Chelsea Manning's Senate Opponent Thinks European Socialists and Environmentalists are "Russian Useful Idiots" -EXCLUSIVE

Ben Cardin, the Maryland Senator who Chelsea Manning will be challenging in this spring’s primary, has already received attention - and notoriety – among the left for his alleged authorship of a bill that would make Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) a felony in America. What has gained less attention, but is arguably more disturbing, are Cardin’s attacks on European socialists, ecologists, and internet freedom and his attempt to tie support for leftist leaders such as Corbyn to a supposed Russian plot to interfere in Western democracies.

On January 10, a 200-page minority report titled “Putin’s Asymmetric Assault on Democracy in Russia and Europe: Implications for U.S. National Security,” purportedly authored by Cardin and Democrats on the Committee on Foreign Relations, was introduced at an event held by the German Marshall Fund (GMFUS) in Washington, DC. The talk by Cardin is part of a broader project by the GMFUS’s Alliance for Securing Democracy, a group fronted by neoconservative intellectual Bill Kristol.

The report Cardin introduced echoes many themes that have permeated the works of Kristol as well as his father, Irving Kristol. Like his bill on BDS, which has been traced to AIPAC, America’s self-declared “pro-Israel lobby,” Cardin’s Russia Report bears the mark of neoconservative and neoliberal think tanks.

Several major topics dominate Cardin’s report, including the background of Vladimir Putin, United Russia’s ties to right-wing populists in Europe, the decline of democracy in Eastern Europe, a somewhat bizarre segment on Putin’s alleged backing of organized crime in Western Europe, and a long section on RT (Russia Today) reminiscent of the DNI report released last year that attacked Abby Martin’s Breaking The Set, as well as the channel’s focus on Wall Street greed and Standing Rock anti-pipeline protests.

Significantly, however, large sections of Cardin’s report are devoted to painting European United Left/Nordic Green Left (EULNGL) political parties, including Die Linke, SYRIZA, Podemos, and the French Communist Party (PCF), as well as the British “far left wing” as tools of the Kremlin.

In the report’s section on the United Kingdom, it is stated that the “anti-EU and NATO-skeptic positions” of some on the British left are cultivated by and useful to the Russian Government. RT, which has featured left-wing Eurosceptics left outside corporate media sources, such as George Galloway and Tariq Ali, is portrayed as a sinister operation employed by Putin to sway the Brexit vote.

Meanwhile, it is claimed without evidence that “far-left and Communist parties in France have been sympathetic to the Russian government, based on skepticism toward Europe and a shared penchant for statism.” The implication is that the left, a vital political force in France since the revolution of 1789 and a key component of the resistance against Nazi occupation, is merely a collection of “useful idiots” for Putin.

Die Linke are attacked as “Russian sympathizers” for providing humanitarian relief in the Ukrainian civil war, while SYRIZA and Podemos are also hit for allegedly providing support to the Kremlin. The denunciation of virtually all European left-wing forces is also preceded by a paragraph detailing Russia’s supposed manipulation of “environmentalists, civil rights activists, and minorities” as well as those who oppose trade deals.

Cardin wraps up the report by suggesting ways the Trump administration and NATO can combat the forces of “disinformation.” Again echoing GMFUS and Alliance for Securing Democracy efforts, the report says social media companies should remove social media accounts used to promote “false news stories,” the US should build a “cyber coalition” among NATO powers, and fund “disinformation efforts” and “democratic institutions” in European countries. American energy exports to European countries, including shale gas and oil, are also suggested as tools to combat “Russian aggression.”

Since publishing the report, Cardin has been defended as a “genuine progressive” by centrist Democrats and neoliberals, who have attacked Manning by declaring her a tool of Putin. It is clear based on where he shoots his arrows, however, that Cardin is nothing but contemptuous for the international left, environmentalists, and perhaps most of all, the right to free expression online.