(Ken Silva, Headline USA) As President Joe Biden compares average MAGA supporters to neo-Nazis at home, his administration is apparently set to arm a literal neo-Nazi unit in Ukraine.
The Washington Post reported Monday that the Biden administration has lifted a ban on arming Ukraine’s infamous Azov Battalion after a review found “no evidence” that it’s involved in human-rights violations.
The Azov Brigade was reportedly founded in 2014 amidst the CIA-backed coup in Ukraine to fight pro-Russia separatists in the Donbas. In 2015, it was absorbed by Ukraine’s National Guard.
U.S. Embassy officials have confirmed that “the 12th Operational Purpose Brigade of the National Guard of Ukraine” (the official name the 12th Special Forces Brigade Azov of the National Guard of Ukraine) has passed the vetting required by U.S. law and is eligible to receive… pic.twitter.com/8grhFzbRvT
— Azov Brigade (@azov_media) June 11, 2024
“The military unit’s founder, Andriy Biletsky, is known for his neo-Nazi and white supremacist rhetoric,” antiwar.com explained in a Tuesday article.
“In 2014, Biletsky was also the leader of an ultra-nationalist organization known as the Social National Assembly (SNA), which dissolved in 2015.”
Headline USA has documented Azov’s ties with U.S. neo-Nazis.
One of the more prominent U.S. neo-Nazis, Blood Tribe leader Christopher Pohlhaus, went as far as briefly planning a compound in Maine to train American extremists to fight for Ukraine against Russia.
However, it’s doubtful whether American neo-Nazis will be keen to fight in Ukraine now that their brothers can receive U.S. arms. But as it became increasingly clear last year that hundreds of thousands of white Ukrainian males have been sent to the slaughter for the benefit of Western war hawks, Pohlhaus abandoned his plans to build a compound and said he and his friends are less zealous in their support for Biden’s proxy war.
“I will still continue to support the struggle of the people there,” Pohlhaus reportedly said on Telegram last November.
“I’m not going to allow our guys, my guys’ efforts and blood to go towards [the war].”
The Guardian reported in January that Pohlhaus’s sentiment is shared by the wider neo-Nazi movement, which is now more focused on Israel and more local issues.
“Within the wider web of neo-Nazi militancy, Ukraine chatter has all but evaporated with the conflict in Gaza and domestic issues outshining what was once a well-followed world event,” the Guardian reported.
“In September, a prominent far-right publication, linked to the disbanded American neo-Nazi terror group Atomwaffen Division, boldly declared that the war not only ‘doesn’t matter anymore to us,’ but it would ‘like to refocus’ on American issues,” the Guardian added.
Ken Silva is a staff writer at Headline USA. Follow him at twitter.com/jd_cashless.
