As of 2001: Russians: 58.32%; Ukrainians: 24.32%; Crimean Tatars: 12.1%; Belarusians: 1.44%; Tatars: 0.54%.
Crimea was annexed by Catherine the Great, thereby satisfying the longstanding quest of the Russian Czars for a warm-water port. In fact, over the ages Sevastopol emerged as a great naval base at the strategic tip of the Crimean peninsula, where it became home to the mighty Black Sea Fleet of the Czars and then the commissars. Still today there is an active Russian naval port.
My dear, there are thousands marching in Moscow this morning and last night in support of furthering Russian support in the region. The admiral of the Crimean navy just announced that he want this to be the opportunity to separate from both Russia and Ukraine.
Itās absolute chaos. If you or I had to be responsible for about a million people, I would protect them, I think you would too. Mr Kerry is playing a chess game that is very likely be one he loses.
Besides, take a step back and see that we the U.S., might be the reason for all of this; There are multiple reports out that the U.S. is responsible for fueling the protests by using your tax dollars to pay protestors:
This in turn would allow for the oil and pipelines from Russia to be controlled by the federal reserve. Russia will do itsā do diligence to make sure hell will have to freeze before something like that happens.
Again, all of those are Ukrainian citizens. Their nationality/ethnicity may be Russian, but their citizenship is Ukrainian. That is what he meant when he said they were ethnically Russian. Russia doesnāt have any special responsibility for these Ukrainian citizens any more than various African countries have for African-Americans living in the USA.
Iām not sure why that is relevant. If thousands marched in Washington, DC to support ethnic Ukrainians and Tatars against the Russian forces in Crimea, would that be a valid justification?
Oh, you have an article by a guy who doesnāt believe 9/11 was caused by airline strikes or that Al Qaeda was involved. How convincing! Iām sure youāre also aware that there are rumors that the pro-Russian protests in some cities were the result of Russian financingā¦ and these reports are somewhat more convincing since the pro-Russian protestors seem to have abandoned their protests after only a couple of hours, after the media had collected their footage. And it has been established that some of the protestors, such as the guy who raised a Russian flag on a government building in Kharkiv, are in fact Russian citizens from places like Moscow.
Yeah, like they didnāt invade Cuba I guess weāll just disagree there.
In many ways they did, see for example this: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A25430-2005Mar10.html. As mentioned in that link, however, they knew very well that strict links with the US administration was clearly not something the Ukrainian electorate would have appreciated at the time, so they kept as quiet as possible.
Yeah, thatās the thing. People of Crimea are considering independence because they donāt think the new government in Kiev is representing their interests? Thatās fine. Kiev clearly doesnāt think the same, so now would be the time for open discussions where Crimea can make demands and the new government can make their case about what, if anything, is going to change under the new rule. And if, given due consideration to all arguments, Crimeans still want to secede, then so be it.
But the Russian troops didnāt come to Crimea to encourage balanced debate. Telephone landlines and mobile communications have been cut, and the people are left with Russian media that is liberally applying āultranationalistā and āfascistā labels to all protesters and members of the new Ukrainian government. That doesnāt sound nice in any part of the world, but in those places that suffered through both the first-hand experience of Nazi invasion and the Soviet propaganda surrounding the Great Patriotic War, itās a way to completely discredit the opposition.
At this point, I think itās pretty clear that Putin has already won Crimea - if not as part of the Russian Federation, then as an āindependentā puppet state. It remains to be seen whether he will also see fit to let his troops protect Russian speakers in Eastern Ukraine and help them democratically decide their future.
Please. Youāre going to equate giving treatment for dioxin poisoning to invasion/occupation of a sovereign nation? Or say that administering medical treatment is somehow similar to how the US has allegedly masterminded the current protests and overthrow of the government? If the US can foment anti-Russian, pro-Western sentiment now, why couldnāt they do so before when Yanukovich was on the decline? Why were they so hands-off, impotent, and sensitive to accusations of meddling then, when you would have us believe they have the power to manipulate a significant part of the country now?
If the US invaded Cuba like Russia invaded Ukraine (i.e., with actual US troops deployed in force) then Fidel would have been gone a long time ago. And if the US invades Canada like they did the Bay of Pigs then Canadaās territorial sovereignty is pretty safe.
And the US seems pretty comfortable with (what they perceive to be) a socialist government on their doorstep.
I was just pointing out how there were ties, and how the US administration at the time went to great lengths to hide them. Do you think they did it out of simple kindness? Isnāt that a bit naive?
I never said that, please donāt equate me with some random Putin trolley. I never said these protests are āmastermindedā by this or that actor, Iām not sure what straw man you are debating there. It is undeniable (from Nulandās call, if anything) that the US extended support to the opposition long before Yanukovich was ousted; itās also clear that the new government formed with the explicit intent of forging closer ties with the EU (and hence the NATO sphere of influence), since thatās precisely how protests started; itās also clear that a large chunk of that government is ideologically unpalatable. You donāt need to call for evil puppeteers to see the geopolitical change in action.
Because they were smart: as they say in the Wikileaks cables, Yuschenko was weak and Tymoshenko was too ambitious (and/or corrupt, according to whom you trust). They didnāt risk burning their chance for permanent change, and it was a smart move.
Well, they went for it in the Bay of Pigs and botched it. Thatās a lesson Putin learnt, clearly: why risk a full-scale operational failure just to maintain a diplomatic fig leaf? Itās also a lesson the US learnt, since they didnāt pick random mercenaries to do the job in Grenada and Panama.
So comfortable that they wonāt allow their citizens to go there, even after the Soviet Union has long gone. God forbid they could be infected by free healthcare!
I was talking about Canada (and its socialised healthcare).[quote=ātoyg, post:127, topic:24467ā]
Because they were smart: as they say in the Wikileaks cables, Yuschenko was weak and Tymoshenko was too ambitious (and/or corrupt, according to whom you trust). They didnāt risk burning their chance for permanent change, and it was a smart move.
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I donāt get it. If Yuschenko was weak and Tymoshenko was too ambitious, how is the situation more favourable now?
What you did say is that this is a āUS-backed neonazi government.ā Maybe ābackedā has a different meaning where you come from, but simply supporting a movement isnāt the same thing as backing them. The US has largely supported all protest movements, even when the results have been politically unpalatable (such as the rise of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, which you could see coming from miles away). The one thing the US seems to be clearly against is violent suppression of domestic protestors.
Iām not sure if this qualifies as the US going to great lengths to hide their involvement, but I am pretty certain that this sort of medical assistance doesnāt seem anywhere comparable to the kind of political involvement/pressure being exerted by Russia or even the supposed current involvement of the USA. Helping save the victim of politically-motivated poisoning is a remarkably subtle form of political intervention, especially since no action at all would have occurred had he not been poisoned.
Sorry man, I missed that. Deadpan humour doesnāt really work on the Internet.
The economic crisis is now much, much worse. Yanukovitch has ruled enough years to fully disgrace himself. A few important decisions about choosing sides could not be postponed. Itās a good alignment of planets, so to speak.
Sounds like sophistry to me, tbh, but English is not my mother-tongue so you might be right. I might be biased by an excessive awareness of the sort of thugs (ābackedā or āsupportedā by different degrees) who were unleashed on Latin America.
Ah yes, like in Bahrain and Saudi Arabia and Turkey. Or European countries in the '70s. Or in '80s Nicaragua. Or in Saddam-era Kurdistan. Great support there!
5 years of slightly-better-than-before Democratic administration and a premature Nobel Peace Prize do not a tradition make. The US look out for their interests like everyone else, they just like to pretend they always do it for the common good.
Mubarakās nationalistic regime had ideological roots in the Cold War and was ripen for the fall. Besides, while Egypt is busy trying to sort itself out, itās not a danger to Israel; in a way, a lawless Egypt could be seen as a better proposition for Israel than a cohesive but potentially hostile nation (Iām not saying it is, Iām saying āit could beā, as seen by Israeli hawks currently in government).
Tymoshenko being in jail, Yushchenko being a political non-entity, and Yanukovich being in power hardly seems like a good alignment of the planets, regardless of how the economy is doing (especially considering the money Putin is willing to throw at a friendly Ukraine in contrast to EU austerity and market conditions).[quote=ātoyg, post:130, topic:24467ā]
Ah yes, like in Bahrain and Saudi Arabia and Turkey. Or European countries in the '70s. Or in '80s Nicaragua. Or in Saddam-era Kurdistan. Great support there!
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OK, Iām not getting the support that should have been there that wasnāt. I mean, what did they do in Ukraine and Egypt that they didnāt do in Iran (where they had tremendous incentive to encourage protest), Bahrain, or Turkey, etc? I guess Iām not seeing the concrete intervention that you are.
Iāll leave aside cold-war era politics because Iāve already said that I think there has been a shift in mentality, but youāre right about Iraq and Saddam being containment for Iran (though this was also occurring in the cold-war context).
Last I heard Ukraine could just as easily cut the water supply theyāre providing to Crimea. Thatās might be worse than global economic sanctions about to be put down on Russia. Maybe the west will furnish Ukraine with a nuke or two down the line if it comes to that, for good measure. Last I heard all options were on the table. I donāt know what game Putin is playing, but I think itās pretty clear heās lost his marbles.
Crimea has a lot of autonomy within Ukraine, and hosts an important Russian military base (which is probably what Putin is really after). The majority of the people there identify as Russian, and before 1956 it belonged to Russia. (Though of course itās not traditionally Russian either; it used to be inhabited by Tatars who were deported by Stalin.)
And depending on your point of view, the revolutionary government in Kiev (not recognized by Russia or Crimea) also has no authority there, whereas the Crimean government indisputably has.
So itās rather complicated, and thereās no single objectively true point of view here.
Personally, I think Ukraine is better off without Crimea. Let regions dominated by Russians join Russia, and the rest of Ukraine will be more free to choose an independent course without half of the population constantly voting for Russian lackeys.
So Russia was invited to Crimea by the [Crimean Prime Minister][1]? You mean the guy who was put in power on February 27th by someone other than the President of Ukraine, who is supposed to be the one who appoints him? That sounds totally legitimate and above board.
And Russia isnāt there to help the target country; itās there to help one autonomous region within that country. I wonder what we would think if France mobilized its army into Quebec to āhelpā it even though Canada didnāt want them to. Itās not an invasion because thereās someone in the country that wants them there!
[1]: Sergey Aksyonov - Wikipedia[quote=āmcv, post:136, topic:24467ā]
Crimea has a lot of autonomy within Ukraine, and hosts an important Russian military base (which is probably what Putin is really after).
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Itās a Russian base, operated and secured by Russian soldiers. Iām not sure why they need armed forces all over Crimea to secure a base that is already securely in their hands: how can Putin be after something he already has? Itās not like Ukrainian forces were trying to get it.
Again, Iām not sure the Crimean government has indisputable authority given how the current Crimean PM came into office.
I guess weāll just disagree there.