Ukraine Crisis

The Russian Duma has asked Putin to recognize DPR and LPR as independent countries.  What are their objectives?

Since Ukraine and the west are not going to recognize these 2 anyway, I am having a difficult time picturing what Putin can achieve if he follows Duma's request.

BeHealthyNPositive wrote:

The Russian Duma has asked Putin to recognize DPR and LPR as independent countries.  What are their objectives?

There's a fair chance Putin asked them to ask him. At the very least, they will have asked him if it was ok to ask him ... before they asked

Reuters is reporting (link) that the Russian backed rebels are claiming the Ukrainian Armed Forces have opened fire on them 4 times in the last 24 hours.

Cynic wrote:

Reuters is reporting (link) that the Russian backed rebels are claiming the Ukrainian Armed Forces have opened fire on them 4 times in the last 24 hours.

Russian pretext for war or the US needing a way out - who knows?

Fred wrote:

There's a fair chance Putin asked them to ask him. At the very least, they will have asked him if it was ok to ask him ... before they asked

I absolutely agree with you.  I just can't figure out what Putin can achieve here.  Neither Ukraine nor the west would care if he recognizes DPR/ LPR or not.

Cynic wrote:

Reuters is reporting (link) that the Russian backed rebels are claiming the Ukrainian Armed Forces have opened fire on them 4 times in the last 24 hours.

Since they have been shelling at each other for 8 years, one more or one less makes little difference.  If not for the current situation, it wouldn't even be in the news.

BeHealthyNPositive wrote:

Cynic wrote:

Reuters is reporting (link) that the Russian backed rebels are claiming the Ukrainian Armed Forces have opened fire on them 4 times in the last 24 hours.

Since they have been shelling at each other for 8 years, one more or one less makes little difference.  If not for the current situation, it wouldn't even be in the news.

Russia is in the news for everything - UK golden visas are being stopped because of Russians, and so on. It was the Chinese a couple of moths back, but that's on hold until the press have done one on Russia.
I'm fully aware both lie, but the BBC is especially nasty because they claim to be free and fair - Liar, liar, pants on fire.

Fred wrote:

There's a fair chance Putin asked them to ask him. At the very least, they will have asked him if it was ok to ask him ... before they asked

Someone more knowledgeable than me explained this move to me.  He calls it "Fat Hint".  Russia recognizes the separatist region in Georgia.  Russia also went to war against Georgia when the latter attacked the separatist region.

By considering to recognize the separatist regions in Ukraine as independent countries, Russia is warning Ukraine, in no uncertain terms, that if Ukraine dares to attack the DPR/LPR, Russia would do to Ukraine what it did to Georgia.

The latest amazing news

https://news.sky.com/story/what-does-th … r-12542880

The light brown structures in the centre of this image appear to be a new field hospital in the Osipovichi training area

Appear to be? They could equally be an entertainment area for bored troops.

A third image showed a new military pontoon bridge which had been built over the Pripyat River, less than four miles from the Belarus-Ukraine border. However it was not possible to tell from the satellite image taken on 15 February alone whether the bridge had been put up simply as part of a training exercise.

A new bridge in an area where we know training is training place. If that's evidence of an invasion on the way, perhaps I could suggest they try a little harder.

And on Wednesday evening, an unnamed US official claimed the Russians and actually deployed as many as 7,000 additional troops to the border area, although they did not provide any evidence.

That's just treating people like idiots.

Some quality stuff.

The latest interview with ambassador Jack Matlock, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e5F0JSy-HHY

What he can share with you is quite different than what you usually hear on the mainstream media.  In fact, he predicted in 1997 (yes, before anyone in public knew who Putin was) the mess we are in today based on the post-USSR American foreign policy.

Here is his latest article mentioned in this video, https://responsiblestatecraft.org/2022/ … e-avoided/

That's more than a bit obvious.

The US and NATO have been advancing towards Russia for years, and now the US is pushing for Ukraine to enter. Russia won't allow that and the US knows it, so they build up troops because of 'Russian aggression', and the US arms industry makes a lot of money.
Then they built up troops closer and closer to Russia - Of course the Russians are concerned - and right in this case. You also have to remember the US instigated, or at least supported, the coup in Ukraine that kicked off the situation as we know it, but that's never mentioned because it spoils the US story. The Russian speaking areas of Ukraine were the old president's voter base so of course they wanted out when a foreign power put a puppet government in. Getting rid of the pro-Russian voters means the revolutionary government may hold elections safe in the knowledge they won't lose.

The same is happening with the US military build up around China. They moan about the Chinese militarising islands, but the Chinese did so because of the threat from US carrier groups. If a dog is pooping on your lawn, you build a fence.

This is nothing new - The Cuban missile crisis was caused by the US putting MRBM into Europe in 1961 - the 1962 Soviet missiles in Cuba were to balance power. However, the Soviets were blamed for something the US started.

Expanding NATO towards Russia is moronic at best, and has the potential to be bloody dangerous.

Don't take this as support for Russia in general, or the cretinous communist CCCP,  just a note I believe they are the defenders, not the aggressors, in this case.

Propaganda is only believed by fools. History is a better source of information and gives you a far better idea of what is happening now.

Fred wrote:

Propaganda is only believed by fools. History is a better source of information and gives you a far better idea of what is happening now.

If I may offer a suggestion - Read declassified papers - they tell a story that's very different to the propaganda of the time,
Then ask this - If they lied then (So many times), why should they be believed now?

Fred wrote:

This is nothing new - The Cuban missile crisis was caused by the US putting MRBM into Europe in 1961 - the 1962 Soviet missiles in Cuba were to balance power. However, the Soviets were blamed for something the US started.

You will be surprised the majority of Americans don't know the Cuban Missile Crisis started because Kennedy deployed missiles in Turkey first!  The Soviets in response deployed in Cuba to counter the balance.  As the video revealed, Kennedy had actually ordered not to disclose those missiles in Turkey to the American public. 

I actually came across a genius or liar not long ago on social media who claimed the missiles in Turkey were old relics that even the Soviets didn't care about.  It got wrapped into the discussion with Cuba so that the U.S. could help the Soviets to save face, ie. both sides withdrew something! 

To refute his claim, I had to research what kind of missiles were placed in Turkey and found out they were only a few years old at that time!

BeHealthyNPositive wrote:

I actually came across a genius or liar not long ago on social media who claimed the missiles in Turkey were old relics that even the Soviets didn't care about.  It got wrapped into the discussion with Cuba so that the U.S. could help the Soviets to save face, ie. both sides withdrew something!

A year old or less. I seem to recall US Jupiter missiles became operational in late 1961, the cuba thing kicking off in the last quarter of 62. Knowing that ruins the US story about Soviet aggression.
Not support for the CCCP - They were just as bad.
The claim about them being old and outdated was in a film called "13 days", but that lie might well have been around before then.

This takes us to North Korea and the question of why the Soviets and China support that bunch of nutters. NK is a serious pain in the bottom for China as they have to juggle with a total idiot, but it's worth it to them as Kim and his head cases are keeping a buffer between US forces and the Chinese mainland. Same for Russia. US forces planted in the far north of Korea would leave Vladivostok in range of US ground fired missiles.

The last paragraph is especially important as the Russians are quite rightly concerned about US forces on their western borders. If the US gets NATO membership for Ukraine, that puts Moscow under direct threat from US ground forces.
Yes,  Is Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia are a headache for Russia, but US forces in Ukraine would makes things far worse. Again, we come to Russia having to support Belarus - not because they want to, but because they don't want NATO  any closer.

What?, I hear, the US is a peacekeeper, a saviour - Crap! That country has started more wars than any other in the history of the world, and has been proven to lie in order to do so. See WMDs.
Not that I believe Putin wouldn't do exactly the same if the positions were reversed. However, the reality is only three countries have never been invaded by, attacked by, or had US military in their country - Andorra, Bhutan, and Liechtenstein.
As a final note, excepting a few minor nothing things, the US has been involved in every conflict since 1945. "The Falklands", comes the voice - look it up, they had a hand in that one.
Mass terrorist bombings in Cambodia and Laos - guess who? Not that Russia has clean hands - just not quite as dirty - perhaps not by much when you look at Syria and others.

Now we come to the worst part. If the whole lot of these idiot politicians got together instead of causing wars for money, the world would be far better off than it is. China and the US are both making great advances in fusion technology. Together they might well have cracked it and solved the world's clean energy problem, but they're both far too busy trying to be top dog and earn from it. 
The massive chunk of cash wasted on weapons could have gone to far more productive things like education and exploring space. I'm pretty sure the moon would have a permanent population by now, and Mars would probably be on the way to the same.
World food shortages and poverty are almost always always caused by idiocy. The only ones that aren't are sustained by stupidity. Working together would see that dumped into history text books.

Putin, Biden, And all the rest are dangerous idiots that are doing a lot more harm than good. Future generations will see the lot as a bunch of morons.
Supporting either set is, in my opinion, about the same as hitting yourself on the head with a sharpened rock.

</rant>

In entirely unrelated, totally off topic, and unrelated to attempted disrupting Russian gas supplies into Europe.

https://www.reuters.com/business/energy … 022-02-17/

Feb 17 (Reuters) - Energy Transfer LP (ET.N) has joined a growing list of energy companies looking to build the next pipeline to transport growing amounts of natural gas production from the Permian Basin, the largest U.S. shale field, in West Texas and eastern New Mexico to export hubs on the Gulf Coast.

Not that I'm a cynic.

Also - Biden has warned Russia is about to invade any time now, probably in the next few days - This has more repeats than BBC TV's Christmas day programme guide.

All rather academic now that Russia have formally claimed Donetsk and Luhansk and Putin has moved his Army into Eastern Ukraine as Peacekeepers. Let's just hope the Russians in Belarus can stay out of Poland.

Cynic wrote:

All rather academic now that Russia have formally claimed Donetsk and Luhansk and Putin has moved his Army into Eastern Ukraine as Peacekeepers. Let's just hope the Russians in Belarus can stay out of Poland.

This is the first move I see as a big mistake for Putin. He had Biden looking like a doddering old fool, but he's tossed that out of the window.
As I understand it, the Russians put on a big show of recognising the breakaway states as independent - not actually claiming them as part of Russia.
However, that's more than likely what it means in the real world.

Still, its all (Yes, all) politicians doing what they do best - being total twats and not giving a flying rats how many people are hurt.

Russia gets one thing from this - Ukraine won't be able to join NATO whilst there is a civil war in progress.

I suspect that all the talk about sanctions will prove to be meaningless in that they will have little to no effect.  I hope I'm wrong because if they don't work, then we have very few options short of open warfare.

Cynic wrote:

I suspect that all the talk about sanctions will prove to be meaningless in that they will have little to no effect.  I hope I'm wrong because if they don't work, then we have very few options short of open warfare.

I understand Russia provides about 40% of the EU's gas - Tough to change that in a hurry, especially when bad weather is with them. Germany has blocked Nordstream 2.

Seems oil prices are on the up in western countries - That comes down to really stupid petrol prices in the UK - possibly elsewhere as well.

Reports are saying the US can't exclude Russia from SWIFT because they would hammer the US as well.

There's talk of stopping US dollar clearing for Russia - That won't really do much as they'll just use BRICS. I don't know how much Russia uses BRICS at the moment, but the petrodollar supports the US dollar, so they'll really have to watch out  if they go down that path.

What China does and says is going to be interesting.

Until Kyiv is willing to let go of Donbas and Crimea, whether Putin recognizes Donbas as independent nations or not,  Ukraine is a nation in conflict and ineligible to join NATO.

Given the nationalism in Ukraine, no president can survive if he gives up the claim over Crimea or Donbas.

Though on paper by recognizing Donbas as sovereign states, who then have the right to invite the Russian military to its territory and thus not an invasion, I am sure the Russian military was already there minus uniforms over the years! 

Other than escalating tension, I can't see what else Putin has accomplished by recognizing Donbas as independent countries.   It's a game of chicken, and whoever blinks first loses.  Since the west wasn't scared in the past, Putin is doubling down.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/worl … 22048.html

Gunfire and explosions could be heard in Kiev and several other cities shortly after Vladimir Putin announced what he called the start of a “special military operation” against Ukraine on Thursday morning, local and international media reported.

The pre-dawn quiet of many major Ukrainian cities was shattered by loud booms and the sound of gunfire, with fighting witnessed outside the country's capital Kiev as well as in Kramatorsk, Odessa, Kharkhiv, Berdyansk, and near the Boryspil International Airport.

I see mass panic and evacuations - ner - local webcams show people shopping.

https://www.skylinewebcams.com/en/webca … treet.htmlhttps://www.skylinewebcams.com/en/webca … treet.html

I wonder what's really going on