Posted on 02/27/2014 10:41:38 PM PST by BurningOak
Dozens of armed men in military uniforms seized an airport in the capital of Ukraine's strategic Crimea region early Friday, a report said.
Witnesses told the Interfax news agency that the 50 or so men were wearing the same gear as the ones who seized government buildings in the city, Simferopol, on Thursday and raised the Russian flag.
The report said the men with "Russian Navy ensigns" first surrounded the Simferopol Airport's domestic flights terminal.
The report could not be immediately confirmed.
The events in the Crimea region have heightened tensions with neighboring Russia, which scrambled fighter jets to patrol borders in the first stirrings of a potentially dangerous confrontation reminiscent of Cold War brinksmanship.
Russia also has granted shelter to Ukraine's fugitive president, Viktor Yanukovych, after recent deadly protests in Kiev swept in a new government.
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
“I am sure Putin would think twice about such a move if Ted Cruz or hell, even McCain was at the helm.”
No Vlad has been itching to do this for years now. He got part of Georgia and now he will settle for part of the Ukraine. He was always going to do this.
Russian Nationalists have been demanding it for years....If Putin doesn’t do it, they would just find someone else who will.
Yes, Crimea is pro Russian. The rest of the Ukraine hates Russia’s guts. This is no suprise.
As The Offspring sang, “You gotta keep ‘em separated.”
Oh, try to keep up.
LowTaxesEqualsProsperity specifically mentioned the deputy-PM.It was you who mentioned Turchynov and Tymochenko. No one has said those two are neo-nazis. However, they chose to bring in 6 ministers from Svoboda and none from Klitchko’s party in the government. That’s telling. Unfortunately.
What are the names of these so called “neo-Nazis”?
I’d like to research this, thanks.
“To a Russian, everyone looks like a Neo-Nazi. When you observe that the head of their state is a former KGB colonel, they tell you that the Cold War is over.”
I’ve been reading that Putin has really put the screws to the Russian news media. He’s definitely got the spin working for him.
About Svoboda from the well known left-wing paper International Business Times:
Svoboda: The Rising Spectre Of Neo-Nazism In The Ukraine
Ukraine: far-right extremists at core of 'democracy' protest
Ukraine Appoints Member of Controversial Svoboda Party Prosecutor General
But most intersting and revealing, and a wonderful example of closing the barn-door after the horses have bolted, was this statement from the German foreign office today:
On May 6, 1992 the Crimean Parliament amended the Crimean Constitution to say that Crimea was part of Ukraine.
While I appreciate your links, and I will read them, the two I read so far are far left-wing sites; channel 4 UK links to “The Nation”, (barking moon bats) another one the Washington Post, both of these sources describe the Tea Party as racists and “extreme Right-Wing”...
You really think that they are reliable sources as to right wing racism? Here’s an example of what I’m talking about:
The Ukrainian Nationalism at the Heart of ‘Euromaidan’
(The Nation)
http://www.thenation.com/article/178013/ukrainian-nationalism-heart-euromaidan
The Grand Old Tea Party
“Why today’s wacko birds are just like yesterday’s wingnuts.”
November 5, 2013 | This article appeared in the November 25, 2013 edition of The Nation.
http://www.thenation.com/article/177018/grand-old-tea-party
The business papers are hardly far-left (despite my tongue in cheek comment). I hope you don’t find Breitbart far-left, and the WaPo article was linked only because it quoted an AP report on a statement by the German foreign office (which has been quoted in British and Swedish papers as well).
But apart from that, the fact that Svoboda leadership last year visited a small fringe neo-nazi party in Sweden tells me exactly what they are. (No, it wasn’t the anti-immigration Swedish Democrats, who are of course reviled by the usual culprits in the media. I wouldn’t have seen that as a problem.)
You said: “.... The Russians played this game several times before. ...”
This is not fair. Imagine a area that is inhabited by 58.5 % Americans undergoing such political changes. We would see bazillons of lethernecks and aircraft carriers there. You Americans have still a disposition for martial appearances.
Best regards from good old central Europe
Andreas
A big part of this view about the US being a bunch of strutting cowboys is Soviet propaganda combined with European complacency based on decades of American protection. The real issue is American conventional wisdom, which is more or less that if the US had sent (I'm being facetious here) an expeditionary force to arrest Hitler during the Beer Hall Putsch, WWII wouldn't have occurred. That's right - American conventional wisdom is that at bottom, the US was responsible for WWII. Not Russia, which signed the Molotov Ribbentrop Pact, thereby giving Germany a free hand to invade its neighbors, and supplied Nazi Germany's war machine while that invasion was ongoing. Not Germany, which obviously did attempt to create a Third Thousand Year Reich. Not France and Britain, which stood by as Poland was invaded instead of attacking Germany's exposed western flank. Not Poland and Hungary, which divvied up Czechoslovakia with Germany instead of insisting on its independence. Not the Netherlands and Belgium, which let their military forces atrophy in the post-WWI years.
Nope. The US conventional wisdom is that America's minding its own business was the cause of WWII. And every flare-up across the globe where the US doesn't respond with military force is the second coming of Munich - the appeasement of a monster among men who will trigger a large scale military and humanitarian disaster akin to Hitler's. The American left has sold the entire country on this concept, which is why we are subsidizing Asia's and Europe's defense three decades after they caught up with us economically. It is long past time we cancelled our defense treaties, brought the troops home and sharply reduced our defense budget to avoid the temptation of getting involved in quixotic wars abroad. The problem is that until we do that, we will forever be tangled up in the affairs of places like Ukraine. As long as we're responsible for Poland's, Romania's, Bulgaria's, Hungary's and Slovakia's defense, we need to worry about what's happening in Ukraine. A Finlandized (Russian-leaning but neutral) Ukraine is helpful because it provides some breathing space in the event of a Russian push west. A Ukraine that is an integral part of Russia means Russian troops on NATO's border.
What's weird is that we emerged from WWII with the complex that we were responsible for peace in the world, regardless of cost. It wasn't us that slaughtered half the Jews in the world. It wasn't us that conducted large-scale post-surrender massacres in the Far East. But for some convoluted reason, it was us who were responsible for making sure that the post-war era was safe from people like Hitler. That's how we ended up fighting in godforsaken places like Korea and Vietnam.
I'm of two minds about Ukraine. On the one hand, the Russian annexation of Ukraine will cause security problems for our allies. On the other hand, a supine response from the EU, mirrored by Obama's insouciance about the whole affair might not be a bad thing - we might finally get a sea change in American public opinion, one that finally shrugs off the costly (to Americans) myth that we have a God-given responsibility to obviate the security problems of countries thousands of miles away from us.
“The business papers are hardly far-left”
-actually, Business Insider IS far-left. Here’s two of BI’s recent articles, complaining about “income inequality” and blaming our weak economy on “greedy overlords”. No mention of their hero Obama, at’all. But plenty on the 1%.
AMERICA TODAY: 3 Million Overlords, 300 Million Serfs
http://www.businessinsider.com/wealth-and-income-inequality-in-america-2013-4
More from “Business Insider” :
“THE ECONOMY SUCKS: Because American Companies And Their Owners Are Greedier Now Than At Any Time In History”
From the article:
“American corporations and shareholders insist on taking an ever-greater share of the country’s wealth for themselves, instead of sharing it with the people who create it (employees), the longer our economy will suffer”.
http://www.businessinsider.com/profits-high-wages-low-2014-3
-and on more than one occasion, Business Insider has praised Obamacare, while attacking Republicans. Here’s one such example of many:
“Obamacare Will Raise Wages”
http://www.businessinsider.com/the-buried-lede-in-the-cbo-report-obamacare-will-raise-wages-2014-2
Sorry, I am not impressed. The fact is that the opposition has allied with some extreme parties. What effect this will have in the future is far too early to say, or to quote dr Szamuely, who is an expert on Russia and definitely not a "leftist":
Nor must we forget that among the many disparate opposition groups there are some very nasty ones and, at this stage, we do not know how much power or influence they will have.
The only problem with your argument is that the Russians fuel the problems and are part of the cause for the chaos in the first place. They help create the conditions so that they can have justification to go in. They have folks that get brought in (civilian clothed), they pay thugs, provide Intel, and safe havens etc. They make the problem they then say they have to fix and yes, the republic of Georgia was the same scenario.
While incredibly amateurish from our side, how do you think some of our communications with the Ukrainians get into the public? Those are controlled releases that intend to influence us/euro actions.
Russia doesn’t want to return to the days if soviet occupation, but they want to re-establish their hegemony regionally and this is done through various ways/means. The Ukraine orienting itself with Europe is simply unacceptable to them, and if need be even a civil war in the Ukraine to prevent this is justifued to them.
Basically your entire augment is based on an erroneous premise, in that the real issue is the Russian intentions and actions to ensure the Ukraine does NOT drift towards the West/EU. The entire ethic Russian debate is merely a facade that is used as rationalization and it is something that they help instigate in the first place.
The problem is that at the most senior US levels you have amateurs. While the bureaucracy is highly competent (highly selective, extensive training, often folks with decades of experience), in such organizations as the DoD and Department of State, the most senior officials are appointed politically, and they are often buffoons: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7EFMHtmNHbg (need one say more?) or: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CL_GShyGv3o
The executive office if frozen into inaction and EVERYONE knows that the US will do nothing except spew hot air... This administration is bent on military disengagement and is more concerned with social issues inside the US: health care, immigration, race, global warming, the homosexual agenda... There will be no military action or even anything that could potentially cause escalation, so the Russians will win by default because they are willing to wager more in this poker game plus their folks aren’t amateurs (they have so far cleaned the US’s clocks in the intel game). That simple. All the normally long winded and self ingratiating Obama can do is give a 3 minute speech, because he’s already lost this game and he knows it too: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dU79NIoWDIE
The Ukraine will NOT orient itself to Europe, but you should be happy, you’re a European and you like a more passive, weaker, non-militaristic US... The Germans like the Carter, Clinton, Obama... types for a reason.
they already held a couple of major bloodlettings during the last hundred years. we have yet to see our nation laid waste as Europe was.
“I can imagine if Lurch got shot, his facial expression would not change.”
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On the contrary, the shock would almost certainly improve his looks.
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