if they agree to never join NATO and remain a buffer state for Russia as was originally envisioned and agreed to with Mikhail Gorbachev.

great deal. Not.

Russia already took parts of it. You want them to not have any protection from further aggression from the country that was the aggressor and broke signed agreements. If the do not get into NATO they should at least get there nuclear arms back so they can have a deterrent from further Russian aggression.

Easiest way to end this is for Russia to go back to it's internationally recognized borders. That means Crimea goes back to Ukraine the way it was prior to the Russian invasion.

The nuclear arms in question, hundreds of mobile launchers and thousands of warheads, were repatriated to Russia as condition for Ukrainian independence. Everyone agreed, in the Budapest Memorandum, that a nuclear Ukraine was not in the best interests of peace.

Those missiles were Russian and always under Russian control before the USSR collapsed.

Do you honestly think that a coalition of Ukrainian neo Nazi militias should have control over 100 ICBM launchers and 1000 warheads?

of Russia respecting Ukraine's international borders. I do not think they would have invaded if Ukraine still had a nuclear deterrent. They gave those up on the agreement that the signing countries would respect it's borders and defend it in time of need. Russia INVADED and broke that agreement. I think the democratically elected government should have some kind of deterrent against a stronger nation that does not abide by agreements and treaties and invades it. I hope they will never have to be used but that would be up to Russia to abide by it's signed treaties and agreements.

breakup of the USSR. That was a very dangerous time. Both Russia and the Ukraine are controlled by gangsters. But at least with Russia you have a country that has a history of making, deploying and decommissioning nuclear weapons according to international treaties.

With the Ukraine you don't even know who is in charge of the country.

Yeah give those yobs nuclear weapons. Great idea.

Unfortunately the Budapest memorandum never made it to the treaty stage so you can't count that. Which is why Russia was emboldened to go into the Crimea and Donbast.

mean a lot to Russia right now, just like the so called cease fire that they keep trying to take the airport and use heavy artillery and Grad systems.

and please do not tell what to do

But when Putin falls and ends up into prison or forced exile, Crimea and E.Ukraine might be free

China and India are Russian allies. The two biggest countries. The U.S. and the EU have released statements and ineffective sanctions but little else. The rest of the world doesn't care one way or the other.

...for Washington, London, Bonn, and Paris.

100 countries voted for reality--that Crimea is Ukraine. Eleven basket-case countries voted against.

Some of whom have less population than a Chicago ward. Those in favor 33.8% of the world's population. Those opposed or abstaining 66.2% of the world's population, including almost all of Asia, Africa and South America. But those are "basket case" countries as you put it.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nations_General_Assembly_Resolution_68/262

I think Crimea has been a Russian port for, what, 200 years? And it also makes sense for Russia not to have a NATO war partner on its borders. This whole "crisis" is an invention of NATO military hawks and the warmongers who love them.

It only changed when, in 1954, the Ukrainian born dictator Khrushchev "gave" Crimea to Ukraine. At that point no one cared about the illegal transfer because it was all part of the Soviet Union anyway.

that's right nobody.

Russia is the only one that invaded another country, they and Putin seem to be the military hawks.

and Libya.

NATO nations have invaded many countries. Most famously in the recent war of aggression on the Iraqi people, which yielded death of people there on a genocidal scale. After this the U.S. and U.K. governments forever lost standing to make moral pronouncements of any kind against any other nation. At least until such time as the perpetrators of these aggressions and war crimes are brought to justice, and reparations are paid to the invaded nation.

Russia can be said to have invaded Georgia on behalf of separatists there, plus started very bad counter-insurgency wars in Chechnya. No one invaded Ukraine, much of the Russian population revolted after a nationalist coup d'etat deposed the president who'd had the support of the Russians.

and the facts are on my side with respect to Russia invading Ukraine.

after the Security Council adopted a resolution calling for an end to hostilities and the sides in the conflict refused to allow peacekeepers in to restrain them. Neither did NATO invade Libya.

Kofi Annan himself has repeatedly stated the intervention was illegal. Nobody has ever claimed it was authorized by the Security Council.

They usually claim it was, while illegal and not authorized, "legitimate", though - which is an entirely different issue, and somehow always left out of the discussion by critics of Crimea's secession.


Ex-Chancellor Schröder admits NATO violated international law:

The Security Council did not approve the NATO invasion.

That phrase is stunning in its revelation of historical ignorance.

The actual Reich was defeated by Russia, even though our history books give us and England all the credit.

This "New Russian Reich", as you call it, is awfully patient and restrained for being so allegedly conquest-oriented. All they seem to have gotten for their alleged expansionism is a province which was Russian for hundreds of years and which voted to rejoin Russia.

If this "New Russian Reich" had invaded, say, Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Syria, etc. and was threatening to invade bunch of other countries as well, perhaps the description might fit.

what's stunning is attempts to defend what's happening in the Russia gov

Is the pretense that the US government behavior has been morally superior to the Russian government behavior. As an American, you and I are really in no position to object terribly strenuously to the actions of the Russian government in Ukraine.

Which country has invaded another country on average every 2 years for decades, violates the Geneva Conventions regularly, and made the most barbaric forms of torture that could be conjured by human imagination into official policy - among many other outrages to civilized behavior?

You don't have to defend Russia to point out the screaming hypocrisy in an American who supports the US government condemning Russia for what it has done.

no comparison has been made, except by you.

Take off the "but USA has been bad too" blinders and take a fresh look at the world

We cannot evaluate Russian actions in a vacuum, they must be evaluated in the actual context in which they are occurring - one where a relentless US banking empire is subjugating the globe, if not economically then with military force. In that context the Russian moves cannot be fairly characterized as anything but defensive actions which they are entitled to make. The pro-Russian, democratically-elected government of the Ukraine didn't overthrow itself!

that Putin has been forced to turn Russia more and more into a dictatorship, forced to invade pieces of other countries. Yes poor Russia the big victim in all this.
Tripe.
Putin was handed the reset button, offered a chance to work together with the US and the West. He rejected it.
I have Russian friends. They tell me that Putin wasn't so bad at first but now he seems to be clinically insane.

Unlike, say, a claim that Russia has invaded other countries.

There's no actual proof that Russia has invaded any country since Afghanistan in the 1980s, never mind multiple countries. Good luck trying to find some, you'll find every single one of those claims originates from a political agent from a country that actually has invaded multiple countries and makes no bones about being willing to do it again, and again, and again, ad infinitum.

Crimea doesn't count, as the violent overthrow of the government in Kiev gave them the opportunity for self-determination (the constitutional contract that bound them to Ukraine was violated by the coup) and they chose to join Russia.

There have been many allegations of Russians invading other parts of Ukraine but each and every one lacks proof.

If you have an actual problem with strong countries invading weaker countries, your protests should be directed at Washington, DC. I can guess that you have no such actual problem - since if you did, you'd see that the US is the actual rogue nation invading others and terrorizing the world. There's not enough cognitive dissonance in the world to reconcile the perpetual war machine of the US with your pretended offense towards countries which invade other countries. Unlike Russia, nobody has to fake up any "facts" to accuse the US of this - our government freely admits to much of what it does.

sorry, you lost me and the rest of the reality-based community. Happy New Year

Nothing anymore shocks me

since Afghanistan in the 1980s, never mind multiple countries."

OMG, I think I am going to

Did you get that from RT?

Seems that those that have Russia pegged as an Evil Empire here are long on evasion and very very short on actual details to back up their claims.

Show me different: name the country Russia has invaded, and show the proof that it happened.

Crimea is Russian and has been for the last couple centuries and a stolen deed does not change that.

see http://metamorphosis.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1014&pid=915921

In the context of your new admission - of the clear and convincing evidence of Nuland's actions - which Russian responses do you find unreasonable, and why?

AKA WTF are you talking about. My god how much debunked BS do you actually believe? Please proceed with naming all the conspiracies going on around you.

facts do not seem to matter.

Many new ones, with low post counts, interesting

I see one just got hidden

things are bad for Putin at the moment, maybe it's making them more and more nuts.
But in their approach to facts that you mention, they've always reminded me of Scientologists. Just like a lot of the RW in America does

clearly a Putin Explainer

which are being made by many in the world, as I showed in the link. Sorry if that just somehow doesn't do it for you, but I think your insistence on this point is itself a rhetorical failure.

save some for future expansions of "New Russia"

Seems to fit the situation. He will be happy if we just keep giving him little pieces of other countries. Worked so well before.

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I've seen at least one in the forum host list

activities' let that happen?



Have a "Happy New Year"!!!

Ukraine doesn't have the money or the military to retake Crimea, and we sure as hell aren't going to pay for it. Crimea was never that important to them, and certainly not to us.

But we should absolutely fund some clandestine fuckery to make Putin keep paying for it while he holds it, in addition to the sanctions. Tax the bastard. Make him pay "rent" on it.

Sabotage wouldn't even be illegal, since it would be with the permission of the UN-recognized authority in Kiev.

everything east of the Dneiper will be a de facto part of Czar Vladimir's empire.

Just because you think you are the good guys, that doesn't mean you win.

Anyone? Tell me how that's a good idea.

If Putin had not invaded another sovereign nation. Simple as that.

Russian troops that removed required insignia, removed number plates from trucks. Sank one of there own derelict ships to blockade the Ukrainian navy ships.

Putin even admitted it after the fact

How many dead in this so called invasion? Seems to me the Russians have been there for a very long time and never left.

They have been there under a basing agreement that paid rent to the nation of Ukraine that was recognized by the UN and Russia that ad legal possession of Crimea after the USSR broke apart. They were allowed a certain number of troops and could not have exercises or leave those leased bases unless Ukraine agreed.

They showed up without any insignia and those little green men also brought military equipment they removed all identifying markings.

Russia sank a ship to block the Ukrainian navy in port (violation of international law)and stormed the ships and land bases and confiscated the ships and equipment. Ukraine did a masterful job at having almost no casualties as their forces were outnumbered by the much better equipped Russians.

Get fucking real, just because Ukraine was so outnumbered and equipped and it would have been suicide to resist, you say it is all well.

well yes, it was an invasion and Google it and you will find plenty of video evidence. VICE TV and Simon Ostrovsky had many Russian roulette pieces on it, before he was taken prisoner by the eastern Ukraine Russian invaders.
https://news.vice.com/show/russian-roulette

Yes, the invaders often celebrate by having a parade after a successful invasion and occupation.
Here is what you should be showing

How far do you want to go push the Russians into leaving their own territory? Is it worth putting us on a path to war? Yes, Crimea is Russian territory with no significant relation to Ukraine prior to it's dubious '54 annexation.

I want Russia to leaver internationally recognized Ukrainian territory.

To bad for the Crimean Tartar population again right, you know the ones the Russians slaughtered and deported before. Now they are deporting them again.

Russia can easily stop this path by leaving Crimea as even they recognized it as Ukrainian territory before the invasion.

They never agreed to leave. Russia cannot easily rebase their Black Sea Fleet and it is unrealistic to expect that.

What utter bull, The countries signed an agreement in 1997 for Russia to lease ports from Ukraine.

Simple world views for simple minds.

Russia invaded another sovereign country and seized a portion of it, breaking internal laws, treaties and agreements.

I feel sorry for those folks who get themselves twisted into knots blaming Russia's actions on everything other than Russia.

I find it quite amazing

The focus needs to be on ending the fighting within the Ukraine and helping the country recover from a year long war. If the Russians want access to Crimea then let them build a bridge.