What is happening with Russia and Ukraine now?

Again, it's possible that our government doesn't understand how internet works BUT it's also possible that it was an attempt to frame the RF.

This is the yellow press at its finest.

 

Just said it was interesting. I'm not gonna pretend like I've followed this whole conflict well enough to made a truly educated opinion on things.

 

I have a question: aside with what happened with the Malaysia airplane being shot down, is Russian still calling their advancement onto Ukraine a "military exercise?" Or have they officially declared war with Ukraine, or vice versa?

 

RF is not advancing into UA, UA is not advancing into RF, and there has been no declaration of war from either side.

 

Yep, as Komo said. Physically Russia stopped at Crimea without either side ever actually declaring war. Now it's a war between the Ukrainian army and Russians living in Eastern Ukraine (as well as Ukrainians who feel Russian or are opposed to the new government for various reasons), without any overt intervention from the Russian state. There's also like a shit-ton of people saying that Ukrainian troops are committing atrocities on civilians in Eastern Ukraine, and just as many saying that Russia is sending trained agents or weaponry or whatever to help the separatists. While there is some truth to both of these statements, you should be very careful about what to believe and what to dismiss... Although the Ukrainian army and separatists really are kicking the shit out of each other (and plenty of people caught in between end up dead), this conflict is also taking place on the internet and there's a hell of a media war around it.

 

A colleague at work told me on Friday that the day before, an unarmed passengerplane with about 300 Ukrainians was shot down by russian rebels, if I remember what he said correctly.

 

No major country declares war formally anymore, actually.

By the way, i see that the US have already decided who's the culprit, as that piece of shit (pardon my french) Kerry and various members of the unitedstatesian diplomatic bodies yell everywhere that "it's clear" (???) that Russia provided the rebels with SPAAG.

 

193 Dutch people died on that plane, four were from my city and someone I know lost his best friend in the accident. The conflict in Ukraine suddenly comes really close because of this crash, people that live nearby the crash are even stealing from the dead victims, which is pretty fucking sad. Everyone here is now anti-Russia because of the crash, they think it were the seperatists who accidentely hit the plane with anti-aircraft weapons that they got from Russia. Anyone knows what happening with the Black boxes? First they were found by seperatist and sent to Moscow, and now they say the boxes aren't even found yet.

 

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe the US declared war in its middle eastern conflicts. Maybe they don't declare it with each other anymore.

And yeah, we know our politicians suck.

 

:ban: Wow, here I go again getting information mixed up on this topic.

As always, Komodo, you are right . This entire time, I had thought that Crimea was part of Eastern Ukraine; but now, after having looked up Crimea's location on Google, I have learned that Crimea is south of Ukraine and west of Russia.

To get everything straight: Ukraine was first trying to decide whether to be closer in relation ship with either Europe or Russia, then something happened and there were protests in Ukraine with pro-Russian and anti-Russian groups. Months later, the Russian Military moves into Crimea (pro-Russian protesters get happy about this and want to become part of Russian again?) (anti-Russian protesters and the Ukrainian Government say that Russia needs to back off?). Then some more violent protest/acts of war between the pro-Russian rebels and UA. Pro-Russian rebels take pictures with grannies to make people in the West think that everything is peaceful and wonderful, then it ends up where it is now.

Thanks for helping me understand. Komodo's post made me wonder about what I had asked and your's clarified it for me.

That's why Kerry never became president of the United States. But it did make me wonder if Russia really was providing rebels with anti-aircraft weapons. Like Bamul said, "you should be very careful about what to believe and what to dismiss." Then I thought it over and it does not make much to any sense why Russia would supply untrained militia with weapons of that caliber. Then again, if they did, it would be a smart move to slowly take hold of Ukraine without actually having to do it themselves. It could go both ways.

At this point, I don't trust the media over this topic anymore. Over here in the U.S., they often show pictures, like the ones here on the forum, of the rebels giving blankets away and feeding families -everything is okay- then a couple of days later, they say "bad rebels" or "good rebels." It's really just a way to get more viewers. After Komodo said that the pictures were staged, and even before that, I have grown to trust Komodo's/some other peoples' word on this topic more the the news over here.

I don't support either side of the conflict.

 

That's a bit of an exaggeration. It is true that for most European and North American countries economic warfare is the main method of dealing with disputes with their neighbours rather than declaring war, but that doesn't apply to many other parts of the world and, as Potarto pointed out, many European/North American countries like to wage war with less developed countries that are geographically distant. There are still plenty of wars going on around the world, with plenty of involvement from Western powers.

In Poland most of the media and much of the population is always anti-Russia, but usually for all the wrong reasons.

That's more or less what happened, but I think the pictures you're referring to were actually taken by the Ukrainian military. It doesn't make much difference though, since both the army and the separatists have been trying to win the local civilians over (which isn't easy, since many people in no way participating in the fight for either side have gotten killed in the crossfire).

I'm not sure about this, but I do have some views on it. It is obvious that ever since the fall of the Eastern Bloc and the resulting loss of former allies for Russia in Eastern Europe (e.g. Poland, Czechoslovakia and all the other former "people's" countries), the Russian government - especially under Putin - has been trying to restore some of Russia's previous significance and influence in Europe. Since starting actual invasions in Europe isn't really the way to do things anymore and most Western countries wage economic warfare instead, Russia wanted to ensure that Ukraine (like Belarus) would remain economically dependent on Russia rather than the EU. Of course, things have been heading in the opposite direction ever since Maidan. Russia didn't want to give up Crimea due to its strategic significance. That was really the only part of Ukraine that Russia "needs" (and has since taking it over).

However, any kind of unrest in Eastern Ukraine (where Russian is the dominant language) that might give more parts of Eastern Europe to Russia is definitely positive for the Russia state. As it stands, the mainstream Russian media are glorifying the separatists whilst demonizing the Ukrainian military (whilst most mainstream Western media are glorifying the Ukrainian military effort and demonizing the separatist rebel groups... the truth is that there are plenty of bastards on both sides). Moreover, some Russian citizens intending to support the separatist armed effort have crossed the Russian border with Ukraine, as well as Ukrainian civilians fleeing from the conflict towards Russia. In other words, Russia is most certainly encouraging the separatists and it is not unlikely that they have sent them various forms of support. But actual anti-aircraft vehicles? If the Russian state is providing any direct military support to the separatists whatsoever, then it is most probably much more subtle than that. If the separatists used an SPAAG to shoot down this plane, it's more likely they nicked it from the Ukrainian military.

Same here. I've been criticizing the Maidan protest since the beginning, seeing as how it was dominated by a nationalist far-right vanguard, but I don't like the Russian government either. Back when things seemed as though Russia wanted to go further than Crimea, I was just hoping war would be avoided... and it looks like there is no physical war between Ukraine and Russia, but instead we have a civil war in Eastern Ukraine; the shooting takes place between the Ukrainian government and Russian-speaking separatists, but the fight is actually between US/EU and RF for who will have more economic control over this region. Though since this Malaysian plane was taken down, it looks like things are just getting complicated further.

 

That was UA army after taking Slavyansk, not the rebels. They shelled the city, then took photo ops to show that they totally did not just murder a bunch of civilians last week.

Same thing that happened in Syria, Lybia and the rest.

Same thing that happened in Ukraine in 2004 and 2010.

Tens of thousands of people can't survive on a lengthy protest on their own, they will just go home after a while. They need food, they need water, they need someone to clean up their literal shit. Someone has to take care of the crap from several weeks generated by tens of thousands of people. That costs a metric fuckton of money. Some interested party had to fork out for this. Someone had to invest a lot of time and effort into stoking the riots. Take a guess who that was.

Here is a hint:



That's Victoria freaking Nuland, US Assistant secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs, handing out food on Maidan back in December last year and instigating further unrest by showing full support of the West. Unrest that led to numerous deaths, deposition of the president, and the general clusterfuck in DPR and LPR we see today.

But naturally it's all Putin's fault. Because he should have sucked the US cock like all the good little NATO countries and backed away while the US dicks around in his backyard, destroying the very principle of M.A.D.

Do nothing or do something situation. It was fine while RF was a wasteland and a pile of broken dreams in the 90s, but now when it's not a punching bag anymore this couldn't be avoided.

Because it's easy to supply a friendly group with instructors and weapons while denying involvement, kinda like the US did in the aforementioned Syria, Lybia and the rest. Kinda like what happened during Korean and Vietnam wars.

EDIT: A typo.

 

No way. Russia is just trying to force its cock back into Eastern European mouths. It's jealous because all those little sluts used to be at its mighty Soviet prick, but now they all flock to get some American meat instead. The last thing Russia would do is suck US dick after being humiliated.

I know the perfect solution! Why don't the USA and RF stop beating others senseless before raping them and taste each other's bodily fluids instead? The RASNA: Russo-American Soixante-Neuf Agreement.

 

This is rather accurate

Not with Putin in charge. I'd love to see that happen, but that's not how it will play out. Smaller countries will have to align themselves with one of the two groups. They can't remain neutral forever.

 

Except Switzerland.

 

Switzerland keeps everyone's money. You are not going to piss the guy who has everything you own off.

 

It's unlikely that Russia supplied the rebels with modern weaponry, as it is much more trackable. Ironically, had we seen older stuff (T-55 and T-64 tanks, AT cannons, BMP-2s and BRDM-2s etc.), it would have been more probable that the supplier were Russia: old Soviet equipment is pretty much everywhere, from Cuba to African countries, from any post-Soviet state to Asia; hence, it's hard to tell where the equipment is coming from and who sold what to whom.

Not really. I believe the last declaration of war of the USA was in WW2.

You confuse the existance of a state of war with a formal declaration of war.

 

Nope.

 

I'm glad no one seems to be offended by my post. :lol: After being reminded of those tapes, I just couldn't stop myself from experimenting with those analogies.

 

Uncle Sam and Mother Russia. :eyebrows: