For those who have followed our work at RSN for years and Truthout before that you would have become accustomed to our consistent stands against military conflict as a means solve political problems and moreover military conflict in general. Very often those stands put us in direct opposition to U.S. policy, a role we never shied away from.

Our coverage of Russia’s war on Ukraine is the exact type of war we have always opposed. One of imperial aggression, generating massive war crimes against innocent civilians. What we see happening in Ukraine today is precisely the reason war should always be opposed.

The difference now is that we have taken a position in support of arming Ukrainians to defend their land and their people. While that would appear to break the cardinal rule that all use of military force is bad, the circumstances in Ukraine we believe demand it.

The term war crimes tends to lose its meaning when repeated frequently. The question arises, isn’t everything that happens in a war a crime? A certain dulling of the senses can set in. For clarity what is taking place in Ukraine at the hands of Russian invaders are the most serious war crimes committed certainly since the U.S. Carpet Bombing of Cambodia in the late 1960s and early 1970s and arguably since genocidal purges of Adolph Hitler’s Nazi forces during World War II.

Specifically the crimes being committed by Putin’s forces in Ukraine include, mass detention and summary execution of civilians, deliberate targeting of civilian infrastructure with weapons of war, rape as a weapon of war, child abduction and deportation and a plethora of related acts expressly prohibited under international law.

RSN in solidarity with every human rights organization in the world condemns these acts as illegal under international law and something that must be opposed through all lawful means. These are the worst human rights violations our organization has ever covered. We stand opposed.

Our readership has traditionally been comprised largely of Western Progressives. Western Progressives seem uniquely receptive to the Putin regime’s rhetorical assertions. Most notably that the US provoked the Russian invasion of Ukraine. That argument fails on every level and would fail in any fair court on earth. Russia and Russia alone is categorically responsible for the crimes it is committing in Ukraine.

While we certainly feel and have always felt a sense of solidarity with our Progressive readership we cannot, we will not remain silent in the face of massive atrocities against innocent civilians. RSN at its core is a human rights organization, that is our most important mission.

During the course of this conflict RSN has lost the support of some readers and gained the support of others. For those who understand the urgency of this moment and the importance of the stand we are taking in this time of crisis we ask for your support. We will absolutely need it to continue our work.

Marc Ash is the founder and former Executive Director of Truthout, and is now founder and Editor of Reader Supported News.

Reader Supported News is the Publication of Origin for this work. Permission to republish is freely granted with credit and a link back to Reader Supported News.