Ukraine and Russia Developments. Version 2.

[Grobar]

And yet Putin supports putsch leader Sisi.

Muslim Brotherhood terrorizes Christians in Egypt. So Putin should support any government that is good for Christians. That is one of the reasons Asad is supported by Russia because he was always good to ME Christians.

[Mangalore]

People who compare Putin to Hitler ignore several crucial differences between Germany and Russia.

Czechoslovakia and Austria were never in the history of the modern German state that was created by the Prussian Kingdom never had control of either Czechoslovakia or Austria since the Austrian Empire fought Prussia tooth and nail and yet Hitler invaded and took control of both them.

Russia however did have a significant amount of control over most of Ukraine that can date back centuries ago, it's only in the last 24 years that the idea of Ukraine as an independent country has existed.

...

That's a weak argument because you had to slip in the qualifier "modern" to make it work. The German nation was seen until Prussian-Austrian squabbles to be the extension of the German lands in the HRE borders. This included Austria and Czech slovakia since the Middle Ages / its foundation. Austria organized those territories as her German regions as well. It would be easy to argue that the catastrophic conflict between Protestant Prussia and Catholic Austria divided lands that should be united and that was argued in the decades following the formation of the second German empire and up to the end of ww2 by various German groups.


That said the defining issue is whether Ukrainians want to be Russians or not. For all I care they could be 100% ethnical Russians speaking Russians and if they want to live in a country called Ukraine as it was organized under the Soviet Union and at its collapse that would still be the defining factor.
The current reaction pretty much tells anyone that except Eastern Ukraine where you would have to make more in depth soul searching absent guns the Ukrainians want to be Ukrainian and bloody left alone by Putin.

[Love Mountain]

Whatever Mangalore. Don't dumb down this conflict to a question of choice, because it isn't. Whats even more amazing is that Simon thinks that things in Ukraine have magically "changed" since the Maidan. It hasn't even been a bloody year and the corruption is just as fresh as last night.

[Simon Cashmere]

The Putin's invasion of the Ukraine does have some lessons:

1. Never give up nuclear weapons.

2. Don't sit on the fence in a bad neighbourhood, especially when your neighbour is coveting your ass.

It's also a lesson in complacency. Ukrainians aren't so different from westerners, once you get past the language barrier if you don't speak Russian. The difference between things being ok and there being tanks rolling over the border happens very quickly. You must always be prepared, everyone. People in the West think...it will never happen here, who cares. They would be wrong to think that, I am sure that Ukraine, who always considered Russia to be its brother, NEVER would have thought that Ukraine would be invaded by Russia, and yet it is. Your alliances and friends can be changed very quickly. One day you are safe, the next you are fighting for your life. It is a lesson I think for everyone to be vigilant, all the time, and know that the difference between peace and war is a very fine line.

Also, Ukraine could not join NATO, because the people in charge of Ukraine basically since independence and until the revolution were Kremlin stooges. Not all of them in the Supreme Rada, but enough of them so that joining NATO plans went nowhere. While there were some politicians who tried really hard since the 1990s to get Ukraine into NATO, the pro-Russian stooges stopped it. In addition, NATO was not that keen, as they knew it would very much upset Russia. And now, the current 'Premier Minister' or Prime Minister saying he wants to join NATO, well a bit late friend! The rest of NATO is not going to let them while the war with Russia continues.

The best Ukraine can hope for now without massive equipment drops from NATO, is to agree to a ceasefire with Russia, that keeps current lines. The other alternative is to have Russian tanks go all the way to Kiev. Which would not be good. There is still a sense of optimism amongst Ukrainians, very much misplaced, delusional optimism. I agree that if Ukraine had sufficient equipment it could make life very miserable for Russia, and this seems to be a half-hearted invasion by Russia. But in the long term, Russia can keep pouring more reinforcements in which Ukraine at the moment cannot match.

Whats even more amazing is that Simon thinks that things in Ukraine have magically "changed" since the Maidan. It hasn't even been a bloody year and the corruption is just as fresh as last night.

The state run protection rackets squeezing businesses, that is what is gone. And also, cops, SBU (Security Service of Ukraine) are almost friendly these days, none of the attitude you used to get when they dealt with you. The cops just about apologise when they pull you over, and are now scared to ask for bribes when before it happened all the time.

That's the difference - sure - the state civil servants are still corrupt, but they are not leaning on restaurants and store owners to cough up protection money which was what happened before. So that is an improvement. The Supreme Rada is also working with the EU to bring in measures to get rid of judicial corruption, and have earmarked 120 million Euro for this purpose. There is going to be a new body, that investigates corruption.

That said the defining issue is whether Ukrainians want to be Russians or not.

Educated people in the East, ethnic Russians, will privately tell you that they hate Putin, he's mafia, that mafia run Russia, that they hate FSB gangsters. The people who wander around parrotting the Russia Today line are normally really simple people, its a simple truth, easy for them to believe. And as I say, if you are an ethnic Russian, and say to Ukrainians, I support Ukraine, that is not questioned. The supposed persecution of Russians is a myth perpetuated by Putin to justify, much like Hiter did in the Sudentland, the invasion and interference. Without Russian instigation from FSB and GRU, there would be no 'rebels' there probably would not even have been any protests. It was a KGB operation from start to finish.

Someone else, one of the Kremlin typists on here (who are in every forum board) was trying to say how that's not the case, Russian FSB doesn't take businesses away from people or extort them....anyone who knows ANYTHING about Russia knows that this is rampant, and one of the most important things that you can have, is to be well connected enough so that you are left alone, or at least not squeezed too badly. If you have money in Russia, if you have a business in Russia, the Kremlin wants its cut. Or if your business is too good, the Kremlin wants that business completely. You may decide to sell, but if you don't, god help you.

To give you an example of how the agencies of Russia perpetuate hostile takeovers of profitable businesses, take a look at what happened to Osmayev's father (Osmayev was caught in Ukraine plotting allegedly to kill Putin - Ukraine has now refused to extradite him)

The role of Mr Osmayev’s father in the case is intriguing. Aslanbek Osmayev, 52, was the head of Chechnya’s oil resources in the early 1990s, a key source of wealth in a region that was about to undergo more than a decade of bitter warfare. Coming from a background of high-ranking Chechen Communists, he was able to exploit well-placed contacts in the late 1980s, and says he made his “first million” during Perestroika, before the Soviet Union had even collapsed. By 1994 he could afford to send his son Adam to Wycliffe College, a £10,000-per-term school in the Cotswolds, where he took A-levels in 1998.
In 2001, shortly after former rebel Akhmad Kadyrov was installed as leader of the region with the Kremlin’s blessing, he asked Aslanbek Osmayev to return to Grozny and run Chechennefteprodukt, the regional oil company. Working closely with Mr Kadyrov, Mr Osmayev says he fought off attempts from Russian oil companies, backed by elements of the FSB secret services, to seize the region’s assets. “There was a major battle for resources going on between different clans in the FSB, and I was in the middle of it,” he recalls, in a Skype conversation from Tbilisi, Georgia, where he fled after the arrest of his son. “Adam had come back from the UK and he was my right-hand man, we worked together.”

This is what you face in Russia if you have something Kremlin wants. This is what you used to face in Ukraine, if you had something Kremlin wants. Now, you can own your own business, and be profitable, and Kremlin cannot take it and Kremlin goons protected by cops don't come round and heavy you.

Also - just in an update - there is no encirclement. Urzuf is quiet, and OK.

That is one of the reasons Asad is supported by Russia because he was always good to ME Christians.

Russian Kremlin couldn't care whether a million christians are crucified. Putin supports Assad because it is the last Russian foothold in the Middle East.

A hostile takeover in Russia has come to mean the redistribution of a company’s ownership through a combination of legal, illegal, and illegitimate means, including forced bankruptcies, the use of administrative resources, raids by police, tax officers, or government inspectors, and even the violent seizure of documents, assets, offices, and places of business. Such hostile takeovers, also known as “company captures” or “corporate raiding” pose a constant threat to successful Russian entrepreneurs, who must expend a great deal of resources to defend their businesses.

http://www.cipe.org/blog/2009/09/02/.../#.VAHJZWQWxXw

The same thing, happened in Ukraine when Kremlin ran it. Now, this stops after Kremlin goes. This makes Russia very angry, how dare Ukrainians stop this protection racket for the Kremlin. So they want it back. It's really about money, the fact that Putin could put his friends in to rob Ukrainians and Ukrainian businesses, and now, he cannot do this anymore. Forget all this rubbish about NovoRussia etc. It's about money.

Another Kremlin typist on here wanted to tell us about the glorious Russian legal system. A good example of how bent Russia and the Russian legal system is, is the example of Hermitage Capital:

No crime illustrates the state of the legal system better than what is known as "reiderstvo," or raiding -- the takeover of businesses through court rulings and other ostensibly legal means with the help of crooked judges or police. The practice is so widespread that local media have reported what raiders charge: $10,000 to alter a corporate registry, $50,000 to open a criminal case, $300,000 for a court order.

Hermitage, once Russia's largest foreign shareholder with more than $4 billion in holdings, says it encountered a bold variation on reiderstvo: When raiders failed to seize its assets, they looted the Russian treasury instead, then went after the lawyers who caught them.
President Dmitry Medvedev, a lawyer himself, has called "legal nihilism" the main obstacle to growth in Russia and has condemned raiding as "shameful." But neither he nor his government has responded to Hermitage's pleas for help or the protests of the Moscow bar association and international legal groups.

In a statement last month, the Interior Ministry touted its success in solving the tax theft. But the money has not been recovered, nor have any officials been arrested. Prosecutors have charged only a convicted killer named on documents as Hermitage's new owner.

So what happens you see, is in Russia, you might be visited by some people who say, well, you see you have a very nice business here Simon. And, we think, that you should share some profits with us. I tell them, get effed. Then perhaps, you are walking to your car, group of big muscled military types beat the crap out of you and say, start sharing Simon, this is the last warning. If I still persist, suddenly, FSB, police and prosecutor appear kick my door in, grab my computers, say you are under arrest for tax evasion, racketeering, fraud, conspiring against the Russian state. And you are taken away, and charged, and found guilty. Or quietly disappeared. Or perhaps you are visited and told to sell, and the same thing happens if you do not sell.


http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...081203359.html

I know very well what the reality of things is in Russia, and how it used to be in Ukraine but is no longer since the revolution. The trick is though, you have to have something to take. If you have nothing, FSB and police goons are not going to come after you. If you are a nobody, you'd never see this side of Russia.

[conon394]

The UN resolution was for a no-fly zone. it was not for Qatar's special forces to be deployed on the ground while NATO jets provides CAS for the rebels.



The US threatened to launch a full scale aerial campaign against Syria while supporting the rebels and they would have done so had there been the political will among the west to do so.

But not an invasion and only force after a very specific event occurring. You can't ignore thee fact that Obama did almost everything he could to not act even after the red line he clearly hoped would never even come up was crossed.

On Libya well the resolution did more than that and it left the open ended demand for a cease fire. Yes you can argue the US and Europe may or may not have taken a wide view the rules, but they did at least operate mostly within them. Putin did not even try - there is a difference.

[Mangalore]

Whatever Mangalore. Don't dumb down this conflict to a question of choice, because it isn't. ...

So you don't want that because you have no arguments is what you are saying?

My point about choice is that historic claims are hogwash to begin with. If someone isn't Russian anymore and he wants to stay non-Russian then he should stay non-Russian. Putin and various posters here don't like that which is why Putin is on the wrong side of history whatever nonsense he says in Russia. That doesn't change the reality of force of arms, it however reveals why Putin needs force of arms to rescue his failing worldview.

[Geronimo2006]

Poll from Levada Centre. Gullible Russians still do not believe Russia is fighting in Ukraine. When asked would they support Putin if he did attack Ukraine, support has fallen from 74% in March to 41% now. 43% are opposed.

No wonder Putin is trying to close it down under the foreign agents law.





Meanwhile Russian Yabloko politician from the Pskov regional parliament has been beaten up after report on secret soldier burials.

[Seether]

@Geronimo

A Russian politician said on Saturday he had been badly beaten after publicising the mysterious funerals of two soldiers who may have died while fighting in Ukraine.
A Kremlin spokesman has said that the relevant authorities will look into the reports about the soldiers' burials.

"We have top men looking into it."
"Who?"
"Top men."

[wulfgar610]

The Rebels show how it is done. You shell to soften up the defenses and then you go in and take the town. The Ukrainian governments mindless shelling of Luhansk and Donetsk became pointless after the first 3 days (unless ethnic cleansing is the program).

Meanwhile the Western Hyena's view any Russian action done to protect ethnic Russian's as illegitimate.

[Simon Cashmere]

Meanwhile Russian Yabloko politician from the Pskov regional parliament has been beaten up after report on secret soldier burials.

This is what happens in gangster 'democracy.' Lucky he is not a journalist, or he would be dead.

[Salvatorel]

The worse explanation i've ever heard. If they need to hide their marks and numbers, then they will use green paint.
Usage of white stripes is dumbest move here - their own troops can hit them.

Not when these tanks are covering exactly these troops and they have radio contact with them,as for green paint,well,when you just have to hide marks and numbers you'll use any paint you have and exact color won't be relevant.

Yeah, paranoic thing indeed. The same as oposite opinion about any pro-russian source. You know all that people are looneys
But you are not the same. You have opened eyes (you see that my post was about 3 (three) articles) and clear mind to understand that it's allmost imposible to get real information in conditions of informational war. All sides in this conflict uses most powerfull weapon - mass media.

If all the sources are biased and useless and neither you,nor me or someone else can prove anything,why are you wasting your time posting here?

Information from social networks . Unlimited sources of parts to create real story with photoes of real names, as fake-creators done before countless times. And does accounts are so secured, that it is impossible to hack it?
I've read link few times, i thought that i missed something, but nothing. Single mourning picture dated 28 march 2014. Looks like your knoledge in russian language dropping badly.

Then I wonder if all these profiles are fake,these people don't exist,etc Why didn't Russian media play a trick like this - where Russian general supposedly killed in Syria personally denied his death on TV?
http://www.ntv.ru/novosti/319303/
If there was nothing to hide,Russian media would be first to interview and show soldiers claimed dead to the world,they didn't and... Even worse - Lev Shlosberg - member of local assembly of Pskov region,who started talking about secret burials of Pskov soldiers,got attacked,why?
http://www.fontanka.ru/2014/08/30/001/
But what I am asking? your answer will be that nobody goes to a meeting scheduled on 22.45 to do something decent and lawful or similar BS.

I do not speak polish. I request a translation.

Or more correctly - you prefer seeing it in Cyrilic,not a problem - быдло

[ElvenKind]

This is what happens in gangster 'democracy.'

Being beaten up in gangster democracy ( ukrainian parliament )..

[Condottiere 40K]

I remember the Taiwanese having fistfights in parliament, and when the CCP invades the island, I think I do know who's more democratic.

[Mangalore]

The Rebels show how it is done. You shell to soften up the defenses and then you go in and take the town. The Ukrainian governments mindless shelling of Luhansk and Donetsk became pointless after the first 3 days (unless ethnic cleansing is the program).
...

Actually the way it is done by your reckoning is running to your big brother and ask him to beat up the other side. The rebels could have done jackshit if not for Russian marterial, artillery strikes and tank assaults. To claim that shows competence is "questionable". The Iraqi security forces were awesome each time the US was the one doing the fighting as well. The only reason the Ukrainians couldn't do that were the Russian reinforcements, be it in tanks and guns or their own soldiers.

[Deepstrike101]

Educated people in the East, ethnic Russians, will privately tell you that they hate Putin, he's mafia, that mafia run Russia, that they hate FSB gangsters. The people who wander around parrotting the Russia Today line are normally really simple people, its a simple truth, easy for them to believe. And as I say, if you are an ethnic Russian, and say to Ukrainians, I support Ukraine, that is not questioned. The supposed persecution of Russians is a myth perpetuated by Putin to justify, much like Hiter did in the Sudentland, the invasion and interference. Without Russian instigation from FSB and GRU, there would be no 'rebels' there probably would not even have been any protests. It was a KGB operation from start to finish.

Well I suppose going to one of the world's top universities and majoring in computer science makes me simple. My cousin who is a software engineer in Crimea and joined the militia there until the referendum must also be simple. My father, who is a software engineer in California and received perfect grades from the Moscow Aerospace Institute, must also be a simple man. My mother, who graduated from a top university in Uzbekistan with a degree in psychology and later earned a perfect 4.0 in California to get a nursing degree must also be simple. My grandparents, 3 of whom are teachers with a university education and one of whom was a WW2 lieutenant who served first in the Russian airforce and then the artillery (when the airforce's planes were bombed in the lightning assault in the first days of the war) must also be simple.

You are so full of and your statements are all bullcrap. I come from a highly educated family, and have lived both in Russia, Crimea, and California. Go try and sell your about uneducated simpleton Russians to someone who actually is an uneducated simpleton. Maybe they might believe you.

You have failed to back up a single thing you brought up with facts, and every point you try to make goes directly against what my entire family and all of my Russian friends have known to be true for our lives. It also goes against any impartial evidence. So far, your argument has included dismissing solid, impartial, evidence, replacing it with ridiculous misinformation, and making claims with no evidence of your own. You post such as "only uneducated Russians support Putin" or "Russians live in poverty." I have already destroyed these claims with evidence but you continue to post them. Until you at least make the slightest effort to back up your claims, I will view you as a troll. Here are a few places to start:

-Prove the courts are corrupt, despite being a branch entirely separate from Putin, with checks and balances and a randomly selected jury.

-Prove there are no trials.

-Prove businesses are being approached by corrupt officials demanding money, despite the Anti-Money Laundering Initiative and Anti-Corruption Act 2014-2015.

-Prove people are arrested for politically disagreeing with Putin, other than during riots or "blocking traffic".

-Prove people are killed by the government.

-Prove that Russians live in poverty despite only 13.1% living below the poverty line, compared to 15.1% of Americans. (in case you forgot, your claim was "majority of Russians live in poverty")

-Prove that there is a wide income gap in Russia, despite the top 20% and the next 60% having the same GDP income, and compare it to the top 1% having the same GDP income as the next 99% in the USA.

-Prove that despite checks and balances, Putin controls both the parliament and the court system.

-Prove that Putin is not democratically elected and does not have popular support.

-Prove Putin has been syphoning money from Ukraine.

-Prove Putin has been syphoning money from Russia.

-Prove people are being arrested for no reason.

If you can offer reasonable statistical and factual proof (ie, not your opinion or rumors) then I might stop viewing you as a troll.

[Condottiere 40K]

The USAF should loan the Ukrainians their A-10s.

They don't want them anyway, since they'll supposedly get wiped out in a modern battlefield environment, and this seems the perfect scenario to prove that thesis.

[Deepstrike101]

The USAF should loan the Ukrainians their A-10s.

They don't want them anyway, since they'll supposedly get wiped out in a modern battlefield environment, and this seems the perfect scenario to prove that thesis.

I don't think we should be loaning Ukraine anything. Especially anything which gives them the ability to drop even more bombs on civilian areas. Russia would also see this as further escalation on part of the USA. That having been said, they would be very vulnerable to modern SAMs and possibly to MANPADS, too, due to their slow speed. Against MANPADS at least you can hope flares might save you, but things like proper SAMs would be very dangerous against low altitude, slow flying, aircraft.

Concerning the Ukrainians though, even MANPADs are enough to shoot down their assault aircraft and helicopters. My father, who used to be a mig pilot in the Russian airforce before he left to become a software engineer and move to California, said that a lot of the Ukrainian aircraft are being shot down by MANPADS because the pilots are inexperienced. He says MANPADS are not incredibly difficult to evade for a good pilot. If that is the case, A-10s won't give Ukraine much more than their current aircraft can offer, and would also require a long amount of time for the pilots to train to use them. Aircraft are not just assault rifles or cars. They are complex, and each one is very different. It takes time to adjust to a new one, and even more time to learn to use it effectively.

[Costin_Razvan]

The US won't allow anyone to buy A-10s, including Israel. You think they'll sell them to Ukraine?

Ukraine has lost already a dozen if not two dozen SU-25s which are close to durability as an A-10.

Deepstrike: Among Russian intelectuals, which you say you are part of, how is Putin viewed and how is the direction he is taking the country in viewed?

[Pavlik the Rus]

A nail to the coffin of the story about "russian T-72 with Kontakt-5 exclusive ERA"

Salvatorel, what marks was hidden under that stripes, can you point me?
Or probably you will be fair and admit, that your explanation does not work.

If all the sources are biased and useless and neither you,nor me or someone else can prove anything,why are you wasting your time posting here?

A lot of reasons. I try to find real information in web to get full image of situation. But still, i do not have it.

Then I wonder if all these profiles are fake,these people don't exist,etc Why didn't Russian media play a trick like this - where Russian general supposedly killed in Syria personally denied his death on TV?
http://www.ntv.ru/novosti/319303/
If there was nothing to hide,Russian media would be first to interview and show soldiers claimed dead to the world,they didn't and...

I guess that you will agree with me, that if those people non exists, then they can not give interview to press. If they exist, then i have a same question.
I do not know all answers to this.
I know for sure one thing - same stories created by one female criminal in Stavropol' region and US's agent organization in S.-Petersburgh. This two aspects causes suspicion in my mind.

PS In the name to avoid some part of your future senceless posting. I do not trust RF state's media as well.

[Papay]

Pro-rebel sources continue to claim that cities and towns west of Mariupol are being "liberated". I am surprised that there is no mention of this in other media. Could it be propaganda?