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Russian Federation605 Posts
On May 01 2022 09:58 raynpelikoneet wrote:
Idk if the picture you posted means much. Like people can be pro-anything in a sense, but what i was talking about is; I was wondering if there is actually support to be part of Russia instead of Ukraine?
E: Just because people would support Russian friendly government doesnt mean they want to be a part of Russia instead of Ukraine.
Good question. While analyzing info about 2014 pro-Russian protests from Kharkov to Odessa, I saw that the main idea of them was that people wanted to be allowed to be Russian (I mean ethnically), i.e. have Russian as official language at least in Russian-speaking regions (during Yanukovich Ukraine was officially bilingual, but this law was cancelled the next day after he fled the country), do not be treatied as some aliens within the country (common saying in Ukraine regarding those who protested against Euromaidan was: "you don't like something here? Suitcase - train - Russia."), do not be forced to abandon Soviet legacy, since a lot of Russian people are positively predisposed towards Soviet Union, since it was their childhood or youth, and USSR of 70's and early 80's for many people was an image of maybe not luxurious, but stable life with social guarantees for everyone, in contrast with the Wild West that we had here in late 80's-90's. But in Ukraine desovietization became one of the main political points, especially after Euromaidan.
So the main question was not "Where to live?" but "How to live?", be it as a part of Ukraine, as independent state (that's where idea of a Novorossia ("New Russia") came from) or a part of Russia. Mostly protesters asked for federalization of Ukraine, with more rights given to the regional governments in terms of forming the legislation, language and social policy. Though separatist movement also had place. Ukrainian law enforcement was crippled by Euromaidan (because it was used against it, and there were a lot of purges afterwards), so government often used nationalists to suppress those protests. It all ended up in massacre of pro-Russian protesters in Odessa on May 2, 2014, which led to rapid increase of those who wanted to support separatists in Donbass (where armed clashes have already started) both in Russia and Russian-speaking parts of Ukraine.
I've actually always thought that if the leaders of Euromaidan used maximum effort to ensure both Russia itself and pro-Russian population within Ukraine that change of power won't affect internal and external relations in any way, all that had happend could have been avoided. But since right-wingers were large powerhouse that helped push Euromaidan to victory (I am talking about Oleg Tyagnibok and his Svoboda ("Freedom") party), it would probably be impossible. So instead we've got immediate cancellation of language law, threats from the leader of the Right Sector (Ukrainian nationalist organization) to send "friendship trains" (sarcastic name for groups of radical right-wingers whose purpose would be to suppress and intimidate local people and authorities) to Crimea, promises to "throw out Russian Black Sea fleet from Sevastopol by 2017" (naval base there wasn't Russian property, it was leased in 1992 for 25 years) and so on.
So it ended how it ended, and I firmly believe that Crimean referendum in 2014 wasn't even rigged, a lot of the Crimeans didn't feel themselves as true Ukrainians (separatist tensions were so strong there that after the fall of Soviet Union Crimea was the only region in Ukraine that was given the status of "autonomous republic" (even though Ukraine is not a federation). Same could be said for Donbass, and, probably, Kharkov. Other regions - not so much.
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I've heard that the Ukrainian attitude has shifted significantly in the post 2014 world. I don't have sources for this.
I think that the reasons why Putin has launched this invasion are wide reaching and easy to understand. The gas deposits found in the black sea and in Donbas represent existential threats to Russia's ability to influence Europe with its gas shipments. It has never liked how much it has had to pay to transport gas through Ukraine and has spent much of the post soviet collapse in trying to find ways around Ukraine. After 2014 Ukraine dammed the river that fed water into Crimea. the area now faces ecological collapse and every attempt to ship water through a pipe or by boat has failed. He either launches an invasion to resolve the water issue or has to give it back. The Russian state is suffering from a loss in population before Covid-19 and no one knows for sure how much Russia has suffered from it. Going on a slave raid into Ukraine to kidnap people and traffic them into Siberia will prop up their demographics for a few more decades. Poland and Ukraine had an agreement to make a land canal from Gdansk to Odesa to make it possible for china to ship containers between the two ports overland in 4 days. If Russia loses any more leverage it has over China it slips dangerously into being a vassal that is not able to resist Chinese requests for far eastern land (land it has labeled for decades as temporarily occupied regions of china). The eastern part of Ukraine has always been an extremely industrialized part of the soviet space and bringing in those industries would prop up an economy that hasn't had technical training for its people for decades now. Technology-wise they're in a really bad position. China has figured out everything they've been doing and are now going to start surpassing them. They can't manufacture T-14's or the Su-57 in any number, But china is going to be able to sell its J-20 and type 99/15s to the same people who used to buy Russian equipment. They couldn't build a carrier to save their lives and the flagship of the black sea fleet was built and renovated by the Ukrainians. Russia knew about BA-2's from the recent war when they were savaged by them by the Turkish armed proxy against their Arminian proxy. Ukraine signed a deal to make BA-2's in-country let alone buy a few dozen. Russian drones are amalgamations of foreign tech and primitive commercial level frames.
The Russian civilization has been invaded through 9 corridors throughout its history and only 9. Before the collapse they had massive formations at all of them, after they had only one. Everything Russia has done from the collapse of the soviet union is to stabilize and attempt to plug each of these invasion routes. The last ones are from Poland Romania and the Baltics. Taking the rest of Ukraine doesn't solve any of these routes but it does move the potential front line by land from Moscow to a front to more than a hundred kilometers from its border. Once it takes Moldova (and they will launch their invasion with the troops stationed there if they believe it can provide the final punch to take odessa) They will be out of non NATO nations to invade. Gee if only there was someone they could have counted on to take the USA out of NATO around this time.
I don't know what is going to happen next but things are going to get much much worse before they get better. Resistance movements in the east of Ukraine is something the CIA has dreamed of for decades after being treated to stories of what the old heads did in the cold war. This is the last war russia will ever be able to wage without using nukes. Putin will die relatively soon and has no succession plan in place. The way the United States has managed to rally all of the western world together like this is terrifying. Sweden Finland and the swiss dropping their neutrality, Germany dropped their pacificism. The USA was releasing the emails of the Russian inner circle in real time and predicted the actions of what would happen publically days in advance. Zelensky turning into Leonidas is not something a comedian people protest voted into office should turn into. China having their Olympics turned into a national embarrassment before signaling to the world that they would rather tolerate a low level famine in shanghai that let a covid outbreak happen at this time.
When Putin drops a nuke or more than one do the russian people revolt then or is that the new normal?
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Thanks for the detailed posts Ardias, it's always useful to see the perspective from the other side.
I'd only like to say that I'm surprised at the "Chinese puppet" theory, if I may paraphrase it like that. Do people in RU generally feel that Putin lacks power to contend with China?
Edit: for levity
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On May 01 2022 11:08 Sermokala wrote:
I've heard that the Ukrainian attitude has shifted significantly in the post 2014 world. I don't have sources for this.
I think that the reasons why Putin has launched this invasion are wide reaching and easy to understand. The gas deposits found in the black sea and in Donbas represent existential threats to Russia's ability to influence Europe with its gas shipments. It has never liked how much it has had to pay to transport gas through Ukraine and has spent much of the post soviet collapse in trying to find ways around Ukraine. After 2014 Ukraine dammed the river that fed water into Crimea. the area now faces ecological collapse and every attempt to ship water through a pipe or by boat has failed. He either launches an invasion to resolve the water issue or has to give it back. The Russian state is suffering from a loss in population before Covid-19 and no one knows for sure how much Russia has suffered from it. Going on a slave raid into Ukraine to kidnap people and traffic them into Siberia will prop up their demographics for a few more decades.
I know exactly what video those talking points originated from and I think its a boatload of 'no I am gonna tell you the REAL reasons why russia invades'. Not attacking you, but rather the video I assume this is largely informed by.
For one, the gas thing was already mostly taken care off through having crimea and the war in donbass, but more importantly, nordstream2 (though I am willing to concede that russia expected nordstream not to get suspended / they expect it to get reopened some amount of time after the war is over). Unless something drastic happens, like a war, nordstream2 is not suddenly getting ditched after a ton of money and political effort is spend on it, with lots of careers attached to it etc . Thus, its not like ukraine would have been able to suddenly replaced russian gas supply and russia could have simply used their existent ability to exert economic pressure to keep ukraine from taking their spot.
And lets say they do manage to capture those territories AND ukraine ends up suing for peace and doesn't choose to remain hostile and just send a rocket over to your refinery every now and then - now russia sells their gas to... who? Currently it seems like the european nations in question will at least get away from being totally dependent on russia. to sell it to others you need to have the infrastructure first, as was discussed in this thread before, developing that takes time, money, and in the end you would still have lost your grip on the european energy market. Not to mention that the war in donbass / crimean landgrab already prevented ukraine from harvesting those ressources, all the companies that wanted to develop them pulled out... Even in the absolute best case scenario for russia, where ukraine did crumble within the first 2 weeks of the conflict, I don't see the gas fields add anything for russia that they did not already have, or offsets the costs of this war.
All in all, doing this for the gas fields seems not likely to pay off in any way, not monetarily, strategically or in terms of prestige.
In terms of the population shift, there are once again way less disruptive methods to fight a decline of population, methods that don't make your highly qualified people try to leave the country and don't kill a bunch of your young male population. Not to mention that population is not just about having lots of people. Shipping a bunch of people off to siberia so you have a larger population on paper does not get you anything if those people are hostile towards your nation and not contributing to your economy in a significant amount.
The water supply to crimea alone is definitely not worth the war, but it is the 1 thing from the list where I actually agree that it is a benefit for them. But there has to be more along side it, like russia seeing this as their last chance at gaining any control over ukrainian territory before they might be able to slip under the EU or NATO umbrella. Or that putin needed a war to bolster support. Hell, I even find the 'putin is just crazy, terminally ill, and wants to be remembered as the grand russian zar' explanation more sensible than the gas and population one, because at least its internal logic would check out. Unlike the gas and population one, they just don't hold up as soon as you start to question their effect or stop looking at them in a vacuum.
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Apparently the fabled general Gerasimov was wounded in Izyum. Perhaps this indeed isn't a war, it's a special operation to purge Russian generals?
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On May 01 2022 09:04 Ardias wrote:Show nested quote +On April 30 2022 03:24 Dangermousecatdog wrote:
Ultimately, we don't know the true motives of those in charge of Russia. From what we can see from Putins rambling speech the invasion of Ukraine has nothing to do with monetary interest (despite what people may read from the usual dumb twitter stuff about Ukraine's exports and resources in the early days of the invasion), and everything to do with a resurgent nationalistic, imperialist and fascist belief in the natural greatness of the apparently to be newly forged Russian Empire.
If the idea is simply to have a conflict to buoy up popularity for example, no amount of monetary calculation matters as it is simply not a factor at all. It is not always about money. This is still a hot topic around here, but everyone agrees that it has nothing to do with making our lives better and our pockets richer. Actually, the reason why very few people in Russia believed that there was a possibility of an open war was not because everyone thought that Putin and his goverment are pink flying ponies, but because there was a widespread opinion in society that our political elite is incapable of direct confrontation with the West exactly for the aforementioned reason - money. With children of our top brass living and studying abroad, with all the yachts and villas of our oligarchs and officials in Italy, France, Spain etc. few could believe that somebody would risk to lose it all. That's why 24th of February was shock for everyone not only abroad, but here as well. As for the local opinions on the reasons of it - they vastly differ. Pro-western people generally believe that Putin went mad and wants to turn Russia into the besieged fortress and rule here as Sun, That Shines From Mount Elbrus. Patriotic ones think that it's proper retribution for the Donbass and anti-Russian actions by Ukraine after 2014. To elaborate on the latter (and i'm probably going a bit offtopic here) and why the idea of supporting ethnic Russians abroad is quite popular around here, despite sanctions an all that - after the fall of Soviet Union a lot of Russians were left in the newly formed indepenent states. States that were already pre-created in Soviet Union as republics of some dominant nation (Armenians, Georgians, Kazakhs, Tajiks etc.). Rapid fall of the Soviet Union, combined with economic troubles, growing nationalism in these new states, especially in regions with low education and cultural levels and strong systems of clan and kindred ties (Caucasus and Central Asia) led to massive repressions against ethnic Russians. Not on state level (authorities simply ignored that, or were silently supportive), but on a common level between people. A lot of Russians were forced out of their homes, left without a job, physically assaulted. Epithome of that was Chechnya in 1990-1994, since Chechens, being, well, Chechens, and in addition to that, being angry for Stalins deportation in 1944, went loose on Russian population as soon as there was no government control, killing, raping, beating up and forcing out Russians en masse (in 1989 there were 270 thousand Russians in Chechnya, in 2002 - 40 thousand, and this number includes troops that were stationed there during 2nd Chechen war). All these events are still sensitive for Russian society and that's one of the main reasons why Putins' rating went up so high after Crimea, as people saw it as national leadership protecting Russian-speaking people abroad from the repetition of events in the 90's. As for my opinion on this - of course Putin definelty has strenghtening his political position in mind, but I doubt he would need such radical measures to simply stay in power. While the ruling party (United Russia) is not very popular (every parlamentary election reports ton of falcifications), presidential race is another thing, since there are no really strong popular candidates in it. But I think that Putin's visit on the Chinese Olympics right before the start of the war is no coincidence. The main benefactor of this conflict is China. It's a perfect opportunity for them to study, what would be Western reaction and what measures US and allies would take if large country with nukes will cross the red line and start the open war not against some random rogue state in Caucasus or Middle East, but against country, directly supported by the US. Perfect model to study different Taiwan scenarios, all potential risks and possible events. Plus China would definetly profit from weakened European economy and potentially getting whole Russian market for themselves (if political situation will somewhat change in the future). Also if Russia, despite everything, will emerge victorious in Ukraine (on the battlefield at least) - it could be a green flag to different countries in Asia and Africa that war is a viable method of resolving diplomatical conflicts once again, after 30 years of basically the US monopoly on warfare. So this thing in Ukraine, I believe, is much bigger that just some dictator going crazy, and we are looking for a possible reshaping of the world order in near future. And the main chance for the West to preserve status quo is to help Ukrainians to defeat our army in the field, because I highly doubt that some internall collapse will happen here soon enough.
Thank you for your long though out reply. I wrote the motivation may be to buoy up popularity, not as in making living standards higher but that there does appear to be a culture of looking up to authority in Russia, and what can be the biggest signal of such, than a foreign influence that resolves and can be construed as prideful for the nation like what occured in Crimea? From what we can see of the first week of the Russian invasion, there was a genuine attempt to take control of Kiev as the primary target and the southern coast as the secondary target, with the donbass region as not a priority at all.
The local opinions relayed is genuinely interesting. I doubt though that Russia is acting as China's stooge, given the lack of support from China. It honestly seemed to have caught China by suprise. I wasn't characterising Putin going crazy, but rather that his motivations of restoring some revisionist historical national dignity as he appeared to show during his speach is exactly as that. A motivation that seems absurd to outsiders can stilll be well reasoned and not a sign of a crazy dictator.
On May 01 2022 11:08 Sermokala wrote:
I've heard that the Ukrainian attitude has shifted significantly in the post 2014 world. I don't have sources for this.
I think that the reasons why Putin has launched this invasion are wide reaching and easy to understand. The gas deposits found in the black sea and in Donbas represent existential threats to Russia's ability to influence Europe with its gas shipments. It has never liked how much it has had to pay to transport gas through Ukraine and has spent much of the post soviet collapse in trying to find ways around Ukraine. After 2014 Ukraine dammed the river that fed water into Crimea. the area now faces ecological collapse and every attempt to ship water through a pipe or by boat has failed. He either launches an invasion to resolve the water issue or has to give it back. The Russian state is suffering from a loss in population before Covid-19 and no one knows for sure how much Russia has suffered from it. Going on a slave raid into Ukraine to kidnap people and traffic them into Siberia will prop up their demographics for a few more decades. Poland and Ukraine had an agreement to make a land canal from Gdansk to Odesa to make it possible for china to ship containers between the two ports overland in 4 days. If Russia loses any more leverage it has over China it slips dangerously into being a vassal that is not able to resist Chinese requests for far eastern land (land it has labeled for decades as temporarily occupied regions of china). The eastern part of Ukraine has always been an extremely industrialized part of the soviet space and bringing in those industries would prop up an economy that hasn't had technical training for its people for decades now. Technology-wise they're in a really bad position. China has figured out everything they've been doing and are now going to start surpassing them. They can't manufacture T-14's or the Su-57 in any number, But china is going to be able to sell its J-20 and type 99/15s to the same people who used to buy Russian equipment. They couldn't build a carrier to save their lives and the flagship of the black sea fleet was built and renovated by the Ukrainians. Russia knew about BA-2's from the recent war when they were savaged by them by the Turkish armed proxy against their Arminian proxy. Ukraine signed a deal to make BA-2's in-country let alone buy a few dozen. Russian drones are amalgamations of foreign tech and primitive commercial level frames.
The Russian civilization has been invaded through 9 corridors throughout its history and only 9. Before the collapse they had massive formations at all of them, after they had only one. Everything Russia has done from the collapse of the soviet union is to stabilize and attempt to plug each of these invasion routes. The last ones are from Poland Romania and the Baltics. Taking the rest of Ukraine doesn't solve any of these routes but it does move the potential front line by land from Moscow to a front to more than a hundred kilometers from its border. Once it takes Moldova (and they will launch their invasion with the troops stationed there if they believe it can provide the final punch to take odessa) They will be out of non NATO nations to invade. Gee if only there was someone they could have counted on to take the USA out of NATO around this time.
I don't know what is going to happen next but things are going to get much much worse before they get better. Resistance movements in the east of Ukraine is something the CIA has dreamed of for decades after being treated to stories of what the old heads did in the cold war. This is the last war russia will ever be able to wage without using nukes. Putin will die relatively soon and has no succession plan in place. The way the United States has managed to rally all of the western world together like this is terrifying. Sweden Finland and the swiss dropping their neutrality, Germany dropped their pacificism. The USA was releasing the emails of the Russian inner circle in real time and predicted the actions of what would happen publically days in advance. Zelensky turning into Leonidas is not something a comedian people protest voted into office should turn into. China having their Olympics turned into a national embarrassment before signaling to the world that they would rather tolerate a low level famine in shanghai that let a covid outbreak happen at this time.
When Putin drops a nuke or more than one do the russian people revolt then or is that the new normal? The oil and gas depositis in Ukraine and Crimea are tiny to the Russian oil and gas deposits and can't possibly last more than an economcial year of extraction at the same rate of Russian extraction. Slave raid to prop up demographics is a ridiculous notion. Prop up how, not like they will be contributing tax payers in high value jobs. Vassal of China business seems to be some Russian propaganda to blame China for everything.
This 9 corridors business is extremely suspect. Taking that theory and applying it to Europe will mean that every country in Europe should be invading each other, seeing as their capitals are all closer to each other's borders than Moscow is to their own border. Also everyone should be invading Moscow out of that same fear since many are closer to the Russian border than to Moscow is the the border.
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So it now appears that Germany is now backing an Oil embargo set to be announced this week.
The European Union is planning a new raft of sanctions against Russia, Brussels insiders told reporters on Sunday. These new penalties are likely to include a bloc-wide embargo of Russian oil.
This measure has for weeks been seen as key to truly crippling the coffers of Russian President Vladimir Putin's war machine, but it has been stymied by foot-dragging from several EU member states — including Germany.
But now, government sources have told German news agency dpa that the administration of Chancellor Olaf Scholz is finally ready to throw its support behind the oil ban.
According to Economy Minister Robert Habeck, Germany has managed to reduce its dependence on Russian oil by a huge margin in just eight weeks. Before Russia's invasion of Ukraine began in late February, Germany relied on Russia for 35% of its energy needs. Now, Habeck said, that has dropped to just 12%.
Should Berlin reverse course, that leaves Italy, Austria, Hungary, Slovakia, Spain and Greece as the holdouts who have yet to publicly support an embargo. Of these, Hungary is seen as the most likely to maintain a strong opposition.
Although the EU had already agreed to stop importing Russian coal, countries that border Ukraine or Russia, like Poland and the Baltic States, have been calling for an oil ban as well.
The oil embargo is likely to be put on the table on Wednesday during an ambassadors summit in Brussels, according to French news agency AFP.
Source
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Yea apparently he was the primary target during the barrage of high ranking officers. He was wounded, shrapnel to the right leg, but another general and over a dozen high ranking officers were killed.
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Russian Federation605 Posts
On May 01 2022 23:37 {CC}StealthBlue wrote:Yea apparently he was the primary target during the barrage of high ranking officers. He was wounded, shrapnel to the right leg, but another general and over a dozen high ranking officers were killed. https://twitter.com/MrKovalenko/status/1520759831589797890
UNIAN published a rebuttal regarding Gerasimov.
https://t.me/uniannet/51402
While Ukrainian forces did manage to kill several Russian generals and have success at targeting command posts (some separatist soldiers actively reported over the years that Ukrainian military has well established radio reconnaissance), some claims still happen to be either false or exaggerated (like it was with general Mordvichev, commander of 8th Army, who posed on video with Kadyrov in Mariupol 2 weeks after supposedly being killed). So every info from both sides needs further fact-checking. Fog of war as it is.
On May 01 2022 11:08 Sermokala wrote:
The Russian state is suffering from a loss in population before Covid-19 and no one knows for sure how much Russia has suffered from it. Going on a slave raid into Ukraine to kidnap people and traffic them into Siberia will prop up their demographics for a few more decades.
Wat?
On a serious note, state of Russian population is sort of the same as European - natural decline, low birth rate, higher average age on the population and main source of population growth being immigrants from even poorer countries (Caucasus and Central Asia for us). As for "slave raid" and "forced deportation" - I understand the idea of viewing Russia as a totalitarian Mordor with Dark Lord on the throne, but it's not exactly that. Russia is currently an authoritarian state, that's true, but if you don't dive into political opposition (and hell, even Navalny was allowed to roll around for 10 years before they locked him up), you are free to live and work as you want and where you want as in any western country. It's not 1940's, not even 1980's, when students were sent on a certain jobs in certain areas after the graduation from universities (free education has its price). Now nobody cares how or where you live. Capitalism-s.
Also if you want to know about measures of Russian government to develop and populate Siberia - you may read up about the law on Far Eastern hectare. Not exactly the GULAG camps.
As for your other points - I agree with the posters above, the only serious possible reason you've mentioned is the North-Crimean water channel.
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I'm not saying these are all the exact reasons but there are a lot of reasons that may be influencing them.
The gas deposits in Donbas and the black sea represented an alternative source of gas that could have been brought out to supply the euro market. Russia has been trying to bypass Ukraine for decades due to the fact that their soviet pipes went through there. If Ukraine now has that gas shipping west, and being inside of the EU like they were intending to in 2014, then the Euros can survive Russia embargoing them for whatever reason a lot better and transition like they are trying to do now. Those fields being down after the war doesn't matter as much as making sure they never come on line in a nation that isn't Russia.
Russian population numbers have been really bad even before taking into consideration the fake numbers that have been released. The Birth rate has been in the same 1.5 range and the economy is never going to attract the kind of immigration to change that, even if russia would allow that kind of immigration like japan doesn't. They emptied out the regions of Ukraine that they controlled before starting the war and have trafficked a lot of children out of the country with the intent of educating them in russia and raising them in russia. If you are uncomfortable with using the term "Slave raid" I understand but its a lot closer than any other term for the kind of mass population trafficking that they are engaging in.
Every Nation in Europe was invading each other for hundreds and hundreds of years. It ended in the two world wars and everyone agreed to form a stronger union to make it not viable anymore. Russia isn't in the EU and has never shown much interest in joining it. They made the soviet union to accomplish the same thing the EU has done
Remember we all thought that Ukraine would fall in days and Russia clearly thought Europe was fractured enough that they couldn't get sanctions up together just like what happened in 2014.
I admit it could just be the water thing in crimea. For any strongman a step backwards is suicide and it was reaching a point where they would have had to start spending billions and billions to toss water into the ground or give it back. The first Water war of many I presume.
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Good question. While analyzing info about 2014 pro-Russian protests from Kharkov to Odessa, I saw that the main idea of them was that people wanted to be allowed to be Russian (I mean ethnically), i.e. have Russian as official language at least in Russian-speaking regions (during Yanukovich Ukraine was officially bilingual, but this law was cancelled the next day after he fled the country), do not be treatied as some aliens within the country (common saying in Ukraine regarding those who protested against Euromaidan was: "you don't like something here? Suitcase - train - Russia."), do not be forced to abandon Soviet legacy, since a lot of Russian people are positively predisposed towards Soviet Union, since it was their childhood or youth, and USSR of 70's and early 80's for many people was an image of maybe not luxurious, but stable life with social guarantees for everyone, in contrast with the Wild West that we had here in late 80's-90's. But in Ukraine desovietization became one of the main political points, especially after Euromaidan.
So the main question was not "Where to live?" but "How to live?", be it as a part of Ukraine, as independent state (that's where idea of a Novorossia ("New Russia") came from) or a part of Russia. Mostly protesters asked for federalization of Ukraine, with more rights given to the regional governments in terms of forming the legislation, language and social policy. Though separatist movement also had place. Ukrainian law enforcement was crippled by Euromaidan (because it was used against it, and there were a lot of purges afterwards), so government often used nationalists to suppress those protests. It all ended up in massacre of pro-Russian protesters in Odessa on May 2, 2014, which led to rapid increase of those who wanted to support separatists in Donbass (where armed clashes have already started) both in Russia and Russian-speaking parts of Ukraine.
I've actually always thought that if the leaders of Euromaidan used maximum effort to ensure both Russia itself and pro-Russian population within Ukraine that change of power won't affect internal and external relations in any way, all that had happend could have been avoided. But since right-wingers were large powerhouse that helped push Euromaidan to victory (I am talking about Oleg Tyagnibok and his Svoboda ("Freedom") party), it would probably be impossible. So instead we've got immediate cancellation of language law, threats from the leader of the Right Sector (Ukrainian nationalist organization) to send "friendship trains" (sarcastic name for groups of radical right-wingers whose purpose would be to suppress and intimidate local people and authorities) to Crimea, promises to "throw out Russian Black Sea fleet from Sevastopol by 2017" (naval base there wasn't Russian property, it was leased in 1992 for 25 years) and so on.
So it ended how it ended, and I firmly believe that Crimean referendum in 2014 wasn't even rigged, a lot of the Crimeans didn't feel themselves as true Ukrainians (separatist tensions were so strong there that after the fall of Soviet Union Crimea was the only region in Ukraine that was given the status of "autonomous republic" (even though Ukraine is not a federation). Same could be said for Donbass, and, probably, Kharkov. Other regions - not so much.
That's some "russia today" explanation of history.
1) The language law you are referring to(so called "Kolisnichenko-Kivalov law") was the case of continuous scandals, disputes and even fights in parliament. This law eventually (in 2018) was admitted as anti-constitutional.
Most people of russian-speaking region had never felt oppressed by the language, beliefs or nationality neither before 2012 nor after cancelation of this law, nor after russian annexation of Crimea and aggression on Donbass. Sure you could meet some marginals who said: "I don't want to read medicine instruction in ukrainian", or "I don't want to watch movies in ukrainian in cinema".
2) It was a Kremlin agenda and idea of federalization and making independent republics in the south-east of Ukraine (creating "Novorossiya" in the best scenario) and was actively sponsored.
3) All the resources were on the side of ruling at that time pro-president party "Partiya Regionov" (majority of them stayed in parliament after president fled (what purges are you talking about?) and accused him in all the "sins").
4) The involvement of nationalists in dealing with pro-russian protests was meager, much more impact did "titushki" + Show Spoiler +https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Titushky
5) Actions in Luhansk and Donetsk were entirely planned and controlled by Kremlin with a help of local collaborators.
6) Right-wing party "Svoboda" held only 10% of the parliament seats and barely influenced on the situation. Nationalist organization "Pravyy sektor" denied the statements of its member Ihor Mosiychuk about "the trains of friendship". None of trains with nationalist were sent.
7) The referendum in Crimea was obviously faked because there are no fair elections in Russia. We surely can argue about the result but it's irrelevant in terms of norms and law.
Nowadays (before the war), the vast majority of people still considered annexed Crimea and a part of Donbass as territory of Ukraine; they used to it and put up with the current situation where Ukraine wasn't able to take it back with military force. People freely communicated in whatever language they wanted no matter where - Lviv, Odesa, Kharkiv, Zaporizhzhia or Uzhgorod. "Pravyy Sektor" almost disappeared from media space. Life was back to the "old" ways. Everything ruined on the 24th of february.
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Russian Federation605 Posts
On May 01 2022 22:41 Dangermousecatdog wrote:
Thank you for your long though out reply. I wrote the motivation may be to buoy up popularity, not as in making living standards higher but that there does appear to be a culture of looking up to authority in Russia, and what can be the biggest signal of such, than a foreign influence that resolves and can be construed as prideful for the nation like what occured in Crimea? From what we can see of the first week of the Russian invasion, there was a genuine attempt to take control of Kiev as the primary target and the southern coast as the secondary target, with the donbass region as not a priority at all.
The local opinions relayed is genuinely interesting. I doubt though that Russia is acting as China's stooge, given the lack of support from China. It honestly seemed to have caught China by suprise. I wasn't characterising Putin going crazy, but rather that his motivations of restoring some revisionist historical national dignity as he appeared to show during his speach is exactly as that. A motivation that seems absurd to outsiders can stilll be well reasoned and not a sign of a crazy dictator.
If our social polls can at least somewhat be trusted nowadays, it actually worked. According to WCIOM agency, Putin's approval rating is now around 80% (in the late 2021 it was around 62-63%). I do not watch TV, but seems propaganda there is doing its job (though it's not that Ukraine never gave any ideas for it).
But the differnce is that Crimea was peaceful, and Donbass was limited military assistance. All-out war is a whole another business (though at first our leadership was taking half-assed steps and rhetoric, like "we are fighting only nationalist battalions, Armed Forces of Ukraine are not our enemy" (and that's the reason why many barracks with troops weren't targeted on a first/second day with missile strikes. Only airfields, supply depots, radar stations and SAM positions), or the fact that "withdrawing from Kiev was a gesture of good will".
As for the goals of operation - it clearly started on the false belief that Ukrainian population will be at least neutral, if not supportive, and shock from sudden and deep attack will force Ukrainan goverment to accept Russian terms shortly due to desire not to escalate the war further. Hence the rush to Kiev to strenghten our position on negotiations.
Donbass actually was also a priority, but it contatines the best troops that Ukraine has and a large number of them (only on the border with LDPR there were reportedly stationed around 76000 men, and it's not including troops in Kharkov and Dniepr (city, not river) regions. It was fortified for 8 years and some defensive positions look like straight from World War 1 (like im Maryinka, to the west of Donetsk, for example).
As for success in the south - I'll elaborate on that in a separate post. I've recently learned an interesting story from my acquaintance from Crimea, who has ties within 126th Naval Infantry brigade regarding the fighting near Kherson in the first days of war.
But if at the start I could believe that declared goals (acceptance of Crimea, separation of LDPR in their administrative borders, Russian language as secon official, reducing of the Urkainian military and changes in government) were actual goals of the war, with the Ukrainian resistance becoming more tough and negotiations grinding to a halt, Russia decided to change the goals and went for the territorial control, since our government understood that nobody in Ukraine will sign peace in our terms. I believe so because in the first weeks of the war it was even forbidden to remove Ukrainian flags from the Russian-controlled territory (not including LDPR though). Even administration in Kherson, Melitopol, Energodarm Berdyansk etc. firstly remained the same. It's in the late March when we started to create military administration on controlled territories and appoint our own mayors in charge of the cities.
The opinion regarding China is a rare one, but I'm personally is in favor of it due to the "qui prodest" principle and Chinese diplomathic rhetorics. Of course I don't believe that "Russia is acting as China's stooge", it's more of "enemy of my enemy is my friend" approach. China has issues with an independent country backed by US (plus economic and political interests in Pacific and over the globe overall, which are clashing with US and its allies interests there), and Russia has issues with an independent country backed by US (and has issues with US allies in Europe).
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On May 01 2022 10:54 Ardias wrote:Show nested quote +On May 01 2022 09:58 raynpelikoneet wrote:
Idk if the picture you posted means much. Like people can be pro-anything in a sense, but what i was talking about is; I was wondering if there is actually support to be part of Russia instead of Ukraine?
E: Just because people would support Russian friendly government doesnt mean they want to be a part of Russia instead of Ukraine. Good question. While analyzing info about 2014 pro-Russian protests from Kharkov to Odessa, I saw that the main idea of them was that people wanted to be allowed to be Russian (I mean ethnically), i.e. have Russian as official language at least in Russian-speaking regions (during Yanukovich Ukraine was officially bilingual, but this law was cancelled the next day after he fled the country), do not be treatied as some aliens within the country (common saying in Ukraine regarding those who protested against Euromaidan was: "you don't like something here? Suitcase - train - Russia."), do not be forced to abandon Soviet legacy, since a lot of Russian people are positively predisposed towards Soviet Union, since it was their childhood or youth, and USSR of 70's and early 80's for many people was an image of maybe not luxurious, but stable life with social guarantees for everyone, in contrast with the Wild West that we had here in late 80's-90's. But in Ukraine desovietization became one of the main political points, especially after Euromaidan. So the main question was not "Where to live?" but "How to live?", be it as a part of Ukraine, as independent state (that's where idea of a Novorossia ("New Russia") came from) or a part of Russia. Mostly protesters asked for federalization of Ukraine, with more rights given to the regional governments in terms of forming the legislation, language and social policy. Though separatist movement also had place. Ukrainian law enforcement was crippled by Euromaidan (because it was used against it, and there were a lot of purges afterwards), so government often used nationalists to suppress those protests. It all ended up in massacre of pro-Russian protesters in Odessa on May 2, 2014, which led to rapid increase of those who wanted to support separatists in Donbass (where armed clashes have already started) both in Russia and Russian-speaking parts of Ukraine. I've actually always thought that if the leaders of Euromaidan used maximum effort to ensure both Russia itself and pro-Russian population within Ukraine that change of power won't affect internal and external relations in any way, all that had happend could have been avoided. But since right-wingers were large powerhouse that helped push Euromaidan to victory (I am talking about Oleg Tyagnibok and his Svoboda ("Freedom") party), it would probably be impossible. So instead we've got immediate cancellation of language law, threats from the leader of the Right Sector (Ukrainian nationalist organization) to send "friendship trains" (sarcastic name for groups of radical right-wingers whose purpose would be to suppress and intimidate local people and authorities) to Crimea, promises to "throw out Russian Black Sea fleet from Sevastopol by 2017" (naval base there wasn't Russian property, it was leased in 1992 for 25 years) and so on. So it ended how it ended, and I firmly believe that Crimean referendum in 2014 wasn't even rigged, a lot of the Crimeans didn't feel themselves as true Ukrainians (separatist tensions were so strong there that after the fall of Soviet Union Crimea was the only region in Ukraine that was given the status of "autonomous republic" (even though Ukraine is not a federation). Same could be said for Donbass, and, probably, Kharkov. Other regions - not so much.
What massacre of protesters in Odessa? There was no massacre. There was a fire. It is unclear who started it. There was violence on both sides, including gun violence by the anti-Euromaidan protesters (with a few people dying) which was the reason for the escalation. Both sides used firebombs. After the building caught on fire, the pro-Euromaidan crowd was helping people trapped in the building escape. There's footage of the whole thing.
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On May 01 2022 10:54 Ardias wrote:
It all ended up in massacre of pro-Russian protesters in Odessa on May 2, 2014, which led to rapid increase of those who wanted to support separatists in Donbass (where armed clashes have already started) both in Russia and Russian-speaking parts of Ukraine.
You sir, are unfortunately caught in the web of propaganda. There was no "massacre" in Odessa. There were protests, which then erupted into violence after a pro-russian activists started firing live rounds at the other side. Then too many people got killed on both sides. This however is not a massacre by any definition of the word.
It has also been widely testified by the majority of russian-speaking Ukrainians that being Russian or speaking Russian has not been an issue for them at all since 2014. Of course this will have been changed since february this year when Russians decided it is time to slaughter and rape thousands of civilians, abduct a million of Ukrainians and level entire cities.
With the theft of hundreds of thousands of tonnes of grain, the UN needs to step up and stop the totalitarian cockroaches of Russia that are trying to start a world war. This theft and the blockage of Ukrainian ports together with potential harvest problems due to climate change may cause conflicts for food all across the globe.
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But if at the start I could believe that declared goals (acceptance of Crimea, separation of LDPR in their administrative borders, Russian language as secon official, reducing of the Urkainian military and changes in government) were actual goals of the war, with the Ukrainian resistance becoming more tough and negotiations grinding to a halt, Russia decided to change the goals and went for the territorial control, since our government understood that nobody in Ukraine will sign peace in our terms. I believe so because in the first weeks of the war it was even forbidden to remove Ukrainian flags from the Russian-controlled territory (not including LDPR though). Even administration in Kherson, Melitopol, Energodarm Berdyansk etc. firstly remained the same. It's in the late March when we started to create military administration on controlled territories and appoint our own mayors in charge of the cities.
I strongly disagree, the real goal of imperialistic regime was always a land grab and "eliminating" Ukrainian identity. You should've been try to listen what kremlin official told us. They've been trying to gaslight the real intentions since forever, including all those bullshit reasons with demilitarization and denazification, there were many words and everything was a nonsense. From the very first day mostly Russian speaking Kharkiv was shelled, with artillery and rocket strikes on residential areas. Does it looks like saving Russian speaking citizens? Quite the opposite. Kremlin simply does not care neither about Ukrainians nor about Russians in general. On day 2 Russian army attempted to capture Kharkiv by a strike group of soldiers/vehicles, as a result they got lost in a city and were eliminated quickly. Maybe before 2014 there were some locals who were interested to be a part of the Russian world, but after 24th of Feb there is no support for the Russian government anymore, majority of the locals clearly understands what is happening, and this is happening in the city 40km from the border. Just think of it, every single action was made by the kremlin resulted the opposite effect. As a result - Ukrainian government, the army and the people are on the same page and are willing to fight till the victory, we care about freedom & democracy historically speaking.
It was weird to see/hear when fuhrer and other officials told during their press conferences, here is a number of reasons why so called special operation must be done for the "good":
- As if Ukraine is not a legit country w/o history
- Ukrainians are suffering from high prices of utility bills
- Language discrimination
- Nazi government
- Biolabs that developed COVID and with the assistance of the US will create a specific viruses that will target Russian "genome" and this virus somehow will be delivered by the seasonal birds
- Dirty bomb creation
- Planning to attack Russia and/or Donbass
WTF?
Every single lane sounds insane. All of that is just a pile of crap for dummies. I understand it was mostly targeted for the local rednecks in the Russian provinces, but still...
All the reasons in the list are straight from bad sci-fi script, even language discrimination is far from reality. First of all you can speak any language you want anywhere, no one really cares, I've seen no signs of discrimination, in Kharkiv we have many universities and high schools with many foreign students, we are very diverse and opposite to xenophobia. Now here me out, as a bilingual (was born in Russian speaking family) I see absolutely no reason why should we have Russian as a second official language in Ukraine. Everything governmental should be purely in Ukrainian, cinemas, movies, sports etc. In universities the second official language is...English, you could write a diploma in ENG and it will be accepted officially, that practice is happening for a number of years already, some of the official papers (not only in education, but for example in trading) could be translated to ENG and considered as legit as well. To sum it up: you could speak, write and think whatever language you want to, no one cares and no oppression, but if you are a part of governmental structure or broadcasting, or you are dealing with the official papers - must use Ukrainian exclusively. Just deal with it.
On May 02 2022 01:22 marwin wrote:Show nested quote +Good question. While analyzing info about 2014 pro-Russian protests from Kharkov to Odessa, I saw that the main idea of them was that people wanted to be allowed to be Russian (I mean ethnically), i.e. have Russian as official language at least in Russian-speaking regions (during Yanukovich Ukraine was officially bilingual, but this law was cancelled the next day after he fled the country), do not be treatied as some aliens within the country (common saying in Ukraine regarding those who protested against Euromaidan was: "you don't like something here? Suitcase - train - Russia."), do not be forced to abandon Soviet legacy, since a lot of Russian people are positively predisposed towards Soviet Union, since it was their childhood or youth, and USSR of 70's and early 80's for many people was an image of maybe not luxurious, but stable life with social guarantees for everyone, in contrast with the Wild West that we had here in late 80's-90's. But in Ukraine desovietization became one of the main political points, especially after Euromaidan.
So the main question was not "Where to live?" but "How to live?", be it as a part of Ukraine, as independent state (that's where idea of a Novorossia ("New Russia") came from) or a part of Russia. Mostly protesters asked for federalization of Ukraine, with more rights given to the regional governments in terms of forming the legislation, language and social policy. Though separatist movement also had place. Ukrainian law enforcement was crippled by Euromaidan (because it was used against it, and there were a lot of purges afterwards), so government often used nationalists to suppress those protests. It all ended up in massacre of pro-Russian protesters in Odessa on May 2, 2014, which led to rapid increase of those who wanted to support separatists in Donbass (where armed clashes have already started) both in Russia and Russian-speaking parts of Ukraine.
I've actually always thought that if the leaders of Euromaidan used maximum effort to ensure both Russia itself and pro-Russian population within Ukraine that change of power won't affect internal and external relations in any way, all that had happend could have been avoided. But since right-wingers were large powerhouse that helped push Euromaidan to victory (I am talking about Oleg Tyagnibok and his Svoboda ("Freedom") party), it would probably be impossible. So instead we've got immediate cancellation of language law, threats from the leader of the Right Sector (Ukrainian nationalist organization) to send "friendship trains" (sarcastic name for groups of radical right-wingers whose purpose would be to suppress and intimidate local people and authorities) to Crimea, promises to "throw out Russian Black Sea fleet from Sevastopol by 2017" (naval base there wasn't Russian property, it was leased in 1992 for 25 years) and so on.
So it ended how it ended, and I firmly believe that Crimean referendum in 2014 wasn't even rigged, a lot of the Crimeans didn't feel themselves as true Ukrainians (separatist tensions were so strong there that after the fall of Soviet Union Crimea was the only region in Ukraine that was given the status of "autonomous republic" (even though Ukraine is not a federation). Same could be said for Donbass, and, probably, Kharkov. Other regions - not so much. That's some "russia today" explanation of history. 1) The language law you are referring to(so called "Kolisnichenko-Kivalov law") was the case of continuous scandals, disputes and even fights in parliament. This law eventually (in 2018) was admitted as anti-constitutional. Most people of russian-speaking region had never felt oppressed by the language, beliefs or nationality neither before 2012 nor after cancelation of this law, nor after russian annexation of Crimea and aggression on Donbass. Sure you could meet some marginals who said: "I don't want to read medicine instruction in ukrainian", or "I don't want to watch movies in ukrainian in cinema". 2) It was a Kremlin agenda and idea of federalization and making independent republics in the south-east of Ukraine (creating "Novorossiya" in the best scenario) and was actively sponsored. 3) All the resources were on the side of ruling at that time pro-president party "Partiya Regionov" (majority of them stayed in parliament after president fled (what purges are you talking about?) and accused him in all the "sins"). 4) The involvement of nationalists in dealing with pro-russian protests was meager, much more impact did "titushki" + Show Spoiler +https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Titushky and sometimes local police on the ani-maydan side. And it's very manipulative to blame "nationalists" just like euro-maydan activists in what happened in Odessa, stressing the outcome itself not mentioning the actions that took place before. 5) Actions in Luhansk and Donetsk were entirely planned and controlled by Kremlin with a help of local collaborators. 6) Right-wing party "Svoboda" held only 10% of the parliament seats and barely influenced on the situation. Nationalist organization "Pravyy sektor" denied the statements of its member Ihor Mosiychuk about "the trains of friendship". None of trains with nationalist were sent. 7) The referendum in Crimea was obviously faked because there are no fair elections in Russia. We surely can argue about the result but it's irrelevant in terms of norms and law. Nowadays (before the war), the vast majority of people still considered annexed Crimea and a part of Donbass as territory of Ukraine; they used to it and put up with the current situation where Ukraine wasn't able to take it back with military force. People freely communicated in whatever language they wanted no matter where - Lviv, Odesa, Kharkiv, Zaporizhzhia or Uzhgorod. "Pravyy Sektor" almost disappeared from media space. Life was back to the "old" ways. Everything ruined on the 24th of february.
Can confirm every single bit, that is exactly what I witnessed as well during last years. It was a great and detailed summary
On April 29 2022 04:55 SC-Shield wrote:
Either distraction or Russia is all-in on this one by forcing others to help them against Ukraine. The latter doesn't add up as Belarus is not fighting yet. Rumour has it that Russia wants to declare victory on 9 May, so escalation is highly likely by then.
@Dav1oN how are you? Have you found a safe place in Ukraine? Long time no see, I hope you're alright!
Hey mate, thank you for asking
Yea, after a bunch of relocations (5 or 6) and with help/support of the company I worked with - we finally managed to find a quite place. It was hell of a ride. Although, I must admit the housing crisis affects the pricing incredibly, western Ukraine is overpriced at the moment. Having pets adds complexity for the searching, as not many are willing to rent the housing for the people with pets, and that's a shame. Irresponsible people won't evacuate pets from the other side of the country while fleeing, but the householders don't think this way for some reason. In general the renting price went up 3-4 times of what it was before the war. Maybe the situation will be more acceptable in a few weeks or a month since Kyiv residents are coming back to the capital cause it's relatively safe out there at the moment. But coming back to Kharkiv is still quite risky, at first the surrounding areas of the city must be liberated. Overall it's safer than it used to be, but some outer parts of the city is still getting shelled, so I hope that the residents will be as safe as possible meanwhile
I have read multiple commentators say that Putin found it a threat that Ukraine, a country Russians have traditionally looked down upon, was catching up and in some cases passing quality of life for the middle and lower classes and this was about knocking them back down. They were saying it was a threat to Putins power to have to many people asking why a country with so much less resources could do better than them.
Do you believe their is any truth to that?
Lately an average low and middle class citizens in Ukraine are having better standards of living in comparison to Russia due to the western course of development - that is correct, life was improving slowly but surely. We have to work harder and are having much less resources overall, but we are more efficient and less corrupt. From my POV everything you mentioned sounds correct.
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On May 02 2022 04:36 Dav1oN wrote:Show nested quote +
But if at the start I could believe that declared goals (acceptance of Crimea, separation of LDPR in their administrative borders, Russian language as secon official, reducing of the Urkainian military and changes in government) were actual goals of the war, with the Ukrainian resistance becoming more tough and negotiations grinding to a halt, Russia decided to change the goals and went for the territorial control, since our government understood that nobody in Ukraine will sign peace in our terms. I believe so because in the first weeks of the war it was even forbidden to remove Ukrainian flags from the Russian-controlled territory (not including LDPR though). Even administration in Kherson, Melitopol, Energodarm Berdyansk etc. firstly remained the same. It's in the late March when we started to create military administration on controlled territories and appoint our own mayors in charge of the cities.
I strongly disagree, the real goal of imperialistic regime was always a land grab and "eliminating" Ukrainian identity. You should've been try to listen what kremlin official told us. They've been trying to gaslight the real intentions since forever, including all those bullshit reasons with demilitarization and denazification, there were many words and everything was a nonsense. From the very first day mostly Russian speaking Kharkiv was shelled, with artillery and rocket strikes on residential areas. Does it looks like saving Russian speaking citizens? Quite the opposite. Kremlin simply does not care neither about Ukrainians nor about Russians in general. On day 2 Russian army attempted to capture Kharkiv by a strike group of soldiers/vehicles, as a result they got lost in a city and were eliminated quickly. Maybe before 2014 there were some locals who were interested to be a part of the Russian world, but after 24th of Feb there is no support for the Russian government anymore, majority of the locals clearly understands what is happening, and this is happening in the city 40km from the border. Just think of it, every single action was made by the kremlin resulted the opposite effect. As a result - Ukrainian government, the army and the people are on the same page and are willing to fight till the victory, we care about freedom & democracy historically speaking. It was weird to see/hear when fuhrer and other officials told during their press conferences, here is a number of reasons why so called special operation must be done for the "good": - As if Ukraine is not a legit country w/o history - Ukrainians are suffering from high prices of utility bills - Language discrimination - Nazi government - Biolabs that developed COVID and with the assistance of the US will create a specific viruses that will target Russian "genome" and this virus somehow will be delivered by the seasonal birds - Dirty bomb creation - Planning to attack Russia and/or Donbass WTF? Every single lane sounds insane. All of that is just a pile of crap for dummies. I understand it was mostly targeted for the local rednecks in the Russian provinces, but still... All the reasons in the list are straight from bad sci-fi script, even language discrimination is far from reality. First of all you can speak any language you want anywhere, no one really cares, I've seen no signs of discrimination, in Kharkiv we have many universities and high schools with many foreign students, we are very diverse and opposite to xenophobia. Now here me out, as a bilingual (was born in Russian speaking family) I see absolutely no reason why should we have Russian as a second official language in Ukraine. Everything governmental should be purely in Ukrainian, cinemas, movies, sports etc. In universities the second official language is...English, you could write a diploma in ENG and it will be accepted officially, that practice is happening for a number of years already, some of the official papers (not only in education, but for example in trading) could be translated to ENG and considered as legit as well. To sum it up: you could speak, write and think whatever language you want to, no one cares and no oppression, but if you are a part of governmental structure or broadcasting, or you are dealing with the official papers - must use Ukrainian exclusively. Just deal with it. Show nested quote +On May 02 2022 01:22 marwin wrote:Good question. While analyzing info about 2014 pro-Russian protests from Kharkov to Odessa, I saw that the main idea of them was that people wanted to be allowed to be Russian (I mean ethnically), i.e. have Russian as official language at least in Russian-speaking regions (during Yanukovich Ukraine was officially bilingual, but this law was cancelled the next day after he fled the country), do not be treatied as some aliens within the country (common saying in Ukraine regarding those who protested against Euromaidan was: "you don't like something here? Suitcase - train - Russia."), do not be forced to abandon Soviet legacy, since a lot of Russian people are positively predisposed towards Soviet Union, since it was their childhood or youth, and USSR of 70's and early 80's for many people was an image of maybe not luxurious, but stable life with social guarantees for everyone, in contrast with the Wild West that we had here in late 80's-90's. But in Ukraine desovietization became one of the main political points, especially after Euromaidan.
So the main question was not "Where to live?" but "How to live?", be it as a part of Ukraine, as independent state (that's where idea of a Novorossia ("New Russia") came from) or a part of Russia. Mostly protesters asked for federalization of Ukraine, with more rights given to the regional governments in terms of forming the legislation, language and social policy. Though separatist movement also had place. Ukrainian law enforcement was crippled by Euromaidan (because it was used against it, and there were a lot of purges afterwards), so government often used nationalists to suppress those protests. It all ended up in massacre of pro-Russian protesters in Odessa on May 2, 2014, which led to rapid increase of those who wanted to support separatists in Donbass (where armed clashes have already started) both in Russia and Russian-speaking parts of Ukraine.
I've actually always thought that if the leaders of Euromaidan used maximum effort to ensure both Russia itself and pro-Russian population within Ukraine that change of power won't affect internal and external relations in any way, all that had happend could have been avoided. But since right-wingers were large powerhouse that helped push Euromaidan to victory (I am talking about Oleg Tyagnibok and his Svoboda ("Freedom") party), it would probably be impossible. So instead we've got immediate cancellation of language law, threats from the leader of the Right Sector (Ukrainian nationalist organization) to send "friendship trains" (sarcastic name for groups of radical right-wingers whose purpose would be to suppress and intimidate local people and authorities) to Crimea, promises to "throw out Russian Black Sea fleet from Sevastopol by 2017" (naval base there wasn't Russian property, it was leased in 1992 for 25 years) and so on.
So it ended how it ended, and I firmly believe that Crimean referendum in 2014 wasn't even rigged, a lot of the Crimeans didn't feel themselves as true Ukrainians (separatist tensions were so strong there that after the fall of Soviet Union Crimea was the only region in Ukraine that was given the status of "autonomous republic" (even though Ukraine is not a federation). Same could be said for Donbass, and, probably, Kharkov. Other regions - not so much. That's some "russia today" explanation of history. 1) The language law you are referring to(so called "Kolisnichenko-Kivalov law") was the case of continuous scandals, disputes and even fights in parliament. This law eventually (in 2018) was admitted as anti-constitutional. Most people of russian-speaking region had never felt oppressed by the language, beliefs or nationality neither before 2012 nor after cancelation of this law, nor after russian annexation of Crimea and aggression on Donbass. Sure you could meet some marginals who said: "I don't want to read medicine instruction in ukrainian", or "I don't want to watch movies in ukrainian in cinema". 2) It was a Kremlin agenda and idea of federalization and making independent republics in the south-east of Ukraine (creating "Novorossiya" in the best scenario) and was actively sponsored. 3) All the resources were on the side of ruling at that time pro-president party "Partiya Regionov" (majority of them stayed in parliament after president fled (what purges are you talking about?) and accused him in all the "sins"). 4) The involvement of nationalists in dealing with pro-russian protests was meager, much more impact did "titushki" + Show Spoiler +https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Titushky and sometimes local police on the ani-maydan side. And it's very manipulative to blame "nationalists" just like euro-maydan activists in what happened in Odessa, stressing the outcome itself not mentioning the actions that took place before. 5) Actions in Luhansk and Donetsk were entirely planned and controlled by Kremlin with a help of local collaborators. 6) Right-wing party "Svoboda" held only 10% of the parliament seats and barely influenced on the situation. Nationalist organization "Pravyy sektor" denied the statements of its member Ihor Mosiychuk about "the trains of friendship". None of trains with nationalist were sent. 7) The referendum in Crimea was obviously faked because there are no fair elections in Russia. We surely can argue about the result but it's irrelevant in terms of norms and law. Nowadays (before the war), the vast majority of people still considered annexed Crimea and a part of Donbass as territory of Ukraine; they used to it and put up with the current situation where Ukraine wasn't able to take it back with military force. People freely communicated in whatever language they wanted no matter where - Lviv, Odesa, Kharkiv, Zaporizhzhia or Uzhgorod. "Pravyy Sektor" almost disappeared from media space. Life was back to the "old" ways. Everything ruined on the 24th of february. Can confirm every single bit, that is exactly what I witnessed as well during last years. It was a great and detailed summary Show nested quote +On April 29 2022 04:55 SC-Shield wrote:
Either distraction or Russia is all-in on this one by forcing others to help them against Ukraine. The latter doesn't add up as Belarus is not fighting yet. Rumour has it that Russia wants to declare victory on 9 May, so escalation is highly likely by then.
@Dav1oN how are you? Have you found a safe place in Ukraine? Long time no see, I hope you're alright! Hey mate, thank you for asking Yea, after a bunch of relocations (5 or 6) and with help/support of the company I worked with - we finally managed to find a quite place. It was hell of a ride. Although, I must admit the housing crisis affects the pricing incredibly, western Ukraine is overpriced at the moment. Having pets adds complexity for the searching, as not many are willing to rent the housing for the people with pets, and that's a shame. Irresponsible people won't evacuate pets from the other side of the country while fleeing, but the householders don't think this way for some reason. In general the renting price went up 3-4 times of what it was before the war. Maybe the situation will be more acceptable in a few weeks or a month since Kyiv residents are coming back to the capital cause it's relatively safe out there at the moment. But coming back to Kharkiv is still quite risky, at first the surrounding areas of the city must be liberated. Overall it's safer than it used to be, but some outer parts of the city is still getting shelled, so I hope that the residents will be as safe as possible meanwhile Show nested quote +
I have read multiple commentators say that Putin found it a threat that Ukraine, a country Russians have traditionally looked down upon, was catching up and in some cases passing quality of life for the middle and lower classes and this was about knocking them back down. They were saying it was a threat to Putins power to have to many people asking why a country with so much less resources could do better than them.
Do you believe their is any truth to that?
Lately an average low and middle class citizens in Ukraine are having better standards of living in comparison to Russia due to the western course of development - that is correct, life was improving slowly but surely. We have to work harder and are having much less resources overall, but we are more efficient and less corrupt. From my POV everything you mentioned sounds correct.
Great to hear from you again! Glad you were able to get to safety.
Has there been any significant development on the Donbas frontlines in the last few days? Every source I've found paints it as either side making only modest gains. Also curious about the saboteur operations going on in Russia
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Russian Federation605 Posts
On May 02 2022 01:22 JimmiC wrote:Show nested quote +On May 02 2022 00:22 Ardias wrote:On May 01 2022 23:37 {CC}StealthBlue wrote:Yea apparently he was the primary target during the barrage of high ranking officers. He was wounded, shrapnel to the right leg, but another general and over a dozen high ranking officers were killed. https://twitter.com/MrKovalenko/status/1520759831589797890 UNIAN published a rebuttal regarding Gerasimov. https://t.me/uniannet/51402While Ukrainian forces did manage to kill several Russian generals and have success at targeting command posts (some separatist soldiers actively reported over the years that Ukrainian military has well established radio reconnaissance), some claims still happen to be either false or exaggerated (like it was with general Mordvichev, commander of 8th Army, who posed on video with Kadyrov in Mariupol 2 weeks after supposedly being killed). So every info from both sides needs further fact-checking. Fog of war as it is. On May 01 2022 11:08 Sermokala wrote:
The Russian state is suffering from a loss in population before Covid-19 and no one knows for sure how much Russia has suffered from it. Going on a slave raid into Ukraine to kidnap people and traffic them into Siberia will prop up their demographics for a few more decades. Wat? On a serious note, state of Russian population is sort of the same as European - natural decline, low birth rate, higher average age on the population and main source of population growth being immigrants from even poorer countries (Caucasus and Central Asia for us). As for "slave raid" and "forced deportation" - I understand the idea of viewing Russia as a totalitarian Mordor with Dark Lord on the throne, but it's not exactly that. Russia is currently an authoritarian state, that's true, but if you don't dive into political opposition (and hell, even Navalny was allowed to roll around for 10 years before they locked him up), you are free to live and work as you want and where you want as in any western country. It's not 1940's, not even 1980's, when students were sent on a certain jobs in certain areas after the graduation from universities (free education has its price). Now nobody cares how or where you live. Capitalism-s. Also if you want to know about measures of Russian government to develop and populate Siberia - you may read up about the law on Far Eastern hectare. Not exactly the GULAG camps. As for your other points - I agree with the posters above, the only serious possible reason you've mentioned is the North-Crimean water channel. I have read multiple commentators say that Putin found it a threat that Ukraine, a country Russians have traditionally looked down upon, was catching up and in some cases passing quality of life for the middle and lower classes and this was about knocking them back down. They were saying it was a threat to Putins power to have to many people asking why a country with so much less reasources could do better than them. Do you believe their is any truth to that?
I try to use Western or Ukrainan sources as much as possible in this discussion (I have already been blamed as "Russia Today propagandist" above), so here is GDP per capita accoridng to NASDAQ as of the end of 2020.
![[image loading]](https://www.nasdaq.com/sites/acquia.prod/files/styles/1100x620/public/2022/03/03/IUGDPCUY_IRGDPC_IEUGDPC_IUSGDPCNY_chart-800x596.png?itok=d3GxiKqT)
So no, not really. As far as I know from Ukrainians whom I spoke with, and comparing their info with what I see here, for a general population living standards are roughly comparable. Better in big cities, worse in small towns and countryside.
Davion above would disagree with this statement, but as far as I know from people around Ukraine, it has much more "grey economy" due to less strict legislative and taxation control over the business, so real Ukrainian GDP is probably higher than presented in the picture. Before the war broke out, I spoke with an entrepreneur from Kiev, and he told me "To hell with your Russian strict taxation control, it's a good thing that here in Ukraine state doesn't get involved in the regulation of buisness activity as much as yours do".
As for the promises of the better life, even Ukrainian media joke about that (quote from the end of the article):
Kravchuk in 1991: in five years we'll be living like in France.
Yushchenko in 2004: in ten years we'll be living like in Poland.
Saakashvili (he was governor of Odessa region at the time) in 2015: in twenty years we'll be living like under Yanukovich.
https://focus.ua/opinions/499943-vsya-zhizn-vperedi-nadeysya-i-zhdi-chto-budet-cherez-18-let-s-ekonomicheskimi-pasportami-ukraincev
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Russian Federation605 Posts
On May 02 2022 08:39 JimmiC wrote:Show nested quote +On May 02 2022 08:21 Ardias wrote:On May 02 2022 01:22 JimmiC wrote:On May 02 2022 00:22 Ardias wrote:On May 01 2022 23:37 {CC}StealthBlue wrote:Yea apparently he was the primary target during the barrage of high ranking officers. He was wounded, shrapnel to the right leg, but another general and over a dozen high ranking officers were killed. https://twitter.com/MrKovalenko/status/1520759831589797890 UNIAN published a rebuttal regarding Gerasimov. https://t.me/uniannet/51402While Ukrainian forces did manage to kill several Russian generals and have success at targeting command posts (some separatist soldiers actively reported over the years that Ukrainian military has well established radio reconnaissance), some claims still happen to be either false or exaggerated (like it was with general Mordvichev, commander of 8th Army, who posed on video with Kadyrov in Mariupol 2 weeks after supposedly being killed). So every info from both sides needs further fact-checking. Fog of war as it is. On May 01 2022 11:08 Sermokala wrote:
The Russian state is suffering from a loss in population before Covid-19 and no one knows for sure how much Russia has suffered from it. Going on a slave raid into Ukraine to kidnap people and traffic them into Siberia will prop up their demographics for a few more decades. Wat? On a serious note, state of Russian population is sort of the same as European - natural decline, low birth rate, higher average age on the population and main source of population growth being immigrants from even poorer countries (Caucasus and Central Asia for us). As for "slave raid" and "forced deportation" - I understand the idea of viewing Russia as a totalitarian Mordor with Dark Lord on the throne, but it's not exactly that. Russia is currently an authoritarian state, that's true, but if you don't dive into political opposition (and hell, even Navalny was allowed to roll around for 10 years before they locked him up), you are free to live and work as you want and where you want as in any western country. It's not 1940's, not even 1980's, when students were sent on a certain jobs in certain areas after the graduation from universities (free education has its price). Now nobody cares how or where you live. Capitalism-s. Also if you want to know about measures of Russian government to develop and populate Siberia - you may read up about the law on Far Eastern hectare. Not exactly the GULAG camps. As for your other points - I agree with the posters above, the only serious possible reason you've mentioned is the North-Crimean water channel. I have read multiple commentators say that Putin found it a threat that Ukraine, a country Russians have traditionally looked down upon, was catching up and in some cases passing quality of life for the middle and lower classes and this was about knocking them back down. They were saying it was a threat to Putins power to have to many people asking why a country with so much less reasources could do better than them. Do you believe their is any truth to that? I try to use Western or Ukrainan sources as much as possible in this discussion (I have been already blamed as "Russia Today propagandist" above), so here is GDP per capita accoridng to NASDAQ as of the end of 2020. So no, not really. As far as I know from Ukrainians whom I spoke with, and comparing their info with what I see here, for a general population living standards are roughly comparable. Better in big cities, worse in small towns and countryside. Davion above would disagree with this statement, but as far as I know from people around Ukraine, it has much more "grey economy" due to less strict legislative and taxation control over the business, so real Ukrainian GDP is probably higher than presented in the picture. Before the war broke out, I spoke with an entrepreneur from Kiev, and he told me "To hell with your Russian strict taxation control, it's a good thing that here in Ukraine state doesn't get involved in the regulation of buisness activity as much as yours do". As for the promises of the better life, even Ukrainian media joke about that (quote from the end of the article): Kravchuk in 1991: in five years we'll be living like in France. Yushchenko in 2004: in ten years we'll be living like in Poland. Saakashvili (he was governor of Odessa region at the time) in 2015: in twenty years we'll be living like under Yanukovich. https://focus.ua/opinions/499943-vsya-zhizn-vperedi-nadeysya-i-zhdi-chto-budet-cherez-18-let-s-ekonomicheskimi-pasportami-ukraincev GDP per capita is not related to my question. That would matter if it was distrubuted equally. The US has the highest GDP per capita in the world but there are many countries where the poor/lower middle are better off for example. Your chart shows that Russias in the same category should be living 3x better, if they are living worse it means all that wealth and taxation is going into billion dollar estates super yauchts and so on. Things like that can create a lot of problems for a dictator.
I've given my personal opinion regarding the subject below the chart, but since I'm a Russian orc, I'm not sure if it does matter, so please give me other objective criteria which I could look up. As for the oligarchs - both Russia and Ukraine have a lot of them.
For Ukraine the following number was presented:
"In total, the top 100 wealthiest business people in Ukraine control around $44,5 billion, according to Forbes,[8] which accounts for 27% of Ukrainian GDP in September, 2021.[9]"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ukrainian_oligarch
For Russian oligarchs I've struggled to find a GDP-to-wealth comparison for the latter years, but could find a report from an older date:
'A 2013 report by Credit Suisse found that 35% of the wealth of Russia was owned by the wealthiest 110 individuals.[31]'
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_oligarchs
Higher percentage for us, but compined with overall higher Russian GDP per capita it should probably give the same result for an average Joe.
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EPT
