Jayjay writes:
boneyard bill.
It is reported that the US government has urged the Kiev government to take over the East militarily although I don't know if the State Department has acknowledged that fact. What is known is that the current IMF aid package to Ukraine is conditional on the Kiev government controlling the East.
I hadn't heard of that. Do you have a source?
It's been reported on several business sites. It would probably take me quite a while to track them down.
To me it seems natural that Kiev isn't just going to roll over and let Russia take the eastern provinces. They don't need US goading to do that. As for intervening militarily to protect Russian speaking people, just because it has been a policy doesn't make it justified. The Russians that were planted by Soviet Union should learn to live in their new host countries and not demand special privileges that they had during the Soviet era.
At first they sent Ukrainian troops, but those troops mostly either defected or ran away. The Ukrainian military is not supporting the Kiev regime. They are basically remaining neutral. They even refused to give up any military equipment for the regime. That's why the sudden emergence of well-equipped, well-trained forces of the Interior Department certainly suggests the use of professional mercenaries here as being reported in the German media.
It doesn't matter whether YOU think Russian policy is justified or not. The fact is that it IS Russian policy, and it isn't going to change. So it's a matter that we have to deal with, and we can deal with it intelligently or recklessly. So far, we've chosen the latter course.
I've found numerous sources on the IMF conditions for lending Ukraine money. That the US urged Ukraine to move on the east was reported as being part of the purpose of CIA Director Brennan's recent trip to Ukraine. I don't remember the source nor have I heard whether or not that report has been confirmed by State Dept. as I already noted. Nonetheless, American policy here should be clear because we have NOT condemned the Ukraine government for shooting on unarmed civilians. Meanwhile, the Russians have condemned it at genocide. Given the numbers killed that is probably an exaggeration, but it is an exaggeration that is also a warning.
When did the new government in Kiev shoot unarmed civilians? The US state department condemned the violence in January before the coup.
That is what Mariupol was all about and probably Odessa as well.
Kiev can't trust their army. These troops are supposedly a "national guard" under the Interior Ministry. They reportedly sent 4,000 of them to Mariupol but there are probably considerably more elsewhere in the east. But what kind of training have these men had? Are they subject to discipline by Kiev? How many of them are Right Sector neo-Nazis or ultra-nationalists? And where did they get their weaponry from? They have tanks and APCs and other heavy equipment. The Ukrainian army refused to relinquish such equipment even to the Minister of Defense much less the Minister of the Interior.
The fact that Kiev's army is weak is precisely the problem. Kiev cannot give up eastern Ukraine without a fight, and they cannot fight fair so they'll just look the other way as "volunteers" from right sector militia do their dirty work which serves to just escalate the violence. IThe portrayal of the governmetn in Kiev as some sort of hapless victims of US manipulation is hardly accurate.
The Ukrainian army is weak BECAUSE of the government in Ukraine. Chances are that army is made up of about half Russian-speaking troops, and they don't recognize the government in Kiev as legitimate because it ISN'T legitimate. At best the coup leaders represent half the country which might amount to half the military and half the provinces. Why should it be surprising that there should be resistance to the government in Kiev, and that that government should be weak? It doesn't represent the people.
Protraying the Kiev government as hapless is pretty much a no-brainer. That they are manipulated by Washington is highly probable given the evidence. After all, our won Assistant Secretary of State, Victoria Nuland, was intercepted in a phone call a month BEFORE the coup insisting that Artsenyuk should be the new premier even as the EU was negotiating a different agreement. Nuland said "fuck the EU." Then, on the day before the EU-negotiated agreement was to go into effect, protestors in the Maiden attacked the police. Who put them up to it? What motivation did they have when a new, compromise government was supposed to go into effect. It was claimed that the police fired on the demonstrators which is true, but we also know now that there was sniper fire from the protestor side as well. So we don't know who fired the first shot.
But there's really only one reasonable conclusion to draw from this. The US acted covertly to torpedo the EU-brokered compromise and put in the man we wanted which was Artsenyk.
Russia is "taking" the Eastern provinces. They are rebelling against the Kiev government because it took power in a coup, and they are seeking independence. There are no Russian nationals among these protestors. The New York Times sent reporters to find them and couldn't. So that claim is just State Department propaganda.
False. Even the separatists have admitted that they have Russian nationals fighting for them, but only that they are just volunteers and "friends". The same unmarked uniforms that were used in Crimea before the takeover showed up in eastern provinces. of course Russia is careful enough not to outright tell New York Times what they are doing.
It wouldn't be surprising that Russia had agents in eastern Ukraine even before the whole controversy began just as we've had agents in western Ukraine. That doesn't negate the fact that the separatist movement is a legitimate eastern Ukrainian independence movement. Russian support for that movement is to be expected, but the people out there in the streets are not Russian citizens. They are Ukrainian citizens. That's really all that the NY Times was looking for. Of course, we can't know how many Russian spies there might be in east Ukraine nor even how many American spies there might be.
Meanwhile, Putin has asked the protestors to delay their vote for independence, and has proposed that Ukraine become a federated republic in which the eastern "oblasts" would become autonomous republics within a larger Ukraine, but such a compromise is difficult to craft if we keep harassing Russian diplomats.
Putin made one comment about delaying the mock referendum, but at the same time, is broadcasting information on polling places on state TV and sanctioning Ukrainian expats to vote in Moscow. What Russia is doing is quite different from what it is saying, and for Russia whether in the end they get to annex the eastern provinces or not, its deliberate destabilization in east Ukraine has already served it well by shifting the discussion away from the annexation of Crimea.
Have you never heard of an "overture"? Putin's request to the east Ukrainians was ultimately rejected by them, but the West had a chance to respond to Putin's proposal and that might have persuaded them to delay the referendum, but there was no response so the referendum has gone forward and, as expected, it was passed overwhelmingly. Outside monitors were invited but refused to show up, but hundreds of western reporters were there to cover the election.
Putin doesn't need to distract attention from Crimea. It's a fait accompli. Every time we've intervened in the this area it has resulted in Russian expansion. We urged the Georgians to attack South Ossetia and Russian peace-keepers stationed there. The result of the Russian annexation of South Ossetia. Then we overthrew the legitimately elected government of Ukraine which led to the Russian annexation of Crimea. Now we're fiddling around in east Ukraine which will result in the Russian annexation of that region.
Indeed, even if Russia decided to invade Western Ukraine we probably couldn't stop him, but I don't think he wants it. Too many neo-Nazis.
So we're just setting ourselves up for failure, or World War III.
Insane.
