"Son....you're on your own."
Posted on 04/22/2014 5:44:15 AM PDT by UMCRevMom@aol.com
As pro-Russian separatists [Putin front-men] in eastern Ukraine IGNORED the provisions of a cease-fire agreement requiring them to abandon their occupation of government buildings on Sunday, the country’s acting prime minister appeared in a taped television interview and admitted that the country’s military and security apparatus could NOT defend the country against a Russian incursion.
“How can you STOP the…Russian Federation, which spent billions of dollars to modernize their military?” Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk asked host David Gregory on NBC’s Meet the Press.
He contrasted the state of Russia’s military – some 40,000 members of which are currently massed along Russia’s border with Ukraine – with the depleted state of his own country’s. Yatsenyuk blamed the CORRUPT GOVERNMENT of RUSSIA-ALIGNED former President Viktor YANKOVYCH for ALLOWING the Ukrainian military and security services to DECLINE.
“In the last four years, the former president, together with the Russian supporters…DISMANTLED Ukrainian MILITARY and SECURITY FORCES,” Yatsenyuk said. “We need to be in a very good shape in order to stop Russia. And for this shape we need to get REAL SUPPPORT from our western partners.”
Despite multiple attempts by Gregory to do so, Yatsenyuk REFUSED TO BE LED into asking specifically for weaponry – the sort of aid that would be freighted with far more political significance than the non-lethal support that has been provided so far. However, it was hard to read Yatsenyuk’s request as not including modern weapons.
“We need a strong and solid state. We need financial and economic support. We need to overhaul the Ukrainian military,” he repeated. “We need to modernize our security and military forces. We need REAL support.”
Yatsenyuk argued that Russia under President Vladimir PUTIN is a THREAT NOT JUST to Ukraine, but also to global stability in general. Russia last month ANNEXED Ukraine’s Crimean peninsula under the GUISE of protecting ethnic Russians living there from political violence – VIOLENCE that now appears to have been SUPPORTED or even INSTIGATED by RUSSIAN SOLDIERS and AGENTS.
“RUSSIA TRIGGERED THIS VIOLENCE. RUSSIA SUPPORTED THESE TERRORISTS,” said Yatsenyuk.
“President Putin has a dream to restore the Soviet Union and every day he goes further and further and God knows where is the final destination,” he continued.
Yatsenyuk ridiculed Russian demands that Ukraine rewrite its constitution to allow more autonomy for Eastern provinces that have large ethnic Russian populations. He compared it to Ukraine demanding that Russia declare Ukrainian an official language and grant special rights to ethnic Ukrainians, a large number of whom live in Russia.
Related: Why Putin’s Adventure in Ukraine Is Doomed
Russian ambassador to the United States, Sergey Kislyak, appeared on Fox News Sunday earlier in the morning, before the entire interview with Yatsenyuk was aired. But he was shown the segment in which the Ukrainian claimed that Putin’s goal is to restore the old Soviet Union. Host Chris Wallace also reminded him that Putin had referred to Ukraine as “Novo Rossiya,” or “New Russia,” in public remarks last week.
The idea that Putin wants to restore the old Soviet Union “is a false notion in its very nature,” he said. “The allusions to the history of relations between Russia and Ukraine was just to show that we are so intertwined.”
Kislyak said that Russia supported the cease-fire agreement that was reached in Geneva last week. But when it was pointed out that armed pro-Russian separatists who have taken over government facilities in several cities in eastern Ukraine were not disarming and leaving the buildings as it required, he appeared to blame the Ukrainian government.
Kislyak said that the separatists could not expected to disarm when, he claimed, “far right” Ukrainian nationalist groups in Kiev have not been forced to do the same.
Related: Why NATO’s Strategy Will No Longer Work
Saying that all Russia wants is to have “a friendly neighbor” in Ukraine, Kislyak did not bother hiding his disdain for those currently running the country.
“Unless the Ukrainian government or temporary government or whatever they call themselves and the regions of Ukraine talk to each other, agree on things, agree on what country they want to live in – that certainly would include expanded authorities of the regional government – unless they do so in a fateful way there will be no solution to the crisis,” he said.
Speaking on CNN’s State of the Union, Geoffrey Pyatt, US ambassador to Ukraine, said that his conversations with UKRAINIAN CITIZENS has convinced him that except for a small percentage of the population, the PEOPLE of Ukraine “are NOT INTERESTED in war” and ONLY “want to be their own country.
SHOULD IT COME TO WAR, he said, UKRAINE HAS NO GOOD OPTIONS.
“Militarily, as Crimea indicated, Ukraine is OUTGUNNED,” said Pyatt. “There is no military solution to this crisis. It has to be solved through diplomacy”
VIDEO AVAILABLE: http://www.thefiscaltimes.com/Articles/2014/04/20/Ukrainian-PM-We-Can-t-Stop-Russia-Alone
And we supported this coup?? It's the same folks from the 2004 Revolution.
Oleksandr Turchynov must BEG from help from his allies. DESPITE the actions of U.S. Congress ACTIONS to support in March, Obama has not acted.
He is the current Chairman of the Ukrainian Parliament and acting President of Ukraine after Yanukovych was removed from power by the parliament on 21 February 2014. He also assumed the command of the Ukrainian Armed Forces on February 25th.
Canada has been in the forefront supporting the peaceful protest of Ukraine citizens since Nov, 2013 and continue to independently issue increased sanctions.
I do not see what the PM is whining about. They wanted the coup, not they get what they asked for. If they could not defend themselves after their hostile takeover, why should they expect help to prevent Russia from their version of a hostile re-takeover?
Sacajaweau, Maybe this will help you know the will of the Ukrainian people and also Putin that said, “Our troops will stand behind women and children. Let them try to shoot them.”
1. WE DO NOT NEED PROTECTION http://ireport.cnn.com/docs/DOC-1099585
2. Crimean refugees in Lviv
http://www.economist.com/blogs/easternapproaches/2014/03/ukraine
3. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uNDJb2_4nu0
4. http://www.nytimes.com/video/world/europe/100000002749138/confrontation-in-crimea.html
PUTIN LIES!
1. Main historical ethnicity in Crimea is Krim Tatars who were being killed massively during WW2 by Soviets and resettled from Crimea by force after 1944 (ethnical cleaning). After that Russians populated Crimea changing ethnical picture of the peninsula. Krim Tatars started coming back after 1991 and now they support the sovereignty of Ukraine and consider themselves Ukrainian citizens.
2. By invading Crimea Russia broke sovereignty of Ukraine and international agreements on the integrity of Ukraine that it signed in 1994 in Budapest along with the USA and UK. If international agreements mean nothing to Putin which agreement he will break next?
3. Ethnic Russians in Ukraine were never persecuted for their origin or language – that is the biggest lie you will find no evidence of.
4. By invading Crimea Russia supported local separatists and prevented the peaceful resolution of the political crisis in Ukraine.
5. Russia is hiding criminal Yanukovich who is being wanted for mass economical crimes and homicides in Ukraine.
More upon request...
Sure you can. The Afghans and Chechyns (nearly) did. Give it a try.
RJSimmon
Ukraine agreed to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons. (The Memorandum originally was signed by three nuclear powers: the Russian Federation, the United States of America, and the United Kingdom with China and France giving individual assurances in separate documents.)
Ukraine gave up 1/3 of the world’s largest nuclear weapons stockpile.
Ukraine could not respond to Russian aggression because Putin would THEN have rationale to interpret to the world his need to PROTECT Russians in Crimea & now eastern Ukraine.
Remember, Putin controls Russian media. That is why you & I have NOT seen or heard of the protests to support Ukraine IN RUSSIA!
Putin had to CREATE provocation of PROTECTING Russian-speaking citizens. Russia then moved in creating a PUBLICALLY ‘occupied’ Crimea to hold an “referendum” to annex Crimea. Ukraine vigorously protested the action as a violation of Article 1 of the Budapest Memorandum.
They don’t stop it with stupid actions that have every babouska in eastern Ukraine wanting to take up arms to keep the Kiev government out!
“They wanted the coup, not they get what they asked for.”
Bingo!
Now good luck, Prime Minister Yatsenyuk. You might not survive for very long.
"Son....you're on your own."
If Ukraine really wants freedom, they’ll have to fight for it themselves.
Not every people is free and independent, the ones who are free are the ones who fought for it themselves and prevailed.
Putin is interested in the Crimea for the port of Sevastopol. His interests in the Ukraine are fleeting if at all. Further, I could not care less about alleged protests in support of the Ukraine in Russia. We have protests in the US for various things that are all crap as well. Russia has taken very few aggressive steps towards the Ukraine that can not be militarily linked as protection for the Crimea and the Russian troops staged there. If Putin had wanted the Ukraine, the flag of the Russian Federation would be flying over parlaiment from day 1. NATO would have been powerless to stop it. The ripple effect thereafter would have been a mess and Vlad probably would have lost if NATO countered, but he has little to no interest in the Ukraine so there he sits until the political landscape stabilizes.
I just don’t see taking over the rest of Ukraine as being worth the trouble for Putin. Now his main concern is that Ukraine doesn’t join NATO.
Completely agree.
rjsimmon Putin’s actions counter your argument.
Putins invasion: http://www.kyivpost.com/content/politics/ukrainian-experts-say-russian-invasion-was-years-in-making-one-alleges-betrayal-by-yanukovychs-administration-338260.html
What messed up Putin was his coward puppet Yanukovych running in the middle of the night to avoided Hague trial on his crimes against humanity. Also, his interest is NOT just in a port: factories
http://www.invest-crimea.gov.ua/show_content.php?alias=export_prom&mid=219&m2=226&locale=en
The Point?
Any effort to break eastern Ukraine from Ukraine proper would meet resistance not only from the western half of the country, but from wide swaths of Ukrainians living within those regions (This is a good time to note that past polls have indicated that a majority of Russian-speakers living in the country have also expressed loyalty to Ukraine and not Russia. Also, some people who identify themselves as Ukrainian-speaking may speak Russian in their day-to-day lives).
“There are significant numbers of ethnic Ukrainians who continue to speak Ukrainian in the east and in the south,” says Ukraine scholar Alexander Motyl in a recent interview with RFE/RL. “There are significant numbers of passionate Ukrainians, let’s call them patriots, who speak Russian and who prefer Russian culture, and who nevertheless are committed to Ukrainian statehood and Ukrainian nationhood.”
In Kharkiv, where the anti-Maidan conference was held on February 22, pro-Maidan supporters have taken over the city-administration building, facing off with protesters who say their loyalty is with Russia.
In Crimea, the home of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet and long a hotbed of separatism, thousands of Crimean Tatars — who made up 11 percent of Crimea’s population according to the 2001 census — have massed in opposition to separation from Ukraine.
Ukraine’s diversity runs deep in both its east and west — ethnolinguistic maps notwithstanding.
http://www.rferl.org/content/ukraine-east-west-divide/25279292.html
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.