I think it is important to shed light on the debate in #Italy about the #UkraineWar so that #EU, #UK and #US audiences realize that, while the Italian government is aligned with its allies, false or misleading narratives are still prevalent in the Italian public debate. Thread 👇
1) Since before the invasion and even after that, Italy's main TV networks have regularly hosted 'geopolitics' experts and other public figures who have argued the following:
2) The #US and/or #NATO share the responsibility for the war, which Putin would've been forced to wage because of the aggressiveness of NATO/EU's expansion plans
3) The underlying argument is that #Russia has structural interests threatened by US/EU. You'll find no elaboration about the fact that such "interests" are in fact a claim to a zone of influence, by way of elite co-optation, intimidation and military force, over neighbors
4) #Ukraine's agency is almost never taken in consideration. Ukraine is discursively construed as a passive object of US-Russia competition
5) Unsurprisingly, their suggestion to Ukraine is that it should surrender to Russia's military superiority to avoid further casualties, and that the US/EU should negotiate with Putin now
6) The war goes to the advantage of a US intent on making Europe even more dependent
7) The war has shown that the EU is divided and ultimately pointless precisely because it's too dependent on the US, the real 'victor' of the war
8) Not all 'experts' or public figures who show understanding to Russia would agree with all the above points, but the problem here is that, in a nutshell, this is what TV watchers in Italy are constantly fed
9) To be fair, you almost always have the opposite side represented in TV as well, but the empirical accuracy of the 'Russia-understanding' experts is never questioned. So viewers at home are left with the impression that it is a debate between equally valid opinions
10) I have no idea to what extent these arguments are influencing Italian perceptions of the war, but the people who support all or most of the points above do carry traction
11) They include the group of 'geopolitical' experts who used to write or still write for Italy's main monthly of geopolitics, Limes, including its editor Lucio Caracciolo, former contributor Dario Fabbri and regular contributor Germano Dottori
12) There are also a number of other public figures who, while not experts in International Relations, still command authority because of their intellectual and/or political background
13) These include former politician and philosopher Massimo Cacciari, philologist Luciano Canfora (who has publicly argued that #Zelensky came to power thanks to a coup), firebrand journalist Michele Santoro, former 5 Star MP Alessandro Di Battista
14) Other academics, such as Alessandro Orsini from the LUISS University, are also pretty outspoken in making the case that NATO and the EU are 'politically' responsible for the war, and that Ukraine should surrender to avoid the worst
15) Obviously these people are fully entitled to their opinions and it would be surely a mischaracterization to attribute all the points above to every and each of them.
16) Still it is important that foreign audiences are aware that the debate in Italy is anything but settled against Putin. No-one defends the war but many, including publicly, are unwilling to consider the imperialist ideology with which its regime is imbued as a factor
Correction: someone has rightly noticed that philologist Canfora did not say that Zelensky came to power thanks to a coup but after a coup (presumably Yanukovich’s flight after demonstrators were shot at in late Feb 2024). I wrote in too much haste and apologize for the mistake
• • •
Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to
force a refresh
