Find it interesting that the leader of the Jewish community in Kiev stated recently that they have had no problems with neo right radicals and or neo Nazi's and that they the Jewish community Kiev were also fighting in the Maidan just as was the neo right.
Really thought the use of the fear of "Nazi's" had died with Stalin.
But I guess old habits of the KGB die hard.
If one takes the Crimea as an example of the new Putin Doctrine ie one in the future can change any border based on language/ethnicity/culture using the Russian model.
There are approximately 365 hot spots (language/ethnicity/culture) where border changes can/could occur in Asia/Africa just as easily as the Crimea.
That is the significance of the Putin Doctrine for the 21st Century.
Economic sanctions will hit Russia hard as they are a two resource based economy, have a poorly developing internal economy that needs investment and new plants from the West, the Rubel has taken a massive hit and the stock market is at a 4 year low and will go lower after Monday as will the Rubel. So I am not sure who the KGB is trying to convince that it will hurt the West more---certainly not European economists who understand the Russia economy.
Gasprom has lost over 14B USD in wealth just in the last ten days and will also go lower which is one of their main cash cows.
How many of these involve current Russian Federation borders either for a territorial gain or a loss?Originally Posted by OUTLAW 09
JMA--the Baltics, four districts on the Chinese border and if Belarus ever gets rid of their current dictator the whole country---maybe give or take seven. He could expand out the current Moldavian enclaves as well as the Georgian ones.
For those that like the I/O work being done by the KGB/FSB---check this US drone story and see how any holes it has---but hey when it is all the info one gets ---even the dumb believe.
http://www.spiegel.de/politik/auslan...-a-958757.html
Firn---the Russian Foreign Ministry claimed late last week they could hold up under sanctions as they had over 500B in foreign currencies---any evidence of that?
JMA---you bring up an interesting point---the SU after 1945 and under Stalin took a move to ensure in the new eastern bloc that Russian was the primary language thus they started "forced" immigration of ethnic Russians into areas that were not previously Russian ethnic areas--remember the SU at the height of the Cold War had over 136 primary different languages and as was English/French were the official languages in Africa during the colonial period so was Russian the official language. This was also true in say Poland, Hungary, the former Czechoslovakia.
In the Ukraine virtually all Ukrainians speak Russian.
In the "stans" one will find pockets of ethnic Russians as well.
IMO the Putin Doctrine is dangerous as he can on a wim change the definition---meaning today it is language/ethnicity/culture and tomorrow what raw resources Russia needs to survive on, or a perceived "threat".
IE a demonstrator is killed in the Donetsk and the Russian FM states we will move in to defend Russians if the Ukrainians cannot control their country.
They claimed he was Russian when in fact the was a proUkrainian member of a right wing party.
Now with the latest claim of capturing of a US drone over the Crimea (one could argue they were attacked by NATO)---a Hunter ---which they claimed was launched from Bavaria by the 66th MI Group which is actually stationed in Darmstadt.
****By the way the Hunter has only a range of 125 miles which if my geography is correct it could have never reached the Crimea much less loiter over it. Unless it was launched by the Navy.
The wim can be redefined to whenever he wants it to mean--that is the dangerous aspect of the Doctrine and it stands on its head the Westphalia Treaty in the 1700s and the respecting of territorial borders since the end of WW2.
This has nothing to do with "spheres of influence" ---it is all about annexation and rebuilding of the former SU pure and simple. Remember Putin served as a KGB officer in Dresden in the GDR during his cold war days. He never did like the breakup of the SU and was vocal about that in a number of recent interviews.
Last edited by OUTLAW 09; 03-15-2014 at 03:15 PM.
The start?
Prof. Schindler has tweeted a Russian platoon has conducted a helicopter landing near a natural gas extraction on one the narrow isthmus between the Crimea and the mainland, at Strilkove - in Ukrainian territory from Google Maps.
Location follow:https://maps.google.co.uk/maps?q=Str...ed=0CAkQ_AUoAQ
Update via Reuters incursion defeated:http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/2014/...l.html?hp&_r=0
Official Ukrainian protest, which does not make it clear if incursion was defeated:http://mfa.gov.ua/en/press-center/ne...nsykij-oblasti
Last edited by davidbfpo; 03-15-2014 at 05:39 PM. Reason: Add 2nd link
davidbfpo
1854 Crimean War, 1914 July crisis and today
Professor Christopher Clark, author of 'The Sleepwalkers: How Europe Went to War in 1914', adds a commentary and a reminder that much of what is happening today has done so before:http://www.spiegel.de/international/...-a-958692.html
He ends:The Ukrainian emergency is a reminder of how quickly events can undo the best-laid plans and produce unforeseen constellations. But all the key players in this drama appear to have grasped one thing: namely that the answers history gives to the questions of the present are multiple and conditional, not singular and absolute.
davidbfpo
The Chinese were there!
Over a week ago I posted this (Post 339), edited down:Thanks to a "lurker" familiar with the region CNOC owns and operates with its own national staff this facility. CNOC? Chinese National Oil Company, sometimes known as CNOOC - adding Overseas. I cannot readily confirm this, but they know the region from regular, long stays and investments.
Perhaps the Chinese aspect explains the rapid Russian exit?
Some 2011 background on the gas field:Link:http://www.naturalgaseurope.com/chor...sea-shelf-3062Ukraine's state-run JSC Chornomornaftogaz has tripled daily production at the Strilkove gas field, to 30,000 cubic meters of gas, the company's press service has reported.
This Ukrainian company was based @ Simferopol, owing US$1 billion to its Ukrainian parent company (in February 2014) and was nationalised by the new Crimean state and then the PM announced:See Wiki:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chornomornaftogaz and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naftogazthe new owner of the company would be Gazprom
Last edited by davidbfpo; 03-26-2014 at 12:42 AM.
davidbfpo
Michael Gerson writes for the Washinton Post and his paragraph on Ukraine hits the nail on the head.
In the early 1990s, Ukraine briefly possessed the world’s third largest nuclear arsenal, including about 1,900 strategic weapons, an inheritance from the Soviet crackup. In exchange for security assurances — specifically, a Russian promise to “respect the independence and sovereignty and the existing borders of Ukraine” — the Ukrainian government turned over all its nuclear weapons to Russia in 1996. The Budapest Memorandum on Security Assurances is now a muddy scrap of paper stuck to Vladimir Putin’s boot. According to a Ukrainian legislator, there is now a “strong sentiment” in what remains of his country that this denuclearization was “a big mistake.”
In all of the discussions one has tended to forget that the Russian Army is now fully armed, manned and supplied in two Divisions worth and is still sitting where in theory "they are just conducting field training".
All the while both Putin and his Defense Ministry are claiming they are not "interested" in the Ukraine and or Moldavia and are not a threat to anyone. It was initially Putin who also stated that he had no interest in the Crimea and then moved one week later
If that were the case then has anyone heard the Russians indicate that the exercise is over and the troops are back in their barracks?
This is any interesting link that says if they go it is now to the mid May timeframe.
Again since Putin seems to think that the sanctions were just a slap on the wrist then he might have a go following the motto we have survived the first round better to get it over and then bunker in.
Interesting that the two German former Chancellors Schmidt and Schroeder seem to be fully supportive of Putin's move and blame basically the West---surprises me about Schmidt. Can understand Schroeder as he made personally a ton of money for himself with the South Stream pipeline.
http://www.foreignpolicy.com/article...ity_in_ukraine
OK, thanks, but one needs to look at how long these ethnic Russians have been there. Here I am looking at the African example (which the Soviet Russians supported) where if you are a European it does not matter how long you have been there you are still a settler. It should be quite easy to work out the movements of ethnic Russians over the past few hundred years. They should then be invited to go 'home' to mother Russia or stay if the indigenous people allow them to but that land would never be Russian. Where there is a Russian dominant enclave one needs to look at the history to see if migration has played a role.
Are there areas of the Russian Fedration which have non-Russian majorities who could claim a need for independence? Here I talk Ingushetia, Chechnya, and Dagestan. How would the Putin doctrine apply to these three countries for example?
Last edited by JMA; 03-15-2014 at 09:12 AM.
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