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Annexing Uktaine. Objections?
type568
Member #8,381
March 2007
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Well, not all of it, just the Russian east.
But seriously. I wonder what the western brainwashed zombies think(I'm not entirely serious).

Thomas Fjellstrom
Member #476
June 2000
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See I thought the new Ukrainian government had already decided to give the crimean's a referendum. Then the Russians[1] moved in ::)

I don't think the russians are at all interested in the people's freedom or rights. They just want to annex more land.

References

  1. By "Russians" I mean Putin

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torhu
Member #2,727
September 2002
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type568, if you actually mean that, I would kill on the spot. But I'm kind of hoping that you're just kidding and not actually a monster :P

Chris Katko
Member #1,881
January 2002
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As a US citizen: I think the USA should fuck off when it comes to other people's business until it can figure out how to manage it's own.

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Derezo
Member #1,666
April 2001
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I had a good laugh last night when the new prime minister spoke of the old president: "He should ... come back ... to Ukraine ... we will keep him ... very safe ... in a prison cell."

"He who controls the stuffing controls the Universe"

torhu
Member #2,727
September 2002
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No, as the world's only western super power I think that the US has a great responsibility. The problem is that the assholes as got too much power in the US, which hurts the whole world. Religion, money, and lack of education, information, and openness is the problem. There's always someone working to hurt everyone else. Even here in Norway, which I think is a society that is more advanced than the US in most ways, all of that is still a fucking problem :-/

jhuuskon
Member #302
April 2000
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The people of Ukraine hate Russia and russians with a passion (well, they have a history). Russians don't like Ukraine or its people but they have to deal with them to sell natural gas to europe because their main gas line goes through Ukraine. With Yanukovich, leaning east and corrupt, gone, Russia expects trouble to their gas exports. With a bit of military beatdown they expect to get more favourable results in trade negotiations. the ukraininan people are fed up with policy dictated from Moscow, and russia doesn't like how difficult selling gas would become with someone like Yanukovich's predecessor Yuchenko at the helm.

But that's only icing on the cake. This all flailing outwards is more to do with russian internal politics than external. After the global embarassing spotlight on corruption that Sochi was, Putin needs a quick win to convince his people that he is still in charge.

It has nothing to do with Kremlin's official mandate, "protecting russian citizens abroad". They weren't at danger to begin with, by acting against Ukraine, Russia brought danger to them.

You don't deserve my sig.

Max Savenkov
Member #4,613
May 2004
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jhuuskon said:

The people of Ukraine hate Russia and russians with a passion (well, they have a history). Russians don't like Ukraine or its people but they have to deal with them to sell natural gas to europe because their main gas line goes through Ukraine.

I don't think this describes situation accurately. Most people of Ukraine DO NOT hate Russia. Even western parts were mostly indifferent, beyond telling of jokes and occasional blamestorm, but eastern parts seem to be pro-Russian even now, when there is a danger of military invasion. Russians, on the other hand, do not dislike Ukraine or its people. I mean, why would we? Ukrainians are fellow Slavs, and while there was some resentment over them providing a source of cheap labour after the fall of USSR, they were driven from that market by Southerners long time ago. There is VERY little dislike for Ukraine in Russia, especially with the rise of anti-Caucasus moods.

Now, here's my take on situation, directly from Moscow, specially for the fellow allegro.cc users :).

First, I have no doubt that both western powers and Russian government do not have the best interests of Ukrainian people in mind. For everyone involved at a higher level, this is just a part of the great game, with Ukraine a mildly important token and its people (including its rulers) just pawns.

If viewed from a purely human level, Ukraine is a tragedy, a country pulled apart by meddling of third parties. Unfortunately, I can't see how this could be stopped now.

As a part of the great game of politics, Ukrainian events seem like American operation. Why? Because Russia actually would win nothing from instability in Ukraine. Even mildly anti-Russian government would be preferable to chaos, from economic and politic standpoints. Did you know there is already a stream of refugees from Ukraine into Russia? That stream would turn into freakin' raging river if a war of any kind started. And NOBODY needs refugees.

European countries, of course, would want to put a more pro-Western government in power, but they also have no need of war or chaos. After all, Ukraine is dangerously close to Europe, and refugees from western parts of the country will certainly try to make their way into Poland and Germany. Does Europe need thousands of refugees from Ukraine? Certainly, no. Does it need chaos in country which controls gas pipe? A bigger NO.

USA, however, could gain some points by creating a war zone between Russia and Europe. It would drive these two powers apart even further (that visa agreement that Russia and EU were talking about for past several years? I think it's off the table already, as are many business deals). It would create problems for both Russia and EU (while many view The West as some united entity, one should not forget that there are no permanent alliances in politics, and USA and EU certainly have some competing interests; therefore, creating problems for already-ailing EU might be a worthwhile goal for some US politics. For example, an influx of Ukrainian refugees may lead to closing of borders between European countries).

Anyway, SOMEONE is pushing the new Ukrainian government to be more radical. The current situation would not arise, if only Rada did not cancel a law that awarded Russian language, which is widely spoken in eastern part of the country and Crimea a special status. There was simply no need to cancel that law right now, even for nationalist party that seems to be in power presently. It could very well wait until things quieted down, a rule of central government has been fully restored and agreements with EU forged. But they went and did it anyway. I think it was done on purpose, to provoke fear of repressions in Eastern Ukraine and, indirectly, provoke Russians into acting. When the goal of government of a country in time of crisis is to turn temperature up, it's obvious that such a government is not acting in the best interests of their own country, but rather in someone else's interests.

All of this, however, does not excuse total failure of Russian politics in Ukraine. A bet on Yanukovitch was a disgrace: not only the man hadn't any integrity (after all, USA has no doubts about installing less-than-stellar rulers in other countries, when they need to), but he also was unreliable and when crisis came, he flip-flopped so many times you could use him to generate electricity.

An armed intervention into Crimea would be a PR disaster and would, most certainly, alienate people of Ukraine further. The cost of annexation of Crimea is just too much, for very little benefit beyond securing a base for Black Sea fleet, which could be done far more cheaply. And I'm pretty sure that Putin has no plans for invading and conquering the whole of Ukraine. Even if he succeeded, and western powers would do nothing to stop him (which seems unlikely), it would be impossible to HOLD captured territories. Russian army would be bound in an endless guerilla warfare, long-lasting PR nightmare and what's most important, it would all be for no benefit at all.

The biggest loser of all possible scenarios would be Ukraine and its people, of course. Beyond that, it remains to be seen if Russia could salvage something of this situation, but the USA, or whoever organised this provocation, has already won: Russia responded predictably, tarnishing its already-less-than-nice reputation, alienating some part of Ukrainian population, which didn't give Russia much thought before, and possibly entering a costly land combat operation.

A colleague of mine, who is visiting our office on a trip from Odessa, mostly expresses the view of "plague on both of your houses" regarding Yanukovitch and the new government. It's just some anecdotal evidences, of course, but I think that this sentiment might be more widespread than either Western or Russian TV news might lead you to believe.

type568
Member #8,381
March 2007
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torhu said:

if you actually mean that

Every joke has some portion of joke in it :P

jhuuskon said:

The people of Ukraine hate Russia and russians with a passion

Invasion![1]

Oh, and a bit more serious..

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P.S:
I mostly agree with above post.

gnolam
Member #2,030
March 2002
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Does it need chaos in country which controls gas pipe?

*cough*

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Max Savenkov
Member #4,613
May 2004
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Quote:

cough [en.wikipedia.org]

Yes, I know about Nord Stream, of course. Still, I'm not seeing what EU might win by supporting instability in Ukraine or provoking Russia into military actions.

On a side note: a report I've heard recently noted, that China used current situation to buy a lot of cheap property in Ukraine. I'm not sure how relevant is this, but who knows. Did you ever noticed, that it's always Hand of Moscow or CIA agents, when things heat up in Europe or in Arab world? It's like China does not have interests abroad or is unable to conduct complex undercover operations...

OICW
Member #4,069
November 2003
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type568 said:

But seriously. I wonder what the western brainwashed zombies think(I'm not entirely serious).

From here, the Czech Republic, it seems mostly like Putin has adopted 1938 German rhetoric on the subject of Sudetenland and Sudetengermans. We've discussed it with a friend whose wife comes from Ukraine and everything the Russian side says and does about Crimea bears uncanny resemblance to Munich 1938.

From what I've heard the Russian television does really a good job at skewing reality in their own way by broadcasting old recordings from Kyjev protests and saying it's what happens there right now and showing photos from Ukraine-Poland border with refugees stating it's the Ukraine-Russian border.

I don't want to speculate who's behind this and who will profit with this. Nobody would profit from a war, certainly not the people of Ukraine. It was their fight against corrupted regime and it should be those people to decide.

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type568
Member #8,381
March 2007
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@molang

Not all of the gas can be rerouted through Nord Stream. :(

@OICW

Thanks. Not that I agree, but well.. Not as brainwashed as I could've expected :P
Oh, and.. What you're totally right about(I guess) is Russian media. It's the western *(-1).
At times more radical, at times less.

Reading both sides gives some clue though. Oh, and there is also the "less biased" stuff from both sides. Like Reuters from the western, and RBK("Russian Business Channel") from the eastern.

& P.S:
God damn it. My stocks. Both Russian & American :'(

OICW
Member #4,069
November 2003
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I've now switched from local media to Guardian and BBC because I smell bias in our media for quite a long time. Yet, you have to be critical on both sides. The truth is somewhere in the middle.

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Thomas Fjellstrom
Member #476
June 2000
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OICW said:

The truth is somewhere in the middle.

Unfortunately it's not as simple as that. The severely biased sources will actually just not tell you about things that aren't in its favour. So not only do you have them reporting on things in such a manner that they might as well be lying, they also try to keep you ignorant. It's insidious. And if they ever do report on it, they treat it as if its nothing and something to laugh at :o

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type568
Member #8,381
March 2007
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Well.. Now there were reports about some Russian ultimatum, about which the Ukranian army officials heard from the news. Which has pushed the S&P to fresh lows, and then skyrocketted from the bottom as Russia officially dismissed the claims. (the news source is my twitter, but stock movement is my observation)

The Guardian is pretty good stuff I suppose. BBC = -RT(I think RT is a bit more objective, but I'm biased here).
As I mentioned above, least biased stuff out there is Reuters. But it's still closer to BBC than RT of course. Unfortunately I know no eastern news source that is comparable in content quality to Reuters.

The severely biased sources will actually just not tell you about things that aren't in its favour.

Every single state media news source is severely biased. First paragraph of this post is an example.

Thomas Fjellstrom
Member #476
June 2000
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type568 said:

Every single state media news source is severely biased. First paragraph of this post is an example.

I don't know if I'd call FOX News or MSNBC "State media sources" though ;)

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"If you can't think of a better solution, don't try to make a better solution." -- weapon_S
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Matthew Leverton
Supreme Loser
January 1999
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Russian beat the Free World in the Olympics. Now they will crush us in war too. >:(

Aikei_c
Member #14,871
January 2013
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I'm all for NATO and/or USA intervention to stop this megalomaniac.

Thomas Fjellstrom
Member #476
June 2000
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I like how the UN held a meeting and passed a resolution to exclude the Security Council to keep Russia out of the discussion.

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"If you can't think of a better solution, don't try to make a better solution." -- weapon_S
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type568
Member #8,381
March 2007
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I don't know if I'd call FOX News or MSNBC "State media sources" though ;)

I rarely encounter first, and I'm totally unaware of what the heck is the second. I've literally no opinion about them.

Aikei_c said:

I'm all for NATO and/or USA intervention to stop this megalomaniac.

Fuel the rockits :P

Thomas Fjellstrom
Member #476
June 2000
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MSNBC is the Fox for the left wing nutjobs in the US. Yet another 24 hour news channel that fills 23 hours of the day with tabloid news, and entertainment shows.

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"If you can't think of a better solution, don't try to make a better solution." -- weapon_S
"The less evidence we have for what we believe is certain, the more violently we defend beliefs against those who don't agree" -- https://twitter.com/neiltyson/status/592870205409353730

OICW
Member #4,069
November 2003
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Unfortunately it's not as simple as that. The severely biased sources will actually just not tell you about things that aren't in its favour. So not only do you have them reporting on things in such a manner that they might as well be lying, they also try to keep you ignorant. It's insidious. And if they ever do report on it, they treat it as if its nothing and something to laugh at :o

Yep, sure. I've made that shortcut. You're unfortunatelly right, we will never know the whole story behind it. It's full of secret intentions of various subjects and we can barely scratch the surface of it. Provided we can discern subterfuge and blatant lies told in the media.

What worries me most about the situation is the role of the so called new media. People can post there anything that can do much harm because the news there aren't double checked. And even if people find out that something posted on Twitter, for example, is an obvious hoax it may be too late or nobody would care.

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type568
Member #8,381
March 2007
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Despite me having no clue about what the website is, the content looks totally legit to me.

Chris Katko
Member #1,881
January 2002
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Can someone who understands give an elaboration of the newest developments?

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