The Situation in the Ukraine. #3

As Sa'iqa wrote:Today huge pro-Ukrainian protests were held in Donetsk and Kramatorsk. Seems that even there support for Donetsk Republic (or whatever is it's name) is not universal.

You should look at the faces of those bored 15-17 year old schoolkids (demonstration happened during school-time - funny that); then maybe you'll get the picture

Also how many people in the crowd shouted 'glory to the heroes'; no more than about 30 out of 300 - 300 people being about the max. that there were in that meeting in Lugansk or Donetsk or whereever it was.

Hannibal Barca wrote:Please Al_Saiga consider that we are only restricted to one negative vote per day and restrain yourself from posting a lot of such posts daily which will make it hard for us to downvote you accordingly.

I don't deserve all the negative rep given to me just because I disagree with the opinions of the majority of people here.  

As Sa'iqa wrote:

Hannibal Barca wrote:Please Al_Saiga consider that we are only restricted to one negative vote per day and restrain yourself from posting a lot of such posts daily which will make it hard for us to downvote you accordingly.

I don't deserve all the negative rep given to me just because I disagree with the opinions of the majority of people here.  

It's called democracy. Deal with it   

Hannibal Barca wrote:I believe it is pretty clear what Putin is doing.  Russia can do whatever she likes in Ukraine but if she acts immediately taking half Ukraine will be more difficult to grab the Western Ukraine in a couple of years. On the other hand if she grabs all Ukraine immediately will be confronted with a huge unrest and dissatisfaction and a widespread panic among neighboring countries who will fear Russias power.

He practically keeps the tensions high while waiting the situation in Western Ukraine to mature slowly but surely. Then he will have enough excuses to react decisively engulfing all Ukraine. To give it with an example, if USA was not so impatient with Vietnam to step in during the 60s now Vietnam would have been capitalist, equally all Korea would had been capitalist once became evident that communism is failing but by creating high tensions with the civil war North Koreans resisted long enough for China to emerge and Russia to recover.

The plan, to me, is simple. Why to take half Ukraine now when you can take whole a little later.

I disagree here. Russia is interested, that in Custom Union comes only southeastern part of Ukraine, because they don't want to have perpetual unrests and revolutions sponsored by the West in western parts. For now, they will be OK with cooperating with southeastern federal parts of Ukraine without fear the West will step in the middle. But if the West repeat with this activity again, eastern federal parts could become independent state. Federal Ukraine is good solution to ensure neutral Ukraine, which could equally cooperate with East and West. Ukraine have two equal halfs, southeastern regions and westerncentral regions, which all have same rights. Both halfs have the right to cooperate with whomever they want and to have their own government. Federal government should care for monetary, foreign and defense politics.

flamming_python wrote:

macedonian wrote:I can't help but feeling that Russia either:
-Has lost this round; or
-Is playing a losers role on purpose...

But who knows what they have in mind, or what they've been (possibly) threatened with.

I'm feeling a bit angry by this whole situation and the cemented hypocrisy by 'The West'.
F' 'em!

It's not the Crimea, Russia is not playing a hand in this latest episode, or not much one - as it has been saying all along.

So what did it lose?   

It escaped sanctions, and that's good

The agreement is non-enforceable, so it will fail anyway, but now Russia has legitimized its position.

Don't be naive FP.
If anything should happen the west will only blame Russia. Doesn't matter what Russia did or didn't do. You know that by now I should think.
I've said this a hundred times before: "These people NEVER quit". They never give up. Not unless they are met with the only thing that they understand: Brute force. But, perhaps the time is not right for that at the moment. They have a check-box agenda, and they check each box after completion. If not now, perhaps next year, or the year after that...but they'll keep pushing their agenda. Ukraine is a great example of that. After one 'Orange revolution' - they've cooked up another one further down the line...perhaps they didn't anticipate the Crimea move, but perhaps they did.

As for Crimea itself - it's certainly a gem, but not the only important thing in the whole scenario.
If Russia alienates its own people in the South and in the East, it's going to be pretty tough to win them back...it could be done...eventually...but with a great deal of effort. Not to mention that after a long sleep they suddenly chose to awake, and Russia not being there for them and backing them up IN FULL at this point will make them even more (if that's possible) apathetic when the next opportunity arises.
Things are not as clear cut as they seem. I only hope that the heads at the Kremlin making the analysis and the decisions are far, far smarter than mine.

First rule is one can never trust the "West" - they lied to Gorbachev about NATO expansion, a fact that Brzezinski openly supported in private conversations with Russian officials. The hugged Gaddafi a few years before killing him. America is essentially the continuation of the British Empire (if you want to understand history that they don't teach in school please Google the flag of the British East India Company circa 1707). No people have been more blood thirsty in history that the Anglo-Americans (90% of all countries on earth have been invaded at some time by them). They couple their innate desire to dominate with a grotesque sense of self-delusional moral superiority. They have not changed. Within recent history they invaded and killed hundreds of thousands in Iraq under lies and are today supporting terrorists killing and orphaning thousands in Syria. The only reason they want a "reset" in Ukraine is because they have been taken back by the strength of the protests in eastern Ukraine and the ineffectiveness of the Ukrainian military response. They need to buy time so build their structures in Ukraine to effectively neutralize this threat. They have not accepted Crimean annexation (nor will they). Their ultimate goal is and always has been the removal of Russia as a geopolitical obstacle. The Putin experience has firmly convinced them that this means Russia even in its post-Soviet weakened state is still too powerful and controls too many resources. It must be dismembered. Brzezinski constantly supports the ideas of micro-states (under the rubric of dignity) except of course when it applies to pro-Russian areas ! For Russia to survive as an independent state it must formulate an appealing strong ideology that counters the neoliberalism of the "west" and it must dramatically change its demographic situation through extreme measures. Having a birthrate of 1.7 as opposed to 1.2 will not do it.

calripson wrote:First rule is one can never trust the "West" - they lied to Gorbachev about NATO expansion, a fact that Brzezinski openly supported in private conversations with Russian officials. The hugged Gaddafi a few years before killing him. America is essentially the continuation of the British Empire (if you want to understand history that they don't teach in school please Google the flag of the British East India Company circa 1707). No people have been more blood thirsty in history that the Anglo-Americans (90% of all countries on earth have been invaded at some time by them). They couple their innate desire to dominate with a grotesque sense of self-delusional moral superiority. They have not changed. Within recent history they invaded and killed hundreds of thousands in Iraq under lies and are today supporting terrorists killing and orphaning thousands in Syria. The only reason they want a "reset" in Ukraine is because they have been taken back by the strength of the protests in eastern Ukraine and the ineffectiveness of the Ukrainian military response. They need to buy time so build their structures in Ukraine to effectively neutralize this threat. They have not accepted Crimean annexation (nor will they). Their ultimate goal is and always has been the removal of Russia as a geopolitical obstacle. The Putin experience has firmly convinced them that this means Russia even in its post-Soviet weakened state is still too powerful and controls too many resources. It must be dismembered. Brzezinski constantly supports the ideas of micro-states (under the rubric of dignity) except of course when it applies to pro-Russian areas ! For Russia to survive as an independent state it must formulate an appealing strong ideology that counters the neoliberalism of the "west" and it must dramatically change its demographic situation through extreme measures. Having a birthrate of 1.7 as opposed to 1.2 will not do it.

What a load of bullshit....haha and then they said it was the west that has propaganda.

Flyingdutchman wrote:What a load of bullshit....haha and then they said it was the west that has propaganda.

When?
And which part of his post do you disagree with?
And which part of it is 'propaganda'?

Flyingdutchman wrote:
What a load of bullshit....haha and then they said it was the west that has propaganda.

Yeah, seems a few people here have some trouble understanding that America is a country like any other.

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"Russian Federation strongly demands the release of " people's governor of the Donetsk region " Paul Gubaryov . This was stated by Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov at a press conference following the four-party talks ( Russia , Ukraine, USA , EU) in Geneva on the situation in Ukraine UNN with reference to the press service of the Foreign Ministry."

Excellent news   

i can agree with macedonian ,whatever happens it will be russias fault automatically ,remember yanukovic agreement ,rebbels broke it the very next day   
many people in the east will feel betrayed ,and will never stand up again.
seems russians lost this one... 

etaepsilonk wrote:

Flyingdutchman wrote:
What a load of bullshit....haha and then they said it was the west that has propaganda.

Yeah, seems a few people here have some trouble understanding that America is a country like any other.

Please do elaborate.

macedonian wrote:

etaepsilonk wrote:

Flyingdutchman wrote:
What a load of bullshit....haha and then they said it was the west that has propaganda.

Yeah, seems a few people here have some trouble understanding that America is a country like any other.

Please do elaborate.

America's foreign policy is not limited or unique to America alone.

Yes, America has done some wrong and hypocritical things, but not because their government is genuinely evil, but because they can get away with it. But guess what, so does China   

macedonian wrote:

Flyingdutchman wrote:What a load of bullshit....haha and then they said it was the west that has propaganda.

When?
And which part of his post do you disagree with?
And which part of it is 'propaganda'?

A long time ago in a discussion about Russia vs nato they said they were surprised about with how much western propaganda western people were raised and i actually disagree with everything in that guys post
, but remember that everyone in the west knows what the americans did in Iraq was for oil but what they did was the right thing they secured the worlds oil.

etaepsilonk wrote:

macedonian wrote:

etaepsilonk wrote:

Flyingdutchman wrote:
What a load of bullshit....haha and then they said it was the west that has propaganda.

Yeah, seems a few people here have some trouble understanding that America is a country like any other.

Please do elaborate.

America's foreign policy is not limited or unique to America alone.

Yes, America has done some wrong and hypocritical things, but not because their government is genuinely evil, but because they can get away with it. But guess what, so does China   

EXACTLY youre the guy that understands this!

Flyingdutchman wrote:

etaepsilonk wrote:

macedonian wrote:

etaepsilonk wrote:

Flyingdutchman wrote:
What a load of bullshit....haha and then they said it was the west that has propaganda.

Yeah, seems a few people here have some trouble understanding that America is a country like any other.

Please do elaborate.

America's foreign policy is not limited or unique to America alone.

Yes, America has done some wrong and hypocritical things, but not because their government is genuinely evil, but because they can get away with it. But guess what, so does China   

EXACTLY youre the guy that understands this!

well,... lets just put it that this EX-Nato soldier fully agrees with Russia on Ukraine. and feel that the U.S needs a good boot up the ass for what they have done over the world. nobody asked them to be the World Police and they have nothing lost here in Europe. and yes, U.S history is based on blood and everywhere they go they leave a bloodbath and smoking ruins.

that said, i do not blame the average american. but their political and millitary system is just insane. they really think they own the world and treat other nations as inferior. like here in Europe there is a severe disconnect between goverment and the people.

and yes, the West's media has heavy propaganda and censorship to keep the regular joe stupid and act as the politicians want to.

etaepsilonk wrote:
America's foreign policy is not limited or unique to America alone.
Yes, America has done some wrong and hypocritical things, but not because their government is genuinely evil, but because they can get away with it. But guess what, so does China

I didn't understand the first part because the second sentence contradicts the first.
If you meant that it's not the first time that a powerful country acts the way the US acts today, I certainly agree with that.
But history has proven it wrong each and every time. One just needs to look at things from a historical perspective and see that what the US does now and did in the past, will be sure to come back and bite. Yes, history has a strange way of repeating itself, and power combined with greed was/is certain to end the rule of the most powerful of empires.
I disagree on the evil part, just because I believe that power corrupts, and greed turns people evil. Same with individuals or governments.

As for the second part - China:
Well, the same could be said here as well. China rose again to be a powerful nation, and it will rise even further to be THE most powerful nation.
The difference between the two is that China has past grievances, as it was not dealt with much respect in the past, and the US doesn't have them, since it is quite a 'young nation' (historically).

----

Flyingdutchman wrote:A long time ago in a discussion about Russia vs nato they said they were surprised about with how much western propaganda western people were raised and i actually disagree with everything in that guys post
, but remember that everyone in the west knows what the americans did in Iraq was for oil but what they did was the right thing they secured the worlds oil.

Propaganda exists on both sides. It's more blatant on the western side now, but it used to be the forte of the 'other side' (USSR) before.
The problem with propaganda is that many people see through it, no matter where it comes from. Especially today when you have virtually billions of sources to get your information from on the internet. And to a certain extent, I agree that western people have been raised with more propaganda in the past 20 years. Not because I want to believe that, but because I've lived in the West, and have seen it first hand. There are many people in the west today who see through that propaganda and censorship, and it makes them genuinely angry because of the fact that they're being fed lies.

For the people that were saying VICE is real truthful media ,they finally show their real colors.. in his last Ukrainian report..
VICE claims to have the first Evidence of a General of the Russian army participating with a violent protest inside Ukraine ,but
he is an impostor.. and reports quickly later showed to proof that..


http://www.unian.ua/politics/908228-pidpolkovnik-rf-yakiy-keruvav-militsieyu-v-gorlivtsi-viyavivsya-mistsevim-zdirnikom.html


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MTdkY8tl2b0

Told you so.. No media either main stream or internet that youtube do not manipulate its viewcounts ,that is very popular ,call itself independent and that have American Mainstream media connections with the major outlets is truthful. Is just CIA operations media.. with the only goal to mislead people about the real situation of world conflicts.  The fact that VICE reported very little if nothing of the violence of maidan is more than evidence of their fraud..  Example of CIA infiltrated media is.. American (VICE, Realnews, Democracy Now) ,Uk media (the independent) and a few others. Non Western media that is pro nato propaganda include Aljazeera.. Qatar media.
The only one that is usually realiable and independent is Infowars. RT reports also are very objective ,report both side.. even though is Russia media.. same with Presstv. The media YoungTurks.. is quite strange they used to be very biased but lately they are becoming more and more objective that is confusing indeed.

I really don't understand the pessimism from some of the members here, "Russia lost this round?" In what way pray-tell? The fact that business giants varying from technology giant Siemens, to energy giant British Petroleum have stated that sanctions against Russia is totally unacceptable, that's a massive victory right there. The fact that the current Kiev govt. is now considered an enemy of the 2 most militant factions: the pro-Russian forces in the East, and Right Sector in the West, that's a victory in it self. That fact that many Ukrainian soldiers are defecting and refusing orders from Kiev, surrendering and laying down arms is a victory right there. This is a situation that requires a velvet glove (a strategy that's seen lots of success) not a iron fist...if the method is not broken, why fix it?

Vann7 wrote:

For the people that were saying VICE is real truthful media ,they finally show their real colors.. in his last Ukrainian report..
VICE claims to have the first Evidence of a General of the Russian army participating with a violent protest inside Ukraine ,but
he is an impostor.. and reports quickly later showed to proof that..


http://www.unian.ua/politics/908228-pidpolkovnik-rf-yakiy-keruvav-militsieyu-v-gorlivtsi-viyavivsya-mistsevim-zdirnikom.html


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MTdkY8tl2b0

Told you so.. No media either main stream or internet that youtube do not manipulate its viewcounts ,that is very popular ,call itself independent and that have American Mainstream media connections with the major outlets is truthful. Is just CIA operations media.. with the only goal to mislead people about the real situation of world conflicts.  The fact that VICE reported very little if nothing of the violence of maidan is more than evidence of their fraud..  Example of CIA infiltrated media is.. VICE, Realnews, Democracy Now and a few others.
The only one that is usually realliable and independent is Infowars. RT reports also are very objective ,report both side.. even though is Russia media.. same with Presstv.

This is not the first time Vice News has engaged in blatantly inaccurate media coverage, there was this report along time ago about defense deals and the defense industry...suffice to say they came to conclusion that the Chinese were the biggest arms dealers and would sell weapons to terrorists, while in reality the obvious fact is that the U.S. makes way more profits, and spends more on the defense industry than China, and has a history from the Afghan War, to Libya, to Syria, to even Mexico (Operation Gun Walker, Fast and Furious) where the U.S. govt was actively engaging in arms trafficking towards terrorists groups. Funny how Vice conveniently left that out.

magnumcromagnon wrote:I really don't understand the pessimism from some of the members here, "Russia lost this round?" In what way pray-tell? The fact that business giants varying from technology giant Siemens, to energy giant British Petroleum have stated that sanctions against Russia is totally unacceptable, that's a massive victory right there. The fact that the current Kiev govt. is now considered an enemy of the 2 most militant factions: the pro-Russian forces in the East, and Right Sector in the West, that's a victory in it self. That fact that many Ukrainian soldiers are defecting and refusing orders from Kiev, surrendering and laying down arms is a victory right there. This is a situation that requires a velvet glove (a strategy that's seen lots of success) not a iron fist...if the method is not broken, why fix it?

Think of it as a relay race...it doesn't matter who passed the baton in the first/second/third round first, what matters is who won at the end.
Some of the points you raise are valid indeed, but WHAT TRULY MATTERS is that Russia comes on top at the very end.

Like it did in the Olympics!   


Oh, and I never said my opinion is the ultimate truth, I only shared it with you guys here for what it is. It's a forum after all.
Again, I HOPE AND PREY that Russia passes the finish line first at the end.

macedonian wrote:I can't help but feeling that Russia either:
-Has lost this round; or
-Is playing a losers role on purpose...

But who knows what they have in mind, or what they've been (possibly) threatened with.

I'm feeling a bit angry by this whole situation and the cemented hypocrisy by 'The West'.
F' 'em!

What is there to lose?

Russia got Crimea at very little cost.
Eastern Ukraine is a massive complication that I pray Russia makes no attempt to take.

magnumcromagnon wrote:I really don't understand the pessimism from some of the members here, "Russia lost this round?" In what way pray-tell? The fact that business giants varying from technology giant Siemens, to energy giant British Petroleum have stated that sanctions against Russia is totally unacceptable, that's a massive victory right there. The fact that the current Kiev govt. is now considered an enemy of the 2 most militant factions: the pro-Russian forces in the East, and Right Sector in the West, that's a victory in it self. That fact that many Ukrainian soldiers are defecting and refusing orders from Kiev, surrendering and laying down arms is a victory right there. This is a situation that requires a velvet glove (a strategy that's seen lots of success) not a iron fist...if the method is not broken, why fix it?

Yup Lavrov used a tried and time-tested tactic of diplomacy - he called the other side out on its accusations, i.e. as Russia is not responsible anyway - why hide anything?
Indeed as it's known in advance that the West's accusations lack substance and evidence, while Russia likely has little connection with the rebels - Russia in fact gave up pretty much nothing at all, in return for expecting that the West will push Kiev to disarm its own militia groups and Pravyj Sektor, etc...

And of course - Russia knows that they will likely fail to do this, giving the eastern rebels justification to keep existing too.

Russia essentially secured the moral high ground.
The only danger is that Russia will be expected to press on the eastern rebels to disarm - but if it truly isn't controlling them - then its influence in this regard will be limited anyway; the rebels will only disarm if they see that Kiev is ready to give them what they want.

TR1 wrote:

macedonian wrote:I can't help but feeling that Russia either:
-Has lost this round; or
-Is playing a losers role on purpose...

But who knows what they have in mind, or what they've been (possibly) threatened with.

I'm feeling a bit angry by this whole situation and the cemented hypocrisy by 'The West'.
F' 'em!

What is there to lose?

Russia got Crimea at very little cost.
Eastern Ukraine is a massive complication that I pray Russia makes no attempt to take.

What, are you and FP twin brothers or something? You guys ask the very same questions.

NVM, I've answered the same question here.

TR1 wrote:

macedonian wrote:I can't help but feeling that Russia either:
-Has lost this round; or
-Is playing a losers role on purpose...

But who knows what they have in mind, or what they've been (possibly) threatened with.

I'm feeling a bit angry by this whole situation and the cemented hypocrisy by 'The West'.
F' 'em!

What is there to lose?

Russia got Crimea at very little cost.
Eastern Ukraine is a massive complication that I pray Russia makes no attempt to take.

East Ukraine is a very juicy prize and Russia should never abandon it or compromise on it but that doesn't mean that it has to invade the territory itself - that would lead to massive complications as you say.
Far better idea is to either wait for the Ukraine to collapse by itself (but that may produce plenty of complications, violence, etc... too), or to negotiate a looser Ukrainian state, with local cultural/linguistic autonomy - that won't attempt to join NATO or the EU and where the eastern Ukrainian regions can be integrated into the Russian economy.

macedonian wrote:

TR1 wrote:

macedonian wrote:I can't help but feeling that Russia either:
-Has lost this round; or
-Is playing a losers role on purpose...

But who knows what they have in mind, or what they've been (possibly) threatened with.

I'm feeling a bit angry by this whole situation and the cemented hypocrisy by 'The West'.
F' 'em!

What is there to lose?

Russia got Crimea at very little cost.
Eastern Ukraine is a massive complication that I pray Russia makes no attempt to take.

What, are you and FP twin brothers or something? You guys ask the very same questions.

NVM, I've answered the same question here.

Great minds think alike as they say   

But actually despite posing the same question me and TR1 came to it via completely different reasoning if you look at the posts carefully.