Revealed - Same Maidan Snipers Killed Police & Protesters

Those Maidan nationalists act like Nazi, indeed. Some even have Nazi insignia. Yanukovich was a greedy creep and he deserved what he got. Perhaps, he should be jailed. Nevertheless, the new so-called "coalition" government began with talking about reforming language in the country, not with reforming economy. They have appointed millionaires as governors of several provinces. Now, Crimea is no longer Ukraine. It is going to be a part of Russia. Ukrainian nationalists are stupid and they got what they asked for.

 

Putin is not a nice ruler of Russia, but in his foreign policy he is very smart. He is better for Russia then most of leaders of countries in EU. KGB is dead now and so is the Soviet Union and Putin's past is irrelevant to what is going on today. National interests of Russia dictate what Putin is doing now. Unfortunately, current events play in hands of Putin and, in effect, help his not so democratic policy inside Russia. This should change with the next president in Russia, but now, we have to deal with Putin.

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They may be secure, but they do not want to use Ukrainian language. They have their own language and culture and they love it. Is it enough?

 

Come on, Russia is a multinational country. Ukrainians have never been discriminated against at all and at any level of social structure or administration. Besides, there are plenty of ethnic Ukrainians who do not share nationalistic fervor coming from Catholic western end of their country. Even in the former Soviet Union Ukrainians were particularly numerous among army officers and in the Communist Party leadership all over the country. This is why Russians are so sensitive to Ukrainian nationalists now. Memories after WWII are still fresh in that part of the world. USA played a great role in defeating Nazi Germany, but Americans never had any part of their country occupied by Nazi. Ukrainians and Russians have much closer experience in what Stephan Bandera did. Both Ukrainians and Russians suffered under Communist rule. Unfortunately, Obama administration is totally unaware of what those people feel and think.

 

Oh - then you mean Academi (formerly Blackwater and Xe Services). They're under new management, hence the name change:
http://academi.com/

Highly unlikely, but that's an interesting prospect. If that happened, my money would be all over the boys at Academi...

 

I agree with much of what you say here, but I don't think Russia will be free of Putin after the next president is elected. I fully expect he'll lurk around in a kingmaker capacity much like Efraín Ríos Montt did in Guatemala...

 

The U.S. loved Yeltsin, because he helped them turn Russia into a nothing state by robbing it of all its assets. The people were even going hungry while Clinton laughed and then Putin came along. Russia is now a power to be reckoned with again, the only problem is what will happen when Putin is not around. Is there anyone strong enough to replace him, or will the U.S. & E.U. make inroads again into Russia and tear it apart for their own geo political ambitions?

 

Post it on the thread then if you dare. It's off topic here.. Identify the good guy rebels for start. Quit posting "nuh uh" type responses though.

 

Correct and it also explains why Yeltsin's domestic popularity rating was low but was high in the West, while the reverse is the case in relation to Putin.

 

Clinton laughed?

Clinton didn't care enough to laugh. He was too busy playing Cigar Afficonado with White House interns.

As for Russia, it's a second-rate power that is only capable of bullying its weaker neighbors. I'm sure it will survive Vlad the Invader just fine - the Russian people are amazingly resilient folks. If they can survive the USSR they can survive just about anything, including ultra-nationalist fascists like Putin...

 

Does anyone else find it strange that Obama would slap visa restrictions against pro-Russian opponents to the new Ukraine government in Kiev, after the pro E.U government took it over by force? This must be our new conceptual norms on what constitutes democracy and what doesn't? Seems to me it's an 'it's us or nothing,' mentality.

I find this strangely reminiscent of the Russian revolution in which freedom of the press was emphasized before the revolution in order to use it against the Tsar, and then taken away by the Bolsheviks when they were in power, so it couldn't be used against them.

Have we now become what the Soviet Union was?

 

Sorry, yes, strictly speaking you are correct. Groups of mercenaries - dressed in civilian clothes and carrying bulky packs - arrived at Kiev airport, from whence they are being sent to Odessa, in the south-east Black sea coast and close to the Crimea. They are reported to be employees of Greystone Ltd, a subsidiary of Academi (Fornerly Blackwater)

http://www.voltairenet.org/article182499.html
http://toinformistoinfluence.com/2014/03/02/report-blackwater-in-ukraine/

 

Such flowery and crudely partisan language demonizing the 'other', overlooks the uncomfortable and inconvenient fact that the 'good guys' also invade and occupy. In this excellent piece, the Guardian's Seamus Milne highlights this hypocrisy and duplicity with reference to the current crisis unfolding in Crimea and Ukraine:

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/mar/05/clash-crimea-western-expansion-ukraine-fascists

The reality is that much of the Western corporate and mainstream news narrative, fed for the benefit of propaganda sponges, is largely false.
The problem is that falsehoods are perpetuated that begin with false premises. When the original premise begins with falsehoods, the rest of the narrative will naturally be based on the original falsehoods. This is common practice with Western media outlets, since most of the smaller outlets take their cue from the bigger outlets. Its nearly impossible to decipher any shred of truth from Western corporate news sources. Hypocrisy largely goes unnoticed by the public. This equates to upholding the illusion of "exceptionalism", which means having no sense of shame for anything the 'good guys' do either at home or abroad. "Bad news" is never put into perspective and connections to past events are rarely, if ever, explored. "Bad news" regarding America is nearly always disregarded as unfortunate.

With that in mind, and despite some misgivings I have in terms of some of the detail, the Paul Craig Roberts piece below is refreshingly free of the kind of false propaganda and dissembling language common to much of the commentary we have come to expect in these kinds of political crisis:

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article37856.htm#idc-cover

This video is a comprehensive exploration of what has been happening in the Ukraine both leading up to and since the violence in Kiev began in late November 2013:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zZNYkCvOhG4

Following the violent ousting of the democratically elected government in Mid-February 2014 (an election certified as 'free and fair' by all international observers), the legal basis on which Russia rests its position and reaction to those events is threefold:

1. Yanukovych remains the only constitutionally constituted legal representative of the Ukraininan State.

2. The Kiev vote which claims to have deposed him was made by a rump of its 450 elected members (the remainder having fled to their Eastern constituencies in fear for their lives), acting outside its standing orders with no quorum and with those members who did vote doing so under threat of violence by armed men inside the parliament chamber - in other words under duress.

3. Russian forces of up to 27,000 personnel are authorised, by treaty with the legal Ukrainian State, to be present in the Crimea and to conduct the operational maneuvers Russia deems necessary to protect the Black Sea Fleet naval base at Sevastopol.

As of 3 March 2014, Russia claims not to have imported any personnel not authorised under the treaty and, in the absence of a legal authority in Kiev, to have merely undertaken patrolling activities requested of it by the legally elected authorities in Crimea itself.

Russia also claims that it has been requested in writing by Yanukovych to use its military to restore legal authority to Ukraine.

http://en.itar-tass.com/russia/721881

As one of the contributors to the video says: an apt analogy for the respective Russian and US actions since the crisis began is that " Russia is playing chess while the US is playing poker and American football - bluffing brute force with a pair of sevens". President Putin is calling the US bluff and it is to be hoped that the West really IS bluffing because Putin certainly isn't.

There is a credible alternative interpretation of unfolding events in the Ukraine, authoritatively voiced by Professor Francis Boyle. It is that, based on extensive experience of its earlier 'colour' and 'Arab Spring' revolutions, the whole situation has been VERY thoroughly gamed by the US-NATO and that Russia has done nothing that was not clearly foreseen and allowed for:

"I suspect this entire Ukraine Crisis had been war-gamed and war planned quite some time ago at the highest levels of US/NATO. Notice DOD slipped 2 US warships into the Black Sea just before the Olympics under a patently absurd pretext. In other words, what we are seeing unfold here is a US/NATO War Plan. They instigated the fascist coup against Yanukovich. They anticipated that Putin would then respond by taking over Crimea.

I suspect the US/NATO/EU response will be to introduce military forces into Western Ukraine and Kiev and thus make Ukraine a de facto member of NATO, which has been their objective all along. They have already anticipated what Putin’s next move after that will be. Notice also the massive anti-Russian campaign by the Western News Media working in lock-step with each other. Another sign that all this has been planned well in advance.

I suspect that US/NATO/EU figure that Putin knows they have this offensive, first-strike strategic nuclear capability with a rudimentary ABM/BMD capability so that at the end of the day he will be forced to stand down—or else. Compellence as opposed to Deterrence. Just like during the Cuban Missile Crisis. That is where this US/NATO/EU War Plan is heading on the assumptions that they can keep their deliberate Escalation Dominance under their control and that at the end of the day Putin will be forced to stand down just like Khrushchev did and for the same reasons. That would leave US/NATO/EU in control of at least half of Ukraine as a de facto NATO member state":

https://wikispooks.com/wiki/Francis_Boyle

 

Here is another very good piece:

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/feb/28/ukraine-genuine-revolution-tackle-corruption

 

Thanks, trout.

Very interesting. Unfortunately I can't corroborate those reports, but I wouldn't be surprised if they were true.

Incidentally, the source is wrong about Greystone - it is not a subsidiary or affiliate of Academi. Like Dyncorp (and Academi), it is an independent military contractor based here in Virginia.

 

Attaboy.

 

I'm overlooking nothing, trout, and that goes for Vlad the Invader's naked aggression in Georgia six years ago.

Personally, I can understand Russia's ties and claims to Crimea. I have no reason to recognize the artificial borders that the Soviets established within the USSR decades ago. However, the Russians did make an agreement to respect Ukraine's territorial integrity and they should make good on their word.

Furthermore, I think Ukraine would be better off in the long run if it wasn't plagued with the problems associated with possessing a territory that is historically Russian and inhabited predominantly by ethnic Russians. Furthermore, if Ukraine does want to join NATO, the existence of this territorial dispute within its borders would prevent that country from qualifying to join the alliance. Ironically, Putin's moves in Georgia and Ukraine are making it easier for these two countries to become the newest members of NATO.

 

Hmmm! Then why were the Americans, Poles, Germans, Lithuanians in Kiev encouraging the gangsters, oops I mean protesters when they set the police and their city on fire? Oh that's right, Kiev is our American version of 'democracy' and rights of the people. As for Russia, if it's such a second rate power, then why is the E.U. and U.S. so afraid of it?

Oh I didn't realize it was Vladimir Putin on the Maidan, and here I though it was McCain and Nuland. Thanks for setting me straight on that. Maybe I should start watching more CNN, BBC and Fox so I'll know what's really going on in this world.

The Russians did survive the USSR and the American invasion and thievery afterwards, now let's see if the Americans will survive their own Soviet renewal, complete with a controlled press, lack of religious freedom, oppression of dissenters, mockery of traditional values, emphasis on consumption, etc., etc.

 

Ask yourself this question: How many countries has Russia invaded since you were born? How many countries has the US invaded since you were born?

 

If it transpires that Russia has indeed broken the terms of its treaty with the legally constituted Ukrainian state then Putin's actions would, as you infer, be correctly regarded as an illegal invasion and as such Putin's actions would be totally and utterly unacceptable. But, to my knowledge, as things stand, that is by no means as certain as I initially thought it was.

The Western media narrative regarding Russia's intervention in Georgia in 2008 was equally as misleading and hypocritical as the current crisis. Journalists kept a straight face as they communicated George Bush's demand that "Russia's government must respect Georgia's territorial integrity and sovereignty." (http://afp.google.com/article/ ALeqM5i2LdnLHTyJgB2Ng8VSQyMQ3eMVrw) Few felt inclined to mention the small matter of Bush's own invasion of sovereign Iraq, or the US-driven separation of Kosovo from sovereign Serbia.

Gordon Brown, proud 'liberator' of Iraq, somehow avoided choking on his own hypocrisy as he insisted: "when Russia has a grievance over an issue such as South Ossetia, it should act multilaterally by consent rather than unilaterally by force."
(http://www.guardian.co.uk/ commentisfree/2008/aug/31/russia.georgia)

Occasional mentions have been made of the fact that the largest pipeline between the Black Sea and the Caspian oil fields and Europe is the 1.2 million barrels a day BP Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan (BTC) line that passes through Georgia, and which happens to be the only pipeline not under Russian control. The Christian Science Monitor described the politics of the pipeline:

"The $4 billion BTC pipeline, managed by and 30 percent owned by British Petroleum, was routed through Georgia to avoid sending Caspian oil through Iran, Afghanistan and Pakistan, or Russia. A 10-mile pipeline could have connected Caspian oil to the well-developed Iranian pipeline system." (http://www.csmonitor.com/2008/0816/p14s01-cogn.html)

In 2000, Bill Clinton described the pipeline as "the most important achievement at the end of the twentieth century." (http://www.wsws.org/articles/2000/may2000/geor-m02.shtml)

Securing this "achievement" involved intense US efforts to manipulate Georgian political and military elites. The US and France are the main suppliers of Georgia's military, but the prime US ally, Israel, has also supplied some $200 million worth of equipment in the eight years from 2000. This has included remotely piloted drones, rockets, night-vision equipment, electronic systems, and training by former senior Israeli officers.

Read more here:

http://www.medialens.org/index.php/...south-ossetia-and-the-political-pipeline.html

 

Not sure what any of this has to do with Clinton's preoccupations while the Harvard boys were running amok in the former-USSR back in the '90s.

I can't speak for the toothless EU, which is heavily dependent on Russian commodities, but who's afraid of Russia in the USA? Obama?

I'm not sure what this red herring has to do with anything I said, either, but it appears that you finally got around to addressing something I actually said here:

I didn't vote for the nihilistic neo-socialist "progressives" who are currently attempting to "fundamentally transform" my country, Jenny, but your question is a valid one. Our "Soviet renewal" will lead us down the same path to economic and social ruin that the USSR's socialists led their country down. Everything depends on whether or not the American people wake up before it's too late. The outcome of the 2012 presidential elections doesn't inspire much faith, but hope springs eternal...

 

So our State Department is not as stupid as I thought they were according to the author, and that the loss of Crimea and half of Ukraine was planned all along. Well we do have a habit of splitting nations up, I mean isn't that what Russia has been fighting against in Syria, a break up of the country by the U.S. for our geo political interests? So much for our respect for international borders, but then again we did bomb Serbia under the pretext of 'genocide' in order to rip away Kosovo? Wasn't our controlled media going wild then as well...especially CNN? Notice how Clinton's war with Serbia is never brought up? So much for freedom of the press.

 

Read this:

http://www.medialens.org/index.php/...south-ossetia-and-the-political-pipeline.html

 

I would agree that there's plenty of bias, propaganda and noise going around right now and it was the same way back in 2008. Interestingly enough, lazy Western journalists and their sloppy reporting actually served the narrative that the Kremlin sold to justify invading its insolent southern neighbor who didn't want to live under its revanchist boot. There was little reported on how the South Ossetians started the war by shelling Georgian positions with artillery that was banned under the existing ceasefire agreement and equally little reporting on how the 58th Army just "happened" to be ready to roll through the Roki Tunnel at the very moment Putin manufactured the pretext he needed to justify invading that country.

As I said earlier, I don't recognize the artificial political constructs that the Soviets created decades ago, but that doesn't mean that the Ukrainian people should be forced to serve as the Kremlin's vassals now or in the future. All one can hope for at the moment is that after all of this upheaval is over the region and its residents will be better off in the long run for it. Clearly, the status quo leaves a lot to be desired.

 

the important difference being the US didn't invade with the intent to permanently annex the territory...only Russia and Israel have done that, which is where the hypocrisy with the USA lies...Russia will pretend to negotiate but has no intention of ever leaving just as Israel has no intention of ever leaving the occupied territories....if it wished it to happen the USA could quickly pressure Israel to leave...

 

You are simply wrong, Talon. South Ossetia didn't start the war. The initial attack was undertaken by the Georgian's. It was this fact that the media ignored. Also ignored were the consequences for the people of South Ossetia resulting from this initial attack. In fact Georgian forces had bombed the South Ossetian capital, Tskhinvali, for 72 hours. An August 20 article in the Times reported how a "makeshift operating table lay under a weak lightbulb in the corridor of a dank basement that smelt strongly of excrement." Dina Zhakarova, a doctor in South Ossetia, commented:

"This is where we had to try to save people's lives. The whole place was a sea of blood while the Georgians were bombing our hospital." (http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/ news/world/europe/article4568945.ece)

Dr Zhakarova described how staff had treated more than 250 people underground after the Georgian Army's assault, adding:

"All the staff gave blood for the patients because there were so many wounded. The Georgians knew very well that this was a hospital, so how could they say that we are their fellow citizens when they were firing rockets at us? It's nonsense."

Such commentary was vanishingly rare.