artem247

You have no clue what is happening on the ground.

Nobody is pressing citizens to join territorial defense, they do auxiliary duties, they are not surrogate for proper army.

Ukrainian army uses artillery, attack drones extensively, so your point of people with rifles has no value.

Whatever, you don’t get what is happening in Ukraine.

I’ve finished state with Ukrainian as a primary language of instruction, being a Russian speaker. That was long time ago, more than 15 years. To be honest, it is not a big deal, you use both languages daily, you watch movies in both languages and so on.

I also don’t get “among neo-nazis” line.

In any case language question is more a Russian propaganda talking point, I don’t see it being major topic in the Ukrainian political life.

This sharing of video by Kremlin apologist needs to stop. Why Westerners have so much taste for Russian state propaganda? If something is “logical”, doesn’t mean that it is true. Russia has tried to subdue Ukraine since Putin came to power, courting Ukrainian political parties at least since 2002. When “soft” approach failed miserably in 2014, he went for military interventions. It doesn’t matter what West was doing at the time, picturing every political development in Ukraine as a result of Western interference is really it’s own way of saying - “Ukrainians are stupid and all their political life is just a proxy for competing foreign powers”

The real world is not some intellectual tongue in cheek discussion between liberals and conservatives.

It is no surprise for me that westerners couldn’t care less about suffering of “other people”. You don’t need to invent complicated reasons why you do not care biggest war in Europe since 1940’s, or the lives of Eastern Europeans.

Ukraine is not a western country, not a part of any pact, not a part of EU. No western country is protecting Ukraine.

How things that West done are somehow connected to Putin’s desire to challenge the sovereignty of his neighbor?

Don’t live in black and white world with good guys and bad guys.

Nobody tried to install “missiles” in Ukraine, there are no NATO troops, no bases in Ukraine.

Are you seriously giving me links on this? I was there, I participated in those elections. Yanukovych was nearing the end of his term, he ordered snipers to shoot at protesters, it was only right for him to step down. The next step was re-elections.

And believe me, people never really liked Yanukovych so much to take arms. The leaders of “separatists” were literal nobodies, nobody knew who they are. Members of Yanukovych party themselves did not en masse supported separatists.

Second, politicians from Party of Regions participated in both 2014 and 2019 parliamentary elections. Same politicians, top Yanukovych lieutenants, with the same oligarchic sponsors.

Third, those elections were not “boycotted” people still participated, on territory controlled by Ukrainian government.

It is not a binary world. You absolutely do not have to support the Western interference in Ukrainian politics. You do not have to support Putin either. This is not good vs bad.

It is great powers exploiting weaker countries. Russia too did interfere a lot in Ukrainian politics, with methods similar to Western. It's like people live in a paradigm "West good/Russia bad" or "West bad/Russia good", yet miss the real picture - "West bad/Russia bad".

He tells you the facts that you want to hear, that is all. His view is Kremlin-apologist.

You are not in Ukraine, you rely on second-hand account. So for any 'facts' you have to rely on someone. Ukraine is a complex topic, and 'things the way they are' is extremely hard to get, there is an ideological lens to everything.

His lecture was shared recently on some Ukrainian forums and widely derided as just repeating Russian state propaganda talking points.

SHIT, Ukraine is not in NATO, it is not on track on joining NATO, It was clear for everyone in Ukraine that with Crimea and LNR/DNR nobody would accept Ukraine into NATO.

There wasn't much support for NATO in Ukraine internally before seizure of Crimea. Who's in the wrong here? Hmm, I don't know.

Arseniy Yatsenyuk is not in power since 2016, what that has to do with invasion of Ukraine?

And only power he got was that in autumn of 2014 his party got a fairly good numbers, that's why he became a PM, not because Americans have put him there.

There were elections in 2019 which completely changed power in Ukraine, humorous chant from 2014 has no relation to power in modern ukraine.

Current regime — is a Russian speaking comedian Vova Zelenskiy (who is a Jew) and his party, which won elections. There is no nationalist party in Ukrainian parliament. There is Russian language in public spaces and TV. There are more then 600 schools with Russian language of instruction.

"Dialect for peasants" has its roots in Ruthenian language, that was a main language in Grand Duchy of Lithuania.

And no, Russians were not written wholesale as Ukrainians, anyone who can check Soviet records can attest that.

>> people hear the chant all the time - “Moskalyaku na gilyaku Well, if they would listen to Russian TV, they would hear that.

This is not true. In 2020-2021 curriculum year in Ukraine there were 874 schools that that had languages of minorities as a language of instruction. In 9 different languages - Russian, Bulgarian, Crimean Tatar language, German, Polish, Slovak, Hungarian, Romanian, Moldavian.

Source, official website of Ministry of Education of Ukraine. (in Ukrainian) https://nus.org.ua/news/mon-pidrahuvalo-skilky-shkil-navchay...

There is no ethnic Russian majority east of Dnieper. The only region were there was a real Russian majority was Crimea.

I am myself could be considered an (at least partly) 'ethnic Russian", my grandfather came to Kyiv from St. Petersburg. There are no ethnic Russian enclaves in Ukraine, there is no way to find out whether a person in front of you is "ethnic Russian" or "ethnic Ukrainian". Does it matter that 50-100 years ago somebody's ancestors came from Russia to Ukraine? In Eastern Ukraine almost everybody uses Russian as their primary language, no matter whether they are "ethnic Russian", "ethnic Ukrainian", Jews or Tatars or Greeks (there is a sizable Greek community in Mariupol region). The level of assimilation is very high. What's important is whether a person is a follower of some Russian nationalism ideology, or neo-stalinism, or something like that. "Ethnic Russian" does not mean "Anti-Ukraine".

That article that you've posted is comically strange.

"Like most conflicts over the past 2,000 years, this is, at heart, a religious war. Most of the people who live in the tiny eastern province of Donbas and surrounds, including the Crimea, are followers of the Russian Orthodox Church under the Moscow Patriarchate. And about 15% of the Donbas is Muslim."

tiny eastern province of Donbas - if you take the size of Donbass as the size of Donetsk and Luhansk regions, 26517 km sq + 26 684 km sq, so 53 thousand sq kilometers. To put it into context, Belgium is 30 thousand sq km, Netherlands is 40 thousand sq km. So Donbass region is bigger than Netherlands in size. In terms of population it is more than 6 million people.

And about 15% of the Donbas is Muslim -- that is simply not true, by a very big margin.

"When Yunokovych, an Easterner who allied himself with Russia, was reelected in 2014, the Kyiv nationalists seized the capital. The insurrectionists were led by Yulia Tymoshenko who had lost the 2010 Presidential race.

Yanukovich was not re-elected in 2014, presidential term in Ukraine is five years. In November of 2013, protests in Kyiv and in other Ukrainian cities started after Yanukovich declined the association treaty with EU. The way that Yanukovich suppresed those protests sparked a much more powerful reaction, with the main demand for him to step down. Most people in Kyiv and in Central and Western Ukraine supported those protests, not only radical Ukrainian nationalists. Protests continued until late February 2014, when around a hundred protesters were shot by snipers on the main square in Kyiv. That sparked a powerful reaction, with Yanukovich fleeing to Russia. In May of 2014 there were re-elections, where Petro Poroshenko won. In 2019 Volodymyr Zelenskiy won in the scheduled elections.

Yulia Tymoshenko was not leading protests, she was literally in jail.

Well, first of all, these two regions (Donetsk, Luhansk) were part of Ukraine since at least 1922, when the borders of republics of Soviet Union were drawn. They were 'part of Russia', only when whole Ukraine was part of Russia. And no, Crimean Tatars are not indigenous people of East of Ukraine, Crimea and Donbass are very different regions with different history.

You base your opinion from an article by guy who knows some Russian nationalists, who do not believe in Ukraine sovereignty. Somehow you extrapolate their opinion on the whole region.

There are plenty of people, more than 1 million, who left separatist controlled regions for 'mainland' Ukraine (that also meant that they lost their property, most of people in Ukraine own their apartment/house, so that is a big deal).

There are plenty of people from Donbass region who volunteered into Ukrainian army to fight separatists.

Ukraine is a big country, with long, varied history, and multi-ethnic regions. That doesn't mean that invading this country is justified. There is Hungarian community in the west of Ukraine, would it be ok for Hungary to invade?

Well, first of all, that's not how it works. When Crimea was occupied, people were going on with their lives. When separatists stormed into government buildings, in other parts of Ukraine people were going on with their lives — except for those who volunteered in the army.

No internet would happen only if Russia will bombard the infrastructure. What if they just invade eastern regions, why don't it qualify as invasion? They literally stated that they do not recognise the sovereignty of Ukraine on their government channel by their highest official.

People are going on about their lives — because they have nowhere to go, there is nothing they can do, why is this so hard to comprehend? Kyiv looks half-deserted, there is easily two times less cars on the road, and there is much less people on the streets, everyone buying matches and candles. People are scared.

In two days, 4 army Ukrainian army members have been killed by shelling.

It means that they are quite content living in a country that they call their home. I understand that it is hard to grasp, but not everyone in Ukraine works in Poland as a laborer. It has nothing to do with West. People who are 40 or younger in a majority recognize Ukraine as their homeland, no matter the ethnic composition or the language preference.

Well, if only it was so simple. Majority Russian-speaking Kyiv voted for pro-Western politicians since early 90's. Russian language dominates in every major southern and eastern city, that does not mean that every Russian speaker wants to join Russia (in the very least).

It is a bit more complicated, because on paper Russia until today recognized separatist-controlled territory as a part of Ukraine. The problem is that DNR/LNR state that their borders are the same as Donetsk/Luhansk oblast, which is a much bigger region. Second, Russia involvement with 'republics' was mainly with keeping status quo since spring of 2015, that changed in 2021, and what they are going to do now, nobody knows.

Eh what? Have you ever been to Ukraine? What 'Russian people'?

There is no clear ethnic separation in Ukraine, a division is mostly political or a question of identity.

School - actually it was kindergarten I think, was hit on Ukrainian side, so that’s unrelated to evacuation in DNR/LNR

You are confusing 2014 Ukraine with 2022 Ukraine. Paramilitaries and militias aren’t really a thing in Ukraine anymore.

About why people from Donbass fleeing to Russia, since 2014, there is more than 1 million people left separatist controlled territory for Ukraine. Current evacuation is done by DNR authorities in a centralized manner. Given the escalation of conflict, it is dangerous to be near “contact line” and evacuate to Ukraine.

Ukraine voted for Zelensky for two reasons:

1. He is not a radical, his message was conciliatory, he can represent both east and west. He is a Russian-speaking Jew, so that’s rather removed from Ukrainian nationalism for example.

2. Demand for new faces, same old oligarchs/career politicians didn’t exactly inspire confidence.

Also Zelenskiy is more of tycoon/ media executive, not just a comedian.

Russian language was removed from the government in 1991, everyone is bilingual in Ukraine, language is a talking point only outside of Ukraine. Again, nobody is strict about that, people use whatever language they want anywhere, except for official documents.

You use the logic of consumer loans for the country, loans are not bad per se. There are certain infrastructure and social projects going on, so that would speed them up. Ukraine’s economy grows even during pandemic, so increased spending would

Second, the media campaign triggered an issue with currency, which already cost more than 1 billion USD of treasury funds. Btw, Ukraine has gold/foreign currency reserves, so it’s not bankrupt just by that account.

Third, you need to look at GDP to debt ratio, which for Ukraine is completely healthy, lower than many EU countries, much lower than US.

GDP of Ukraine has grown between 2015 and 2021 by 114%. So much for “bankrupt failed state”.

As Ukrainian, I can answer the question. So, ultra-rich are super powerful, they own tv channels, media, bankroll political parties. Most political parties are aligned with their donors. Foreign policy is dictated by US, more or less. Zelenskiy is interesting, because he actively tries to undermine some of the existing financial groups and consolidate the power. There are presidential elections every 5 years and the same for parliament. It is very volatile, political parties have very fast churn, current parliament is something like 80% newcomers, literally.