To the editor:

Twenty-three years ago, as a 10-year-old little girl growing up just a quick drive from NYC, I saw what no child should ever see. The sky on the horizon was a vast deluge of black smoke. I could smell the burning in the air. I can recall everything that happened to me the first 72 hours of that day. And over 20 years later, I can say the same thing about 02/24/22. Having this dark history as a part of my life, both in my past and present, I understand that the precedents we set as a country today will determine whether our sons and daughters will go to war in the future. Therefore, I persist in my communications with the public, to raise support and awareness, to pressure our politicians to do the right thing now, to arm Ukraine, so they can defeat the enemy, so we can prevent the further loss of precious human life.

The events of that day are central to the global upheaval now underway. In the wake of terror, our country’s leaders set out to establish a precedent, that the U.S. would not tolerate an attack on US soil. For our national security, we needed to respond. But along the way, we trusted but did not verify, and we set many weak and dangerous precedents which only emboldened our enemies. We went soft on Russia. We turned out back on our allies. We let nations fall to enemies. These precedents continued for years, in spite of the good work of our countrymen who fought global terror to protect the homeland. Now, we are left with a decision to make: Do we let our past mistakes define our future decisions?

On Feb 23, 2022, the night before the invasion of Ukraine, Russian President Vladimir Putin gave a harrowing speech which contained a litany of innuendos against the United States. He stuck his finger in the healing wounds of our recent past, blaming the Iraq War on so-called “U.S. imperialism,” and continues to spew his revisionist history via pseudo-journalists such as Tucker Carlson who resides in Southwest Florida, by the way. Let’s make no mistake here, it is Vladimir Putin who is the imperialist colonizer, who’s maniacal fanaticism for taking land just to take land, to redraw a different map of world, and in doing so is destroying our planet.

On the contrary, from what I know, and who I know, it is those men and women who fought for our freedom in the global war on terror, as well as previous foreign wars, who understand the risk more than anyone, should we let Putin get away with it.

We need people to understand basic math.

The American politicians who slow rolled weapons to Ukraine have left hundreds of thousands of soldiers and civilians defenseless and we are culpable. Those politicians and libertarians who say no to war tend to be the ones who never fought for anything besides the popularity contest and can’t even think for themselves when they got dollars flashing in there faces. It is they who say “we don’t want war” who are the ones who are promising war to our children.

As an American, I feel a very heavy burden. I feel that our country has blood on our hands. And I won’t let today’s politicians get away with it.

Never have our country been so weak with politicians such as Congressman Byron Donalds who, at every turn, will make up a new excuse to prevent military aid to Ukraine.

It was only a year ago at his town hall meeting in Bonita Springs where Rep. Donalds stated “do I just want to send bags of money to Ukraine with no accountability? No. I don’t. I don’t know why this is so hard and it’s become so political but it just makes no sense especially because, um ,during the fall of Afghanistan I went back and read the Inspector General’s classified report on Afghanistan and the way that we’re spending money in Afghanistan was insane. If you did it here in the United States you will be indicted and thrown up jail for fraud; that’s the truth.”

But all the while, as Congressman Byron Donalds took the moral grounds of accountability, recent revelations find that he himself violated the federal laws of our country as he failed to properly disclose up to $1.6 million in stock trades.

Congressman Byron Donalds does not live by the principles he so claims, meanwhile his policy agenda betrays U.S. national security interests–why should we listen to Byron Donalds on national security matters and accountability, if he cannot even be held accountable?

Rep. Donalds has proven to be unworthy to be entrusted as a member of Oversight Committee, let alone a member of Congress.

Meanwhile. I’m pretty sure the people who don’t want war are my friends and I, who want to send Ukraine the defense equipment it needs to stop Russia once and for all.

Our country must designate Russia as a state sponsor of terrorism. And our country must oust corrupt politicians such as Congressman Byron Donalds, who makes me ashamed to know that he was also a New Yorker who witnessed 9/11, and yet still absconds his duty to our country by choosing to ignore the threat our enemies pose.

Byron Donalds is a national security threat to our nation. Right now, I call on our public to urge Southwest Florida Congressman Byron Donalds to immediately resign.

To learn more, please watch my film on Ukraine, titled “LVIV FREE OR DIE,” (https://youtu.be/HB6xoa3SsBc?si=5jiV9-YwCpWGYe9Z) where I give my first-hand glimpse into life during war, and I call on Congress to abandon its neutral stance on Russia. I and many of my friends will be traveling to D.C. later this month, to speak to Congress directly about my requests.

Alexandra Zakhvatayev

Cape Coral