Sunday, March 2, 2014

Ukraine – Extreme Apprehension

I sure called it wrong on Crimea.  We are on the brink of a war.  People are lined up to get international passports, including Lina and Tania.  Masha already has one and Dasha is too young to need one.  We will not leave without our family and by the time they get passports it could be all over but the crying.

The Russian army in unmarked uniforms has taken control of the peninsula, including Ukrainian military bases.  They are supported by the pro-Russian government of Crimea which has declared it independent and called in the Russians to save them from the right-wing terrorists who have taken control of Ukraine.  Russian propaganda has been preparing Crimea for years for something like this and the population of ethnic Russians has bought in to the whole thing.  

Fear mongering is rampant; the population is convinced that Western Ukrainian Nazis are on their way to Crimea and that the Crimean Tatars are just “Chechen” terrorists in waiting.  Expect to hear of a number of deadly bomb attacks which can be blamed on the Tatars, in the same way that the FSB arranged bombings of apartment buildings in Moscow triggered the second Chechen war and elected Putin to presidency.

The ex-Berkut police, now on the payroll of the Crimean government and backed by Russian soldiers are controlling entry and exit routes.  All journalists are banned from entering except Russian approved ones.  Russia flew in several thousand troops over the weekend.  The Kuban Cossacks are there also in thousands, though I may be double counting, if that was who flew in.  

It is hard to say what will happen next.  Every attempt is being made to create a civil war between pro-Russian and pro-Western people.  Where ever there are clashes, you can be certain whose beaten head will appear on Russian TV. 

Whether the intent is to split the country or force a federation, I don’t know.  A poorly run federation would certainly keep us out of the EU and a split country, ceding 1/3 to Russia to protect her citizens, smacks of “Peace in our time”.
Intervention is out of the question.  Neither EU nor USA have the testicular fortitude to tackle Russia militarily and likely not any other way either.  This whole script is way too familiar.  We saw it in Georgia in 2008 and we have seen it many times in other countries on the wrong side of other empires: the propaganda, the civil unrest and riots and finally the invasion.  

Empires will beat on little countries which cannot defend themselves but they hesitate to take on other empires except as a last resort.  Obama is brave when it comes to sending drones to kill people at weddings and funerals.  And the quote of the century from the Guardian from US secretary of state John Kerry*: 'You just don’t in the 21st century behave in 19th-century fashion by invading another country on completely trumped up pretext'

The Kyiv Post has links to lots of other papers. www.kyivpost.com/hot/euromaidan



*When I look at the presidents they could have had, Gore and Kerry, the wisdom of the American people in electing Bush simply astounds me.

19 comments:

  1. You guys keep your heads down and stay safe. We're praying for Ukraine.

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    1. Thanks OAFS. Lots of prayers here today too and thousands of candles burning. today was sort of National I am sorry day. Not sure of the correct term, maybe like confession?

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  2. On a scale of 1 to 10, how worried should I be for you? Because I am hovering somewhere near a 9 right now.

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    1. More like a 3 for now. Oblasts are declaring for Ukraine left right and centre. Only Lugansk and Donetsk seem to be holding out.. Odessa, Dnipro and even Kharkiv have declared for Ukraine. There are still demonstrations but there does not appear to be outright rebellion approved by the local governments as there is in Crimea. I feel much better after watching the late news. Putin's invasion has brought the country together like nothing ever before.

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  3. Thank you for your commentary. You are so much more informative than the news. Here's hoping things return to some kind of normalcy soon - whatever 'normal' is.

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    1. I don't think Ukraine will ever be normal again, though in the long run of its history, this IS normal.

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  4. Oh Daddy. I'm sorry. I wish I could scoop you all up and bring you home. Stay safe, my Poppa.

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  5. Please be safe and keep writing.

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  6. Thanks for the inside information.

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  7. Keeping you and your family in my thoughts, for what it's worth. Stay safe.

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  8. Hang in there, Big Guy. Maybe Putin's move will bring the country together.

    Blessings and Bear hugs!

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  9. Praying. And sharing this info, because this may be the closest anyone I know gets to the truth. Thank you for sharing, Al!

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  10. Thank you so much for these posts. I feel so much better informed after reading them.

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    1. Thanks all for your thoughts, well wishes and prayers. Until something happens one way or another we will keep on keeping on. Ukrainians have been through enough in the past 1000 years that they know how to endure and adapt to whatever comes along. I will tag along and take orders and help as best I can.

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  11. The testicular fortitude is kind of out of the question here. The USA has no real creds when it comes to standing up to Russia...look at Bush and Georgia and the entire Iraqi War thing. I think the fact that Russian Bourse nose dived is a more credible point here. Russia can't stop the natural gas lines supplying so much of Europe. Putin has done his "shock and awe" but now the dust has to settle and it will. I don't know and can't predict how this will all play out, but my most sincere hopes are with the Ukrainian people. Last night I saw Pharrell Williams on French TV and he saw the Happy Kyiv video shot last month for the first time and started crying...me too.

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    1. Bourse picked up after his speech. I read as much as I could stomach. What a pack of lies. He could write for Fox News.

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