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> In what continent does one find Ukraine? Earlier you accused Russia of meddling everywhere, just to pull Ukraine out of the hat. Completely omitting that Uk

> In what continent does one find Ukraine? Earlier you accused Russia of meddling everywhere, just to pull Ukraine out of the hat. Completely omitting that Ukraine didn't start with Crimea, it started on Euromaidan [0], with heavy involvement of "Yat's our man" [1] and even that was only the ultimate result of decades, and millions of US$, in "regime change" efforts [2]. That's the actual context of Ukraine and not "Russia having ambitions to invade all of Europe". The annexation of Crimea wasn't an offensive play, it was a desperate defensive play trying to hold to as much ground and, and military industrial infrastructure [3], as possible. The way all of this is constantly omitted, in favor of the "Russia just went into aggressive expansionist mode" narrative, is pretty good evidence for how one-sided this whole topic has become in the public discourse. [0] https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-26079957 https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-26079957 [1] http://openukraine.org/en/about/partners http://openukraine.org/en/about/partners (Originally he was the face of the org, they later replaced him with his wife) [2] https://www.theguardian.com/world/2004/nov/26/ukraine.usa https://www.theguardian.com/world/2004/nov/26/ukraine.usa [3] https://www.rferl.org/a/russia-ukraine-military-equipment/25312911.html https://www.rferl.org/a/russia-ukraine-military-equipment/25...

codedokode 8y ago
As I know Euromaidan (protests in Ukraine's capital in 2013) has started because pro-Russian Ukranian president decided to cancel plans about integrating with EU, not because of some US involvement. As Ukraine was a part of USSR, there are people sympathising with the West and people sympathising with Russia. And when one part comes to power, other feels disappointed. Russia uses this distrust in its propaganda to divide the society, spreading ideas like the Ukranian government is going to ban Russian language at public schools and sadly the government doesn't take steps to reassure Russian people in Ukraine. Russian is not an official language in Ukraine or in any of its regions (except the annexed ones). Your point about annexation of Crimea is similar to what Russian propaganda says: if we didn't take a part of Ukraine then there would be new NATO bases (another excuse: "Crimea has always been our land and people living there are mostly Russian"). But it is nothing more than an excuse - you can justify anything this way. USSR earlier did similar things - in 1939 they annexed a part of Finland [1] using an excuse that the Leningrad city was too close too the border so they needed to push the border further. It is like US foreign policy - they always have a good excuse to bomb some country and pretend to be the good guy saving people from a dictator. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Winter_War https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Winter_War
- codedokode 8y ago
  Also I wanted to add that in some other ex-USSR countries the situation is similar to Ukranian: there are parts of Russian population who associate themselves with Russia and didn't integrate well into the society. For example, in Baltic states (like Latvia) there is a part of Russian popluation many of whom moved in during Soviet times. They don't speak the national language, they feel disappointment because of dissolution of USSR. To make things worse, Latvia doesn't count them as citizens and they don't have some rights, for example, a right to vote [1]. So who knows, maybe Russia will try to escalate this conflict next. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-citizens_(Latvia) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-citizens_(Latvia)
- freeflight 8y ago
  > As I know Euromaidan (protests in Ukraine's capital in 2013) has started because pro-Russian Ukranian president decided to cancel plans about integrating with EU, not because of some US involvement. It was a bit more complicated and chaotic than that, but you can't just brush aside US involvement as "inconsequential" like that because Euromaidan saw literal US Senators (McCain), and many other foreign nationals, interfere in the elections. In times where every random Russian doing something remotely shady in the US is instantly connected to the Russian government as some kind of "professional agitator" this whole reasoning seems quite a bit hypocrite. > It is like US foreign policy - they always have a good excuse to bomb some country and pretend to be the good guy saving people from a dictator. It indeed is, that's why many people think the US is in no position to be hysterical about "election interference". The cold war might have officially been over, but spheres of influence, and the mostly covert fight over them, still exist and persists to this day. In that context, it's a bit like the US playing the game all the time and mostly winning, but as soon as Russia manages to win a round, the US starts complaining how evil Russia is for playing the game in the first place.
  - codedokode 8y ago
    If Unkranians believe that US were meddling with their elections then they can investigate that. If you are not an Ukranian citizen then probably it doesn't affect you anyway.
gandhium 8y ago
> The annexation of Crimea wasn't an offensive play, it was a desperate defensive play Wow. 'Yes, your honor, I did robbed that guy - but it was a desperate defense!'

codedokode 8y ago

As I know Euromaidan (protests in Ukraine's capital in 2013) has started because pro-Russian Ukranian president decided to cancel plans about integrating with EU, not because of some US involvement. As Ukraine was a part of USSR, there are people sympathising with the West and people sympathising with Russia. And when one part comes to power, other feels disappointed. Russia uses this distrust in its propaganda to divide the society, spreading ideas like the Ukranian government is going to ban Russian language at public schools and sadly the government doesn't take steps to reassure Russian people in Ukraine. Russian is not an official language in Ukraine or in any of its regions (except the annexed ones). Your point about annexation of Crimea is similar to what Russian propaganda says: if we didn't take a part of Ukraine then there would be new NATO bases (another excuse: "Crimea has always been our land and people living there are mostly Russian"). But it is nothing more than an excuse - you can justify anything this way. USSR earlier did similar things - in 1939 they annexed a part of Finland [1] using an excuse that the Leningrad city was too close too the border so they needed to push the border further. It is like US foreign policy - they always have a good excuse to bomb some country and pretend to be the good guy saving people from a dictator. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Winter_War https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Winter_War

codedokode 8y ago
Also I wanted to add that in some other ex-USSR countries the situation is similar to Ukranian: there are parts of Russian population who associate themselves with Russia and didn't integrate well into the society. For example, in Baltic states (like Latvia) there is a part of Russian popluation many of whom moved in during Soviet times. They don't speak the national language, they feel disappointment because of dissolution of USSR. To make things worse, Latvia doesn't count them as citizens and they don't have some rights, for example, a right to vote [1]. So who knows, maybe Russia will try to escalate this conflict next. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-citizens_(Latvia) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-citizens_(Latvia)
freeflight 8y ago
> As I know Euromaidan (protests in Ukraine's capital in 2013) has started because pro-Russian Ukranian president decided to cancel plans about integrating with EU, not because of some US involvement. It was a bit more complicated and chaotic than that, but you can't just brush aside US involvement as "inconsequential" like that because Euromaidan saw literal US Senators (McCain), and many other foreign nationals, interfere in the elections. In times where every random Russian doing something remotely shady in the US is instantly connected to the Russian government as some kind of "professional agitator" this whole reasoning seems quite a bit hypocrite. > It is like US foreign policy - they always have a good excuse to bomb some country and pretend to be the good guy saving people from a dictator. It indeed is, that's why many people think the US is in no position to be hysterical about "election interference". The cold war might have officially been over, but spheres of influence, and the mostly covert fight over them, still exist and persists to this day. In that context, it's a bit like the US playing the game all the time and mostly winning, but as soon as Russia manages to win a round, the US starts complaining how evil Russia is for playing the game in the first place.
- codedokode 8y ago
  If Unkranians believe that US were meddling with their elections then they can investigate that. If you are not an Ukranian citizen then probably it doesn't affect you anyway.

gandhium 8y ago

> The annexation of Crimea wasn't an offensive play, it was a desperate defensive play Wow. 'Yes, your honor, I did robbed that guy - but it was a desperate defense!'