Hi all, just want to learn more about what's happening in Russia/Ukraine right now. Like I obviously know there are tensions and what not, but what are the underlying factors at play? What is America's role in all this? Why are we training paramilitary squads in the US and who exactly are we training?
Drunk with it's victory over the collapsed USSR, Washington decides "why be friends with Russia when we can just run it into the ground and have it all?" NATO, which is Washington's tool to extend its power to Europe, instead of winding down undergoes 5 waves of extension to the east, moving all this military infrastructure closer and closer to the Russian borders. Russia objects all the way through, of course, but it is in shambles to be taken seriously. Then there is a coup in Ukraine in 2014, aided or maybe just fully orchestrated by the Washington and others, ppl that come into power are pro everything Europe/US and against everything Soviet (hence nazi marches in Ukraine now), and they want very much to join NATO too. So Russia does what it does, most notably the annexation of Crimea (after a referendum there btw). That, plus LNR and DNR that secede, and Ukraine becomes a little bit of a poisoned fruit at least in terms of being able to join the NATO legally (since they now have disputed territories). So Ukraine here is just small change. The conflict is really about Washington extending it's sphere of influence and it's weapons closer and closer to Russia, and Russia, finally, having enough military strength to do something about it. In short, it's about money and power, and who in this world is the hungriest hungriest hippo when it comes to that?
Nato wants to integrate all the countries around russia (but not russia), for no particular reason (not against russia, they are just collectors), russia doesn’t like this, so annexed piece of ukraine and sends weapons/troops to russia-inclined part of ukraine. They (russia, ukraine) agreed to freeze the conflict in 2015 by giving more autonomy to those parts, but then ignored it (it’s minsk agreements).
Usa sells weapons, and trains Ukrainian troops, which, due to ukraine history, partially embraced nationalism aligned with nazi-collaborators.
Russia wants written guarantees that ukraine won’t join nato, cause words to gorbachev that nato won’t expand in the east obviously didn’t work. Nato (usa) says they cannot guarantee that. So russia continues slow conflict in the east, which by the nature of usa supplied weapons/implied support flares up periodically
USSR creates Soviet Republic of Ukraine. Cold war anticommunism creates NATO. After the fall of the USSR, NATO repeatedly expands despite the USSR no longer existing, and therefore its explicit justification disappearing. Ukraine also got independence during this time, a combination of nationalist sympathizers and Western-induce balkanization. Ukraine is not unified in this nationalism, particularly regionally, with the East having an ethnic tie and political affinity for Russia. Ukraine has a particularly shitty time after the fall of the USSR with mass unemployment and drop in quality of life. It also never establishes "strong democratic institutions" and has rampant governmental corruption. Westerners jump on a golden opportunity of Euromaidan: the political leader of Ukraine had been sidling up to Russia but also creating intense internal opposition (there were legitimate concerns against him). The West supports the uprising and makes it color revolution-ie. It should also be noted that Nazis are a big part of the color revolution and gain their political legitimacy during this time. Leader is deposed/couped. Eastern Ukraine is not a fan, declares independence, gets Russian assistance. Civil War. Ukraine, again, makes Nazis fully legitimate in their political system. Trains and arms Nazis to fight as paramilitaries in the civil war. Gets Western material support to do so.
West characterizes all of this as Russian aggression and threatens Russia to stay out of it.
moon over alabama's latest
https://www.moonofalabama.org/2022/01/the-failure-of-this-weeks-us-nato-russia-meetings-make-war-more-likely.html
links to some of the earlier pieces with more background
Just imagine Russia/China forming a military alliance and setting up missile "defence" systems in Cuba, Venezuela, Bolivia etc... Yeah Washington would go apeshit and invade. Russia and China has shown restraint with US and NATO militarily surrounding them.
When the Berlin Wall fell, Bush promised Gorbechev that NATO will NOT expand Eastwards towards Russia, but it is constantly expanding further and further towards Russia, Ukraine is a redline for Russia, no further US/NATO expansion.
