Re:U.S. Pauses All Military Aid to Ukraine
by EGreg on Monday March 03, 2025 @11:33PM
(#43250319)
I understand you're Ukrainian, but I am not an expert on everything about USA, why would being Ukrainian make you say others don't understand anything? Plus, I have developers in Ukraine, visited Ukraine multiple times, I know what people in various places in Ukraine think, I have spoken to people who left Ukraine, etc. Let's speak about the substance. I'll just address one point at a time.
1. You mentioned Crimea. Let's just start there for example. Here are things you as a Ukrainian might not know because I doubt this would have been taught in public education:
Even before Ukraine seceded from USSR, Crimea already wanted to be independent of Ukraine. 95% voted to secede from Ukraine but they were ignored:
That same year, Ukraine voted to leave the USSR and a mere 54% of Crimea voted in favor. This is always cited as the basis for Crimea voting to "be part of Ukraine" but 54% is much lower than 95%, and the question was whether Ukraine would be independent of USSR, not Crimea from Ukraine.
You can see Crimea continued to want to be independent because in 1992 they declared a republic with its own self-government. They vote to elect their own President, which Kyiv denounces as unconstitutional: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1992_Crimean_constitution
But Ukraine created a Ukrainian Presidential Representative in Crimea, kicking off a wave of protests there. Their 1994 referendum strongly supported autonomy and independence from Ukraine again: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1994_Crimean_referendum
The Crimean public popularly elect pro-Russian president Yuriy Meshkov. He clashes with the parliament. Ukrainian government intervenes in the crisis, invades Crimea with about 4000 officers, scraps their constitution, removes their President, and deports him to Russia. Kyiv appoints Anatoly Franchuk to run Crimea instead, rather than a popularly-elected leader.
Crimea was demanding autonomy from 1991-1993 and Kyiv agreed to give them this autonomy. It was only on this basis that Russia agreed to support Crimea being under Ukraine. But then in 1995 they renegged on it, and invaded it.
So shouldn't this be mentioned when people talk about Crimean referendum in 2014 being "rigged" and "under Moscow influence and little green men"? What about Kyiv's influence and 4000 officers?"
It makes sense since Crimea was originally under Russian SSR but got transferred in 1954 to Ukrainian SSR. A decade earlier, Stalin had deported 200,000 Crimean Tatars, in a horrific ethnic cleansing. But even before that, Russians were the majority there. So it's not surprising to me why they would want to be independent from Ukraine.
Funny enough, in the 2014 referendum the only two choices were "under Ukraine" or "under Russia". I think if they had a third choice, "independence from both countries", they'd choose that.
I am on neither country's side, I'm a libertarian, I just think there is a matreshka doll of countries wanting to control regions. Georgia wanted to bring Abhazia and South Ossetia under control, and was emboldened by NATO. Thankfully that whole war was averted quickly. I mean, heck, I strongly condemned Russia's bombing of Grozny, Chechnya. I condemn Erdogan's starving of Rojava region and diverting water from it. I condemn Stalin's role in Holodomor as much as I condemn the British role in the Irish Potato Famine. I don't think it's right for anyone to exercise force over large groups of people.
Libertarians would say a simple solution is just to allow both Russians, Ukrainians, Greeks, Jews, Tatars and others to visit Crimea, live there, own property, etc. There is no reason to fight about it. Having exactly one flag over every region on earth is not a principle worthy to have everyone killing each other over.
Ironically, when everyone is just provinces under one federation / union (Canada, USA, USSR) they think more sanely. When Crimea changed hands from Russian SSR to Ukrainian SSR in 1954, no one killed each other over it. They just changed road signs and moved on. They didn't try to divert water from it, Erdogan-style, as punishment. Why in the 21st century can't we have more approaches like that? Well, it seems we can, inside federations. Europe has stopped fighting under the EU, and it was horrific before. It's some kind of nationalistic / statist madness. Here is a statistic I want to leave you with: 11 million Russians have family members in Ukraine, and vice versa. Do you think they want to kill them? Those are stories of love, of people meeting and starting families, there are so many, why do we focus on stories of hate now? Because politicians. They fail to avert wars, due to their pride and incompetence, and refusing to listen to each other in good faith. Then for years they sip wine and give speeches about how "we" must fight until victory, while the plebs kill each other due to their failures. Plebs just want to make money and feed their family. That's my view.
1. You mentioned Crimea. Let's just start there for example. Here are things you as a Ukrainian might not know because I doubt this would have been taught in public education:
Even before Ukraine seceded from USSR, Crimea already wanted to be independent of Ukraine. 95% voted to secede from Ukraine but they were ignored:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1991_Crimean_sovereignty_ref...
That same year, Ukraine voted to leave the USSR and a mere 54% of Crimea voted in favor. This is always cited as the basis for Crimea voting to "be part of Ukraine" but 54% is much lower than 95%, and the question was whether Ukraine would be independent of USSR, not Crimea from Ukraine.
You can see Crimea continued to want to be independent because in 1992 they declared a republic with its own self-government. They vote to elect their own President, which Kyiv denounces as unconstitutional: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1992_Crimean_constitution
But Ukraine created a Ukrainian Presidential Representative in Crimea, kicking off a wave of protests there. Their 1994 referendum strongly supported autonomy and independence from Ukraine again: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1994_Crimean_referendum
The Crimean public popularly elect pro-Russian president Yuriy Meshkov. He clashes with the parliament. Ukrainian government intervenes in the crisis, invades Crimea with about 4000 officers, scraps their constitution, removes their President, and deports him to Russia. Kyiv appoints Anatoly Franchuk to run Crimea instead, rather than a popularly-elected leader.
Crimea was demanding autonomy from 1991-1993 and Kyiv agreed to give them this autonomy. It was only on this basis that Russia agreed to support Crimea being under Ukraine. But then in 1995 they renegged on it, and invaded it.
There is much more here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Crimea_(1991%E2%80%...
So shouldn't this be mentioned when people talk about Crimean referendum in 2014 being "rigged" and "under Moscow influence and little green men"? What about Kyiv's influence and 4000 officers?"
Crimea protested against NATO presence since 2006: https://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/11/world/americas/11iht-kiev...
It makes sense since Crimea was originally under Russian SSR but got transferred in 1954 to Ukrainian SSR. A decade earlier, Stalin had deported 200,000 Crimean Tatars, in a horrific ethnic cleansing. But even before that, Russians were the majority there. So it's not surprising to me why they would want to be independent from Ukraine.
Funny enough, in the 2014 referendum the only two choices were "under Ukraine" or "under Russia". I think if they had a third choice, "independence from both countries", they'd choose that.
I am on neither country's side, I'm a libertarian, I just think there is a matreshka doll of countries wanting to control regions. Georgia wanted to bring Abhazia and South Ossetia under control, and was emboldened by NATO. Thankfully that whole war was averted quickly. I mean, heck, I strongly condemned Russia's bombing of Grozny, Chechnya. I condemn Erdogan's starving of Rojava region and diverting water from it. I condemn Stalin's role in Holodomor as much as I condemn the British role in the Irish Potato Famine. I don't think it's right for anyone to exercise force over large groups of people.
Libertarians would say a simple solution is just to allow both Russians, Ukrainians, Greeks, Jews, Tatars and others to visit Crimea, live there, own property, etc. There is no reason to fight about it. Having exactly one flag over every region on earth is not a principle worthy to have everyone killing each other over.
Ironically, when everyone is just provinces under one federation / union (Canada, USA, USSR) they think more sanely. When Crimea changed hands from Russian SSR to Ukrainian SSR in 1954, no one killed each other over it. They just changed road signs and moved on. They didn't try to divert water from it, Erdogan-style, as punishment. Why in the 21st century can't we have more approaches like that? Well, it seems we can, inside federations. Europe has stopped fighting under the EU, and it was horrific before. It's some kind of nationalistic / statist madness. Here is a statistic I want to leave you with: 11 million Russians have family members in Ukraine, and vice versa. Do you think they want to kill them? Those are stories of love, of people meeting and starting families, there are so many, why do we focus on stories of hate now? Because politicians. They fail to avert wars, due to their pride and incompetence, and refusing to listen to each other in good faith. Then for years they sip wine and give speeches about how "we" must fight until victory, while the plebs kill each other due to their failures. Plebs just want to make money and feed their family. That's my view.