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this is my conceit – a long thing I took the trouble to write after someone on my Facebook asked me my view of just what was going on in Ukraine.
I don’t expect many here to read it – it’s likely that nobody will read it, as people prefer small personal smart comments to this sort of thing. longish thing, sorry.
anyway this is how I see events over Ukraine, which are likely to get much worse now, from my reading of a number of newspapers and watching a number of tv news stations on this.
so if anyone is still reading at this point lol
The US cynical ploy to use the shooting down of the airliner over Ukraine (cynical – the US mistakenly shot down an Iranian passenger airliner in 1988, killing nearly 300 people, including 66 kids, and refused to apologise for 8 years) isn’t working. Ukrainian jets attacking the major city of Donetsk are being increasingly shot down by sophisticated rockets (all but certain to come from Russia), so the US attempt to use the horror of MH-17 to shame Russia into withdrawing such arms and allowing the Ukrainians to bomb their own cities without danger is not working – the lives of Iranian passengers and Ukrainian civilians don’t count in the Western agenda..
All the evidence suggests that Russia is massively increasing arms supplies, and heavy-duty arms supplies, to the rebels. The RUSI (Royal United Services Institute) are claiming that Putin is not providing arms for guerrilla warfare, or resistance – he’s creating an army for eastern Ukraine. The CIA is advising the Ukrainian govt (now falling apart – their PM just resigned), and US Special Advisors (as in the early days of Vietnam) have provided training and advise to ginger up the Ukrainian army, which was itself falling apart)
It figures – this is a proxy war between Russia and the US, it turning more deadly. Russia is very likely to win it – they have more at stake. It’s been made clear that nobody in the West will go to war over Ukraine, and the EU is certainly not going to bail out Ukraine economically, as it has troubles of its own. IN fact, it’s very unlikely that the EU will take any effective sanctions against Russia. A further deterioration could alter things – nobody expected to go to war over Serbia 100 years ago, and look at the mass slaughter that resulted.
The West wants Ukraine in its orbit – Russia doesn’t want Ukraine in the Western orbit. That about sums up the conflict.
Putin doesn’t want to invade Ukraine – too costly, and he can achieve his purposes n other ways. He did take Crimea, which is Russian basically, but that was opportunity provided by a heady Ukrainian nationalist movement (strongly influenced by an outright Nazi element (Israel refused to support the US over the issue). Putin is now making Ukraine ungovernable, a perpetual military threat, which economically makes Greece look good. He’s on a win-win phase, and he’s fronting out the embarrassment over MH-17, just as Israel and the US will front out the embarrassment over the massacre of kids in Gaza.
The US will lose. Obama is a weak President who lost the thread in foreign policy several years ago (he was shamed by Putin over Syria). He’s being driven to action to avoid neo-conservative claims that he’s a weakling – they’re making those claims anyway, and he is. Nobody in the West is prepared to go to war over Ukraine, yet Russia is at war there (just as the US was effectively at war in Central America under Reagan). The EU are making noises, but any effective action is blocked (at least for the moment) because of lucrative contracts and Western investment in oil etc in Russia (BP is very worried because of its massive investment in the Arctic and Siberian regions). Angela Merkel, an exceptionally canny politician) is keeping lines to Putin open and saying that that things are getting out of control (German business is in a state of deep concern to get things with Russia back to normal).. Ukraine will require a huge amount of money from an economically-struggling West to set it on its feet, and nobody’s going to be throwing money at a state torn by an ethnic war.
Answer – a ceasefire, and the two sides (effectively Russia and the US) need to come to a deal . Unlikely, as it’s getting worse. It’s starting tog et dangerous, and they’re going to have to work hard to avoid a real military and economic crisis for us all.
Result – misery for Ukrainians, danger for us all.
ah go on go on go on
dont worry about it ,be happy
theyll sort it out eventually its just 2 cox of the school having a scrap.@sceptical guy wrote:
this is my conceit – a long thing I took the trouble to write after someone on my Facebook asked me my view of just what was going on in Ukraine.
I don’t expect many here to read it – it’s likely that nobody will read it, as people prefer small personal smart comments to this sort of thing. longish thing, sorry.
anyway this is how I see events over Ukraine, which are likely to get much worse now, from my reading of a number of newspapers and watching a number of tv news stations on this.
so if anyone is still reading at this point lol
The US cynical ploy to use the shooting down of the airliner over Ukraine (cynical – the US mistakenly shot down an Iranian passenger airliner in 1988, killing nearly 300 people, including 66 kids, and refused to apologise for 8 years) isn’t working. Ukrainian jets attacking the major city of Donetsk are being increasingly shot down by sophisticated rockets (all but certain to come from Russia), so the US attempt to use the horror of MH-17 to shame Russia into withdrawing such arms and allowing the Ukrainians to bomb their own cities without danger is not working – the lives of Iranian passengers and Ukrainian civilians don’t count in the Western agenda..
All the evidence suggests that Russia is massively increasing arms supplies, and heavy-duty arms supplies, to the rebels. The RUSI (Royal United Services Institute) are claiming that Putin is not providing arms for guerrilla warfare, or resistance – he’s creating an army for eastern Ukraine. The CIA is advising the Ukrainian govt (now falling apart – their PM just resigned), and US Special Advisors (as in the early days of Vietnam) have provided training and advise to ginger up the Ukrainian army, which was itself falling apart)
It figures – this is a proxy war between Russia and the US, it turning more deadly. Russia is very likely to win it – they have more at stake. It’s been made clear that nobody in the West will go to war over Ukraine, and the EU is certainly not going to bail out Ukraine economically, as it has troubles of its own. IN fact, it’s very unlikely that the EU will take any effective sanctions against Russia. A further deterioration could alter things – nobody expected to go to war over Serbia 100 years ago, and look at the mass slaughter that resulted.
The West wants Ukraine in its orbit – Russia doesn’t want Ukraine in the Western orbit. That about sums up the conflict.
Putin doesn’t want to invade Ukraine – too costly, and he can achieve his purposes n other ways. He did take Crimea, which is Russian basically, but that was opportunity provided by a heady Ukrainian nationalist movement (strongly influenced by an outright Nazi element (Israel refused to support the US over the issue). Putin is now making Ukraine ungovernable, a perpetual military threat, which economically makes Greece look good. He’s on a win-win phase, and he’s fronting out the embarrassment over MH-17, just as Israel and the US will front out the embarrassment over the massacre of kids in Gaza.
The US will lose. Obama is a weak President who lost the thread in foreign policy several years ago (he was shamed by Putin over Syria). He’s being driven to action to avoid neo-conservative claims that he’s a weakling – they’re making those claims anyway, and he is. Nobody in the West is prepared to go to war over Ukraine, yet Russia is at war there (just as the US was effectively at war in Central America under Reagan). The EU are making noises, but any effective action is blocked (at least for the moment) because of lucrative contracts and Western investment in oil etc in Russia (BP is very worried because of its massive investment in the Arctic and Siberian regions). Angela Merkel, an exceptionally canny politician) is keeping lines to Putin open and saying that that things are getting out of control (German business is in a state of deep concern to get things with Russia back to normal).. Ukraine will require a huge amount of money from an economically-struggling West to set it on its feet, and nobody’s going to be throwing money at a state torn by an ethnic war.
Answer – a ceasefire, and the two sides (effectively Russia and the US) need to come to a deal . Unlikely, as it’s getting worse. It’s starting tog et dangerous, and they’re going to have to work hard to avoid a real military and economic crisis for us all.
Result – misery for Ukrainians, danger for us all.
Now we have that out of the way – can we talk about ME and ONEs Knee Operation !
sorry, all, I have a serious side
and I did say at the start that it’s my conceit – I doubt more than one or two would read it…if that..but even given that chance, I’m happy to submit it.
There’s room for many different sorts of post here (sorry MM)
Doesn’t any conflict seem to end up with superpowers posturing
sceptical guy wrote:Answer – a ceasefire, and the two sides (effectively Russia and the US) need to come to a deal . Unlikely, as it’s getting worse. It’s starting tog et dangerous, and they’re going to have to work hard to avoid a real military and economic crisis for us all.Result – misery for Ukrainians, danger for us all.[/quote}
We all know that Scep….the answer is so simple (a deal) but seemingly impossible?
One will have to back down which the rest of the world will see as a weakness.
I am not going to pretend to know even a fraction of what you do regards this situation especially. But as a normal (no smart comments please) citizen living in a civilised country having an answer isn’t a solution.Trapper, Russia isn’t a superpower any more – China is a potential superpower. Russia is mean because of humiliation since the end of the USSR.
Kenty, agreed, but until the UN appoints me as Czar of the World a solution is outside my reach.
However
and this keeps me going (which may prompt some to shoot it down in flames)
understanding a situation is important, often the only thing open to us. Ukraine is hardly my strength, but I do see it as important, and I do see misinformation from the BBC, Russian propaganda etc as causing a serious cloud of confusion. So I try to prompt discussion where I can – I’m not the expert, but I do try to understand.
cosychops, what can I say about your comment???
When did Russia lose superpower status?
When wasn’t China a superpower??What constitutes a superpower nowadays then?
They (don’t you dare say “who is this *they* people bring up) said a few years back India will soon be a superpower….what do you reckon?
@kent f OBE wrote:
When did Russia lose superpower status?
When wasn’t China a superpower??What constitutes a superpower nowadays then?
They (don’t you dare say “who is this *they* people bring up) said a few years back India will soon be a superpower….what do you reckon?
1) Russia was a superpower in the post-world war 2 era. If you were as old as me, young Ms K, you would remember the USSR. There were two superpowers, and the rest were the Third World. The end of the USSR was a catastrophe for Russia, with the bottom-pinchng cosy, oh sorry, Yeltsin in power and the mafia running the show. Russia was too weak even to stop Crimea not being handed back to them when Ukraine became independent. So 1989-91 – fall of the Berlin wall to end of USSR – is when Russia ceased to be a superpower.
2) China was never a superpower – it was a power with a lot of people in it, unable to defeat even India (lol) in war (1962, over Ladakh), but that was about it. Everybody thought of China in the words of Napoleon – a sleeping giant. Let if sleep, for when she awakes, she will shake the world. She’s been waking since Mao’s death, building economically, mean and racist (very anti-black in Africa), and everybody became aware of her power in the wake of the 2008-09 crash.
3) India? hahahah..sorry. That was me trying to provoke. India, as you know, has built itself up economically to become one of the three great economies of Asia, and is still rising. India may well become a superpower, able to influence world events and worry other powers, but it ain’t yet, and there are many weaknesses (tremendous poverty In the countryside still, corruption in government big-time, uncertainty about how to deal with its ethnic/religious tensions. Watch India – a troubled giant – if looking for the superpower league.
4) what is a superpower??? Oooooooo – think of Superman, scares everybody shi tless, big d ick and big muscles, respect through fear, everything a man and a woman craves – well, supposed to crave.
Why focus on India instead of MM and my strategy for world peace though being made a personal superpower and Czar of the Known World (parts of central Africa still unexplored, apparently)????
I think Russia is getting ready to go into Ukraine.
They’re losing the final battle in Donetsk, and they’ll use the humanitarian disaster (acknowledged by the UN) to create a protection zone around Eastern Ukraine. They’ve announced manoeuvres of their air force around the border, and are massing troops there.
It’s cynical, but if you look at the medieval conditions into which the Ukraine, fully supported by the West, have plunged many of the cities of the area, then it’s no different from the UK-French decision to create a protective air zone around Benghazi in 2011, and a lot more defensible that the UK-US invasion of Iraq aimed at overthrowing the government there in 2003.
But the consequences could be difficult, to say the least. There will be an economic smack felt by us all, despite cosy’s mindless comments not to worry, be happy..
That’ an opinion – the next week or two should make things clearer
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