Ukraine: military (Aug '14 to mid-June '15) closed

[kaur]

Putin peace plan in Ukraine 2014.

1. the separatists (kaur - Russians) halt all offensive operations

2. Ukrainian troops move their artillery back out of range of cities and large towns in the rebel-held (kaur - Russian held) area

3. Ukraine to cease airstrikes

4. the establishment of an international monitoring mission and humanitarian aid corridors

5. “all for all” prisoner exchange

6. “rebuilding brigades” to repair damaged roads, bridges, power lines and other infrastructure.

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/04/wo...ssia.html?_r=0

Sarkozy-Medvedev plan in Georgia 2008.

1) Non-use of force.

2) Stop all military action.

3) Free access to humanitarian aid.

4) Georgian troops return to their previous positions before the conflict.

5) Russian troops return to the lines they held before the start of the military operation. Before an international solution is worked out Russian peacekeepers are taking up an additional security role.

6) The start of an international discussion over the future status of South Ossetia and Abkhazia.

http://www.ccun.org/News/2008/August...rgia%20War.htm

Authorities in South Ossetia say about two thousand people have died in the fighting. Their capital Tskhinvali lies in ruins. Russian emergency services say they are caring for hundreds of wounded in the area.

The Russian Government has promised some 40 million dollars to help re-build the city.

It is estimated that more than 30,000 Ossetians have fled the fighting to cross the border to Russia. Funerals are being held in North Ossetia for some of those who have died.

What is the difference between those two Russia's wars? Did they figure out that South Ossetia and Abhazia are too expensive projects and it would be more clever to share the rebuilding process expences with West? Hatred is seeded and strings are attatched?

[kaur]

Opinion: High price for ceasefire in eastern Ukraine

The Kremlin will have achieved its goals - for the time being - if there is a ceasefire in eastern Ukraine. But it wouldn’t mean the end of the conflict, writes DW’s Ingo Mannteufel.

- A new frozen conflict

- Poroshenko, a loser

- Another loser

http://www.dw.de/opinion-high-price-...en-eu-2092-rdf

To continue Georgia and Ukraine comparsion.

19.08.2008

“No business as usual”

The Council strongly urged Russia to “take immediate action to withdraw its troops from the area”.

As NATO Secretary General underlined during his press conference, “the NATO-Russia Council meetings would be placed on hold until Russia adhered to the ceasefire and the future of our relations will depend on the concrete actions Russia will take to abide by the … peace plan”. “We are not closing doors”, he said again, but “we…cannot continue with business as usual… as long as Russia does not commit to the principles upon which we agreed to base our relationship”.

http://www.nato.int/docu/update/2008...st/e0819a.html

31.10.2008

Kouchner’s Kommersant interview coincided with his talks in St. Petersburg with Russian Minister of Foreign Affairs Sergei Lavrov. In those talks, Kouchner called for a quick start to EU-Russia negotiations on a partnership agreement, signaling a return to business-as-usual after Russia’s recent invasion of Georgia.

http://www.jamestown.org/single/?tx_...1#.VAeDNWIaySM

At page 20, there is resume about European action after Georgia-Russia war. Good material to compare with today's situation in Ukraine. For example page 12 is like deja vu.

http://www.natolin.edu.pl/pdf/analiz...iza_1_2013.pdf

[OUTLAW 09]

http://www.dw.de/opinion-high-price-...en-eu-2092-rdf

To continue Georgia and Ukraine comparsion.

19.08.2008



http://www.nato.int/docu/update/2008...st/e0819a.html

31.10.2008



http://www.jamestown.org/single/?tx_...1#.VAeDNWIaySM

At page 20, there is resume about European action after Georgia-Russia war. Good material to compare with today's situation in Ukraine. For example page 12 is like deja vu.

http://www.natolin.edu.pl/pdf/analiz...iza_1_2013.pdf

kaur---I am not sure that the "Putin Plan" is anything other than a verbal way to influence the EU meetings this week as Putin knows sanctions are coming that will literally put the Russian economy over the cliff for the next 5-7 years and that is hard then to explain to the Russian population just "how important south/eastern Ukraine is for Russia" w2hen many in Russia are now questioning the Crimea annexation---meaning in the end what did it bring us the Russian population?

This popped up in RIA this morning and goes to the heart of why Putin "engaged" in the global media with his "offer".

http://en.ria.ru/politics/20140904/1...event-New.html

Right now the core hindrance is the demand by the mercenaries that they want to have a relationship with the EEC and the core demand from Russia is still on the table--no EU Association agreement and they have three reasons that they demand that even the EU cannot agree to.

So stalemate.

I am not so worried about about a "frozen state" similar to Georgia and Moldavia for the simply reason the industrial base in the Donbas needs business outlets and secondly with the Crimea annexation and the severe hit the Russian economy has taken Russia cannot provide any rebuilding efforts as they promised for say the Crimea which did not also show up as Russia is basically broke.

Here is the interesting point---all of the industrial base in the east is outdated and built around the Soviet state model of tons produced not quality and export chances---that will take the EU to help out but the EU will not spend funds on an "occupied frozen state" concept that Russia has pulled before. So any downsizing that is needed means unemployment and a flat lining of the local economies--- and that will hit the DPR in the face not Kiev since it is the DPR that is "governing".

There are now reports of "taxes" being forced on the local businesses by the mercenaries--that ain't going over well with many saying they will fold up and depart for Kiev rather than stay in the area.

Also if the area is "frozen" cannot see the Kiev central government doing a lot of money investments in a area that is basically under Russian control---why would they?

If the economy in the east/south remains unchanged and frozen then the so called ethnic Russians will start asking "was it worth it" as they have done in the liberated eastern towns and villages.

There is an entirely different scenario that has come forward--quietly from within the Kiev elites---slowly let the Donbas go---set then a definitive border between the DPR and the Ukraine---rebuild and modernize with EU assistance the western portion and let Russia be responsible for the south-east and failure as they are doing now in the Crimea simply because they cannot afford 10-15B USD per year to support both separatist areas plus the other three enclaves.

But Kiev cannot sell that idea right now just after the hard fighting and the Maidan---

They have Putin/Russia over a barrel right now in the IJC rulings first on Yukos and then coming in Stockholm where Russia is desperately trying to renegotiate a gas price in order to show Stockholm they are agreeable--Gazprom does not want an international ruling on it's gas contracts which are in fact monopolistic. On top of this they can via the IJC get massive rulings for all oil/gas lost revenues and royalties, lost investments/properties and for the lost military facilities/equipment in the 100s of billions which Russia must pay or face constant harassment via seizures of their ships, planes, oil and gas and losing their banking creditability if they do not pay.

Such a ruling would reinforce the coming EU Cartel ruling which will be also against Gazprom---you have seen the South Stream completely stopped by the EU.

Gazprom and Putin virtually hate the new EU Regulation 3 requirements---that there must be deregulated energy competition across the EU.

Gazprom and Putin want to have gas as a weapon the new EU requirements kill that idea totally.

[OUTLAW 09]

A perfect example of what I have been calling the Russian "altered state of reality".

Begs the question--what has the individual been smoking lately?

From RIA today:

MOSCOW, September 4 (RIA Novosti) - The concerns of Eastern European countries about their security and Russia’s alleged destabilization of the situation in Ukraine are baseless, as such an attitude has more to do with phobias then with real security concerns, Russia’s Permanent Representative to NATO Alexander Grushko said in an interview with Euronews.

“These worries are completely baseless. We have proven many times that all these so called facts produced by NATO and other European capitals are not really facts, but fabricated documents. We are not concentrating troops, neither movement of military hardware which could be considered as destabilizing,” Grushko said.

According to Grushko, these concerns can be attributed to phobias. “And phobias can not be treated with deploying tanks and additional combat forces, “ he noted, advising the countries to take a closer look at such problems prevalent in their own societies,

Again what planet is this individual currently residing on?

He definitely seems to have never read the Russian new military doctrine, nor seems to know the Russian military exercised a tactical nuclear strike on the Baltics and Poland, nor seems to have read the comments by a Russian military "expert" that the Baltics would become first targets if NATO placed bases in their countries and he definitely does not seem to know what the stated 2012 Russian nuclear doctrine of tactical first strike is.

[OUTLAW 09]

This is an interesting interview with one of the surviving Russian airborne types that got beaten up on when they convoyed into the Ukraine.

http://euromaidanpress.com/2014/09/0...whole-company/

Notice he mentions not once but twice the alleged involvement of an American radio intercept/jammer unit in the Ukraine that was used against them.

Interesting as this alleged bit of information also was stated by Russia back when the Crimea was being occupied/annexed.

Russia claimed then that it was the 66th MI Group out of Germany.

Are they still telling that story to their troops during deployment prep?

[OUTLAW 09]

Noticed that someone took the time to attempt to analyze the Putin "altered state of reality"---but with Orwell an interesting twist to say the least. Seems I am not the only one saying "altered state of reality" and Putin in the same sentence.

The article below is really interesting as it does go to the heart of this "altered reality problem" Putin is having--I really do believe he is truly believing his own propaganda which is extremely dangerous.

Orwell can help us understand what is happening to us as if we make a good-faith effort to use Russian media official sources to try to understand the world. Russian propaganda about Ukraine is today’s doublethink: it requires that people, as Orwell put it, “hold simultaneously two opinions which cancelled out, knowing them to be contradictory and believing both of them.” Russian propaganda daily pounds out two sides to every story, both of which are false, and each of which contradicts the other.

That is why he has not taken any off ramp or exit offered to him by the West--he simply does not "see" them--because in his "altered state" he is in fact "winning".

http://www.politico.com/magazine/sto...l#.VAg6hWD8JMv

Core thesis:

After all, every attempt thus far at negotiation and cease-fire has been accompanied by a Russian escalation, to the point where we can be certain that this is not a coincidence. If Russian President Vladimir Putin meets with other leaders, we must simply expect that this is cover for the latest outrage, as with the entrance of Russian troops, armor and artillery during the recent talks in Minsk.

But we need to dig a bit deeper into the plot for the three concepts needed to understand this very strange war, in which Putin has radicalized Russian politics, destroyed a European peace order, challenged Europeans’ assumptions about their entire future — and even threatened nuclear war. Every reason proffered to explain a war that is pointless to the point of nihilism is obviously bogus or self-contradictory or both. To grasp this horrible event in which people are killing and dying for no discernible reason, we need to remember some key concepts from Orwell: Eurasia, doublethink and learning to love Big Brother.

To take these thoughts a step further Putin in his recent school visit and interview basically condemned the Communists and Lenin directly for allowing the Russian Army to fail during WW1.

An unusual step for a former KGB COL who owed his career to the Communist Party especially since the KGB was "the Sword and Shield of the Party".

http://www.newyorker.com/news/news-d...n-disses-lenin

.

[AmericanPride]

What is the difference between those two Russia's wars? Did they figure out that South Ossetia and Abhazia are too expensive projects and it would be more clever to share the rebuilding process expences with West? Hatred is seeded and strings are attatched?

There isn't much difference - that's been pointed out by a number of people. I think it's pretty obvious the Russians want strings to be attached - the Maiden revolution meant all of their strings were cut, and the military operations were launched to bring Russian interests back to the table vis-a-vis Ukraine's political future. Rebuilding eastern Ukraine using Russian resources or funds means accepting Russian conditions for said aid - and that means continued Russian influence in determining Ukraine's economic and political future.