Ukraine Invasion Part 14

[MagicFox]

New thread

@Ijsbear

Yes, can see that overall a lot of growth did occur.

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I'm afraid that even if things could have been handled better by the West it still does not for one microsecond justify invasion and atrocities. You can point fingers are the West (with some justification in many areas) but the fact remains that nothing justifies what Russia's done here.

I don't think anything justifies the military action and Russia's closest allies are saying the same thing, to Russia, and have done from the outset.

But it is what happens next which will determine stability for the region.

An offer to negotiate is not the same as genuinely negotiating. Words are cheap and negotiations can be utilised as a smokescreen or delaying tactic. See also "we will not invade."

Five weeks ago articles like this one were still being written...

www.aljazeera.com/amp/opinions/2022/2/9/no-russia-will-not-invade-ukraine

It's got feck all to do with NATO. Ukraine hadn't and couldn't join. It was an aspiration but unlikely to ever develop beyond that whilst fighting continued in Donbas. There was little sign that they'd ever qualify.

"NATO agreed in 1990 that they would not expand eastwards." Not quite as clear cut as that is it?

Good article about NATO expansion over the 1990's and early 00's and Russian responses.

theconversation.com/amp/ukraine-the-history-behind-russias-claim-that-nato-promised-not-to-expand-to-the-east-177085
"Russia was a participant in these new security arrangements, and was keen to clarify that Nato enlargement was not a security threat to Russia. The then president of Russia, Boris Yeltsin, wrote in a September 1993 letter to the then US president, Bill Clintonn_: “Any possible integration of east European countries into Nato will not automatically lead to the alliance somehow turning against Russia.” So it was being clearly signalled that Russia did not object to the direction Europe’s new security architecture was following."
Article ends saying NATO hasn't fundamentally changed track but Russia under Putin has.

@megynhelena

This is a really good article actually written last year about what should happen when putin goes.

www.atlanticcouncil.org/in-depth-research-reports/report/russia-after-putin-report/

The new government’s first action should be to release all political prisoners and to establish all elementary freedoms of speech, media, assembly, organization, and religion.

It should dissolve the Federal Security Service (FSB), the principal security agency of Russia, and dismiss all its employees and form a new judicial system, courts, as well as the general prosecutor’s office.

Russia should abandon its presidential system and hold early founding elections at all levels soon after a democratic breakthrough.

"We do not know when and how Russian President Vladimir Putin’s regime will end, but there are signs that it is struggling and the end could come in the foreseeable future"

"In the spirit of the new constitution, new laws are being adopted that render the current regime more repressive and make it similar to occupation. In every way, it reduces the influence of the population on the uncontrolled ruling class. In November/December 2020, the State Duma adopted laws that practically declared all forms of public protest illegal.

"The main reason for the unfortunate situation of the Russian people is the current elite, which is caught with an inadequate perception of the current reality, in addition to simply being criminal. Practically, all members of the country’s higher leadership are involved in corruption and other crimes. The ruling elite lives in a zero-sum game with the population. What is beneficial to the elite aggravates the situation of the nation, and what is necessary for the nation hurts the elite’s interests; for example, honest and transparent state procurement. The changes that are necessary for the country are harmful to Putin’s friends who thrive on state orders without tenders. Russia would benefit from an end to the amoral and meaningless war in the Donbas, but for the elite this is a means to legitimize their power. Russia cannot develop normally as long as this group stays in power.

^^ good detail about the gangsters and how they continue to pillage.

I can't believed we've circled back to the Azov Battalion and pro-Russian separatists rising up coincidentally at just the time when Ukraine told the Russians to finally bugger off, but one might suggest that if Putin wanted to ensure the progress of that well-known stable country Russia (not at all a human rights dustbin) and the continued success of its economy (a vast, resource-rich country that has somehow managed to have an economy smaller than one of those Southern European countries that changes government more often than the rest of us changes our socks) then he might want to deal with his own neo-Nazis and fascists, especially those in the GRU and various army companies (e.g. Sparta), and he might want to stop the Wagner Group torturing civilians to death in the DRC and Syria.

A previous poster asked why Odesa had not yet been invaded. My understanding is that their coastal defences have been tested through shelling in recent days from the sea but I think the Russians are waiting for back up on land. I don't know whether there is any russian presence around Odesa on the ground.

I'll try find links for this.

@EsmaCannonball

The source for the information on Russian treatment of people in Crimea and the Donbas is the UN Commission on Human Rights.

Now I shared information from Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International previously on these threads, which people seemed to not like but I at least made the point about breaches on both sides which you seem to be ignoring. The Ukrainian security services were described as "notoriously abusive". They laid mines in breach in State treaties which killed people just walking home. They also raped, tortured and shot people dead for mild verbal disagreements. One poor guy was taken away by them and tortured for two months. He was then returned and the other side thought he was a spy so he was tortured by them too. If there is to be peace in that region everything needs to be acknowledged not selective pick n mix .

It was me .. I suppose if Mariupol is entirely taken over then apart from some holding-troops, a lot of the military could move West to Odessa and there could be a two-pronged attack.

Still wondering why Eastern rail networks haven't been sabotaged if that's how the army is bringing its supplies in!

I’m agreeing with Esma in that we seemed to have almost completely lost the largely factual reporting of events and circled back to topics that were rejected many threads back. And it doesn’t feel to me that megynhelena is posting in good faith.

I’ve fallen down a Twitter wormhole talking about Putins rally being fake. Use of green-screen and using footage from a rally from a year ago.

@Ijsbear

Yes, can see that overall a lot of growth did occur.

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I'm afraid that even if things could have been handled better by the West it still does not for one microsecond justify invasion and atrocities. You can point fingers are the West (with some justification in many areas) but the fact remains that nothing justifies what Russia's done here.

Totally agree with this and I’m very disheartened to see arguments that Ukraine should give in to Russians demands.

@megynhelena if your next door neighbour demands you give them your garden will you do it? What if they start destroying it? Does your neighbour the right to do that? What about your rights? You’ll lie down and let them have it?

No it’s not that simple as there are grey areas but that is what it seems to me you, and a couple of previous posters who have gone quiet (maybe you name changed from earlier threads though) are arguing should happen. My opinion only.

Only posted on this thread, just something to be mindful of.

@QuantumHypothesis

I’ve fallen down a Twitter wormhole talking about Putins rally being fake. Use of green-screen and using footage from a rally from a year ago.

I visited that wormhole earlier

The pictures of people smiling were from last year.
This years crowd seemed rather sombre.
Putin has either put on three stone or was wearing a bullet proof vest under his very expensive Italian designer coat.
The green box concept is interesting...
The big bullet proof glass box has not featured at previous rallies.

@Hillsmakeyoustrong

A previous poster asked why Odesa had not yet been invaded. My understanding is that their coastal defences have been tested through shelling in recent days from the sea but I think the Russians are waiting for back up on land. I don't know whether there is any russian presence around Odesa on the ground.

I'll try find links for this.

Experts elsewhere seem to be thinking that the Russians may have looked at those coastal defences long and hard over the last few days and have decided don’t fancy an opposed landing.

Time will tell as to whether those suspicions are correct but possibility being aired that the forces earmarked for that assault will be will end up being put ashore somewhere not in Ukranian hands , over to the East.

Giving in to Putin's demands will only encourage him.

Based on his observable traits, he will keep fighting and fighting and fighting until the day he dies, one way or another. A compromise will be seen as weakness.

Peace now will give Ukraine time to bury its many dead and to rebuild. But strategically thinking, if it's feasible then perhaps it'd be best to push the Russian army right back to the borders of Russia. Because a compromise is a win, for Putin.

But this does not take into account the human suffering and I can't help thinking the Ukrainian forces must be getting very tired now after solid fighting for so long. Sadly because the human cost means precisely zilch to Putin, I think Zelensky has to accept a number of civilian deaths and consider them an 'acceptable' (:s) cost in pushing Putin back.

This game's terms has been defined by that man and others need to match them to some degree, I think :s

@Bluebellsunderthetrees

Despite all we have seen from the worlds independent news sources in Ukraine, there are still some posters who seek to defend/justify/explain away Russian genocide.

[quote Alexandra2001]@Bluebellsunderthetrees

Despite all we have seen from the worlds independent news sources in Ukraine, there are still some posters who seek to defend/justify/explain away Russian genocide.[/quote]
I am not doing that . I am responding to a specific point made by a previous poster about atrocities carried out in a specific region prior to the invasion.

Maybe the Russians could be pushed back to the border and then peace keepers sent into Donbas to try and sort the problems there. Donbas could exist as a UN protected semi-state while someone works out how to solve the problem.
Ukraine won't have lost land to Russia.
One of Russia's spread sheet full of excuses to invade will be a work in progress.

Putin will never again be able to get away with massing his massive military force on another countries border though, the whole "military exercises, nothing to see her, just going to pop home now" has been revealed for what it actually was a prelude to invasion. It's desperately sad that Ukraine is paying the price for the West's complacency but we have at least woken up to what an evil bastard Putin is and he will never be trusted again. If he tried the same tactics again I'm sure we'd be better prepared to assist a threatened country with weapons and aid before an invasion took place.

Showing my ignorance here but why is it okay for Putin to bring in 40,000 Syrian fighters and mobilise the military of puppet state Belarus but our hands are seemingly completely tied, to the extent that the government here had to retract Liz Truss's statement that ex military and those with some experience could go and support the Ukrainian forces if they so desired.

From the Washington post... I've copied and pasted for you guys as there is a paywall. This is the city my company is helping as the red cross are currently too busy with where hostilities are and are slow to respond...

"Russian President Vladimir Putin’s war on Ukraine is coming soon to the country’s third-largest city, Odessa, often called Ukraine’s “southern capital.” The people of the city are in desperate need of weapons and humanitarian aid to survive the coming onslaught. So far, though, the international community isn’t focused enough on this crucial battle — and the window of opportunity is closing.

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Odessa’s mayor, Gennadiy Trukhanov, told me during an interview that he doesn’t know exactly when Russian forces will attack, but ominous signs are everywhere. Russian warships are probing the Black Sea beaches and shelling parts of the coastline, indications an amphibious invasion force might soon be on the way. Ukrainians have tried to mine the beaches, but there aren’t enough mines to go around. Military units are positioned to resist any landing, but Ukrainian forces don’t have enough antiship weapons, such as Harpoon missiles, to keep the Russian fleet at bay.

The Russian ships that threaten Odessa from the sea represent only one prong of an expected three-pronged attack. Thousands of Russian ground forces with heavy equipment are pushing toward Odessa from the east, though they are meeting stiff Ukrainian resistance. To the west, the mayor said he expects Putin to activate Russian troops already stationed in Transnistria, a Moldovan territory occupied by soldiers Moscow calls “peacekeepers.”"

@Ijsbear

Giving in to Putin's demands will only encourage him.

Based on his observable traits, he will keep fighting and fighting and fighting until the day he dies, one way or another. A compromise will be seen as weakness.

Peace now will give Ukraine time to bury its many dead and to rebuild. But strategically thinking, if it's feasible then perhaps it'd be best to push the Russian army right back to the borders of Russia. Because a compromise is a win, for Putin.

But this does not take into account the human suffering and I can't help thinking the Ukrainian forces must be getting very tired now after solid fighting for so long. Sadly because the human cost means precisely zilch to Putin, I think Zelensky has to accept a number of civilian deaths and consider them an 'acceptable' (:s) cost in pushing Putin back.

This game's terms has been defined by that man and others need to match them to some degree, I think :s

Listening to this person earlier on Times kyivindependent.com/author/oleksiy-sorokin/ he sounded strong. Said morale was strong and there was zero intention to support government giving away any land.

One voice but his strength made me notice him

@DesdamonasHandkerchief

Putin will never again be able to get away with massing his massive military force on another countries border though, the whole "military exercises, nothing to see her, just going to pop home now" has been revealed for what it actually was a prelude to invasion. It's desperately sad that Ukraine is paying the price for the West's complacency but we have at least woken up to what an evil bastard Putin is and he will never be trusted again. If he tried the same tactics again I'm sure we'd be better prepared to assist a threatened country with weapons and aid before an invasion took place.

Showing my ignorance here but why is it okay for Putin to bring in 40,000 Syrian fighters and mobilise the military of puppet state Belarus but our hands are seemingly completely tied, to the extent that the government here had to retract Liz Truss's statement that ex military and those with some experience could go and support the Ukrainian forces if they so desired.

I’m not sure there was that much complacency TBH.

The intelligence community were allowing their worries to be leaked into the MSM way back (last year if not earlier) which is why a least some in the MSM were carrying warnings of a potential invasion months ago.

Armaments were being shipped and training being given in Ukraine by NATO troops well before the invasion began.

There was however I suspect amongst politicians a limit as to what could be done to assist a none NATO member before Russian boots actually crossed the border.

@DuncinToffee

Only posted on this thread, just something to be mindful of.

Seems rather sus, best to ignore that particular poster I reckon, seems to just be trying to disrupt the thread.

Has this been mentioned yet? How official Russian accounts manipulate Twitter in amplifying disinformation

www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-60790821

Which posters?
I've seen one.

@MarshaBradyo likewise the Ukrainian MP on LBC this morning. There is no doubt or hesitation in the willingness to defend.

These people are fighting for their rights to free speech and free will. They’re choosing to fight. If enough Ukrainian people had wanted to be Russia controlled then they wouldn’t be fighting to defend their freedom, they would have been welcoming as putin expected.