The Situation in the Ukraine. #13

auslander wrote: "What kind of shell/ military hardware made that big hole in the apt???"

Hard to say. From the looks of it whatever it was did not explode but knocked a fair sized hole in the wall. A lot of the determination of the size of the round would depend on the age and original quality of the wall. It is conceivable that a round as 'small' as 5 cm could to such a hole, but in all probability it was rather lager.

Still and all, the bombardments of patently civilian areas and infrastructure would beg the question of when is Ukraine going to do the first thing to implement the Minsk 2 protocols?

flamming_python wrote:

Those liberators from fascism are protecting the locals, not torturing them

Yes I know, I know, the Amnesty International and HRW reports.

Meanwhile we have dozens of actual videos worth of footage, of unarmed locals resisting the Ukrainian army, locals supporting the militia, militiamen proffessing themselves to be locals and recounting their past lives, all sorts of atrocities and crimes by the Ukrainian side, artillery strikes on innocents with the innocents claiming that the Ukrainians are responsible, torture of prisoners, etc...

I'll believe the line about the militia being Russian invaders, occupiers and unwelcome for the local population, mostly or wholy Russian citizens, torturers, terrorists, etc... when I actually see evidence of it.

Ukraine made it's own bed in regards to its integrity; as did Georgia, various other post-Soviet countries, and indeed the Soviet Union itself did in 1989-1991.
Perhaps if it didn't decide to trample on the millions of votes and voices from the East, didn't violently throw out the elected preisdent who had near unanimous support in the Crimea, didn't start with nationalist hysteria and beatings of Party of Regions and Communist deputies in the Rada, etc... then Crimea might not have elected to secede and Russia wouldn't have decided to intervene.
Perhaps if the Ukrainian government then didn't decide to deal with the protest movement with political repression and arrests, seize control over all the media, use Neo-Nazi hooligans to violently scatter and bully protestors, and perhaps tried to negotiate first with the inevitable civil and then armed uprising that followed.. then the Ukraine wouldn't have lost the Donbass either.

When Gamsakhurdia of Georgia in 1991 or whenever it was - stated to his supporters that 'Ossetia is a lovely country - only w/o the Ossetians'... well - is it supposed to be any surprise today, to us - that Ossetia split away from Georgia?
Should one step in for its territorial integrity too? "It was all the evil Russians, you see"..
The American ambassador to Georgia, after meeting with Gamsakhurdia, promptly relayed to his government his dismay over this man's ideas, and declared him a nut that should not be supported.

Yet here we are with Kiev, in 2015; using the same sort of language, the same sort of tactics - yet now it's supported.
Yet now, it's the victim, and its 'territorial integrity is threatened'
Yet now, it's not fighting against its own people, it's fighting against a Russian invasion.
Bullshit

What will it lose next? Dunno, it's up to them and their decisions really. What I've seen so far gives me no grounds for optimism and I see it as very likely that the Ukrainian government will provoke or restart the war, make more mistakes, and ultimately destroy itself and break apart its own country even further.

etaepsilonk wrote:

KoTeMoRe wrote:

etaepsilonk wrote:IMO, Ukraine's goal is to inflict such casualties upon the enemy that their public will demand peace. Territorial gains are only secondary.

This has to be the most stupid idea ever. So Ukraine a country that is currently a dead corpse in lieu of state, is going to inflict casualties so that would be unbearable to who? The "Republics"? Are  you by any chance a former MP.net member? This "peace through bodycount" narrative, I have already heard, in a MP.net thread over...Viet Nam, Afghanistan etc...

It doesn't work because be it VIet Nam, Afghanistan or even the Republics, don't operate out of a Vacuum. They have backers. In this case it is Russia. Hell will long be frozen before Russia is beaten by Ukraine in an attrition battle.

Then off course, we can also become more logical and see that this is low quality trolling, that amounts to describing the Ukrainian strategy as attempting to produce an humanitarian catastrophe wich falls within some of the guidelines issued by the UN to identify a genocidary action. More to the point, the distinct aiming at civillian utilities in order to disrupt normal course of life with the intention to render unhospitable the area of target is typically forbidden.

Rome Charter. wrote: a) Killing members of the group;
(b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;
(c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;
(d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;
(e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.

So yeah basically European Values.

If ukraine needs to follow the rules of some charters, maybe the beloved russia should too?
Of course, you can't bring back all the innocent people tortured to death by "liberators from fascism", but upholding budapest agreement respecting ukraine's integrity should be a pretty good start.

KoTeMoRe wrote:
Anyway, just to satisfy my curiosity, are you or have you ever been a member of MP.net.

etaepsilonk wrote:

If ukraine needs to follow the rules of some charters, maybe the beloved russia should too?
Of course, you can't bring back all the innocent people tortured to death by "liberators from fascism", but upholding budapest agreement respecting ukraine's integrity should be a pretty good start.

etaepsilonk wrote:And you are correct, ukraine's goal is genocide. Now, I understand that for your prorussian allegiance, it might be difficult to go past all the nazi, bandera, evilness cliches, but try to imagine yourself in the shoes of ukraine leadership. And here you're seeing all of those separatist warlords boasting how they'll drive for kiev. Wouldn't it be a matter of serious concern for maintaining your country's survival, to the point where every possible war strategy may become viable?

etaepsilonk wrote:Or do you think that ukies are actually wishing to do what they've been doing, and not forced by the circumstances?

etaepsilonk wrote:Or do you think that ukies are actually wishing to do what they've been doing, and not forced by the circumstances?

Neutrality wrote:A bit off-topic maybe, "Izvestia" has published an article (sorry, I can't post external links as I'm still considered "new") and the article says that Merkel is apparently planning to meet the Russian opposition leaders on May 10th. They'll ask her to keep the sanctions and strengthen them against certain individuals because it's apparently the only way to change the government.

RIP to the Russian opposition. Putin doesn't have to do anything, they are destroying themselves.

sepheronx wrote:

Neutrality wrote:A bit off-topic maybe, "Izvestia" has published an article (sorry, I can't post external links as I'm still considered "new") and the article says that Merkel is apparently planning to meet the Russian opposition leaders on May 10th. They'll ask her to keep the sanctions and strengthen them against certain individuals because it's apparently the only way to change the government.

RIP to the Russian opposition. Putin doesn't have to do anything, they are destroying themselves.

Depends which opposition members.  So far, the liberal opposition are pretty much insignificant.  Like single digit in terms of popularity.  Fair Russia, Just Russia and Communist parties are quite popular.

Werewolf wrote:
That is treason and a reason for throwing out scum out of the country.

Seriously, It is like Putin comes to germany to meet with Sahra Wagenknecht and to have a speak on who Putin should sanction in Germany, that of course would be counted as treason, but not as long it is the russian opposition.

The hypocrisy...

Neutrality wrote:A bit off-topic maybe, "Izvestia" has published an article (sorry, I can't post external links as I'm still considered "new") and the article says that Merkel is apparently planning to meet the Russian opposition leaders on May 10th. They'll ask her to keep the sanctions and strengthen them against certain individuals because it's apparently the only way to change the government.

RIP to the Russian opposition. Putin doesn't have to do anything, they are destroying themselves.

sepheronx wrote:Putin recently met with former Prime Minister of Canada Chretien.  That really pissed off Harper.

Neutrality wrote:A bit off-topic maybe, "Izvestia" has published an article (sorry, I can't post external links as I'm still considered "new") and the article says that Merkel is apparently planning to meet the Russian opposition leaders on May 10th. They'll ask her to keep the sanctions and strengthen them against certain individuals because it's apparently the only way to change the government.

RIP to the Russian opposition. Putin doesn't have to do anything, they are destroying themselves.

etaepsilonk wrote:

KoTeMoRe wrote:
Anyway, just to satisfy my curiosity, are you or have you ever been a member of MP.net.

No.



And you are correct, ukraine's goal is genocide. Now, I understand that for your prorussian allegiance, it might be difficult to go past all the nazi, bandera, evilness cliches, but try to imagine yourself in the shoes of ukraine leadership. And here you're seeing all of those separatist warlords boasting how they'll drive for kiev. Wouldn't it be a matter of serious concern for maintaining your country's survival, to the point where every possible war strategy may become viable?

Or do you think that ukies are actually wishing to do what they've been doing, and not forced by the circumstances?

auslander wrote:But..but...but...aren't the more pragmatic posters elsewhere saying Mother Merkel is actually in desire of more close ties to Russia? Hmmm. Perhaps General Shoigu should go to Berlin and meet the German opposition.

auslander wrote:

Neutrality wrote:A bit off-topic maybe, "Izvestia" has published an article (sorry, I can't post external links as I'm still considered "new") and the article says that Merkel is apparently planning to meet the Russian opposition leaders on May 10th. They'll ask her to keep the sanctions and strengthen them against certain individuals because it's apparently the only way to change the government.

RIP to the Russian opposition. Putin doesn't have to do anything, they are destroying themselves.

But..but...but...aren't the more pragmatic posters elsewhere saying Mother Merkel is actually in desire of more close ties to Russia? Hmmm. Perhaps General Shoigu should go to Berlin and meet the German opposition.

Neutrality wrote:A bit off-topic maybe, "Izvestia" has published an article (sorry, I can't post external links as I'm still considered "new") and the article says that Merkel is apparently planning to meet the Russian opposition leaders on May 10th. They'll ask her to keep the sanctions and strengthen them against certain individuals because it's apparently the only way to change the government.

RIP to the Russian opposition. Putin doesn't have to do anything, they are destroying themselves.