Self explanatory:
MFA Russia just tweet "Russia does not recognize the principles of Maidan democracy, spontaneous and uncontrollable mob-rule on the streets"
#OSCE reports they see active & constant movement over #Ukraine border in & out to #Russia by military people.
http://www.20khvylyn.com/news/war/news_11478.html …
A Russian form of the "race to the bottom" meaning---do I Russia attempt a full takeover of "New Russia" before or after the Ukrainian elections on the 26th and do I do it before my own Rubel crashes to lows not seen since the brutal crash of 1998.
Ruble seems to be heading for 42/$ (now 41.91), even with no word yet on the supposed rating downgrade
"It's a devaluation. It doesn't matter now how many dlrs the central bank dumps on the mkt," trader tells @Vedomosti http://vedomosti.ru/~HjR
Assume at some point Russia will complain it is a western "humiliation" that is being forced upon them as Putin alluded to it in his Milan press conference---"the US and the KSA have a secret agreement to destroy the Russian economy".
AP---you will notice that in this WSJ article the author is starting to use my concept of "an altered state of reality" that you so stridently oppose.
What he missed and I was surprised is a little more going into the constant Russian propaganda and info war statements that form many of the Russian FM and Putin statements.
The Russians have currently a problem with their own propaganda---they believe it and when you are in an "altered state of reality" it is difficult to recognize you need to urgently find the "exit ramp" before your own economy totally collapses as you are seeking a "military/geopolitical victory".
http://online.wsj.com/articles/russi...ies-1414099668
Goes to the heart of the Washington Post "humiliation" article. Excert taken from the previously linked WSJ article.
Notice just how Russia starts their own internal "humiliation" myths and then direct them towards the West. That "drumbeat" is then passed via their social networks, and news media both inside Russia and world in general
The Russian conspiracy theory isn’t a new phenomenon. A senior Russian security official, Nikolai Patrushev, rehearsed a couple of historical theories in a recent interview with state media: that the U.S. lured the Soviet Union into its disastrous invasion of Afghanistan and that Washington manipulated the collapse in oil prices in the 1980s to destroy the Soviet Union. Likewise, the new sanctions against Russia are seen as a U.S. effort to bring about regime-change in Russia
Notice the authors use of the following sentence......rehearsed a couple of historical theories in a recent interview AND again from the Washington Post article the expansion of NATO to the Russian borders and western violations of "international law" are perfect examples of such "rehearsal of historical theories".
For those commenters who buy into the various Russian "humiliation myths" this should actually end the discussion on NATO alleged "eastward expansion".
Gorbachev Confirms There Was No NATO 'Non-Expansion' Pledge
23:15 (GMT)
Russia Behind the Headlines, an English-language news site sponsored by the state-run Rossiyskaya Gazeta, ran an interview with the last Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev in which he refutes a common Kremlin propaganda claim about NATO expansion.
Taking their cue from Russian leaders, the pro-Kremlin propaganda outlet globalresearch.ca (Centre for Research on Globalization) has repeatedly published claims that Western leaders "lied" about plans for NATO, and even historians have interpreted Gorbachev's own memoirs to imply the West broke its promise to Moscow. Putin even blamed the forcible annexation of the Crimea on "NATO enlargement."
This interview shows why we're fortunate such a historical actor is still alive to explain what happened when the Berlin wall fell 25 years ago.
RBTH: One of the key issues that has arisen in connection with the events in Ukraine is NATO expansion into the East. Do you get the feeling that your Western partners lied to you when they were developing their future plans in Eastern Europe? Why didn’t you insist that the promises made to you – particularly U.S. Secretary of State James Baker’s promise that NATO would not expand into the East – be legally encoded? I will quote Baker: “NATO will not move one inch further east.”
M.G.: The topic of “NATO expansion” was not discussed at all, and it wasn’t brought up in those years. I say this with full responsibility. Not a single Eastern European country raised the issue, not even after the Warsaw Pact was terminated in 1991. Western leaders didn’t bring it up, either. Another issue we brought up was discussed: making sure that NATO’s military structures would not advance and that additional armed forces from the alliance would not be deployed on the territory of the then-GDR after German reunification. Baker’s statement was made in that context, mentioned in our question. Kohl and [German Vice Chancellor Hans-Dietrich] Genscher talked about it.
Everything that could have been and needed to be done to solidify that political obligation was done. And fulfilled. The agreement on a final settlement with Germany said that no new military structures would be created in the eastern part of the country; no additional troops would be deployed; no weapons of mass destruction would be placed there. It has been obeyed all these years. So don’t portray Gorbachev and the then-Soviet authorities as naïve people who were wrapped around the West’s finger. If there was naïveté, it was later, when the issue arose. Russia did not object at the beginning.
The decision for the U.S. and its allies to expand NATO into the east was decisively made in 1993. I called this a big mistake from the very beginning. It was definitely a violation of the spirit of the statements and assurances made to us in 1990. With regards to Germany, they were legally enshrined and are obeyed.
The idea of "NATO expansion" as a trigger for Russian aggression is a popular one for analysts keen to blame the West for the war in Ukraine, explain Russian alienation, claim the US has treated Russia like a loser, or find something the West can change instead of demanding change from Moscow.
Gorbachev's remarks make it clear that there weren't promises made, that some aspects of the discussion only concerned Germany, and that at best we can really only argue about the violation of "a spirit" not a letter.
Anna Applebaum dispenses with these claims in a piece titled "The Myth of Russian Humiliation" in the Washington Post in which she covers the joining of both EU and NATO by Central and East European nations:
These two “expansions,” which were parallel but not identical (some countries are members of one organization but not the other), were transformative because they were not direct leaps, as the word “expansion” implies, but slow negotiations. Before joining NATO, each country had to establish civilian control of its army. Before joining the European Union, each adopted laws on trade, judiciary, human rights. As a result, they became democracies. This was “democracy promotion” working as it never has before or since.
But times change, and the miraculous transformation of a historically unstable region became a humdrum reality. Instead of celebrating this achievement on the 25th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall, it is now fashionable to opine that this expansion, and of NATO in particular, was mistaken. This project is incorrectly “remembered” as the result of American “triumphalism” that somehow humiliated Russia by bringing Western institutions into its rickety neighborhood. This thesis is usually based on revisionist history promoted by the current Russian regime — and it is wrong.
For the record: No treaties prohibiting NATO expansion were ever signed with Russia. No promises were broken. Nor did the impetus for NATO expansion come from a “triumphalist” Washington. On the contrary, Poland’s first efforts to apply in 1992 were rebuffed. I well remember the angry reaction of the U.S. ambassador to Warsaw at the time. But Poland and others persisted, precisely because they were already seeing signs of the Russian revanchism to come.
Indeed, Russia would be hard put to explain why the decision from the NATO summit in Bucharest in 2008, where Georgia and Ukraine were not given invitations or Membership Action Plan, due to opposition from Russia, Germany and France, and a decision by President Barack Obama not to deploy missiles in Czech Republic and Poland, prior to the reset, could somehow explain aggression against Ukraine 6 years later in 2014.
Strong indicators that Russia wants via their mercenaries to disrupt the Ukrainian 26 Oct elections as Putin cannot allow it to be an example of a former Soviet style government actually pulling off fairly democratic elections after a fair, open, and relatively peaceful election campaigning.
Still say that one of the underlying fears that is driving Putin is to eliminate the success by the people during the Maidan as an example for the Russian population as a whole.
BREAKING Per credible sources #Russian terrorists in #Donetsk received strict order to take #DonetskAirport whatever the cost before Oct 26.
On October 23 news came #Russian terrorists in #Donetsk must vacate all taken hospital beds by Oct 26 the latest. Smth is waiting to happen.
Right now news on imminent #DonetskAirport attack fr North hints to soon unfolding carefully planned provocation.
#BREAKINGNEWS RUSSIAN INVADERS PREPARE OFFENSIVE ON #DONETSK #AIRPORT, CALLING PEOPLE TO LEAVE DONETSK'S NORTHERN QUATERS.
Last edited by OUTLAW 09; 10-24-2014 at 11:30 AM.
This summer Moscow Levada centre studied how well Russian know how started WW I and WW II. They were asked also about Ukraine. Sorry for Google translat.
http://www.levada.ru/24-10-2014/tri-mirovye-voinyPoor understanding of how to start the first and second world wars, raising the specter of the Third. But this is not the main problem. Light (in the opinion of those who have not been there) victory in Georgia in 2008, an easy victory in the Crimea in 2014, give rise to the public the impression that Russia - a great power. It is worth and to war. The cenario that clashes in eastern Ukraine could turn into a "war between Russia and Ukraine", ready to imagine 66% of Russians. Whether they want to immediately stop the conflict, to withdraw "volunteers" to stop supplying weapons there? The survey shows that the answer is no. In general, if it wants to Russian war? Maybe they do not want, but are willing to support those who express such an intention. Answers to the question "Will you support the Russian leadership in a situation of armed conflict between Russia and Ukraine?" Were distributed as follows: "Definitely yes" - 17% "more likely" - 38%, "Probably not" - 18% "Definitely not "- 11%" Do not know "- 16%.
Posting Permissions
Bookmarks