and raised a Ukrainian flag, before all returned safely home.
It was the first time Ukrainian forces are known to have landed in Crimea since Putin ordered his forces over the border last year. They had to evade Russian defences on a long journey across the Black Sea, and then escape again after a skirmish.
A video mostly captured in blurry night vision showed Ukrainian fighters on boats, then attaching the country’s blue and yellow flag to a wooden building.
Kyiv says its path to victory must go through Crimea, illegally occupied by Russia in 2014, and has previously carried out a series of daring long-range and sabotage attacks on targets there. They have hit Russian warships and an airbase, and the Russian-built Kerch bridge, a prestige project linking Crimea to Russia.
With a counteroffensive against Russian troops occupying southern and eastern Ukraine only creeping forward, Kyiv appears to be looking for other ways to put pressure on Putin and his military.
This week drones destroyed a supersonic bomber jet at an airbase deep inside Russia and twice stopped flights in and out of Moscow, though Ukraine has not directly claimed responsibility for these operations. A Russian helicopter also recently landed in Ukraine, after the pilot was lured to defect.
Russian attacks continued across Ukraine, which was on high alert. At least 10 people were wounded in a missile strike on Dnipro, an important river port, with three hospitalised. Shelling in Kherson city injured a seven-year-old girl, officials said.
To mark independence day, Zelenskiy addressed a small audience in the square outside St Sophia’s cathedral. He also released a video filmed in front of a new mural of a captured soldier whose defiant death made him famous.
In an exchange caught on video and later released online, Oleksandr Matsievsky shouted “Glory to Ukraine” – a popular patriotic slogan – at the Russian soldiers holding him prisoner last year. They immediately gunned him down in response.
Zelenskiy described Ukraine’s resistance, and its successes against Russia as a collective effort to protect Ukrainian territory and its national identity.
“In a big war there are no small deeds, no unnecessary ones,” he said in a 12-minute video that thanked those who had died for Ukraine and their families, those injured in the line of duty, those taken prisoner and those still on the frontline.
He also paid tribute to everyone from farmers and medics to electrical engineers, musicians and sports stars. He included the millions of refugees who have fled the war, thanking refugee families still teaching their children Ukrainian and passing on their Ukrainian identity.
A clip of Matsievsky’s courageous last words ended Zelenskiy’s message: “We have all made it that when one person says ‘glory to Ukraine’, the whole world responds ‘glory to the heroes’.”
Zelensky addresses Ukraine during Independence Day
Speeches of Zelensky and Presidents of Allied Nations during ceremony
transcript of President Zelenskyy’s speech
Ukraine celebrates independence day with first raid into Crimea
Troops landed in western tip of territory and raised Ukrainian flag before returning home safely/ The Guardian
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Ukrainian
24 серпня 2023 р. Нездоланна людська воля до свободи: День Незалежності України в тіні війни
Слава Україні!
Тут, у Києві, жити — перемагати; Непереможені перед обличчям жахів і безжального жорстокого завоювання ворогом, який не вважає нас людьми та веде кампанію терору, геноциду та знищення цілого народу.
У цей день ми святкуємо незалежність України від Росії, а також свободу та незалежність усього людства та солідарність усіх, хто разом протистоять гнобленню.
Славна непокора та єдність цілей України нагадали нам усім про велику правду; про ненадійну, ефемерну, швидкоплинну та крихку природу нашого існування як нав’язаних умов боротьби за те, щоб разом стати людьми.
Ми стали прекаріатом усього людства під загрозою ядерного знищення, і оскільки цей театр Третьої світової війни загрожує охопити всю Європу війною повного знищення та цивілізаційного колапсу, кожен, хто вважав себе безпечним, повинен переглянути людський стан і що це означає, адже тільки солідарність міжнародної спільноти та народів як об’єднаного людства, вільного суспільства рівних і наших універсальних прав людини може протистояти темряві глобального Четвертого Рейху, який загрожує пожерти та поневолити нас.
Щоб отримати бачення нашого майбутнього та нашого світу, якщо наша солідарність і обов’язок піклуватися про інших підведуть нас, нам потрібно лише подивитися на Маріуполь.
Процитувати рядки Вінстона Черчилля у чудовому фільмі «Найтемніша година», які історична особа ніколи не вимовляла; «Не можна міркувати з тигром, коли твоя голова в його пащі».
3 червня 2022 Сто днів вторгнення в Україну
Вже сто днів в Україні точиться велика боротьба між демократією і тиранією, любов’ю і ненавистю, надією і страхом, де доля людства висить на волосині і у великій грі обираються наші майбутні можливості стати людьми. випадково це війна.
Тут, як і в надто багато разів і місцях, кілька непереможних героїв і ті, хто солідарно стоять з ними, як група братів, проти темряви варварських атавізмів грубого страху і сили та нігілістичного режиму, в якому тільки влада має сенс і страх. є єдиним засобом обміну, помирають у занедбаній надії купити своїм життям час, щоб цивілізація прокинулася перед загрозою фашистської тиранії та імперського завоювання.
Як ми відповімо на випробування нашої людяності в цей момент екзистенційної загрози? Ким ми хочемо стати, ми людьми? Вільне суспільство рівних чи світ панів і рабів?
Бо це ставки цієї гри, в яку ми зараз граємо, Третьої світової війни; свобода чи тиранія.
Коли ті, хто хоче нас поневолити, приходять за нами, як вони завжди роблять, нехай знайдуть не народ, підкорений вченою безпорадністю, чи розділений ієрархією приналежності та виключаючого інобуття, а об’єднане Людство, непереможне солідарністю і відмовою підкорятися.
Тиранії та фашизму може бути лише одна відповідь; Ніколи знову!
Ось моє свідчення історії та правди в цій першій загальній історії Третьої світової війни. Як і все людське, це також вигадка, за винятком тих випадків, коли це не так, міф, коли це може бути, поетичне бачення і переосмислення і трансформація людського буття, сенсу і цінності та наших безмежних майбутніх можливостей стати людьми.
Хіба ми не ті історії, які розповідаємо про себе, собі та іншим?
Завжди залишається боротьба між масками, які ми робимо для себе, і тими, які роблять для нас інші.
Це перша революція, в якій ми всі повинні боротися; боротьба за володіння собою.
Тут я прошу вибачення за мій відступний ars poetica; одного разу я плив по Озеру Мрій, мене залицяла Краса, але на мене заволоділа Бачення; і в таких видіннях я потрапив у море слів, образів, пісень, історій, шаруватих і взаємопов’язаних один з одним, як мережа відблисків і відлуння втрачених у часі голосів, пустелі дзеркал, які захоплюють, спотворюють і розширюють нас безмежно. у всіх напрямках.
Ось тінь наших історій, яку ми тягнемо за собою, як невидиму рептилійну казку, спадщини, з яких ми повинні вийти, щоб створити себе заново, і ті, які ми не можемо покинути, не втративши того, хто ми є.
Тут проявляються мої інтертексти, захоплюють і стрясають мене бурхливими голосами і ненадійними цілями, бо де закінчуються наші історії і де ми починаємо?
Ми не можемо втекти один від одного, мої тіні і я.
Війна перетворює питання нашого авторства над самими собою на екзистенційну першість; де закінчуються ми самі, а інші починаються? Як ми можемо подолати цю межу Забороненого та зв’язатися з чужорідними сферами людського буття, значення та цінності, з поділом та ієрархією приналежності та виключаючої іншості чи із солідарністю, різноманітністю та включенням, зі страхом чи з любов’ю?
Зрештою, важливо лише те, що ми робимо зі своїм страхом і як використовуємо свою силу.
Немає ні українців, ні росіян; тільки такі люди, як ми самі, і їхній вибір щодо того, як бути разом людьми.
Torch of Liberty 
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