The State of Affairs in Russia

[Gaijin de Moscu]

Putin maintained a corrupt puppet in Ukraine and even invaded part of a sovereign country because he didn't like the new regime's open attitude toward Europe.  That "ally" was ousted after he tried basically selling the country to Russia.  Is it really a surprise he's now living in Russia?
You can't be serious about all that propaganda shit.
Stop interfering and attacking your neighbors and the West will leave you alone.
They won't even lift a finger when you jail homosexuals and political opponents to Putin.

Ukraine people voted Yanukovich in. He was democratically elected. It's a fact, even if you don't like it.

The 2014 coup removed the democratically elected president of Ukraine and kicked off all the issues we've been discussing ad nauseum. Just because someone doesn't like the government of another country, they aren't entitled to interfere. I agree with Berkut on this 100%.

Yanukovich was "ousted", as you put it, because he asked for a time-out before signing the agreements with the EU.

The reason for his pause was the need to understand how the new agreements would work in the context of tax-free movement of goods agreements he had with the CIS countries. Literally, that was it. It was absolutely solvable.

But no, he had to be "ousted." Is it because it's okay to ignore Russia's economic interests?

And now we have what we have.

[Zoupa]

Il a été sorti de la par ce que c'était un politicien corrompu qui détournait des milliards... On ne peut pas ignorer le role du peuple ukrainien en 2014. Avec ou sans influence de l'Ouest, étant élu démocratiquement ou pas, Yanukovich a été trop loin, et son départ n'était qu'une question de temps.

[Gaijin de Moscu]

Russia push its neighbours into western arms because it tries to destabilize them repeatedly and subvert local democracy to its own interest.  Then it complains these countries want to join NATO and NATO accepts them.

the way Russia/USSR treated Eastern Europe between 1939 and 1989 pretty much guaranteed that everyone one who could would join NATO asap. The way Russia treated other countries after 2005 pretty much guarantees that those that can join NATO but haven't done so yet will try to do so asap.

Maybe Russia should have taken a leaf from the German playbook: show genuine contrition for the atrocities committed. Who knows what would have happened in that case? But no, instead the country went around being a bully, but without the massive reserve of diplomatic credit the US had.

I agree with you. I despise the communism and what it did to both Russia, Eastern Europe, and a lot of the world.

(Apart of the USSR leading the country to destroy the Nazis, that is. But I don't think we needed communism for that).

Russia actually started recognising the communist crimes — for example, in 2010 our parliament apologised for Katyn. Putin volunteered to join NATO in 2000, and he talked about open-border Europe "from Lisbon to Vladivostok." But it has all now stopped.

[Gaijin de Moscu]

Il a été sorti de la par ce que c'était un politicien corrompu qui détournait des milliards... On ne peut pas ignorer le role du peuple ukrainien en 2014. Avec ou sans influence de l'Ouest, étant élu démocratiquement ou pas, Yanukovich a été trop loin, et son départ n'était qu'une question de temps.

C'était aux ukrainiens de décider démocratiquement.

La prochaine élection était imminente, de toute façon.

[The Brain]

Jag har en väldigt stor baguette.

[Jacob]

Again I'm not super versed in recent events in Ukraine...

Sounds like Gaijin du Moscu has a version of events where the people of Ukraine elected Yanukovich, and then Western agents engineered his ouster to pull Ukraine away from Russia?

Meanwhile, the West understands events to have been that Yanukovich was undermining democratic processes to hang on to power until a popular uprising restored democracy?

Something like that?

[Sheilbh]

Russia and its leaders have had the same obsession since Ivan and Putin is no different. We learned this in middle school:

• Secure the plain
• Get access to year-round ports

Hence Crimea, hence Syria, and now hence Ukraine. History has repeatedly underlined the importance of securing the northern european plain for Russia. Poles, Swedes, Napoleon, Germans (twice).

I'm not saying the EU should let Russia have free reign in Ukraine, but Putin is not acting any different from any other Russian leader. Russia is cursed by geography.

Yeah - I agree. And I think the paranoia/fear is real and was real all the way through the Cold War. It is almost impossible to overstate even if it seems to us - especially with the benefit of hindsight - ridiculous (such as Stalin's genuine and constant fear of a Polish invasion in the 20s and early 30s.

Invade or be invaded, have friendly regimes nearby or bolster those forces. It's Holy Alliance, it's the Warswaw Pact - it's geography. Just as much as the most important about the UK is that it is an island nation, and about the US that it has two very benign neighbours.

The 2014 coup removed the democratically elected president of Ukraine and kicked off all the issues we've been discussing ad nauseum. Just because someone doesn't like the government of another country, they aren't entitled to interfere. I agree with Berkut on this 100%.

Yanukovich was "ousted", as you put it, because he asked for a time-out before signing the agreements with the EU.

The reason for his pause was the need to understand how the new agreements would work in the context of tax-free movement of goods agreements he had with the CIS countries. Literally, that was it. It was absolutely solvable.

But no, he had to be "ousted." Is it because it's okay to ignore Russia's economic interests?

I'd put it differently. The EU, Russia and. I think the IMF, were all bidding for Ukraine with a range of competing financial to help Ukraine out after the crisis. Yanukovych gave the impresion he was going down the route of the EU route but then because I think it looked a little too demanding so he swung back to the Russian deal which was more generous.

I think this overlaid onto divides within Ukraine and in particular for young, Western (Ukrainian) and Ukrainian nationalists who were keen, for different reasons, to align with Europe and the West. So what was just going for the highest by Yanukovych was, to them, a betrayal. They launch protests. Yanukovych for whatever reason uses force for a time but decides he doesn't want to any further/can't hold/there's a possibility security forces might not follow orders. The West is very quick to recognise/view this as a revolution.

So Putin moves to grab what he can rather than be faced with a fait accompli - now my own take is that actually Ukraine would have carried on bouncing from pro-European to pro-Russian and those divisions would not have resolved themselves any time soon. But by invading, Ukraine's now far more pro-Europe, pro-West to the extent that I think the last polling I saw had 60% of Ukrainians want to join NATO (including 40% in Eastern Ukraine - I don't think that happens without the Russian invasion. I think it was probably counter-productive.

[Gaijin de Moscu]

Again I'm not super versed in recent events in Ukraine...

Sounds like Gaijin du Moscu has a version of events where the people of Ukraine elected Yanukovich, and then Western agents engineered his ouster to pull Ukraine away from Russia?

Meanwhile, the West understands events to have been that Yanukovich was undermining democratic processes to hang on to power until a popular uprising restored democracy?

Something like that?

Which democratic processes was he undermining?

If anything, the elections in Ukraine worked well, unlike in Russia.

[Jacob]

Again I'm not super versed in recent events in Ukraine...

Sounds like Gaijin du Moscu has a version of events where the people of Ukraine elected Yanukovich, and then Western agents engineered his ouster to pull Ukraine away from Russia?

Meanwhile, the West understands events to have been that Yanukovich was undermining democratic processes to hang on to power until a popular uprising restored democracy?

Something like that?

Which democratic processes was he undermining?

If anything, the elections in Ukraine worked well, unlike in Russia.

I don't know... I was guessing - I just told you I didn't follow events so I was asking for a precis

Sheilbh's summary makes sense to me.

So basically the question is to what degree the protests in Ukraine were something Ukrainians did on their own, or whether it was engineered by Western interests?

[Gaijin de Moscu]

I'd put it differently. The EU, Russia and. I think the IMF, were all bidding for Ukraine with a range of competing financial to help Ukraine out after the crisis. Yanukovych gave the impresion he was going down the route of the EU route but then because I think it looked a little too demanding so he swung back to the Russian deal which was more generous.

I think this overlaid onto divides within Ukraine and in particular for young, Western (Ukrainian) and Ukrainian nationalists who were keen, for different reasons, to align with Europe and the West. So what was just going for the highest by Yanukovych was, to them, a betrayal. They launch protests. Yanukovych for whatever reason uses force for a time but decides he doesn't want to any further/can't hold/there's a possibility security forces might not follow orders. The West is very quick to recognise/view this as a revolution.

So Putin moves to grab what he can rather than be faced with a fait accompli - now my own take is that actually Ukraine would have carried on bouncing from pro-European to pro-Russian and those divisions would not have resolved themselves any time soon. But by invading, Ukraine's now far more pro-Europe, pro-West to the extent that I think the last polling I saw had 60% of Ukrainians want to join NATO (including 40% in Eastern Ukraine - I don't think that happens without the Russian invasion. I think it was probably counter-productive.

Thank you for a much more balanced view without the tiring ideological component.

We can go into details about the role of the western governments and Russia in those events. Maybe later, as there's a lot of material we'll need to address.

Overall, what this discussion shows to me is how far we've moved away from each other on this topic

[Sheilbh]

Meanwhile, the West understands events to have been that Yanukovich was undermining democratic processes to hang on to power until a popular uprising restored democracy?

Something like that?

I don't think there was any undermining the democratic process - at least no more than is standard for Ukrainian President.

There were protests over leaning to the EU agreement and then pulling back by Ukrainians who for different reasons felt very passionately about that (Ukrainian nationalists because it's anti-Russian, and some young more educated passionately pro-European Ukrainians). I don't think it was a violation of any democratic process or anything like that. I'm not sure that it would have been any different if, instead of Yanukovych, Tymoshenko had been elected - I think it probably would have been the same fairly corrupt process of trying to get a bidding war going between Russia and the EU.

As I say I think the problem was that Ukrainian politics as normal actually mapped across a fault line, so inadvertantly set off massive protests that they initially tried to restrict and squash down but then stopped pretty quickly. The West were very quick (within the first week of three months of protests) to see them as basically a revolution say there should be no attempt at repression and I think backing their demands perhaps, especially within Europe, because this was Euromaidan - there were EU flags everywhere.

[Gaijin de Moscu]

I don't know... I was guessing - I just told you I didn't follow events so I was asking for a precis

Sheilbh's summary makes sense to me.

So basically the question is to what degree the protests in Ukraine were something Ukrainians did on their own, or whether it was engineered by Western interests?

Oh, I see, sorry. Makes sense.

Yes, everyone was meddling in Ukraine in 2013 — Russia, EU, and US. A lot of documentary, photo and video evidence of that meddling exists. I'm too emotionally exhausted to go dig it up right now.

[Gaijin de Moscu]

Meanwhile, the West understands events to have been that Yanukovich was undermining democratic processes to hang on to power until a popular uprising restored democracy?

Something like that?

I don't think there was any undermining the democratic process - at least no more than is standard for Ukrainian President.

There were protests over leaning to the EU agreement and then pulling back by Ukrainians who for different reasons felt very passionately about that (Ukrainian nationalists because it's anti-Russian, and some young more educated passionately pro-European Ukrainians). I don't think it was a violation of any democratic process or anything like that. I'm not sure that it would have been any different if, instead of Yanukovych, Tymoshenko had been elected - I think it probably would have been the same fairly corrupt process of trying to get a bidding war going between Russia and the EU.

As I say I think the problem was that Ukrainian politics as normal actually mapped across a fault line, so inadvertantly set off massive protests that they initially tried to restrict and squash down but then stopped pretty quickly. The West were very quick (within the first week of three months of protests) to see them as basically a revolution say there should be no attempt at repression and I think backing their demands perhaps, especially within Europe, because this was Euromaidan - there were EU flags everywhere.

Agreed. There's more to it, but at this level I agree with you 100%.

[Sheilbh]

Overall, what this discussion shows to me is how far we've moved away from each other on this topic

Yeah - I think, though, that it has also moved Ukraine away on this topic.

I mentioned before but I've been to Ukraine a couple of times in recent years - and the process of memorialisation is fascinating to see. Both of Euromaidan where the graffiti and the posters of the protesters on the Independence Monument are preserved more or less and there are markers that look on their way to becoming permanent of both the protesters who were killed and the site of the snipers.

In the context of the war you have these ersatz war memorials in every town I went to (admittedly not to Eastern Ukraine) where it's nothing more than a laminated photo of both protesters and soldiers from that town/village who have been killed on a board in the town square. It is really striking but I think even if Ukrainian national identity was weak before 2014, I think it has now been solidified or is in the process of being created.

[Gaijin de Moscu]

Overall, what this discussion shows to me is how far we've moved away from each other on this topic

Yeah - I think, though, that it has also moved Ukraine away on this topic.

I mentioned before but I've been to Ukraine a couple of times in recent years - and the process of memorialisation is fascinating to see. Both of Euromaidan where the graffiti and the posters of the protesters on the Independence Monument are preserved more or less and there are markers that look on their way to becoming permanent of both the protesters who were killed and the site of the snipers.

In the context of the war you have these ersatz war memorials in every town I went to (admittedly not to Eastern Ukraine) where it's nothing more than a laminated photo of both protesters and soldiers from that town/village who have been killed on a board in the town square. It is really striking but I think even if Ukrainian national identity was weak before 2014, I think it has now been solidified or is in the process of being created.

Yeah, I've been to Ukraine many times.

Let's not forget that the "unknown snipers" shot both at protesters and the Berkut police. 13 policemen were killed and 200 were wounded. 106 protesters were killed, mostly by those snipers.

Here's just one image to show the atmosphere of those "protests:"