Russia Discussion

Number 8 is silly. It isn't led by fascists and nationalists but they are in there and have taken some of the most important positions.
As far as I'm aware, nothing has happened to them yet but kievs chief rabbi advised Jews to leave after the protests finished with the toppling of the president.

Danny, how far would you be willing to go in defence of Russia? If they did invade eastern Ukraine, would that still be justifiable to you?
 
africanspur said:
Number 8 is silly. It isn't led by fascists and nationalists but they are in there and have taken some of the most important positions.
As far as I'm aware, nothing has happened to them yet but kievs chief rabbi advised Jews to leave after the protests finished with the toppling of the president.

Danny, how far would you be willing to go in defence of Russia? If they did invade eastern Ukraine, would that still be justifiable to you?
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I'd imagine there are politicians of varied stripes there. As far as I know these are the same people elected in the last parliamentary elections.
 
Raoul said:
I'd imagine there are politicians of varied stripes there. As far as I know these are the same people elected in the last parliamentary elections.
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There are and they were. So don't ask yourself a question about fascists and nationalists and then pretend they don't exist, it takes away from the rest of the article from the state department.
 
africanspur said:
There are and they were. So don't ask yourself a question about fascists and nationalists and then pretend they don't exist, it takes away from the rest of the article from the state department.
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The question is legitimate imo, as its the central theme of Russia's propaganda campaign to justify invading Crimea and its current agitations in the east. Even the UN has characterized it as such in its recent report which is getting wide play in the press, much to the annoyance of the Russian government. A good number of European ambassdors have also called Russia's fascism claims a "fantasy narrative".
 
Raoul said:
The question is legitimate imo, as its the central theme of Russia's propaganda campaign to justify invading Crimea and its current agitations in the east. Even the UN has characterized it as such in its recent report which is getting wide play in the press, much to the annoyance of the Russian government. A good number of European ambassdors have also called Russia's fascism claims a "fantasy narrative".
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It is a very valid question, especially in the face of Russian attempts to paint the whole government as fascists.

However, the state department, and seemingly, you, have gone in the other direction and are completely skipping over the presence of *ahem* 'unsavoury' characters in the new government, perhaps in the mistaken belief that acknowledging their presence makes the whole exercise less legitimate?

How many ministries is Svobda represented in? And what is the importance of those ministries?
 
africanspur said:
It is a very valid question, especially in the face of Russian attempts to paint the whole government as fascists.

However, the state department, and seemingly, you, have gone in the other direction and are completely skipping over the presence of *ahem* 'unsavoury' characters in the new government, perhaps in the mistaken belief that acknowledging their presence makes the whole exercise less legitimate?

How many ministries is Svobda represented in? And what is the importance of those ministries?
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Its not discussed because its widely held to be a non-issue that has been used as a device for propaganda by the Russians. If it were significant, I'd imagine the UN report would have made a right meal out of it.
 
The fact that it has been used for propaganda by the Russians does not make it a non issue. There are fascists in the government, they are a small minority but they do exist and they hold some important posts. Fascists in the government are always an issue. Trying to brush over it helps nobody and only serves to take away from your overall argument.
 
africanspur said:
The fact that it has been used for propaganda by the Russians does not make it a non issue. There are fascists in the government, they are a small minority but they do exist and they hold some important posts. Fascists in the government are always an issue. Trying to brush over it helps nobody and only serves to take away from your overall argument.
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Its actually a diversion from a bigger issue, which is why many in the know choose to not fixate on it. There are also nutty right wing politicians in the US, as well as comparably nutty ones on the left. The macro issue however remains that Ukraine is being invaded by a foreign country that is seeking to build an empire over Ukrainian land. Ukraine's actual existence is currently being threatened, which is correctly imo, the grand narrative here - not the preferred Russian diversion of a few one off fascists kicking up a fuss in parliament, many of which would coincidentally be irrelevant if not for Putin's interference in Ukraine.
 


africanspur said:
The fact that it has been used for propaganda by the Russians does not make it a non issue. There are fascists in the government, they are a small minority but they do exist and they hold some important posts. Fascists in the government are always an issue. Trying to brush over it helps nobody and only serves to take away from your overall argument.
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Russia didn't make it an issue when Yanukovych was in charge and the same people were in the Rada then. It's just now that their puppet is gone they want to publicize it as if it was something new to help their case for a federal Ukraine, which is hilarious since Putin worked very hard to effectively de-federalize Russia to give Moscow all the power that Yeltsin lost in the 90s.
 
In other news, Putin went on Russian TV and has finally admitted to the lie that Russian forces weren't boots on the ground in Crimea.

http://news.yahoo.com/putin-hopes-no-send-troops-ukraine-102731980.html

"At the same time, he recognized for the first time that soldiers in unmarked uniforms — dubbed "little green men" by some — who have swept Ukraine's Black Sea region of Crimea laying the ground for its annexation by Moscow last month were Russian troops.

Putin, who previously said the troops were local self-defense forces, said the Russian soldiers' presence was necessary to protect the local population from armed radicals and to ensure the holding of a referendum, in which an overwhelming majority of its residents voted for seceding from Ukraine and joining Russia".
 
Apparently, the largest pro-Russia protest in Donetsk has been a whopping 7000 people. Compared to the Maidan, that's minuscule.
 
africanspur said:
Number 8 is silly. It isn't led by fascists and nationalists but they are in there and have taken some of the most important positions.
As far as I'm aware, nothing has happened to them yet but kievs chief rabbi advised Jews to leave after the protests finished with the toppling of the president.

Danny, how far would you be willing to go in defence of Russia? If they did invade eastern Ukraine, would that still be justifiable to you?
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I'm not really "defending" Russia. I'm giving my opinion about the conflict.

I've made it clear why I think Crimea is a different case to East Ukraine. Nobody should be involved in Eastern Ukraine. Neither Russia, not the CIA for that matter.

If Russian forces enter Eastern Ukraine, then we can talk in that case about a real invasion of a country by another country.
 
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Danny1982 said:
I'm not really "defending" Russia. I'm giving my opinion about the conflict.

I've made it clear why I think Crimea is a different case to East Ukraine. Nobody should be involved in Eastern Ukraine. Neither Russia, not the CIA for that matter.

If Russian forces enter Eastern Ukraine, then we can talk in that case about a real invasion of a country by another country.
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Russian forces already have - where do you think the "local, spontaneously-organised pro-Russian forces" get all their nice shiny equipment from? Plus, if you still put faith in what VVP says, we are taking about a leader who had the chutzpah to say today in his televised Q&A session that Russia does not undertake mass surveillance of its citizens!
 
Sir Matt said:
:lol: How will Danny deny it now?
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Can please quote me where I "denied" it?

The most important part of my opinion about what happened in Crimea was: a- the treaty. b- the fact that not a bullet was shot. Anything you know now that should change my opinion about those two points?
 
MoskvaRed said:
Russian forces already have - where do you think the "local, spontaneously-organised pro-Russian forces" get all their nice shiny equipment from? Plus, if you still put faith in what VVP says, we are taking about a leader who had the chutzpah to say today in his televised Q&A session that Russia does not undertake mass surveillance of its citizens!
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It's about "believing Putin". In that respect nobody holds any credibility really to be believed.

How can "nice shiny equipment" mean "invasion"?! So by that logic...

Syria rebels get US-made missiles

The US has invaded Syria?
 
Danny1982 said:
Can please quote me where I "denied" it?

The most important part of my opinion about what happened in Crimea was: a- the treaty. b- the fact that not a bullet was shot. Anything you know now that should change my opinion about those two points?
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You claim that there are only "hints" that the men in Crimea were Russian soldiers. You asked me for proof of them in tanks in Crimea, I provided it and you refused to accept the truth. You said that even the vehicles with military plates weren't proof that they were Russians. It doesn't matter whether or not there was a shot fired; it was still an invasion by a foreign military force. By definition.

They didn't obey the treaty, which authorized them to secure their bases. They went and secured all the other bases in Crimea for themselves by surrounding and disarming them. The restraint of the Ukrainian military is the only thing that kept it from being bloody. Did the treaty authorize them to scuttle a retired Russian ship in the harbor at Sevastopol? I don't think so.
 
Danny1982 said:
It's about "believing Putin". In that respect nobody holds any credibility really to be believed.

How can "nice shiny equipment" mean "invasion"?! So by that logic...

Syria rebels get US-made missiles

The US has invaded Syria?
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No they haven't (despite misguided assistance to the rebels) because we would know - the average American looks a bit different to the average Syrian. With Russia and Ukraine, the plausible deniability angle can be maintained as, apart from accents, there's no real difference between the two nationalities. I am at a bit of a loss why you are trying to deny the obvious though - even people here accept there are special forces on the ground masquerading as local self-defence organisations.
 
Danny1982 said:
It's about "believing Putin". In that respect nobody holds any credibility really to be believed.

How can "nice shiny equipment" mean "invasion"?! So by that logic...

Syria rebels get US-made missiles

The US has invaded Syria?
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Are you being intentionally obtuse? His point was quite explicitly that the "local, spontaneously-organised pro-Russian forces" were neither local nor spontaneous. Their new Russian weapons and Russian accents are proof of that. They managed to leave their vehicles in Crimea since that gave them away there, for reasonable people. The people, not the weapons, are the invading force.
 
Sir Matt said:
You claim that there are only "hints" that the men in Crimea were Russian soldiers. You asked me for proof of them in tanks in Crimea, I provided it and you refused to accept the truth. You said that even the vehicles with military plates weren't proof that they were Russians. It doesn't matter whether or not there was a shot fired; it was still an invasion by a foreign military force. By definition.

They didn't obey the treaty, which authorized them to secure their bases. They went and secured all the other bases in Crimea for themselves by surrounding and disarming them. The restraint of the Ukrainian military is the only thing that kept it from being bloody. Did the treaty authorize them to scuttle a retired Russian ship in the harbor at Sevastopol? I don't think so.
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I already said that there are clues that they were Russian forces, but I maintain my position that before Putin admitted it, we didn't have a proof. How is saying we don't have a definite proof yet = denying it? Do you understand the difference between those two stances? And excuse me for maintaining a level of skepticism about the "Western clues", because I have been tricked in the past.

Either way the presence of those troops have never been a part of the main reasoning behind my opinion.

The treaty subject is very complicated. It is allowed in the treaty for the Russian forces to be present outside their bases, in agreement with the Ukrainian government. And here you get the issue of the interpretation of "which one is the legitimate Ukrainian government right now?", it's really complicated.

The important points are:

- No borders were crossed in Crimea. (The case is different in Eastern Ukraine.)
- The Russian forces are allowed to be present in Crimea (anywhere in coordination with the Ukrainian government). (The case is different in Eastern Ukraine.)
- No bullet was shot in the process in Crimea. (The case will be different in Eastern Ukraine, no matter what they do.)

I don't even want to go into the history of Crimea, and the type of people living in it. Crimea is a special case imo, and I think the whole world knows it is. They just want to use it as leverage in Eastern Ukraine.
 
MoskvaRed said:
No they haven't (despite misguided assistance to the rebels) because we would know - the average American looks a bit different to the average Syrian. With Russia and Ukraine, the plausible deniability angle can be maintained as, apart from accents, there's no real difference between the two nationalities. I am at a bit of a loss why you are trying to deny the obvious though - even people here accept there are special forces on the ground masquerading as local self-defence organisations.
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Once again I'm not "denying" anything. What's with this stupid logic? If I don't immediately believe anything you (or the West) say, and take their words for it, then I'm suddenly denying it? How about we wait so we know more?

If you're of that opinion then fine. I never said you're a liar. But the way you're trying to force me to take somebody's word for it reminds of something similar that happened 11 years ago, which eventually led to a disaster.

So are you saying the people in East Ukraine like the new government? Don't want autonomy?

How do you explain this then?

Ukraine PM offers more power to eastern regions to quell crisis
 
Raoul said:
When things get dicey, just pivot towards Syria.
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Nothing wrong with getting a bit of perspective.

People have a created a parallel universe for themselves in this thread just to attack Russia. "meddling in the politics of other countries is a crime that should be met with severe punishments"? "Sending equipments to people inside other countries = invasion"? "Assisting anti-government fractions in other countries = the ultimate crime that can't go unpunished"?

No wonder you don't want to look back at your opinions in the other threads we have in this forum.
 
"The only difference is that our servicemen are not used against our own people," Lavrov says. "And Ukrainian servicemen have been mobilized by an illegal order to suppress a mass protest."
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2437280-7106786002-giphy.gif
 
Damn, I wish intrade was still running, could have put a bet on civil war happening ages ago!

On topic: I saw a documentary recently that put Russian/Ukranian relations from the last 15 years or so into context. If y'all are interested, I'll post it - it is a bit biased though.
 
Danny1982 said:
I'm not really "defending" Russia. I'm giving my opinion about the conflict.

I've made it clear why I think Crimea is a different case to East Ukraine. Nobody should be involved in Eastern Ukraine. Neither Russia, not the CIA for that matter.

If Russian forces enter Eastern Ukraine, then we can talk in that case about a real invasion of a country by another country.
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It would surely be fair to say now that Russia is directly intervening in Eastern Ukraine right now? Whether you believe that those militiamen are just normal Ukranians, Russian special forces or a mix of both, they are clearly not acting alone? In a sovereign nation?
 
Sir Matt said:




Russia didn't make it an issue when Yanukovych was in charge and the same people were in the Rada then. It's just now that their puppet is gone they want to publicize it as if it was something new to help their case for a federal Ukraine, which is hilarious since Putin worked very hard to effectively de-federalize Russia to give Moscow all the power that Yeltsin lost in the 90s.
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Right but I am not Russia. I am not stating this as propaganda for Putin, I think his actions in Crimea were wrong (though with some more justification than what he's currently doing now) and I think his actions in E. Ukraine are also wrong.

In all honesty, you guys are as blinkered as each other, on both sides. I was merely stating a fact, a fact that the state department has decided to ignore. There are fascists now, just as there were fascists before. This fact does not justify Putin's actions. You should be able to look at things objectively, without always comparing the situation to what Russia/ the US have been doing.
 
Sir Matt said:
2437280-7106786002-giphy.gif
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:lol::lol:

Incredible stuff.

As I said before, considering Putin loves decentralisation, referenda and non-violence against citizens, I am looking forward to all of these ideologies being implemented in Chechnya soon.
 
africanspur said:
Right but I am not Russia. I am not stating this as propaganda for Putin, I think his actions in Crimea were wrong (though with some more justification than what he's currently doing now) and I think his actions in E. Ukraine are also wrong.

In all honesty, you guys are as blinkered as each other, on both sides. I was merely stating a fact, a fact that the state department has decided to ignore. There are fascists now, just as there were fascists before. This fact does not justify Putin's actions. You should be able to look at things objectively, without always comparing the situation to what Russia/ the US have been doing.
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So nothing really changed on that point since the last election? So even if the guy who was aligned with Russia was still in charge in the Ukraine there were facists in the government already? All that has changed is what offices some of them hold?
 
africanspur said:
It would surely be fair to say now that Russia is directly intervening in Eastern Ukraine right now? Whether you believe that those militiamen are just normal Ukranians, Russian special forces or a mix of both, they are clearly not acting alone? In a sovereign nation?
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There is no doubt Russia is encouraging to say the least those protests. What's the extent of their intervention, it's still not clear to me yet. There might be Russian people already in Ukraine, and there might not be Russian people there yet. Those tanks in Eastern Ukraine have turned out in the end to be Ukrainian tanks that the protestors seized, so you can't believe everything that's being said. Both sides are trying to push their case to its limits.

Now, like I said before, we're not debating here if Russia is in the wrong at all or not. I can find many reasons to prove that the US is in the wrong too. It's the extent of the wrong we're talking about.

Encouraging people to protest in other countries is in principle wrong, but which country is not doing that?

Sending arms/equipments to those protestors is a bigger wrong, but how big is it? Can we agree on a reasonable punishment that should be placed upon any country that does that?

You can not assess a single conflict and separate it from what's going on everywhere else in the world. I'm all for tackling every single wrong any country does, but we have to keep things in perspective.

Spying on other countries is also wrong in principle, but which country is not doing that? I can also say: "Hey, this country spied on that country, which is totally wrong! Is it not wrong? Are you saying it's not wrong? It's wrong............ Let's bomb them!". Things don't work that way.

The US and its allies are looking for an excuse in Ukraine, just like in Syria somebody pointed out that the US should keep the civil war going so Iran can be blamed for the people killed there. It's the same mentality. People are not being honest about what they think of the situation, they just want an excuse for them to do what they already want to do.. That's the way I see it, till this moment at least.
 
africanspur said:
Right but I am not Russia. I am not stating this as propaganda for Putin, I think his actions in Crimea were wrong (though with some more justification than what he's currently doing now) and I think his actions in E. Ukraine are also wrong.

In all honesty, you guys are as blinkered as each other, on both sides. I was merely stating a fact, a fact that the state department has decided to ignore. There are fascists now, just as there were fascists before. This fact does not justify Putin's actions. You should be able to look at things objectively, without always comparing the situation to what Russia/ the US have been doing.
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The State Department's list doesn't deny that there are fascists in the government though, does it? It says that the new government is not run by fascists, which is accurate.
 
There was a vague agreement last night in Geneva. Not sure whether Putin is prepared to do something that he just yesterday, he denied he was doing - which was the use of covert, irregular Russian backed forces in eastern Ukraine. Hopefully he will use his influence to call them off.
 
Well I thought US, EU and Russia were all involved and agreed to 'de-escalate' the tension. I wonder what to make of that, whether it would be like the peace talks between the Palestine and Israel. Here's to hoping some peace and an end to racism, chavunism, imperialism and a lot of unwanted 'ism's.
 
Seems that the pro-Putin nutters in Donetsk are asking Jews to register. Not fascist at all. :)
 
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