Roots and consequences of Ukraine's violence

[robertlouis]

So the truth comes out - you're Jeb Bush and you've just announced your candidacy for president and your foreign policy all in one fell swoop.........nice job!

So that would be the same Jeb Bush that rigged an election in 2000 to ensure that his brother could steal the presidency?

Just the kind of guy we need to defend democracy in the rest of the world...

[robertlouis]

Paul sums it up succinctly: "We don't have any business there."

That makes me a little queasy. And I don't understand the following that Ron Paul has. Yep, he's a libertarian, whatever the fuck that means, but he's a fascist when it comes to gay rights for one thing. Anyway, I digress.

Neville Chamberlain in September 1938 described Hitler's annexation of the Sudetenland thus, only for it to be swiftly followed by his takeover of all of Czechoslovakia and within a year saw the world plunged into the horrors of the Second World War:

"How horrible, fantastic, incredible it is that we should be digging trenches and trying on gas-masks here because of a quarrel in a far away country between people of whom we know nothing. It seems still more impossible that a quarrel which has already been settled in principle should be the subject of war."

Putin has already spoken about his desire to establish a Eurasian political and economic bloc to counter the expansion of the EU and with it, democracy.

Who's to say that the current crisis in Ukraine isn't a potential template for any other nation that was a constituent of the USSR and seeks to ally itself with the west? Sounds a bit like the Iron Curtain all over again, doesn't it?

Let's say that Belarus overthrows their post-Stalinist dictator Lukaschenko and votes to join the EU. Will it be the same all over again? And again and again? The west needs to ensure through diplomatic means and without resorting to conflict that the territorial integrity of Ukraine is maintained, or the same could well be the fate of each and every country on the periphery of the old USSR.

[robertlouis]

Here's another worrying and very unsavoury development. Maybe Putin and his supporters are right in part at least in calling some of the protesters, and now appointed to office in Kiev, fascists.

http://iacknowledge.net/nazis-come-t...s-the-outrage/

[Stavros]

You want a solution? Fine, I will give you a simple and effective one. Borrow a page from the Gipper's book.

The great Ronald Reagan defeated the evil Soviet Union back in the late 80's - without firing a single shot on the Russians. How did he do it, you say? Easy, by waging proxies wars on the red commies, suffocating their finances, chocking their self-esteems, and showing the world how feeble they truly are.

From Afghanistan, to Central America (places like Nicaragua-El Salvador- Panama), to the middle east (e.g. Syrian-Israeli conflict in 1982), the Great Communicator was picking one side - usually the winning side- and going at it at the Reds. Kremlin was so broke in the 80's that for their parades they used to paint wooden posts and show them as new intercontinental ballistic missiles.

Fast forward 30 years later, the US can still wage proxy wars on Putin. Places like Syria, Iran, etc. are a good start. Have the US back the opposition in Syria to the butcher who is supported by Putin. Kick the mullahs ass in Iran. Strengthen our relations with KSA, Egypt, and Israel.

That's my friend, how Ronnie single handily won the cold war.

Oh dear, what a simplistic, and confused account of history.

1) Did Ronald Reagan defeat the USSR in the Cold War? No. Did the US attempt to undermine the economy of the USSR by bogging it down in an expensive war in Afghanistan? Yes -but the Soviet economy would have collapsed without the Afghan war commitment - Hillel Ticktin spent years warning about the USSR's collapse but nobody took him seriously.

2) The USA was found guilty of violations of international law in Nicaragua in 1984 by the International Criminal Court, so it decided to boycott the court! For decades the USA had turned a blind eye to the human rights abuses in Nicaragua of the Somoza dynasty until the people of Nicaragua had said enough! A popular revolution was immediately followed by the creation of a Constitutional Commission made up of all political parties which drew up a new constitution and organised the free and fair elections which were won by the Sandinistas. The Reagan Presidency decided democracy was a violation of its interests in Central America and proceeded to fund terrorist acts against Nicaragua using proceeds from arms sales to Iran (America's No 1 enemy!) to arm the 'Contras' after Congress had limited the right to fund them (The 'Boland Amendment').
-there is a reason why El Salvador was engaged in a 'dirty war', as with Honduras -and of the three, Nicaragua, Honduras and El Salvador, which one is most closely engaged with the illegal drug trade flowing through Mexico into the USA? Could it be the ones which did not have a popular democratic revolution?
Blame it on Reagan, the President who presided over an explosion of drug abuse in the USA -then ask, who benefits from this trade?

3) "the middle east (e.g. Syrian-Israeli conflict in 1982)" -there was no Syria-Israel conflict in 1982 -the two countries have not fought a war since 1973. Israel invaded Lebanon in 1982 to smash the PLO which was based in Beirut; it is widely recognised that the long term impact of this invasion damaged Israel domestically, and internationally. Ronald Reagan's presidency mediated the withdrawal of the PLO from Beirut, placing troops from the USA and France in the country, the first time US troops had been sent to the front line of a Middle Eastern conflict since 1958 -the result was the worst single casualty of US troops in a conflict since the Vietnam war and before 9/11 -241 marines killed in a bombing, which led to the withdrawal of US troops from Lebanon, and Reagan's mission in shreds. The Civil War raging in Lebanon continued for years thereafter.

4) The 'hawks' around Ronald Reagan who did so much to steer the kind of policy initiatives you approve of, were appalled when he sat down with Mikhail Gorbachev and began to negotiate away the USA's nuclear arsenal. Reagan's measured attitude to Gorbachev and the USSR suggests that an uncompromising assault on the country did not happen; Reagan, using diplomacy, was prepared to compromise. The USSR was weak in 1985, it didn't need that much to push it closer to oblivion. Reagan had a walk-on role in this particular movie.

[Prospero]

this is some reaiistic thinking from a writer in the UK magazine Prospect.

Where is Ukraine Headed?
by Gregory Treverton (director of the Rand centre for Global risk and security)

The situation in Ukraine evokes eerie echoes of the Cold War, not to mention czarist preoccupation with what has come to be called Russia’s “near abroad.” The situation is dangerous, and in that circumstance, wishes are not policy. Neither is foot-stomping. The first task is not rolling back the effective occupation of Crimea by Russian troops, but trying to keep a bad situation from getting worse.

It is useful to begin with a clear-eyed appraisal of what we know and what we don’t. The most important “knowns” are two: Russia’s occupation of Crimea will not be undone unless and until Vladimir Putin decides to; and Ukraine has ceased to exist as a functioning state.

Take the two in turn. Neither western foot-stomping nor sanctions can force Putin to withdraw Russian troops or replace them with European observers to guard Crimea from a danger no one has yet seen. As Lyndon Johnson said: sometimes, like a mule in the rain, you just have to stand there and take it. Putin’s spokesman was, alas, on target when he made fun of threats to cancel the G8 meeting scheduled for June in Sochi or to expel Russia from the group. Europe’s dependence on Russian oil and gas means there is no stomach for sanctions against those exports. In any case, those sanctions, like ones against visas or assets, would take time to bite.

In an important sense, it is no surprise that Ukraine has ceased to function as a state. The surprise is that it ever appeared to. The divide between its east and west is yawning; parts of western Ukraine were annexed only through the force of the Red Army in 1939. Ukraine received Crimea as a “gift” from the Russian republic in 1954. Like other Soviet republics—but unlike Soviet satellite-states in eastern Europe—Ukraine came to independence with no semblance of a national organised military command.

So, too, the “known” category almost surely includes a Russian protectorate, in some form, over Crimea. Russian interests and entanglements begin with the Black Sea Fleet but run much deeper. And the populace generally seems to have welcomed the Russian occupiers.


Beyond that, Ukraine’s future is in the unknown column. Neither a loose federation nor a three-way split (East, West and Crimea) would be the end of the world—provided there were decent signs it is what “Ukrainians” desired. It surely is painfully plain in retrospect that Ukraine’s previous status quo could not endure.

In these circumstances, the touchstones for policy need to be generosity toward Ukraine and openness to Russia. Europe’s niggardliness toward Ukraine was hardly the cause of the previous government’s turn to Russia, but it did precipitate it. The crisis has brought long-simmering political issues to the surface. Now is the time to try to take dour economic prospects out of the equation. As Sir Winston Churchill famously said, it is better to jaw, jaw than to war, war. The same might be said of “pay, pay” in the form of an aid package for Ukraine.

Putin is the harder part. Stern words and firm lines are unwise when your target’s interests are strong and yours are relatively weak, all the more so if you can’t do much about that target’s transgression in any case. The last crisis, over Russia’s invasion of Georgia in 2008, began with foot-stomping but ended more in a whimper. The Bush administration was unwilling to risk escalation through sending troops, bombing key chokepoints or arming the Georgians.

This time around, while Ukraine is more important to Europe than Georgia, so too the risk of escalation is all that much more dangerous. Rather, this seems like the time for policy to hold its nose and engage Russia, not try to isolate it. This time around more creative diplomacy might seek to recognise Russia’s legitimate interests in Crimea while engaging Russia in a discussion of Ukraine’s future.

[Ben]

Typical of the liberal elite, as it were, by frightening the population with the ghost of Hitler. But, well, Hillary has gotta appear tough. (Why does the political class always invoke the name Hitler? I mean, that was 70 years ago. It was a different world, different times. I thought Saddam Hussein was the new Hitler -- ha ha!
Ahhh... the crazy political class.
Well, the liberal political class seems more bellicose at this point.
And, too, a President Hillary Clinton would feed the military-industrial-complex very nicely.

Hillary Clinton says Vladimir Putin’s Crimea occupation echoes Hitler:

http://www.theguardian.com/world/201...-echoes-hitler

[broncofan]

That makes me a little queasy. And I don't understand the following that Ron Paul has. Yep, he's a libertarian, whatever the fuck that means, but he's a fascist when it comes to gay rights for one thing. Anyway, I digress.

Neville Chamberlain in September 1938 described Hitler's annexation of the Sudetenland thus, only for it to be swiftly followed by his takeover of all of Czechoslovakia and within a year saw the world plunged into the horrors of the Second World War:

"How horrible, fantastic, incredible it is that we should be digging trenches and trying on gas-masks here because of a quarrel in a far away country between people of whom we know nothing. It seems still more impossible that a quarrel which has already been settled in principle should be the subject of war."

.

I like this reading of any Chamberlain lesson better. Absolute isolationism is callous and irresponsible. You cannot abdicate responsibility simply because those affected come from a different region of the world.

If a country were to begin building a system of concentration camps, Ron Paul would ask, "are any of the victims American?". There is a place for American intervention, somewhere between arbitrarily attacking countries and completely ignoring the plight of victims of genocide. I only mention the region of the world this conflict is taking place in to highlight the danger attending Western intervention. It would be to meet the lion in the lion's den.

I think Chamberlain's legacy suffers from terrible hindsight bias. That's not to say I think his actions were proper, only that people judge his actions with information that could have only been obtained after he acted. They also judge him for failing to act under an anomalous set of circumstances, the full weight of which again, I don't think any person could have reliably forecasted. The lesson is not that diplomacy is the same thing as appeasement. It's that you can never be oblivious to what is going on in other parts of the world.

[dderek123]

Ron Paul is a nut that will never get elected into a position where he would do damage with his nutty ideas. I like a few of his core ideas but his stance on dissolving the federal reserve is naive and his views on gay marriage are too old fashioned.

I like him where he is since he brings an opposing view from the norm and he's charismatic. He's not your typical politician but he seems to be popular with young people. He's also done a few AMAs on reddit which is nice to see someone other than Obama using social media effectively.

[Ben in LA]

It all stems from Bengazi.

</sarcasm>

[Prospero]

It all stems from Bengazi.

</sarcasm>

Naaahhhhh it all stems from Eden.