Ukraine and Endless War for Profit

[anthony]

A "whataboutism".

Question is, does `even` an autocratic leader and country have the right to pre-emptive action for its self protection from another?

And if the two countries' leaders and governments have only shades of moral grey, between them?

I don't know.

When it was the Evil Empire against the good nation, black against white - there was no doubt then: an invasion and overthrow of the Cuban state acting as nearby proxy for the belligerent Soviet threat, would have been generally hailed as necessary and good ( I can vaguely remember) and objectively so.

This avid anti-nuke author draws the comparison with the Cuban crisis. Written just before Russia invaded Ukraine, he presciently suggests ways to de-escalate matters with negotiation. I haven't any confidence in the UN's peacekeeping, though.

The secret Turkey angle of the JFK-NK deal isn't widely known today, I reckon. ("The Shell Game", the excellent novel by Douglas Terman came to mind). Khruschev got what he wanted.

 

What the Cuban Missile Crisis can teach us about today’s Ukraine crisis | IPPNW peace and health blog

PEACEANDHEALTHBLOG.COM

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Commentators on the current Ukraine crisis have sometimes compared it to the Cuban missile crisis.  This is a good comparison―and not only...

 

[Peter]

3 hours ago, anthony said:

And if the two countries' leaders and governments have only shades of moral grey, between them?

I don't know.

The millions of innocent civilians nor the military or government in Ukraine, did not invade Russia. So which country is more evil? At least Ukraine's leader won their version of Dancing With The Stars. Lame joke? Can you imagine Putin being a comedian? I think Putin could do a good imitation of Josef Stalin.

And I suppose there are variations of the initiation of force . . . Like the initiation of more force? Once again, Russia does not have millions of civilians, half of who are children, fleeing for their lives. Ukraine is not bombing or shelling Russia. To say Ukraine and Russia are equally evil is absurd.    

[anthony]

12 hours ago, Peter said:

The millions of innocent civilians nor the military or government in Ukraine, did not invade Russia. So which country is...   

From another angle, they did. And did try. The several years-long assault by Kyiv on the eastern regions, denying the Russian-Ukrainians their self-determination, what do you call that? A conflict not reported over-much that I've seen on the media. (The MSM's notion of "History" goes back about one year). Why confuse viewers with complex, nuanced info?

I have asked: who draws the borders? Are they set in stone, never to be negotiated by people living there?

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

1 hour ago, Peter said:

The millions of innocent civilians nor the military or government in Ukraine, did not invade Russia. So which country is more evil?

Peter,

What would you feel if South Korea invaded North Korea and millions of North Koreans made a run for the border?

Would you feel the same moral outrage against South Korea that you feel against Russia? Would your arguments be the same? Would South Korea be a more evil country than North Korea?

The fact is, many of the same things that happen in North Korea have been perpetrated in Ukraine by the Ukrainian government against the Russian part (called the Donbas region). Not to the same extent, but just as deadly. Deaths galore. What's more, they do it back.

These two parts hate each other.

In the middle of this, the most corrupt of our politicians go there to feed at the embezzlement pig troughs. Not for a little money. For gobs and gobs and gobs of money.

When the Iron Curtain fell, many gigantic Russian companies (oil, gas, electricity, mines, and so on) got privatized. That's when the oligarchs were created. These are ex-KGB people and others just as nasty. They worked things so they could "legally" buy major Russian companies for very little money, a thousandth of the price, things like that. And where did they do their monkey-shines to pull this off "legally"?

Ukraine.

You won't read about any of this in the mainstream press. But the fact is, Ukraine had a duly elected government and the CIA went in and did one of its regime change operations in 2014. Do you agree with the US government funding violence in foreign countries to effect regime change? Isn't that a form of invasion?

I'm not justifying what Putin did, which I am against. But I understand why he did it. And it's not for the reasons painted in the Western mainstream press.

 

But wait. There's more!

Do you know how Putin managed to fund his invasion of Ukraine?

Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden got him the money.

Uranium One. Nord Stream pipeline. God knows what else. And they knew he would use it to invade Ukraine (or worse) when they did it. But they didn't care. They got filthy stinking rich (richer) doing this.

So who's more evil? Putin or the people who gave him a lot of money through corruption schemes knowing what he would do with it?

In fact, why does there have to be "more evil" in that? Why can't they both be just as evil? Why does there have to be a more evil country between Russia and Ukraine? 

In a list I have seen going around of the most corrupt countries in the world, Ukraine is listed No. 4 and Russia No. 7. This corruption is not just internal. It involves these countries doing embezzlement schemes with people the world over, including USA politicians and their cronies.

Michael

[Abiding Dude]

11 minutes ago, anthony said:

From another angle, they did. And did try. The several years-long assault by Kyiv on the eastern regions, denying the Russian-Ukrainians their self-determination, what do you call that? A conflict not reported over-much that I've seen on the media. The MSM's notion of "History" goes back one year. Why confuse viewers with nuanced info?

I have asked: who draws the borders? Are they set in stone, never to be negotiated by people living there?

Exactly! I mean, think about the German-hating victors who included all those German speakers in the Sudetenland inside Czechoslovakia in 1918. They made up a quarter of the population of Czechoslovakia. It sure is a good thing the West agreed with Hitler in 1938 that they needed to be returned to the pan-German state instead of leaving them bereft of ethnic "self"-determination inside a foreign ethnicity. Solved that problem for al time, instead of creating a world war like those stubborn Ukrainians are doing.

[Peter]

I know the "situation" is complex. I know it is wrapped in history. But Russia is now murdering innocents and making light of it. They are invading and taking over an entire country. Ukraine is not doing that. Even if a Ukrainian caveman wacked a Russian neanderthal on the head, once upon a time. Wars start, when the latest war starts and I think it has been going on for a month. But I don't even think of it as a war . . . . It is a barbaric invasion and murder. Russia invaded Ukraine. Russia slaughtered civilians. Russia is threatening to use chemical weapons. Russia is threatening Nato and America with nuclear war. Russia is violating human rights.

Biden has said we will not put boots on the ground . . . of Ukraine . . . but is Putin capable of having a step two and three invasion / expansion plan? Is he evilly capable of that? I think so. So who is our enemy? Russia or Ukraine. Who should we "morally support.?  What do Russia and Ukraine's neighbors think? What does the free world think? The free world is on the side of Ukraine, the country being brutally destroyed.  

[Abiding Dude]

1 hour ago, Michael Stuart Kelly said:

You won't read about any of this in the mainstream press. But the fact is, Ukraine had a duly elected government and the CIA went in and did one of its regime change operations in 2014. Do you agree with the US government funding violence in foreign countries to effect regime change? Isn't that a form of invasion?

Actually, protests started throughout Ukraine in November 2013, called the Euromaidan movement. Why did they protest? Because the duly elected Parliament had voted overwhelmingly to closer ties with Western Europe, but the president, Yanukovich (who was at the time declared the most corrupt world leader by Transparency International), and his government rejected their demands and chose a pro-Russian position instead. The protests turned violent and Yanukovich finally fled to Russian territory (since they liked the cut of his jib) and the next day was stripped of the title of president by Parliament, 328 of 447 members. So what in that was the doing of the CIA? Is it your position that the Ukrainians had no agency in any of this process and that it was all the malign doings of the CIA?

[Abiding Dude]

2 hours ago, Michael Stuart Kelly said:

Peter,

What would you feel if South Korea invaded North Korea and millions of North Koreans made a run for the border?

Would you feel the same moral outrage against South Korea that you feel against Russia? Would your arguments be the same? Would South Korea be a more evil country than North Korea?

The fact is, many of the same things that happen in North Korea have been perpetrated in Ukraine by the Ukrainian government against the Russian part (called the Donbas region). Not to the same extent, but just as deadly. Deaths galore. What's more, they do it back.

I see, so minority ethnicities have every right to invite in foreign armies seeking to protect their rights, as Russia did on the Donbas, and as Hitler did in the Sudentenland. It is wrong to ban political parties supporting dismembering the state to join an outside state, as Ukraine did recently and as Czechoslovakia did when it banned the Nazi Party. A willing tool of Russia like Medvedchuk and a tool of Hitler like Henlein, leader of the Sudentenland autonomy movement, are right and good and Benes and Zelenskyy are bad bad bad. After all, all Hitler wanted was pan-German unity (he said so himself!); all Putin wants is pan-Russian unity (he said so himself!). And by your argument, then, Czechoslovakia and Nazi Germany were equally evil.

[Abiding Dude]

4 hours ago, Michael Stuart Kelly said:

Do you know how Putin managed to fund his invasion of Ukraine?

Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden got him the money.

Uranium One. Nord Stream pipeline. God knows what else. And they knew he would use it to invade Ukraine (or worse) when they did it. But they didn't care. They got filthy stinking rich (richer) doing this.

So they knew Putin would invade Ukraine and didn't care. Yet in the post starting this thread, you wrote, "Now Biden is tanking in the polls and his butt is owned by oligarchs and others in Ukraine (especially from his son's corrupt ventures). So what better way to solve it all than a sudden war for profit?...To make it look good, they have been antagonizing Russia to try to goad Putin into overreacting. Then they can send in American troops and look justified."

On 15 February, you wrote, "What a big fake nothing-burger...This is a Biden machine PR stunt and not much more."

So did Biden know Putin would invade Ukraine and didn't care, or did he have to make up lots of lies to make him do it because there was no way he'd have done it otherwise?

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

5 hours ago, Peter said:

Biden has said we will not put boots on the ground . . . of Ukraine . . .

Peter,

Unless the MAGA people manage to stop him, hold his beer and watch...

What do you think the uproar is all about?

The game for his machine is endless war for profit, not human rights, good and evil, not any of that.

And, yes, he lies...

 

MAGA people (hell, Americans in general who are not in the predator class) are sick and tired of watching their kids slaughtered in foreign wars so people in the Washington cocktail crowd never run out of goodies...

Michael

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

2 hours ago, Abiding Dude said:

So did Biden know Putin would invade Ukraine and didn't care, or did he have to make up lots of lies to make him do it because there was no way he'd have done it otherwise?

AD,

Yes.

And more.

All sides.

Consistency with these assholes is no object.

Michael

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

4 hours ago, Abiding Dude said:

So what in that was the doing of the CIA? Is it your position that the Ukrainians had no agency in any of this process and that it was all the malign doings of the CIA?

AD,

Here in O-Land, we call that a false dichotomy.

The situation with the CIA is rotten to the core. I lived in Brazil for 32 years and saw up close what it was capable of while staying in the shadows. But people (all people, not just Ukrainians) have agency, even when they are manipulated with propaganda and dirty tricks. 

I doubt you will sell your axiomatic binary frame on OL. What is that frame?

Russia is evil in all things and Ukraine is good in all things.

That has been your running subtext up to now. But normal people have seen too much to believe in political fairy tales any longer. They know all politicians are corrupt with very few exceptions.

 

Here's my frame. You can agree with it or not, but my frame is not going to change. I believe many here on OL have a similar frame (with some disagreements), but they can speak for themselves.

The people, the general populations of Ukraine and Russia are lovely people. Most of them just want to go to work, come home, take care of their families, and so on. They are good at heart. They all have wonderful traditions, stories, music, dreams, aspirations, desires to improve, just lovely people.

Those who govern these two countries are ruthless killers and predators. All of them. That includes Zelenski.

That's my frame.

From there, for Americans to send in US forces mostly made up of young American males from the heartland and poorer classes to prop up the Russian or Ukrainian predator ruling class assholes (and enrich the USA predator class assholes) is repugnant to me.

 

If you want to talk about how wonderful the Ukrainian people are, I'm all ears. If you want to make that mean Ukrainian leaders are just as wonderful, you've lost me. Ditto on the Russian side.

What's more, the more I look into Zelenski, the worse he gets for me. I will grant you this. He's colorful.

 

Here's an unsolicited piece of advice about your rhetorical style. I suggest you try to understand what someone is saying before using an accusing tone to box them into a false dichotomy based on your Russia bad/Ukraine good frame peppered with small references to history.

If you want to convince them of your frame, that is the best way to turn them off. I speak from a lot of experience. Believe it or not, you are not the first to show up acting like this. Nor will you be the last.

So try to understand what they say correctly. Not what you want to believe they said. What they actually said. Then start using reason instead of rhetorical tricks and accusations.

You will find that works a lot better, at least around here. You will also find that people are open to reasoned arguments. There is no need to try to bully them to get heard.

But it's your choice.

Michael

[Peter]

Michael wrote, “Unless the MAGA people manage to stop him, hold his beer and watch...”

President Biden just spoke in Warsaw, Poland after visiting refugees in shelters. There was some talk about him speaking in Ukraine but that didn’t happen. What a mess that could have been but darn it could have been the biggest public relations stunt ever seen (outside of Barnum and Bailey.)

What are your thoughts, oh intelligent ones? 1) Did Trump show such a fearful “I will nuke you” visage with Russia and North Korea’s leaders, so that they would always shiver and back down? Maybe. Who knows? But is that the best poker hand along with devastating sanctions, businessman, President Trump might have had just like Biden? Maybe.

It is intriguing to think about what really goes on behind the scenes. Some of those books written years later that are called “tell all books,” are interesting.

2) Why do people think this “war for territory and profit” would never have occurred if President Trump were still in office? And back to square one, under the same circumstances would President Trump have gone to Poland or Ukraine?

[anthony]

On 3/26/2022 at 8:01 AM, Peter said:

I know the "situation" is complex. I know it is wrapped in history. But Russia is now murdering innocents and making light of it. They are invading and taking over an entire country. Ukraine is not doing that. Even if a Ukrainian caveman wacked a Russian neanderthal on the head, once upon a time. Wars start, when the latest war starts and I think it has been going on for a month. But I don't even think of it as a war . . . . It is a barbaric invasion and murder. Russia invaded Ukraine. Russia slaughtered civilians. Russia is threatening to use chemical weapons. Russia is threatening Nato and America with nuclear war. Russia is violating human rights.

Biden has said we will not put boots on the ground . . . of Ukraine . . . but is Putin capable of having a step two and three invasion / expansion plan? Is he evilly capable of that? I think so. So who is our enemy? Russia or Ukraine. Who should we "morally support.?  What do Russia and Ukraine's neighbors think? What does the free world think? The free world is on the side of Ukraine, the country being brutally destroyed.  

Largely true, well said. Outrage is appropriate (and assumed by others here, I think). Right, causation of conflict can't go back forever to first causes. The last initiator, Putin, takes the main condemnation (for all that he too, appears to 'feel threatened' by NATO's - I believe - irrational and quite arrogant provocations, insinuating their influence up to Russia's doorstep, in "encirclement" - and well after the Cold war had ended) .

Some commentators have said, and I reiterate, "understanding" (or trying to), "is not condoning". Trying to get a fix on the situation, where it could potentially lead, what precedents were set earlier, what treaties broken, why the lack of truthful information, who are any other cynical players who abetted and/or are benefiting from this war, what is Putin's mindset and intent - those, and more are up for debate and need unpacking. The facts must be clarified before making moral evaluations and expressing emotions. Being railroaded into a knee-jerk, collective emotionality warns sane people that there are many who blindly (or cynically) want a military retaliation against Putin, therefore, escalation. Over-riding everything, they must be dissuaded, not be allowed. This will have to be settled soonest and at the table by the respective leaders.

(When both realize they are heading into stalemate, perhaps)

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

1 hour ago, Peter said:

Why do people think this “war for territory and profit” would never have occurred if President Trump were still in office?

Peter,

Come on. You really don't know?

Why do you think people think this?

Michael

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Jason Miller, the head of Gettr, just told Steve Bannon that ALL of the war dead in the Ukraine in the Russian invasion during the last month are the direct responsibility of Joe Biden and his family.

All of them.

That invasion and war would not have happened without the Bidens.

Jason Miller on the Biden Family Crime Syndicate

RUMBLE.COM

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Jason Miller on the Biden Family Crime Syndicate

Michael 

[Peter]

Tony wrote, “Being railroaded into a single collective emotionality warns sane people that there are many who blindly (or cynically) want a military retaliation against Putin, therefore, escalation. Over-riding everything, they must be dissuaded, not be allowed. This will have to be settled soonest and at the table by the respective leaders.” end quote

“Where have all the flowers gone?” sang Peter, Paul, and Mary. No one wants to be hunkering down in a bomb shelter or inside room. I haven’t reached the point where I fill buckets with water for flushing, like I do when a hurricane is coming. I wonder how South Africans are taking this statement from a man from Pretoria: "We cannot let Putin take over Ukraine," Elon Musk said. "This is crazy."

Former President Trump seems to agree. “We’re watching a holocaust. We’re watching something that I’ve never seen before, the way that they’re going to go in — they’re blowing up buildings with children, with women, with professions, with people — think of just people,” Trump responded. “They’re blowing up indiscriminately, they’re just shooting massive missiles and rockets into these buildings and everybody is dying.”

From Canada’s, CNS news: Both literally and figuratively on the frontline of Russia’s war in Ukraine, Poland is proposing a peacekeeping mission in the neighboring country, has called for a total E.U. ban on trade with Russia, and wants NATO to station troops permanently on its territory. Poland has taken in more than 2.4 million of the total 3.6 million Ukrainians who have fled their country since the invasion began on February 24, according to U.N. figures.

Also from Canada, a few days ago: Ahead of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s address to Parliament, Canada announced it is imposing sanctions on 15 more individuals who the federal government says have “enabled and supported President Putin’s choice to invade a peaceful and sovereign country.” Prime Minister Justin Trudeau spoke about the new measures on Russian “elites” when introducing Zelensky in the House of Commons chamber. “With allies and partners, we’re imposing crippling sanctions to make sure Putin and his enablers in Russia and in Belarus are held accountable,” Trudeau said.

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

For example, there's this.

EXCLUSIVE: Hunter Biden DID help secure millions in funding for US contractor in Ukraine specializing in deadly pathogen research, laptop emails reveal, raising more questions about the disgraced son of then vice president

Hunter Biden helped secure millions in funding for military biotech research program in Ukraine | Daily Mail Online

WWW.DAILYMAIL.CO.UK

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Email emails and correspondence obtained by DailyMail.com from Hunter's abandoned laptop show he helped secure millions for Metabiota.

 

Quote

• The Russian government held a press conference Thursday claiming that Hunter Biden helped finance a US military 'bioweapons' research program in Ukraine
• However the allegations were branded a brazen propaganda ploy to justify president Vladimir Putin's invasion of Ukraine and sow discord in the US
• But emails and correspondence obtained by DailyMail.com from Hunter's abandoned laptop show the claims may well be true
• The emails show Hunter helped secure millions of dollars of funding for Metabiota, a Department of Defense contractor specializing in research on pandemic-causing diseases
• He also introduced Metabiota to an allegedly corrupt Ukrainian gas firm, Burisma, for a 'science project' involving high biosecurity level labs in Ukraine 
• The president's son and his colleagues invested $500,000 in Metabiota through their firm Rosemont Seneca Technology Partners 
• They raised several million dollars of funding for the company from investment giants including Goldman Sachs 

. . .

Moscow’s claim that Hunter Biden helped finance a US military 'bioweapons' research program in Ukraine is at least partially true, according to new emails obtained exclusively by DailyMail.com.

The commander of the Russian Nuclear, Biological and Chemical Protection Forces, claimed there was a 'scheme of interaction between US government agencies and Ukrainian biological objects' and pointed to the 'financing of such activities by structures close to the current US leadership, in particular the investment fund Rosemont Seneca, which is headed by Hunter Biden.'

Intelligence experts say the Russian military leader's allegations were a brazen propaganda ploy to justify president Vladimir Putin's invasion of Ukraine and sow discord in the US.

But emails from Hunter's abandoned laptop show he helped secure millions of dollars of funding for Metabiota, a Department of Defense contractor specializing in research on pandemic-causing diseases that could be used as bioweapons.

What's causing me a small bit of pleasure is seeing the press go back to investigative reporting instead of fairy-tale narrative control through propaganda.

It's not fully there yet, but man is it getting better.

Michael

[Abiding Dude]

17 hours ago, Michael Stuart Kelly said:

AD,

Here in O-Land, we call that a false dichotomy.

The situation with the CIA is rotten to the core. I lived in Brazil for 32 years and saw up close what it was capable of while staying in the shadows. But people (all people, not just Ukrainians) have agency, even when they are manipulated with propaganda and dirty tricks.

Stop avoiding the question: Were the thousands of Euromaidan protestors and 73% of the Ukrianian Parliament who voted to remove the president from office after he fled to Russian-controlled Crimea and then to Russia CIA stooges and/or agents, or did they do what they did for their own reasons? In short, were they right in stripping a president of office for going against a parliamentary decision and then fleeing, or was it fundamentally just a CIA plot in which their decision means nothing?

Edited March 27, 2022 by Abiding Dude
Clarification

[Abiding Dude]

13 hours ago, Michael Stuart Kelly said:

AD,

Yes.

And more.

All sides.

Consistency with these assholes is no object.

I'm not asking about consistency from a senile idiot socially promoted into second Jimmy-Carterhood, I'm asking for a consistent answer from you.

[tmj]

Which countries’ State Dept puppet regime lead to full scale military incursion? Asking for a friend .

[anthony]

On 3/26/2022 at 7:21 AM, Abiding Dude said:

Exactly! I mean, think about the German-hating victors who included all those German speakers in the Sudetenland inside Czechoslovakia in 1918. They made up a quarter of the population of Czechoslovakia. It sure is a good thing the West agreed with Hitler in 1938 that they needed to be returned to the pan-German state instead of leaving them bereft of ethnic "self"-determination inside a foreign ethnicity. Solved that problem for al time, instead of creating a world war like those stubborn Ukrainians are doing.

Inexactly. Here's a quick refresh on that invalid comparison. https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=2ahUKEwig-Ny2teX2AhUOY8AKHZOfA0kQFnoECCoQAQ&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.historyonthenet.com%2Fnazi-germany-sudetenland&usg=AOvVaw3appmPhJTq_B5WMOnbDDf_

Is Putin a Hitler intent on taking Ukraine - Poland, the Czech Republic, Europe - the World? And here is the Churchill (with nuclear weapons) to say "No Further!"

That's the sort of emotionalist false comparison which could lead to conflagration. (Blindly or cynically like I said).

So, no. Putin knew that Ukraine alone (if conquered) could not be held for long- if he even wanted to; If he didn't at first, he surely knows now. And he knows he couldn't step an inch past Ukraine with the war-escalators clamoring for revenge .

Obviously then, Putin's territorial goal was and is slightly more modest:  Establishing and securing the Donpass self-nominated republics initially by force, following with negotiations. 

It is not as much about "ethnicity". Here one part of the society leans towards the old traditional culture, and western Ukrainers aspire to modern European civilization, I think. That's often the nature of humans to prefer to be among others of their 'kind'. Collectivist and non-rational, that can be, but not unlawful. Particularly justifiable, when a certain group is treated as second-class in any way by their elitist countrymen. An agreeable solution for both 'tribes' shouldn't be too difficult.

[Abiding Dude]

24 minutes ago, anthony said:

So, no. Putin knew that Ukraine alone, could not be held for long- if he even wanted to; If he didn't at first, he surely knows now. And he knows he couldn't step an inch past Ukraine with the war-escalators clamoring for revenge .

Obviously then, Putin's territorial goal was and is slightly more modest:  Establishing and securing the Donpass self-nominated republics initially by force, following with negotiations.

Not obviously at all. You write, "If he didn't at first, he surely knows now." You then contradict yourself, "Obviously then, Putin's territorial goal was and is slightly more modest: " What Putin is willing to accept now is probably more modest than what he demanded when he invaded, which was basically to reduce Ukraine to dependent status. Otherwise all he needed to do was march his armies into Donbas and Luhansk instead of pouring over the borders from all directions. Merely a negotiating tactic? Right.

[Abiding Dude]

56 minutes ago, anthony said:

Is Putin a Hitler intent on taking Ukraine - Poland, the Czech Republic, Europe - the World? And here is the Churchill (with nuclear weapons) to say "No Further!"

...

It is not as much about "ethnicity" as one part of the society which leans towards the old culture and western Ukrainers who aspire to modern European civilization, I think.

Putin does what he thinks he can get way with. Like Hitler, he has sent in troops wherever the opportunity has presented itself--Ossetia, Abkhazia, Transnistria, Crimea, Donbas, Kazakhstan, Syria--and in many cases for the defense of ethnic Russians in exactly the same way Hitler did so for the defense of ethnic Germans. But really, I'm just agreeing with you: "No, the dirty tricks Putin has been up to in supporting a break-away bunch of Ukrainian-Russians who would force another annexation of a part of Ukraine--while pretending he has nothing to do with it. He could soon be doing some major backing down I predict, the only good thing to come out of this." Of course, back then he only marched into the Donbas and Crimea; now that he's invaded many other parts of Ukraine with over 100,000 troops, he's clearly just trying to negotiate.

[anthony]

On 3/26/2022 at 8:01 AM, Peter said:

I know the "situation" is complex. I know it is wrapped in history. But Russia is now murdering innocents and making light of it. 

This is unfounded. After a month of fighting the recent official numbers do not support 'murder', slaughter', 'genocide' nor "making light of" innocent deaths. Even if under-counted, deaths and injuries are remarkably low ... for such intensely-contested, widespread conflict on many fronts, in and around urban areas

The figures point to the opposite. A policy to minimize civilian casualties, observed by any who have some idea of being on the ground. And - please note that a portion of those civilian casualties were in the Donpas. Presumably caused by government forces. Preferable to avoid extremely emotive expressions about a serious situation which is emotionally charged enough. 

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=2ahUKEwi2pbDRyuX2AhXDiVwKHXqSDRkQFnoECAkQAQ&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.ohchr.org%2Fen%2Fpress-releases%2F2022%2F03%2Fukraine-civilian-casualty-update-24-march-2022&usg=AOvVaw23RvVZN3QyxyCGuIsd3p2k