After his idiotic speech about Russia and Ukraine, Hans-Hermann Hoppe, far from listening to those better informed than him, instead doubled down on his parroting of Kremlin narratives, repeating the same (at best) ignorance (click only if you can stand the stench of the unequivocally pro-Putin Lew Rockwell Cesspool).
Solid pro-invader start with the title: it’s a war on Ukraine, not in the Ukraine. From the outset Hoppe already shows his disrespect for Ukrainians and denial of Ukraine’s sovereignty (Russia’s, of course, is never questioned), a classic among Putinverstehers1. He continues in the first paragraph by calling Ukrainians “useful idiots” and denying them all agency.
German nationalist Hans-Hermann Hoppe spells Zelenskyy the German way (“Selenskij”, 29 times in the article), as if he’s never read a single article on this topic in English (or in Ukrainian or Russian, for that matter), so let’s use an appropriate German term to describe him: Putinversteher.
German nationalism
German nationalist Hoppe (like in his idiotic speech) is particularly concerned about Germany (“its [US’s] various European vassals and in particular Germany”). Illuminating here is to read for instance the German introduction to his infamous Democracy: The God That Failed:
Das besiegte Deutschland wurde nicht nur besetzt, sondern auch umerzogen. Deutschlands Schulen und Universitaeten, unter nahezu totaler Kontrolle des Staates stehend, und die staatlich lizensierten Massenmedien verkuendeten und verkuenden bis heute die offiziell-offizioese amerikanische Sicht der Geschichte und insbesondere des 20. Jahrhunderts als eines Triumphs des Guten ueber das Boese. Und doch werden nach mehr als fuenfzig Jahren Besatzung und Umerziehung in Deutschland wieder Themen und Sachverhalte oeffentlich eroertert, die nicht oder nur schwerlich in das amerikanische Weltbild passen und darum lange tabuisiert waren (im besiegten Deutschland mehr noch als in den siegreichen USA)
Defeated Germany was not only occupied, but also re-educated. Germany’s schools and universities, below almost total control of the state, and the state-licensed mass media announced and continue to announce the official American view of the world to this day History and especially the 20th century as a triumph of good over the evil. And yet, after more than fifty years of occupation and re-education Germany is again publicly discussing topics and issues that are not or only hardly fit into the American world view and were therefore taboo for a long time (in defeated Germany even more than in the victorious USA)
Add some dog whistles to nazis and Holocaust deniers and remember that Hoppe’s teacher Rothbard literally endorsed the nazis’ excuses for starting World War II (“Hitler was put in the wrong in the eyes of Europe and the world, when he was eminently in the right, and all because the British refused to pursue its goal of rational appeasement quickly and single-mindedly”, “The Cold War, as well as World Wars I and II, has been launched by the Western democracies”) while praising Holocaust deniers for their dedication to “the cause of peace and justice and historical truth”, and that Hoppe’s article is published on a website which publishes Holocaust deniers and articles from Holocaust-denying websites, when not directly promoting articles by neo-nazis.
Hoppe is now walking straight in Rothbard’s disgraceful footsteps: just like Rothbard didn’t directly say he was on Hitler’s side – he was merely blaming World War II on anyone but the fascist genocidal invaders – now we have, for the largest war in Europe since World War II, his successor Hoppe not directly endorsing Putin either, but likewise blaming the invasion of Ukraine on anyone but the fascist genocidal invaders. And just like Rothbard happily embraced Holocaust deniers because acknowledging the Holocaust (and the nazis’ other planned genocides) would have weakened his anti-American, pro-appeasement, pro-nazi narrative, Hoppe today ignores the genocidal actions and intents of the Russian invaders, for the same reasons. Indeed, Hoppe eagerly embraced Rothbard’s grotesque anti-Americanism2 – adding a specifically German nationalist resentment on top of it.
Hoppe laments Germany as US-occupied since World War II3. For him that’s something to cry about apparently (“Growing to Understand Contemporary Germany and Weep”), in particular if it involves Jews (!) and “the so-called Holocaust industry” (another dog whistle):
There are hard indicators of this US domination. The constitution of West Germany and now of all of Germany had to be okayed by the occupying forces. Parties, newspapers, media, schoolbooks required a license by the occupiers. There was an implementation of de-Nazification programs and campaigns, a so-called Charakterwaesche, character wash. There was a promotion of a new orthodox history. Victors always write the history.
And this retraining and re-education, de-Nazification, etc. was developed and supervised very often by imported or re-imported Germany emigrees [sic], mostly Jewish, and the introduction of the field of political science that did not exist before; it is a typical American discipline that did not exist previously.
In 1955, that’s the next indicator of American domination, Germany became a NATO member under US leadership, of course. And thus, Germany became enlisted and involved in the Cold War. Beginning also at that time was the European integration, which ended ultimately with the EU and the European Central Bank, with the purpose to control and weaken the defeated Germany as a potential rival economic power.
The promotion of the so-called Holocaust industry and of the uniquely German guilt complex was to cement Germany’s position as eternal paymasters and with any, even the slightest criticism of the official narrative, you would be punished by prison sentences, up to this day. There are plenty of Germans for telling slightly deviating stories to sit in prison.
Notice also that Hoppe’s lamenting of the much needed education about the Holocaust and denazification of a country whose regime had just murdered 6 million Jews (and caused dozens of millions dead overall through their invasions) doesn’t stop Lew Rockwell, on the very same website, from endorsing Putin’s imaginary “denazification” of a country with a Jewish president and the lowest antisemitism in Europe, used, ironically, by a fascist regime as a preposterous pretext for a genocidal invasion, against protests of Jewish Ukrainians, and executed in part by russian-government funded terrorist organizations such as nazi-inspired Wagner, neo-nazi Rusich, etc.
While lamenting the “occupation” of Germany, the prospect of an actual, genocidal, Russian occupation of Ukraine, conversely, does not seem to preoccupy German nationalist Hoppe at all4.
Surrendering to evil
Rapes, castrations, deportations, genocide? Nothing to worry about, Ukrainians: It’s merely a different gang ruling over you! Hoppe has absolutely no awareness of what has been going on – or willingly denies reality when it doesn’t fit his preferred bothsidesist narrative:
Anti-American obsession and paranoia about a hypothetical US “hegemony and world domination” make Hoppe downplay Russia as merely “one of only two major stumbling blocks remaining on the way toward global hegemony”, instead of recognizing it as a regime much, much worse than Ukraine or the US, and a threat not only for other gangs but for everyone. This is also similar to Kremlin propaganda about a “multipolar world order”, as if somehow Russian concentration camps would contribute anything to keeping the wrongs of the US government in check5.
And too bad for those born under these regimes – Hoppe won’t even grant them the possibility to choose the oh-so-terrible oppression of the USA or Germany instead.
Not one word, not one single word in Hoppe’s long article/speech about the atrocities of Russian occupation. Atrocious bothsidesism, to put it politely, or maybe spoiled Westerner who thinks the summum of oppression is reached when his taxes go up by a few bucks, German children are taught about the Holocaust, or his government is too “woke” or something. And for the life of him just can’t imagine anything worse than that:
it is difficult to imagine how matters could possibly get worse under foreign rule. An invasion may even bring some benefits or improvements. Who knows?
Hoppe, who was sooo offended by Nazi Germany being occupied by the US, now proclaims he couldn’t care less if liberal democratic Germany were invaded and occupied by someone else.
In Hoppe’s simplistic, childish fantasy world, war bad, but all forms of “peace” are morally equivalent, including genocidal occupation:
With local or regional decision-making, many places in these regions would have peacefully surrendered to Putin’s gang, and thus been spared the ravages of war, rather than being defended by Selenskij [sic] and his gang. One gang-rule would have been replaced by another.
Business as usual cynicism:
the best of outcomes a Ukrainian libertarian could hope for is a widespread public call for peace and a return to normal, to business as usual.
Hoppe even dares ask:
So why not go with Russia?
Maybe he should ask the slaughtered civilians of Bucha, Izyum, etc...
Still others may have fought the invading Putin gang with other weapons and by different means (e.g. peaceful resistance).
Even Rothbard was not that stupid.
Is the Mises Institute’s motto still “Do not give in to evil, but proceed ever more boldly against it”?
Neutrality for thee but not for me
We must take sides. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented.
– Elie Wiesel6
In previous articles, Hoppe has argued that states should stay “neutral” if they don’t want to be invaded by other states: The myth of neutrality.
And yet Liberland was invaded last month: who did they “provoke”? Were they not strictly neutral? Finland, conversely, is doing fine after joining NATO: no Russian invasion.
Hoppe’s description of the reasons and events leading to the 2022 full-scale invasion (he doesn’t even mention the 2014 invasion) is pure fantasy – ignorance at best, deliberate Kremlin support at worst. Hoppe writes “the Selenskij [sic] gang has successfully externalized a significant part of the cost of its war”: its war, as if Zelenskyy had any responsibility whatsoever for Russia’s invasions of 2014 and 2022 – planned by Soviet Union nostalgic Putin since at least 2003.
Ukraine (“The Selenskiy [sic] gang”), in particular, is blamed for being invaded for having committed some unspecified “provocations”. Hoppe doesn’t even bother to offer a theory of what constitutes a “provocation” justifying aggression (perhaps because such a theory would be too obviously anti-libertarian?), basically leaving it up to Putin’s whims to decide what is and what isn’t one and thus justifying whatever war of conquest Russia decides to initiate. (The real root “provocation” for Putin is of course the mere existence of an independent, not-Russia-occupied-anymore Ukraine, a non-Russia which Putin considers as an “anti-Russia”.)
And if states are all merely equally bad gangs, why should Russia have a right to a neutral Ukraine next to it, but not Ukraine or Poland a right to a neutral Belarus or Russia? “Neutrality” here means simply “remaining defenseless so that Russia can invade you whenever Russia decides to”. For Hoppe everyone is supposed to be neutral – except Russia, of course (“And this vision, I venture to say, should be that of a neutral Ukraine (or Poland), i.e., of an Eastern European Switzerland, independent, outside of both NATO and the EU, and yet wealthier than any and all of its neighbors.”).
Where is the call for a neutral Russia that would have nothing to fear from NATO? Why is Hoppe not touring Russia asking them to surrender? Why should Russia not be the one refraining from “provoking” anyone? The implication is accepting Kremlin propaganda on all counts: that Russia would never invade anyone (the Kremlin: “Russia has never attacked anyone throughout its history”), and accepting Kremlin propaganda that the USA, conversely, would invade Russia for no reason. This is even worse than bothsidesism or neutrality: Hoppe doesn’t offer any general, consistent, theory of neutral states, he simply supports the imperialist expansion of the Russian side: by asking Russia’s victims (countries previously occupied by Russia) to be disunited against Russia’s invasions, to submit to every Russian demand, and to immediately surrender whenever Russia invades them7.
Hoppe also claims libertarians should stay “neutral”:
As a libertarian living and locked up in Selenskij-gang [sic] land, then, and faced with an invading Putin gang that has in store for you another collective security deal, you try to stay equidistant from both parties, you avoid provoking either side and you listen and are always open to talks with both sides.
Once again, Hoppe’s ignorance (at best) completely sidesteps the genocidal intents and actions of the Russian invaders.
Hoppe himself, of course, is not neutral here (and not libertarian, either): by asking only one side to surrender, by putting the blame on the victim and not the aggressor, and by taking the genocidal invader’s side by pushing their narrative – just like Rothbard pushed Hitler’s, Stalin’s, etc.
He [a Ukrainian libertarian] should draw inspiration from and align himself to voices that call for immediate peace-talks with the Putin-gang (and in particular also with Putin himself) .. he should seriously consider even the possibility of regional surrender as a viable path to peace. There may be regions whose inhabitants do not care whether they are ruled by the Putin or the Selenskij [sic] gang, or who even prefer the Putin gang, and who are willing to peacefully surrender in order to be spared the ravages of war. Why not? Must we wage war against such people, as traitors or Russian collaborators? As a libertarian, I fail to see why.
Of course.
Warmongering and support for conquest
the greatest harm done to the Ukrainian people, in terms of death and destruction, is the result of the all-inclusive support coming from the US-American gang, the world’s most powerful gang of all. Without this support, the Selenskij gang and the rival neighboring Putin gang would have long ago reached an armistice or come to some compromise-peace, which could have saved many lives and much real estate.
No, the “support coming from the US-American gang” saves lives every day.
Regarding “armistice”:
“Ceasefire”. A ceasefire, truce, or armistice rarely ends the conflict for good unless both sides are worn out, and mutually agree that neither can win and the war is thus regrettable—a rare phenomenon in military history. More often, ceasefires are mere breathers for one or both sides to frantically resupply and rearm for rounds two, three, four… Ultimately, wars—even those that last decades—end when one side loses and the other wins (often most clearly via ‘unconditional’ surrender), or both suffer such calamitous losses that each believes victory is unachievable and will in the future continue to be so. Unless the antithetical political agendas that lead to war are resolved, then breathers and truces and time-outs eventually ensure lengthy or multiple wars. Victory leading to the loser’s abandonment of political agendas more often leads to lasting peace.
It is no coincidence that Russia has been pushing for a cease-fire through its “peace” stooges, ever since it annexed parts of Ukraine and started losing territory instead of gaining it: to fortify their position, rebuild their forces, and attack again later.
Whether one views some or all states as generally benevolent, necessary actors or as intrinsically criminal “gangs” is in fact entirely irrelevant for a correct assessment of war and peace. Some gangs are still much worse than others, and being occupied by them is tremendously worse. Some gangs are still clearly the aggressors in some conflicts, and fighting them is legitimate, even for rival gangs. Hoppe’s use of the word “gang” (122 occurences in the article) does not, in fact, “[clear] up immediately” any “mental fog and confusion” – it is completely irrelevant to the issue at hand and is nothing but a pseudo-clever distraction appealing but to the most superficial of “libertarians”, while revealing Hoppe’s own “mental fog and confusion”8.
States (“gangs”) have in fact mutually recognized borders, internationally recognized borders, and in particular border treaties – such as the Treaty between Ukraine and the Russian Federation on the Ukrainian-Russian State border, ratified by Putin himself, not to mention the Budapest Memorandum. Putin himself thus recognized Ukraine, including Crimea, as not disputed territory. The borders being clear, peace is generally preserved when states keep their tanks, troops and warplanes on their own side of them9.
Justifying territorial conquest through war is the very definition of “warmonger”. Having Ukraine surrender or cede internationally recognized (and previously Putin-recognized!) Ukrainian territory to Putin would not, in fact, “save many lives”. Besides delivering disarmed Ukrainians to Putin’s armies’ rapes, castrations, tortures, deportations, and massacres, it would strenghten the aggressor, weaken Ukraine, and encourage both Russia and other genocidal dictatorships such as China to start new wars. Hoppe’s view here is pure appeasement, cowardice, and shortsightedness, if not outright siding with evil: absolutely contrary to the libertarian concerns for true, long-term peace, justice, and non-aggression.