Posted on 03/07/2014 10:28:51 AM PST by Jim Robinson
(CNN) -- All the self-righteous huffing and puffing in Washington over Ukraine jars on European and especially Russian ears after the multiple U.S.-led invasions and interventions in other people's countries of recent years. It's difficult to say what is more astonishing: the double standards exhibited by the White House, or the apparent total lack of self-awareness of U.S. officials.
Secretary of State John Kerry risked utter ridicule when he declared it unacceptable to invade another country on a "completely trumped-up pretext," or just because you don't like its current leadership. Iraq in 2003 springs instantly to mind. This is exactly what George W. Bush and Tony Blair did when they "trumped up" the supposed threat posed by the hated Saddam Hussein's fabled weapons of mass destruction.
Like Saddam, the Taliban leadership in place in Afghanistan in 2001 was deeply objectionable. But instead of just going after Osama bin Laden and his al Qaeda training camps after the 9/11 attacks, Bush (again abetted by Blair) opted for full-scale regime change. The lamentable consequences of that decision are still being felt 13 years later, not least by Afghan civilians who have been dying in ever greater numbers as the final Nato withdrawal approaches.
U.S. President Barack Obama, a former law professor who should know better, has charged Vladimir Putin, his Russian counterpart, with violating Ukraine's sovereignty and territorial integrity, in breach of international law.
But it is Obama, following in Bush's footsteps, who has repeatedly and cynically flouted international law by launching or backing myriad armed attacks on foreign soil, in Libya, Somalia, Yemen and Pakistan to name a few, without U.N. security council authorization...
(Excerpt) Read more at cnn.com ...
No. I didn’t forget. I merely cited under whose Presidency the precedent was argued out and accepted that a Declaration of War is not an authorization to fight if attacked or threatened, but rather an authorization to take...like if next Thursday we wanted Canada.
There is a huge difference between invading a nation, or bombing its cities (as Clinton/Blair did to Serbia), and sending frigates & marines to protect your shipping from Pirates & brigands.
Agreed.
bump to that
“Secretary of State John Kerry risked utter ridicule when he declared it unacceptable to invade another country on a “completely trumped-up pretext,” or just because you don’t like its current leadership. Iraq in 2003 springs instantly to mind.”
Where and when we heard that before?
1999 - “Milosevici killed 100,000 Albanian Kosovars” (no bodies were found)
2003 - “Saddam Hussein has Weapons of Mass Destruction” (no WMD were found)
and now
2014 “Yanukovich sent snipers to kill peaceful demonstrators” IT REMAINS TO BE PROVED!
A leaked phone call between the EU foreign affairs chief Catherine Ashton and Estonian foreign minister Urmas Paet has revealed that the two discussed that the blame of the killing of civilian protesters in the Ukrainian capital, Kiev, is on the radical militiamen rather than the government police forces.
youtu.be/ZEgJ0oo3OA8
youtu.be/eXp-SiMXbnU
Olga Bogomolets, who gave the information to the Estonian minister, is a public figure and a respectable doctor, who has actually taken part in the Maidan movement from the onset and was tending to the wounded victims herself, along with other doctors. You can google her name. She certainly cannot be suspected of being a Yanukovich sympathizer. She saw the wounded and the dead herself, and also showed photos to the Estonian minister, who, being not too crazy about Russia himself, wouldn’t go broadcasting the news if he believed it was just a rumour
The Estonian foreign ministry confirmed the leaked conversation was accurate. “So there is a stronger and stronger understanding that behind snipers it was not Yanukovych, it was somebody from the new coalition,” Urma
When will they stop trying to fool us?
“As for Crimea - most of it is Russian. It’s not Russia that is living in another world, but the West, led by America that is oblivious to the human rights of the people who live there, including their right to decide their own future.”
The Autonomous Republic of Crimea parliament has voted on joining Russia, with 78 of 81 deputies in favour.
A referendum on the status of Crimea will be held March 16.
The West can accept a democratically elected government to be overthrown by a militant groups and recognize it as fully legal, but they cannot accept the right to self determination of another group through a referendum?
The West supported the secession of a region from another country Serbia through fire force(Kosovo) because of self determination but now cannot support this right to Crimea?
In US it was a strong support for the invasion of Panama, in ‘91, when American citizens were at risk, but would be indignant if this is done to protect Russian citizens in another state ?
It’s highly ironical that the West and the putschistes from Kiev rely on the gesture of a communist drunkard like Krustchev, who attached Crimea to the SSR of Ukraine in 1954, to talk about “legitimacy”.
One one word to expose the hypocrisy of the US and the EU: Yugoslavia.
NATO supported every secessionist group that wanted to break away from Yugoslavia, they bombed Yugoslavia, and they declared the Yugoslav Army to be an occupier on its own territory.
The West can’t have it both ways. They can’t say, for example, that the right of Albanians to self-determination in Kosovo trumps Serbia’s right to territorial integrity, and then turn around and say that Ukraine’s right to territorial integrity trumps the right of Russians in Crimea to self-determination.
Obama said any decisions on the future of Crimea, a pro-Russian area of Ukraine, must include the country’s new government.
“The proposed referendum on the future of Crimea would violate the constitution and violate international law,” Obama said. “We are well beyond the days when borders can be redrawn over the heads of democratic leaders.”
BLAST FROM THE NOT SO FARAWAY PAST
The Assembly of Kosovo, a province of Serbia, approved an unilateral declaration of independence from Serbia on 17 February 2008. Kosovo was soon recognized as a sovereign state by the United States, Turkey, Albania, Austria, Germany, Italy, France, the United Kingdom, and others ...
With the recognition of Kosovo, Russia was free in its approach, including towards the ‘unrecognised republics’ of Abkhazia, South Ossetia and Pridnestrovie-Transnistria.
According to Russia Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov at the time: “A precedent is objectively created not just for South Ossetia and Abkhazia but also for an estimated 200 territories around the world. If someone is allowed to do something, many others will expect similar treatment.”
“Obama, following in Bush’s footsteps, who has repeatedly and cynically flouted international law by launching or backing myriad armed attacks on foreign soil, in Libya, Somalia, Yemen and Pakistan to name a few, without U.N. security council authorization”
Watch this video: When Victoria Nuland was setting up the “new” Maidan-putschist government of Ukraine, as a time (January 2014) when V.Yanoukovih was the legitimately elected president, in a call with US ambassador to Kiev Geoffrey Pyatt
youtu.be/qv7qy7jot30
Washington was heavily meddling in the Ukrainian political crisis by manipulating the pro-EU opposition and helping it in its efforts to oust President Viktor Yanukovich.
It’s just disgusting , anyone who loves freedom should be shocked and appalled by the actions of the US and EU. Many people were killed by putschists on the place, demonstrators AND policemen, so that the US could install a puppet government whose primary aim will no doubt be to antagonise Russia / Putin.
The US was caught red-handed interfering into a sovereign nation’s government. The Maidan-puppet PM Yatsenyuk sold out Ukraine to the USA. It is obvious from the conversation that Yatsenyuk talked to Nuland and the ambassador beforehand.
....”The US was caught red-handed interfering into a sovereign nation’s government. The Maidan-puppet PM Yatsenyuk sold out Ukraine to the USA”.......
Amazing that people aren’t seeing this even now...western media are certainly NOT allowing anyone to criticize the Kiev coup or trying to make people understand the Russian view on all this.... They just bash Russia day after day. There’s no balance or criticism of US foreign policy on US news networks.
Aggression by stealth is the covert/overt funding,.....arming...and training... of dissident groups in ‘targeted countries’, with the sole purpose of overthrowing the—very often—democratically elected governments, then installing ‘compliant puppets’ as the new ‘democratic’ leaders...........
These dirty trick tactics have been/are being used by the U.S. against such countries as Venezuela, Granada, Iraq, Iran, Lebanon, Syria, Libya, Egypt and others.
The ultimate aim of these operations is to ‘open up’ the targeted countries to Western domination and resource exploitation under the Globalist Agenda for One World Governance.
Venezuela is next as we see unfolding already.
caww
Wow that is quite a list. You may want to go to happy hour and relax. This stuff is getting to you.
I agree with some but please some are a bit out there.
Crosslink
It was the Berkut that did most all of the shooting.
Spare me the bullshit of how it was the EU, Soros, the CIA and Ukraine Nazis. You should be zotted for all that misdirection garbage you have been bringing to these pages. About the only excuse you have for doing as you have been, is that you are a shrill Jewish female(?) seeing antisemitism as primary mover of every Ukrainian "nationalist" who prefers their nation distanced from the left-over, retread communists turned crony capitalists, of Moscow .
If it wasn't Yanukovych who ordered the shooting done, then someone else possibly, someone in the same Ukraine government/crime syndicate.
Regardless of who (most likely from Party of Regions) ordered it, when it didn't work, Yanukovych ran away, but not before trying to eliminate evidence of his economic crimes.
I hate to keep posting this but if the Crimea wanted the Russians to come in why did this biker group replace the mayor two days before the attack. Because it is a KGB operation . New mayor asks for help. Rinse and repeat throughout region.
I found the article where the Night Wolves motorcycle gang helped replace the mayor days before the invasion. This happened on 2-25 in Sevastopol.
Form the article
“We will not submit to the regime in Kiev,” Dmitry Sinichkin, president of the local branch of motorcycle club the Night Wolves told the crowd in Sevastopol.
The Night Wolves are closely linked to Russia’s political elite. Putin has visited the group in the city several times, on one occasion in 2010 riding a three-wheeled Harley Davidson alongside the bikers.
After his speech, Sinichkin told RIA Novosti that fresh bloodshed in Ukraine’s ongoing political crisis was inevitable.
Rally-goers waved the Russian red, white and blue tricolor and yelled the football fan-style chant of “Ros-si-ya, Ros-si-ya, Ros-si-ya,” as they endorsed calls to create self-defense squads with police cooperation and withhold taxes from Kiev.
More on night wolves
Yeah, dirty pool. I thought this move was silliness at first. What would this be like, George Bush sending Hells Angels? Well, except Hells Angels really are independent minded. Their vices are typically American, but so are their virtues. They wouldn’t have any reason to be part of something like this. The Wolves’ vices are Russian.
In the middle of all this chaos what does the average Crimean really want? Do they regard Russia as boon or bane? We can’t hear it.
I don’t think so because the ned game is gaining nations and revenues, resources and those who will co-operate under the Global Agenda.
Gaddaffi and Mubarack told them right to their faces they would not be part of their unified world governance...and they’re gone..
Heck why do you think France was the spearhead in Libya? Gaddafi said he would not co-operate with Sarkosi’s Mediterrain Group for dominance over the Mediterrainian...which was Sarkosi’s plan that EU initally opposed but then were willing to incoperate his group into the EU push.
Morsi was initially compliant and willing, using the long arm of the Muslim Brotherhood throughout the ME, as they are organized and can do so, was the plan, and remains so...even though Morsi got power hungry too fast and upset the initial plans.
One of the reasons we don’t get the whole picture is because our news agencies control what we’re told, and or withheld.
How often our MSM agencies report anything other then one crisis over the next on the world stage...they don’t...you have to go to foreign news agencies to see who is uniting with who, who’s seeing who, and the groups and organizations organizing.
I don’t think so because the ned game is gaining nations and revenues, resources and those who will co-operate under the Global Agenda.
Gaddaffi and Mubarack told them right to their faces they would not be part of their unified world governance...and they’re gone..
Heck why do you think France was the spearhead in Libya? Gaddafi said he would not co-operate with Sarkosi’s Mediterrain Group for dominance over the Mediterrainian...which was Sarkosi’s plan that EU initally opposed but then were willing to incoperate his group into the EU push.
Morsi was initially compliant and willing, using the long arm of the Muslim Brotherhood throughout the ME, as they are organized and can do so, was the plan, and remains so...even though Morsi got power hungry too fast and upset the initial plans.
One of the reasons we don’t get the whole picture is because our news agencies control what we’re told, and or withheld.
How often our MSM agencies report anything other then one crisis over the next on the world stage...they don’t...you have to go to foreign news agencies to see who is uniting with who, who’s seeing who, and the groups and organizations organizing.
It's an easy thing for the Kremlin to do.
If one cannot see that part of things (I'm not saying you don't, but some here don't, believing every Kremlin lie -- there are new ones every day) then I don't know what to say...
other than the U.S. should be very careful in what it officially says and does.
I think you do great work here and I have a great deal of respect for all of your contributions to FR. That being said I am one who has many sources of information and have a certain skill set that has given me access to tremendous amounts of info. I will just say to you don’t take your eye off the ball chasing things that are impossible to prove. Continue using your great skills posting information that are sourced and if what your saying is true you will have the facts to back them up.
Crosslink
The Russians are hellbent on a fascist empire run by Russian mobsters and the worker drones controlled by an Orthodox church.
Given a choice between filthy muzzies and Orthodox, Putin's actions are not just entirely understandable, but sensible.
Agreed, nothing is as it appears.
BFL
Transcript of the telephone conversation between EU Foreign Policy Chief Catherine Ashton and the Estonian Minister of Foreign Affairs Urmas Paet, which was intercepted and recorded and has been authenticated by the Estonian Foreign Ministry:
Paet: “And still, people are seriously concerned about the fact that the new coalition is unwilling to investigate what really occurred there . The understanding of the fact that somebody from the new coalition, not Yanukovych, was behind those snipers is becoming more and more strengthened with every passing day.”
Ashton: “I think we do want to investigate. I mean, I didn’t pick that up, that’s interesting. Gosh,”
Paet: “And second, what was quite disturbing, this same Olga Bogomolets told as well that all the evidence shows that the people who were killed by snipers from both sides, among policemen and then people from the streets, that they were the same snipers killing people from both sides.” He also added: “She also showed me some photos and said that as a medical doctor she can say that, the same type of bullets were used on both police and protestors.”
Ashton: “Well, yeah…that’s, that’s terrible.”
youtu.be/ZEgJ0oo3OA8
youtu.be/eXp-SiMXbnU
Olga Bogomolets, who gave the information to the Estonian minister, is a public figure and a respectable doctor, who has actually taken part in the Maidan movement from the onset and was tending to the wounded victims herself, along with other doctors. You can google her name. She certainly cannot be suspected of being a Yanukovich sympathizer. She saw the wounded and the dead herself, and also showed photos to the Estonian minister, who, being not too crazy about Russia himself, wouldn’t go broadcasting the news if he believed it was just a rumour.
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