Ukraine and Crimea development thread

[I WUB PUGS]

Touché.

[RubiconDecision]

Okay RD.

Those are amphibious landing ships. The Russians have been building up armor on the Russian side of the strait. Those ships will be used to transport that armor across. They aren't blocking anything, they're positioning as part of a potential reinforcement into Crimea.

Yeah I don't know. The Russians moved in BMP-2's yesterday, perhaps less than ten. Those are amphibious ships. Then today Zerohedge is reporting on those two ship types but they weren't directly identified as to their capabilities or uses (re the : the Alligator Class landing ship 150 Saratov and the Ropucha class landing ship 156 Yamal")

The infographic updated for yesterday and previous reports indicate something like 125 total Russian naval vessels in the region.

EDIT: I updated my post on page 114. Putin said two important things in his opening remarks (which were not translated from the Kremlin) and then his Q and A with the reporters. First that the masked soldiers are NOT Russians. He's disavowing those soldiers, which means anyone could shoot them as they have no legitimate authority and backing. Second that he's not going to honor the 1994 Agreement that Russian, the Ukraine, the UK, and the USA signed. It is null and void because this is a new country and therefore Russia must now create new treaties with it post-revolution.

Also the Russians are in the midst of a orchestrated communications jam on the Ukraine with cell phones, the Internet and land lines not operating across the country.

[DisgruntledGoat]

Well...


Happy now?

Holy crap the delusions contained in that Voice of Russia editorial is CRAZY.

[Pavlik the Rus]

I WUB PUGS
Here is a message to you on 0.54

[I WUB PUGS]

RD,

Yes, they have plenty of line ships in the area to effectively challenge a NATO incursion. Those two ships have the special ability to transport armor and I've read reports of armor being built up on the Russian side of the strait. They aren't really blocking the strait as there isn't much reason to get into the Sea of Azov. The Russians also already took over the ferry crossings on the Ukrainian side so they can move whatever they need across relatively quickly. It speaks more to a defensive posture in Crimea as it will be faster to move troops across the strait than have them coming through the rest of Ukraine.

Pavlik, I have no sound at work, and the video says "try again later" anyway.

[Heathen Hammer]

It worked in Cuba 1962, didn't it? And after that Khrushchev lost his job.

Better then losing half your skull like his opponent did.

Putin gets the hint.

No he won't. He knows well, that NATO won't attack, because that would mean war. Most they can do is causing some sort of provocation, but in this day and age even best cover ups may get exposed.

Giant? Really?

As big as Euromaidan demonstrations in some cities.

Rest assured that those Russians and the whole chain of command up to Putin got the message.

What message? Ukrainian soldiers are defecting to Russian side, and they take commands from the government half the country does not even recognize.

Like the Ukrainian ships who were switching sides two days ago, right?!

Crimean Ukrainian HQ defected. Those officers from both sides studied in same academies and fought in same wars. There isn't even any hostile activity going on between them on any significant scale. Most of military bases in Crimea have been blocked by either Russian troops or local Crimean militias.

[RubiconDecision]

The Ukrainian video has a translation if you back to page 113 or so. They were unarmed while the Russians fired over head, then thought better of it and stopped. Pretty ballsy. Without the translation you have no idea of what's happening.

There's been little recent word on tanks, but there was something about 4 2S1 SPH in Sevastopol. I'm assuming those are tanks.

[The Glorious Moldovan]

1) In the space of few years, Novorosiisk will become the most important port for Black Sea Fleet.

A source will suffice to make such a statement with a solid basis.

2)Black Sea Fleet was neglected for last 30 years. It is the least modern and combat ready part of Russian Navy. If it was so important, why was it so neglected?

will be dealt with in the last paragraph

3) Black Sea Fleet could act independently, thats literally the entire point to Russia's military base in Sevastopol.

I'll need a source for this claim, thanks[/QUOTE]

4) You are giving Transnistria way too much importance to Russian interests.

Really now, if its so irrelevant why are they still there protecting a separatist regime under the guise of "peace keeping" ?

If it wouldnt be "important" they would leave the separatists's control zone to us, so we can arrest them accordingly. If it wouldnt be "important" they would have left us arrest the separatists back in 92' when the war was still ongoing and this whole mess with which they constantly harrass us and block our western integration wouldnt even be a thing today , why did they make us release Smirnov? Because the region is important to them.

The fact is, is that Russia needs to be as close to the balkans as possible, without having too much NATO/EU influence around its hotbed. Transnistria is as close as it will ever get to the balkans, and now with the Crimean Crisis it can create a tampon zone in ukraine's south-eastern borders so that transnistria isnt stuck between another state.
Regardless of how old any military is, the fact that they are present on foreign soil means you have to deal with their retreat diplomaticly since it violates the sovereignity of a country which you guaranteed under various international laws, unless you're naive enough to think any sort of direct military conflict between two major states is even a thing in the 21st century.

1) Maybe the Crimean Crisis wasn't an act of planning, but a spontaneous reaction to the situation at hand? Do you know when Russia was given rights to organise Winter Olympics?

>spontaneous

No, infact the crimean region was an ongoing situation since it faced small scale conflicts as far back as the 90's after the fall of the soviet union. Russia's been monitoring the situation and now that it finally reached a critical point, it intervened under the well known pretext that it merely "protects its russian citizens" as requested by the local governments, which is the exact same scenario with Transnistria (wow what a surprise)

2) Maybe, along with international reputation, Putin values the prestige and popularity Sochi 2014 gave to his regime?

What?

[Dromikaites]

Good evening.
Tovarishi, Sit down please.

You know what, my dear civilized friends, we will never be a friends. I mean Russia and "west" Western countries can accept Russia as something positive, only in shatered peaces, because of their fear.

Western countries would accept Russia as a partner when Russia starts behaving properly. The problem is the Russian leaders cannot behave properly because they need a "foreign menace" to legitimize their grip on power. And until now the Russian citizens haven't managed to elect a different type of leaders.

That such situation might lead to Cold War 2 and the dismantling of the Russian Federation just like the Soviet Union was dismantled is just the consequence of Russia's behavior, not "what the West wants".

Full version of video with group of ukrainean officers.

Dromikates, go ahead. Translate it.
I am wondering, why all without exception western media shows only castrated version?
Anyone knows the answer?

There are indeed some interesting parts left out.

The most important one is 10 soldiers are allowed to go disarmed to do their jobs. I do not know all the abbreviations of the Russian military terms, but from what I get those are technicians doing specialized tasks needed to keep the Belbek military airport functional.

The other interesting piece is that one of the thugs claims to be a local (as in "not a member of the Russian special forces"). He also claims to be armed because he was a victim of violence in the past weeks.

I wouldn't say that what was left out is in any way changing the initial conclusion. The Ukrainian soldiers not only showed they aren't afraid to march up unarmed till they got right next to the "unidentified troops", but their resolve also resulted in getting some degree of control over their airport.

Everybody knows now that the Ukrainians aren't afraid and that things can get easily turn ugly. Putin definitely has another hot potato in his hand.

And another one video, from ukrainean TV-channel

Ukrainean marine major says that they are not blockaded, assaulted or disarmed, and there was no such attempts, there was no ultimative demands on them, meantime they are loyal to the Ukrainean goverment in Kiev.

I am really sad that people like that ukrainean colonel and marine major must experience all of that because stupid political games.

The things look more and more like Putin is ready to back off. He can't prop up those "unidentified forces" for much longer and the Ukrainian army in Crimea doesn't disintegrate. In the mean time the Western pressure mounts both publicly and behind the scenes (you know, the faxes I mentioned in some other post).

[RubiconDecision]

Ukraine stops Russian Armored Vehicles


Why the hell don't the Ukrainian people just block the roads with their cars and bring this to a head? If you're ing being run over, do you just bend over and take it?

Here if the entire Putin talk (1 hour long) in English but no transcript as yet.

[Dromikaites]

Good evening.
Tovarishi, Sit down please.

You know what, my dear civilized friends, we will never be a friends. I mean Russia and "west" Western countries can accept Russia as something positive, only in shatered peaces, because of their fear.

Western countries would accept Russia as a partner when Russia starts behaving properly. The problem is the Russian leaders cannot behave properly because they need a "foreign menace" to legitimize their grip on power. And until now the Russian citizens haven't managed to elect a different type of leaders.

That such situation might lead to Cold War 2 and the dismantling of the Russian Federation just like the Soviet Union was dismantled is just the consequence of Russia's behavior, not "what the West wants".

Full version of video with group of ukrainean officers.

Dromikates, go ahead. Translate it.
I am wondering, why all without exception western media shows only castrated version?
Anyone knows the answer?

There are indeed some interesting parts left out.

The most important one is 10 soldiers are allowed to go disarmed to do their jobs. I do not know all the abbreviations of the Russian military terms, but from what I get those are technicians doing specialized tasks needed to keep the Belbek military airport functional.

The other interesting piece is that one of the thugs claims to be a local (as in "not a member of the Russian special forces"). He also claims to be armed because he was a victim of violence in the past weeks.

I wouldn't say that what was left out is in any way changing the initial conclusion. The Ukrainian soldiers not only showed they aren't afraid to march up unarmed till they got right next to the "unidentified troops", but their resolve also resulted in getting some degree of control over their airport.

Everybody knows now that the Ukrainians aren't afraid and that things can get easily turn ugly. Putin definitely has another hot potato in his hand.

And another one video, from ukrainean TV-channel

Ukrainean marine major says that they are not blockaded, assaulted or disarmed, and there was no such attempts, there was no ultimative demands on them, meantime they are loyal to the Ukrainean goverment in Kiev.

I am really sad that people like that ukrainean colonel and marine major must experience all of that because stupid political games.

The things look more and more like Putin is ready to back off. He can't prop up those "unidentified forces" for much longer and the Ukrainian army in Crimea doesn't disintegrate. In the mean time the Western pressure mounts both publicly and behind the scenes (you know, the faxes I mentioned in some other post).

[Pavlik the Rus]

I WUB PUGS

I guess that you will trust me.
One of ukrainean officers in that moment told his argument
"America with us"
are you ready?

Another point of view.
Autor - Ilya Varlamov. Russian blogger and independent photographer journalist. He is not from Putin's media, i will never post link to that circus.
This man was with rioters in Kiev

http://zyalt.livejournal.com/1017094.html

p. 18
18. Между солдатами нет никакого напряжения. Они спокойно общаются, обмениваются сигаретами, что-то обсуждают. Вот КПП на украинскую военную базу. В черных шапках украинские военные, они спокойно заходят и выходят через КПП, наши не препятствуют. Такое впечатление, что все тут друзья.


Literraly: There is no tensions between russian and ukrainean soldiers, they speaks peacefully, makes chages wih sigarettes and other staff, discussing something. Here is checkpoint on the ukrainean military base's territory. Black hats wears ukrainean soldiers, they freely walks throu the checkpoint. Our troops do not oppose them. looks like there all friends here.

RubiconDecision
This video is "very" old right now. Something like one week ago such thing happen.

Dromikaites
Probably "west" should behave properly too? No?
Any way, back to topic.
Why full version of this video was not shown in "free" TV?
What do you think?
And what about misterios ultimatum on ukrainean troops?

[trance]

It look's really bad for the US, a country that has waged war in Libya, Yemen, Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan and wherever else just in the last decade out of "Self Defense" to cry foul against the Russians for preemptively sending troops to Crimea. There was certainly no guarantee that the Ukrainians would have attacked Crimea, but there damn sure is a guarantee that they WON'T be attacking Crimea now. Which I think is all that Putin care's about.

You admitted its hypocritical, which is all I'm getting at, being moral when you feel like it is . The only reason why Europeans are choosing to cry morality and ignore US hypocrisy in this instance is because it threatens them. Europeans that want the US to take the lead and do something even though Europeans have been the most critical of American actions in our War on Terror.

NO AMERICAN BLOOD FOR EUROPEAN PROBLEMS.

You Euros go write your letters now and keep buying Russian oil.

Wtf ? Who said anything about the U.S should commit troops? Even though I hope the USA would get involved if some country started invading democratic trade partners and allies of the USA. Btw, as for all the whining at U.S interventions, I seem to remember meeting plenty of swedish Afghanistan veterans while in the army... strange right? Even if Sweden hasn't lost a great number of soldiers in Afghanistan, I do also seem to remember loss of life amongst them too, and iirc Afghanistan wasn't really a swedish 'problem' from the start right (even though I'd regard it as a global problem)? Lulz .
Anyway, I'm seriously hoping that this will wake up some politicians so they stop scrap crapping our militaries, we do ing need them. They can't throw the responsibility of their defense on the USA, it's wrong and stupid on so many levels.

[ElvenKind]

Strange then, that that has conveniently never happened

You obviously do not know about my country`s War for Independence, when we decided to leave Yugoslavia in 1991? History is soo boring is it?

.. nor have I read a single source claiming that there was a planned attack on the Crimean peninsula.

I did not know that Ukrainian Head Staff share their plans with you.. They probably left this out, or, you went out for a cup of coffee when they were talking about this possibility.

Not if it is still currently part of the Ukrainian state. It can appeal to higher governmental bodies (UN, etc) for statehood or something similar but nothing that I can see gives it the right to call in a foreign powers military forces

It is an autonomous parliamentary republic, and, it has it`s own Constitution. It can make a descision about it`s future on it`s own.

Is this a serious question? Probably because it is not Russia I would guess. Hey, there are probably areas of Mexico/Canada that have large numbers of American citizens, guess we should just rush troops in there any time they feel "threatened" and the surround Canadian military installations. I mean, its ok because we were invited in

So, why don`t you send troops into Canada or Mexico? Don`t like to **** where you eat?

The thing that I love the most about hot button topics like this is that they draw in people from all over the forums that dont normally post about geopolitics, its nice to get a new perspective on things. That being said, I find your assertion that this is at all similar to the Iraq war to be hilarious. Did you actually think your post through before hitting submit?

I did not say it is similar to Iraq war, my intention was to get an answer why the hell USA/you is making hypocritical statements like: No country can invade or send in troops on another country`s territory without being provoked ? Or similar hypocritical statements..

Did USA had any Americans living in Iraq begging for defence of their lifes, or, had any port/ or military object which they needed to defend?

Well, that answers my question about whether you thought anything through. The current population of the Falklands are in fact British citizens which means that all of them are both living inside British territory and are British citizens, and additionally some 70% are of British descent.

Actually, you haven`t read my question ( or, I haven`t made it clearer): How many British citizens are located there in numbers to go to war for them? 2000-3000? And, Islas Malvinas are a controversial territory, it has a long history of being under different rulers, and to be honest, British have nothing to do with that Island, especially if you look at it from geographic point of view.

Remind me, where is Argentina, British Kingdoms, and where are Islas Malvinas?

[Armenum]

While it is expected that Putin will leave the pro-Russian regions alone (push for some sort of autonomy for them), the question is what will happen with Crimea. Will Russian soldiers stay until a referendum is done that confirms aspirations of independence or annexation? I however sense that the worst of it is over and that tensions will start to slowly diffuse over the weeks.

[Pavlik the Rus]

Everyone have forgot about Kiev for last few days. Everyone so impressed with this self-defence forces, equipped better than RF and Ukraine both.

Meantime "goverment" decided to create "language commission" about rights of russian language in Ukraine. And would you know... There is Irina Farion amongst that four people. She is famous for slogans like "we have 5 millions of russian speaking imbiciles inside the country" and "Liza (short form of Elizabeth) is wrong name. It is created from lick (oh yeaaaahhh, old witch ) Real ukrainean kid must be named with correct names"
Enjoy

My deep appology for NTV channel, but in this time they told everything correctly.
From 0.45 pure nazism.
Dromikates, please, translate it.

Hardly it is a good way to calm down revolts of russian speaking regions. "Goverment"...

[Slaytaninc]

Putin but just reinforce his regime.

Isn't it funny that governments the "West" doesn't like are called "regimes?"

Putin received 63% of the vote in his last election. Even assuming mass voter fraud (which hasn't been proven) 63% is pretty clear. He's the legitimate Russian President. The only thing that might not be legitimate is the constitutional changes but I don't know enough about that.

[Love Mountain]

From 0.45 pure nazism.
Dromikates, please, translate it.

Hardly it is a good way to calm down revolts of russian speaking regions. "Goverment"...

Please stop Pavlik. We need to dedend Ukraine no matter what.

On a more serious note, Russia is no better when it comes to discrimination. Still, Ukranian Russians would be a lot better off wuth Russia.

[DisgruntledGoat]

You obviously do not know about my country`s War for Independence, when we decided to leave Yugoslavia in 1991? History is soo boring is it?

I was unaware that the Balkans were located entirely within Crimea

I did not know that Ukrainian Head Staff share their plans with you.. They probably left this out, or, you went out for a cup of coffee when they were talking about this possibility.

You also just disproved your own argument. Hypothetical arguments present as fact to prove a point due not actually count as facts.

It is an autonomous parliamentary republic, and, it has it`s own Constitution. It can make a descision about it`s future on it`s own.

Correct and incorrect. It is an autonomous republic within Ukraine, subject to the Ukrainian government. Additionally the current Crimean parliament was not elected with the political mandate to just announce secession nor were they given the political mandate to request Russian intervention. Hence the need for democratic process. You see, while ethnic Russians do make up 58% of the population there is this trouble 42% that still get to have say. Not to mention that not all of the 58% may want to secede. Seeing as 54% of Crimeans voted FOR INCLUSION in Ukraine in the last referendum it is an unfair assumption to believe that secession is a forgone conclusion.

I did not say it is similar to Iraq war, my intention was to get an answer why the hell USA/you is making hypocritical statements like: No country can invade or send in troops on another country`s territory without being provoked ? Or similar hypocritical statements..

Did USA had any Americans living in Iraq begging for defence of their lifes, or, had any port/ or military object which they needed to defend?

The hypocritical nature of the US has no bearing on the actions of the Russian Federation in Ukraine. The school yard adage of "well... he did it first" does not apply to international relations and I can be just as outraged at Russia for Ukraine and Georgia as I can be outraged at about the Iraq war. The US or European nations do not have to justify past incidents for Russia's actions to be morally wrong and ethically wrong.

Actually, you haven`t read my question ( or, I haven`t made it clearer): How many British citizens are located there in numbers to go to war for them? 2000-3000? And, Islas Malvinas are a controversial territory, it has a long history of being under different rulers, and to be honest, British have nothing to do with that Island, especially if you look at it from geographic point of view.

Remind me, where is Argentina, British Kingdoms, and where are Islas Malvinas?

See the thing is the Falklands don't just contain ETHNIC-British, they contain actual, passport carrying, tax filing BRITISH CITIZENS. Regardless of their proximity to the UK or Argentina or the history of the islands the fact is that during the Falkland War and at present the island is made up of BRITISH CITIZENS. Citizens who have voted on several occasions to REMAIN British citizens. So, ya.. you don't know what you are talking about.

EDIT: I think I understand now why you don't understand the Falkland thing. See, in places outside of nationalist circles and in particular the Balkans national identity is determined not by geography or historical prominence but by the people themselves through a democratic process that establishes unity. The concept of ethnic countries is absolutely foreign to North Americans and to a growing extent Western Europeans due to growing multiculturalism. Its in part because of this misunderstanding by the multicultural "West" that countries have been so poorly established in the past (see Iraq or India and Pakistan).

[Phalanx300]

If these areas were indeed Russian during the times of the Tsar then yes, let them decide their future. As long as the Soviet lebensraum wont destroy more history and culture.