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Congress is failing the Tonkin Gulf test on Ukraine

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by Robert Parry
Posted on  Information Clearing House, February 21, 2015

As the Ukraine crisis worsens, Official Washington fumes only about “Russian aggression” — much as a half century ago, the Tonkin Gulf talk was all about “North Vietnamese aggression.” But then and now there were other sides to the story – and questions that Congress needed to ask, writes Robert Parry.

February 21, 2015 “ICH” – “Consortium News” – Many current members of Congress, especially progressives, may have envisioned how they would have handled the Tonkin Gulf crisis in 1964. In their imaginations, they would have asked probing questions and treated the dubious assertions from the White House with tough skepticism before voting on whether to give President Lyndon Johnson the authority to go to war in Vietnam.

If they had discovered what CIA and Pentagon insiders already knew – that the crucial second North Vietnamese “attack” on U.S. destroyers likely never happened and that the U.S. warships were not on some “routine” patrol but rather supporting a covert attack on North Vietnamese territory – today’s members of Congress would likely see themselves joining Sens. Wayne Morse and Ernest Gruening as the only ones voting no.

Bravery in hindsight is always easy, but things feel quite different when Official Washington is locked in one of its pro-war “group thinks” when all the “important people” – from government to the media to think tanks – are pounding their chests and talking tough, as they are now on Russia and Ukraine.

Then, if you ask your probing questions and show your tough skepticism, you will have your patriotism, if not your sanity, questioned. You will be “controversialized,” “marginalized,” “pariahed.” You will be called somebody’s “apologist,” whether it’s Ho Chi Minh or Vladimir Putin.

And nobody wants to go through that because here’s the truth about Official Washington: if you run with the pack – if you stay within the herd – you’ll be safe. Even if things go terribly wrong – even if thousands of American soldiers die along with many, many more foreign civilians – you can expect little or no accountability. You will likely keep your job and may well get promoted. But if you stand in the way of the stampede, you’ll be trampled.

After all, remember what happened to Morse and Gruening in their next elections. They both lost. As one Washington insider once told me about the U.S. capital’s culture, “there’s no honor in being right too soon. People just remember that you were out of step and crazy.”

So, the choice often is to do the right thing and be crushed or to run with the pack and be safe. But there are moments when even the most craven member of Congress should look for whatever courage he or she has left and behave like a Morse or a Gruening, especially in a case like the Ukraine crisis which has the potential to spin out of control and into a nuclear confrontation.

Though the last Congress already whipped through belligerent resolutions denouncing “Russian aggression” and urging a military response – with only five Democrats and five Republicans dissenting – members of the new Congress could at least ascertain the facts that have driven the Ukraine conflict. Before the world lurches into a nuclear showdown, it might make a little sense to know what got us here.

The Nuland Phone Call Continue reading →

Will Nuland’s Nazis push the world into war?

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From Executive Intelligence Review, February 20, 2015
by Jeffrey Steinberg

Feb. 17—As of midnight on Feb. 15, a ceasefire went into force in eastern Ukraine. The deal that was hammered out among Russian President Vladimir Putin, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, French President François Hollande, and Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko—i.e., without the direct involvement of the Obama Administration and the U.K. government—after 17 hours of non-stop negotiations in Minsk last week, is fragile, to say the least.

 

The immediate danger lies with an identifiable force—the neo-Nazi militias who are an integral part of the Kiev government, which came to power one year ago in a Nazi-driven coup d’état. Those Nazis are acting as protected assets of the Obama Administration, specifically Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs Victoria Nuland.

 

These neo-Nazi forces have officially rejected the ceasefire. The battalions they control in southeastern Ukraine are not fully under the control of the central government in Kiev, but are armed by Ukraine’s “oligarchs”—big businessmen such as Dnepropetrovsk Governor Ihor Kolomoysky. They are the offshoot of the Bandera movement, which was fascist in its own right even before World War II, then welcomed Hitler’s invasion of Ukraine and carried out atrocities against the people of Ukraine and Poland that should have landed them in the dock at the Nuremberg war crimes tribunal. Instead, they were recruited by British and American intelligence services for the Cold War against the Soviet Union.

 

The neo-Nazi representatives within the government in Kiev are also out to sabotage any peace agreement. According to Russian media, former Commandant of the Maidan and current First Deputy Speaker of the Ukrainian parliament (the Supreme Rada) Andriy Parubiy is coming to Washington this week. A cofounder of the neo-Nazi Svoboda party and of one of the paramilitary groups that became the Right Sector spearhead of the February 2014 coup, Parubiy today is a leader in the People’s Front, the political party of the man Victoria Nuland hand-picked as Ukraine’s post-coup prime minister, Arseniy Yatsenyuk.

 

Speaking Feb. 14 on Ukrainian TV, Parubiy announced the purpose of the trip: to get weapons. He said that Ukraine needs to strengthen its armed Forces and get “the USA to give us highly precise modern weaponry.” He added,

 

“Next week I am going to the United States, to discuss this in a very concrete and targeted way.”

 

The possibility that the U.S. would arm Ukraine—a move Moscow would see as an act of war—is precisely what impelled the leaders of France and Germany to work frenetically to get a ceasefire in Ukraine. It would be a step to World War III.

 

The Rush for a Ceasefire

 

President Hollande and Chancellor Merkel saw the Minsk talks as existential. They agreed that, if there were no diplomatic breakthrough, the Obama Administration would begin arming the Ukrainian military and this would escalate the crisis. Over the past weeks, more and more strategic analysts and policymakers have come to view the Ukraine crisis as a potential trigger for thermonuclear war between the United States and Russia. Articles headlining the danger have appeared in Germany’s Der Spiegel and even Britain’s Daily Telegraph.

 

The specter of a war of annihilation starting in the center of Europe was a powerful incentive for Merkel and Hollande to team up to preempt the U.S. weapons flows by the last-ditch diplomacy.

 

On the eve of the Minsk talks, Chancellor Merkel flew to Washington on Feb. 9 to confer with President Obama. She delivered a blunt message, according to German and American sources. First, she told the President that Europe was adamantly opposed to the U.S. arming the Ukrainian Army. Second, she told Obama that the lack of a direct dialogue between him and Russian President Putin was putting the world at risk. Only the leaders of the two nations with the thermonuclear arsenals that could destroy the planet could be the ultimate guarantors of mankind’s survival. They had to resume a direct, personal dialogue, Merkel insisted.

 

Her admonition appears to have had some impact. On Feb. 11, on the eve of the Minsk talks, Obama called Putin, and the two men had a 90-minute conversation, the content of which has been kept secret. According to Spiegel Online, which published a detailed account of Merkel’s and Hollande’s diplomatic efforts, the mere fact that the phone call took place demonstrated that Washington was deeply interested in the outcome of the Minsk talks.

 

At one point in the marathon diplomatic session, according to the Spiegel account, Putin, in private, spoke by phone to the heads of the self-proclaimed Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics (DPR and LPR). He secured their agreement to the ceasefire terms. In addition, Kremlin aide Vladislav Surkov shuttled between the Hollande-Merkel-Poroshenko-Putin meeting and the Minsk contact group, which also met through the night at another location in Minsk (because Poroshenko refused to speak with the DPR/LPR delegation directly). It was the contact group, consisting of Alexander Zakharchenko (DPR), Igor Plotnitsky (LPR), Ukrainian ex-President Leonid Kuchma, Russian Ambassador to Kiev Mikhail Zurabov, and OSCE negotiator Heidi Tagliavini, who actually signed the 10-point Minsk accord.

 

In the previous months of renewed fighting in eastern Ukraine, after the September 2014 ceasefire broke down, the DPR/LPR forces captured an additional belt of territory, especially within the Donetsk Region, as they moved to push the Kiev battalions out of the range from which they could shell Donetsk and other cities. While the Minsk talks were proceeding, the DPR/LPR militias had nearly encircled 6,000 to 8,000 Ukrainians in the town of Debaltseve, the major rail junction between Donetsk and Lugansk. With growing defections, collapsing morale, and widespread draft evasion, the Ukraine Armed Forces were already at a break-point. For Merkel and Hollande, the idea of arming such a disintegrating army was a grave mistake, reflecting a lack of understanding of the reality of the Ukraine crisis in official Washington.

 

The Nuland Factor

 

Indeed, the policy of the Obama Administration towards Ukraine and Russia has been hijacked from day one by a collection of neo-conservatives and humanitarian interventionist ideologues—led by Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs Victoria Nuland. The wife of neo-con Robert Kagan, Nuland served as a foreign policy advisor to then-Vice President Dick Cheney, before being appointed as the Bush Administration’s Ambassador to NATO.

 

Nuland publicly boasted that the U.S. had poured $5 billion into the “democracy” movement in Ukraine since the end of the Cold War, and she made clear, in an infamous taped phone call in January 2014, that the man who is now Ukrainian Prime Minister, Yatsenyuk, was owned by Washington. She is responsible for covering up the powerful role of the Banderite Nazis in the Maidan coup and the conflict in eastern Ukraine.

 

Nuland’s current role in sabotaging efforts for peace was highlighted in a Feb. 15 article in Germany’s Der Spiegel, entitled “America’s Riot Diplomat.”[1] The column stated that Nuland poses a threat to America’s allies, and that while she is supposed to solve the crisis of Ukraine and relations with Russia, “in the crisis, Nuland herself has become the problem.”

 

Der Spiegel described a closed-door meeting, apparently reported anonymously both to it and to the Bild newspaper, held by Nuland at the Munich Security Conference one week ago, with “perhaps two dozen U.S. diplomats and Senators.” There Nuland gave instructions to “fight against the Europeans” on the issue of arming Ukraine to fight Russia. She was described as referring “bitterly” to the German Chancellor’s and French President’s meeting with President Putin as “Merkel’s Moscow junk,” and “Moscow bullshit,” and she welcomed a Senator’s calling German Defense Minister Ursula von der Leyen the “Defeatism Minister.”

 

These reports give the lie to Nuland’s claim on the morning of Feb. 11, when the Minsk Agreement was announced, that “we [the United States] enthusiastically support it.”

 

Der Spiegel says that Nuland does not stop short of calling for “heavy weapons” to be given by NATO to Ukraine.

 

Raising the Alarm

 

In a statement issued on Feb. 14, Lyndon LaRouche warned that the war danger would persist until Nuland was fired and her links to hardcore Banderite Nazis exposed publicly (see box).

 

The larger threat of thermonuclear war, stemming from the Ukraine crisis, was a dominant theme behind the scenes at the annual Munich Security Conference. On the eve of that meeting, three national security specialists, former U.S. Sen. Sam Nunn (D-Ga.), former Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov, and former British Secretary of State for Defence Des Browne, wrote an op-ed calling for an overhaul of the Euro-Atlantic security architecture, with an inclusive role for Russia.

 

The same view was echoed in two other high-visibility venues. On Feb. 11, Jack Matlock, who was President Reagan’s ambassador to the Soviet Union during the closing days of the Cold War, told a packed audience at the National Press Club in Washington that the West had violated some of the most essential agreements with Moscow, those which had allowed for the peaceful demise of the Warsaw Pact and the Soviet Union, and that the danger of a world war was grave (see transcript in this Feature).

 

Two days later, Markus Becker, writing about the Munich Security Conference in Spiegel Online, warned that the “Threat of War Is Higher than in the Cold War.” He presented some of the same arguments as the Nunn-Ivanov-Browne article.

 

Unless LaRouche’s demand for Nuland’s ouster is acted upon swiftly, the chances of the neo-Nazis in Ukraine wrecking the fragile peace are immense. Nuland’s ouster must be followed by the agreement among governments to disqualify and remove the Nazi elements now running rampant, and participating in government, in Ukraine. This demand has been raised repeatedly by the Russian government, and by LaRouche.

 

If the cycle of violence in eastern Ukraine resumes full-force, the prospects of escalation into a direct Russia-U.S. military confrontation are very high.

 

Richard Burt, who was one of the chief U.S. arms control negotiators with the Soviets, told Spiegel Online (Feb. 9) that the danger of nuclear war is very great. “Both American and Russian nuclear arms are essentially on a kind of hair-trigger alert. Both sides have a nuclear posture where land-based missiles could be authorized for use in less than 15 minutes.” He acknowledged that the kind of “hybrid warfare” now underway in eastern Ukraine adds greatly to the danger of miscalculation into thermonuclear confrontation. Former Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov concurred, telling Spiegel, “Now the threat of a war is higher than during the Cold War.”

 

It must be understood, in addition, that the primary driver for war is the bankruptcy of the trans-Atlantic financial system, centered in London and Wall Street. The desperation of financier circles over the looming doom of their system and the collapse of their political power is driving the war danger. As Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has observed in recent statements, if there had been no Ukraine crisis, some circles in the West would have created one—to deal with the larger collapse they are facing.

Source:
http://www.larouchepub.com/other/2015/4208nuland_nazis_world_war.html

[1] Der Spiegel article is here (in German):
http://www.spiegel.de/politik/ausland/victoria-nuland-barack-obamas-problem-diplomatin-a-1017614.html

Italian medical mission reports on health care crisis in Ukraine: 50 hospitals destroyed (Video)

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Posted on Fort Russ

January 7, 2015
Video: Alessandro Ferrucci, Lorenzo Galeazzi e Vauro for Ilfattoquotidianor
Translated from Italian by Tom Winter

First half of video: the hospital of Slovyansk, reduced to rubble; then in Kiev, where there are no medical supplies.

Once at Sloviansk, theater of the last summer’s ferocious fighting between regular Ukrainian troops and the pro-Russian separatists, stood a hospital at the cutting edge; a proper and real provider of health services, now completely destroyed. These images, still to this day never shown in the Italian media, show better than others the grave situation that has befallen on Ukrainian society.
 

Indeed, the outbreak of revolt at Maidan, the war, and the economic crisis have brought the health care system to a collapse. Fifty hospitals have been reduced to rubble, and the price of many drugs has risen 3200 percent. Many drugs are to be had only on the black market. Even in the capital, Kiev, far from the Donbass, where the fighting continues, medical facilities are incapable of meeting the health care emergency, which is worsening day by day. Entire hospitals are without painkillers, analgesics, chemotherapy. Children stricken with cancer, many of them victims of the Chernobyl legacy, are paying the highest price: where a survival rate in Europe would be 75-80%, in Ukraine it is one child out of every two.

As in our earlier work on the Ivory Coast, this report was made possible by the support of Soleterre, a non-governmental organization that has operated in Ukraine since 2003 in diverse ways that contribute to the healing of young patients, from the free supply of pharmaceuticals to psychological assistance, finally to the establishment of a welcoming home to shorten the hospital stays of children suffering from cancer.

Vauro’s tour was supported by the Italian medical charity Soleterre.

Translator’s note:

 We are eager to supply Ukraine with weapons for war; the real needs go begging for charity.

http://fortruss.blogspot.com/2015/01/italian-medical-mission-reports-of.html

German researchers find overwhelming Crimean support for Russian annexation

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Posted on Oriental Review, February 10, 2015

By Konstantin KOSARETSKY (Ukraine) 

A few days ago an interesting study, “The Socio-Political Sentiments in Crimea,” was released by the Ukrainian branch of GfK, the well-known German social research organization, as part of the Free Crimea initiative. Intriguingly, the primary objectives of this project, launched with the support of the governmental Canada Fund for Local Initiatives, were to “debunk aggressive Russian propaganda” and to “reintegrate Crimea into Ukraine.” Thus the researchers can hardly be suspected of being Russian sympathizers. So let’s take a look at the results.

The attitudes of Crimeans were studied in January 2015. This representative sample included 800 respondents living on the peninsula, from all age and social categories. The poll had an error margin of 3.5%.

In answer to the most important question: “Do you endorse Russia’s annexation of Crimea?” 82% of the respondents answered “yes, definitely,” and another 11% – “yes, for the most part.” Only 2% gave an unambiguously negative response, and another 2% offered a relatively negative assessment. Three percent did not specify their position.

We feel that this study fully validates the results of the referendum on reunification with Russia that was held on March 16, 2014. At that time 83% of Crimeans went to the polling stations and almost 97% expressed support for reunification.

Ukrainians continue to question whether this was a credible outcome, but it is now backed up by the data obtained by the Germans. The 82% of the respondents who expressed their full confidence in the results of the Russian election make up the core of the electorate who turned up at the ballot boxes on March 16, 2014.

These figures are also relevant in terms of another important question. The former chairman of the Mejlis of the Crimean Tatars, Mustafa Dzhemilev, has repeatedly stated that all Tatars on the peninsula are opposed to reunification with Russia. Dzhemilev’s statements have been widely quoted by the media, which present them as entirely authoritative and undisputed.

But let’s think about that – Crimean Tatars make up 12% of the Crimean population, yet only 4% of those polled conveyed disapproval of Crimea’s reunification with Russia. And that 4% very likely includes not only Tatars, but also Ukrainians and citizens of other ethnicities. There’s an inconsistency here. Of course further study is needed on this issue, but the results obtained by GFK cast doubt on whether Mustafa Dzhemilev or the entire Mejlis of the Crimean Tatars is an accurate barometer of the feelings of the Crimean Tatar community.

Those few respondents who disapproved reunification were then asked “Why do you fully or mostly disapprove annexation?” Only 20% of them (i.e., less than 1% of the total sample) claimed that they preferred to live in the state of Ukraine. The most common response, offered by 55% of those who opposed reunification, was “Annexations was not fully legitimate, it should be brought into accord with the international law.” Which means that, in theory, they do not object to the idea of living in Russia, but rather question the legitimacy of the transition.

GFK1

No doubt it would be a good idea to hold such a referendum under the auspices of international legislation and in accordance with Ukrainian law. But would laws ever be passed that would grant Ukrainian regions the right to secede? Back in the totalitarian Soviet Union, Ukraine exercised its right to a referendum without a single shot being fired, while in “democratic Ukraine,” separatists are either burned alive as in Odessa, or are shot along with the elderly and children as is happening in the Donbass.

In answer to a question about their financial circumstances, 21% of Crimeans said that in the last year their position had “improved significantly,” while another 30% claimed it had “somewhat improved.” Only 13% of that population has experienced a setback, to a greater or lesser extent. This suggests that, despite EU sanctions on the peninsula’s economy, and despite Ukraine’s partial blockade on communication from Crimea, the reunification with Russia has provided most Crimeans with material gains. But even among those who have not reaped those sorts of benefits, there are few signs of nostalgia for their old Ukrainian citizenship: although 13% of citizens have seen their financial well-being decline, only 4% disapprove of the reunification with Russia. These figures suggest that economic sanctions are an ineffective means of persuading the residents of the Crimea to view Ukraine more favorably.

The results of the survey indicate that 28% of the residents of the peninsula regularly watch Ukrainian TV, and another 20% regularly consult Ukrainian news websites. This proves that no steps have been taken in Crimea to restrict access to Ukrainian sources of information, such as Ukraine has done in relation to Russian media.

And now the moment of truth: “What is your opinion of what is being written by the Ukrainian media about Crimea?” Who could be a more objective judge on this issue than the residents of the peninsula themselves? Who else but they – who have been fated to experience all the pros and cons of both Ukrainian and Russian citizenship – could better evaluate the accuracy of the information being published? Perhaps no one.

However, only 1% of those surveyed reported that the Ukrainian media “provides entirely truthful information” and 4% said it was “more often truthful than deceitful.” But 45% of respondents see “completely untrue information” on Ukrainian TV, and another 35% claim those broadcasts are “more often deceitful than truthful.” The rest either do not watch Ukrainian news programs or do not pay attention to information in those programs about Crimea.

GFK2

This is the verdict on the contemporary Ukrainian press, as handed down by an impartial panel of eight hundred jurors.

But if those who shape the media coverage in Ukraine today are so biased in regard to Crimea, how can we expect them to report objectively on other critical problems associated with this country? Can we trust Kiev’s official stance on the tragedy of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17? Or on the causes of the humanitarian crisis in the Donbass? Or on the presence of Russian troops inside Ukraine? Or on the human fatalities in Odessa or the victims of the “Heavenly Hundred”?

GfK’s study demands a clear answer to these questions.

Konstantin Kosaretsky is the Ukrainian freelance journalist and writer.

http://orientalreview.org/2015/02/10/german-sociologists-on-crimeas-choice/

Ukrainian-Polish-Lithuanian brigade to become operational in 2015

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Posted on Fort Russ

2/20/2015

Poroshenko creates the Ukrainian-Polish-Lithuanian militarybrigade. Its command to be located in Poland.

Translated from Russian by J.Hawk

Petro Poroshenko signed the law ratifying the agreement with Lithuania and Poland on the creation of a joint military unit.

“The brigade is being formed in order to participate in international operations on the basis of a UNSC mandate and decisions by the appropriate government agencies of Lithuania, Poland, and Ukraine. The agreement is open to other countries upon their invitation by the three signatories,” the announcement states.

The president’s press service notes that the structure, manning, weapons, and equipment or other aspects of its activities will be regulated by a separate technical agreement between security institutions of the respective countries.

The brigade’s HQ will be located in the Polish city of Lublin. The HQ will operate in accordance with Polish law and relevant components of international law.

Each of the signatories is responsible for the financial support of its units included in the brigade during joint training exercises and operations.

The agreement was signed by Ukraine, Poland, and Lithuania in Warsaw on September 19, 2014 and was ratified by the Verkhovna Rada on February 4, 2015.

Defense Minister Poltorak announced earlier that the brigade should become fully operational in the first half of 2015. He estimates that the first group of Ukrainian military personnel will arrive in Lublin in the second quarter of 2015.

Poltorak also said that the number of Ukrainian soldiers included in the brigade will be determined during the working group meetings, and the troops will be subject to rotation.

It sounds something like “fascists of all countries unite.” They have united before, and have come to Russia before, but we also know how these marches had ended. If someone has a short memory, too bad for them.

J.Hawk’s Comment:  This announcement, coming very shortly after Poroshenko’s call for peacekeepers, makes one wonder whether this is how he intends to deal with the Donbass problem, namely by handing over the fighting to Poles and Lithuanians. Because once Poles and Lithuanians start dying, the rest of NATO might be drawn into the conflict. This is a rather artful way of overcoming the inevitable French and German objections to a NATO-led peacekeeping force being sent to Ukraine. This is a trilateral agreement that does not involve Germany or France, therefore they have no official say about it. But once this unit is deployed anywhere, it will quickly become a NATO mission simply because these are NATO countries. There can be absolutely no doubt that Poroshenko wants to continue the war until victory or Doomsday.

However, what is the likelihood if the brigade being deployed? There are many obstacles to the implementation of the plan. The brigade is unworkable, period, and it will not be a militarily effective formation. For starters, Lithuania and Poland are NATO countries whose militaries have been under NATO standards for years. Just to illustrate the level of difficulty here, Polish and Lithuanian soldiers use 5.56mm rifles (Kalashnikov clones, to be sure), while Ukraine uses actual 5.45mm AK-74s. Similar problems exist in all areas of interoperability.

But the real problem is political in nature. Poland and Ukraine (though probably not Lithuania, but we’ll never know) both pretend to be the regional leaders. Poland will treat its former colonies as if they were younger brothers in need of tutelage by their world-wise (and Iraq/Afghanistan experienced) older brother, while Ukraine will naturally feel that since it bore the entire burden of defending Civilization from Russian aggression, it should be in the driver’s seat. It’s unlikely that the shared Russophobia of the three partners is sufficient to overcome their mutual suspicions and megalomania. The Poles’ hatred of Nazis and Banderites might even prove stronger than  Russophobia, for what will happen should one of the units rotating to Lublin be one of the ones which treat Stepan Bandera as their patron saint?

http://www.fortruss.blogspot.com/2015/02/ukrainian-polish-lithuanian-brigade-to.html

War correspondent Vauro Senesi on the situation in E. Ukraine; “The Americanist front is cracking”

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From Fort Russ

Interview of Vauro Senesi by Lorenzo Maria Alvaro
Published February 10, 2015 in Vita Magazine
February 20, 2015
Translated from Italian by Tom Winter
 
The satirist is one of the few people from the west to have been on the ground in the Donbass, the part of Ukraine called Novorossiya that is fighting against Kiev. “The situation is extremely dramatic. Instead of Russian regular army, there are guerillas that fight against a nazist government.”
The situation is at a crossroads. At present there are negotiations between the USA, the EU, and Russia. If Merkel, Hollande and Kerry can find a deal with Putin the situation could cool down. The problem is that in the opposite case, the scenario is at risk becoming quite dramatic. The notices that come from the war zone are few, and almost always from Ukrainian and American sources. One of the very few Italians and westerners to have been on the other side, amidst the pro-russian combatants, is the famous satirical cartoonist Vauro Senesi. Therefore Vita has contacted him and asked him to recount what he saw.
Vita: You’ve recently been in the east of Ukraine. What did you see?
VS: A humanitarian disaster. Many cities and villages are partially depopulated. Mainly the refugees head for Russia, and this goes a long way about saying who the liberators are. The ones to remain are those who can’t get out. These are the elderly, the disabled, or persons in extreme poverty. It’s winter, with temperatures of 20 below. They don’t have water; they don’t have electricity. I’ve seen them transport drinking water in old oil drums in the back of pickups in the bombarded and half-destroyed neighborhoods. One moving scene: the driver of the pickup was an old World War Two vet, still in his Red Army uniform.
It’s impossible, going there, not to see the fact that there is a clear strategy on the part of Kiev: ethnic cleansing. When you strike the nerve center of the life of a community with such arrogance, that can only be the motive: Raze to the ground the schools, hospitals, factories, electric power plants…
Vita: What’s the response of the pro-russians?
VS: The reply of the armed Cossacks is participatory, and heroic. In addition to defending the territory militarily, they have also taken on the burden to the extent possible, of sustaining the population. They distribute food and water, and organize co-ops and aid groups to rebuild the social fabric.
The population in recent years has had the experience of a liberalism without rules, a society run only in the private interest of the tycoons. In Ukraine the system denies fundamental rights like access to health care: right in Kiev, the hospital, for example, even before the conflict, was still living in the Chernobyl emergency era, without available cures or treatments. The only access was the black market.
A situation like that, with a state system so unfair, then coupled with the Maidan coup, and the memory of the massacre at Odessa, has cut a deep chasm between  the the russo-ukrainian population and the Kiev regime. I say the regime, because within the same society of Ukraine there are strong currents of dissent, stifled by the militarization in place in Kiev.
Vita: His reading of the facts is a bit pro-soviet, Or at least, that is the accusation of his critics. But we should remind these gentlemen that the Soviet Union ended in 1991.
Actually, the accusation is a matter of being nostalgic…
VS: I’m not Russian, so the nostalgia would be about something else. But certainly there is a vein of nostalgia in the population of Donbass. The people there say that while there was a Soviet Union, the welfare was free and better than today. Sanitation and school worked for everybody. In the midst of it all, strange to relate, were mingled Byzantine icons, Madonnas, portraits of Lenin, Russian flags and Red flags. I have to say that this nostalgia is for a system that, with all its horrors, guaranteed basic rights: health, education, and work.
Vita: How did Anti-fascism get into the pro-russian revolt in Ukraine?
VS: It’s outright: the salute the Cossacks give among themselves is a clenched fist accompanied by the phrase “¡No pasarán!” This because on the opposing side there are army divisions  that have adopted the symbols of the German SS. The battalions of the Ukrainian National Guard are openly nazist. At Kiev they have erected a monuments to nazi criminals like Stepan Bandera.
Vita: In the western media they refer to the rebels of the Donbass as regular army supported by Russia. True?
VS: I haven’t walked through every corner of the Donbass. What I saw was an army equipped with light to medium weapons. I didn’t see an army set up like the Russian army. There certainly are Russians among them, but they are volunteers. Guerillas. A guerrilla army. They are composed, from a tactical standpoint, on Guevarism. So said the general I was able to talk to — the idea is that of a guerrilla war of liberation and of reconstruction of an ethical society. 
The thing I don’t understand is that here we are in 2015: Why don’t we have satellite photos or news of prisoners from the Russian Army that are supposed to have invaded Donbass? It seems that these soldiers of Putin have the gift of invisibility.
Vita: In these hours we have negotiations between the US, the EU, and Russia. There are those who say it’s an attempt to manage the conflict at least, if peace itself is not attainable. What do you think?
VS: From my personal experience as a war correspondent, the idea of regulating the intensity of a conflict is folly. When you unchain the breakout of the violence it’s not able to be regulated or circumscribed. A war on this scale in the heart of Europe could be the fore-runner of a world conflict.
Europe is getting pushed onto pro-American positions, but I hope diplomacy can get to a positive opening. The alternative would be an immense tragedy. On the positive side there is this: Europe, though Mogherini has categorically squelched the idea of arming Kiev. And Tsipras is dealing with Putin and has said no to new sanctions. So the Americanist front is cracking. I hope they take it hard. 

To read Vauro’s own account of his tour of Donbass, click here, and here

http://www.fortruss.blogspot.com/2015/02/vauro-americanist-front-is-cracking.html

Crimea: was it seized by Russia, or did Russia block its seizure by the U.S.?

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By Eric Zuesse

Both before and after Crimea left Ukraine and joined Russia in a public referendum on 16 March 2014, the Gallup Organization polled Crimeans on behalf of the U.S. Government, and found them to be extremely pro-Russian and anti-American, and also anti-Ukrainian. (Neither poll was subsequently publicized, because the results of each were the opposite of what the sponsor had wished.) Both polls were done on behalf of the U.S. Government, in order to find Crimeans’ attitudes toward the United States and toward Russia, and also toward Ukraine, not only before but also after the planned U.S. coup in Ukraine, which occurred in February 2014 but was actually kicked off on 20 November 2013, the day before Ukraine’s democratically elected President Viktor Yanukovych publicly announced that Ukraine had received a better economic offer from Russia’s Eurasian Economic Community than from America’s European Union. (The EEC subsequently became the Eurasian Economic Union, now that it was clear that Ukraine was going with the EU.) That decision by Yanukovych in favor of the EEC was mistakenly thought by him to be merely an economic one, and he didn’t know the extent to which the U.S. Government had set up an operation to overthrow him if he didn’t go along with the EU’s offer. (If some of these basic historical facts don’t come through from merely the wikipedia articles alone, that’s because the CIA is among the organizations that edit wikipedia articles, and so wikipedia is unwittingly a political propaganda vehicle. It is especially used for propaganda by the CIA and FBI.)

 

More recently, a poll of Crimeans was issued on 4 February 2015, by the polling organization GfK, and paid for this time by the pro-American-Government Canadian Government, via its Canada Fund for Local Initiatives, and via Free Crimea, which is itself funded by the latter organization. However, the Canadian Government got no better news than the U.S. Government had gotten: 82% of Crimeans “Fully endorse” Crimea’s having become part of Russia (of which it had been part between 1783 and 1954, and which the public there had never wanted to leave); 11% “Mostly endorse” it; 2% “Mostly disapprove”; 3% “Don’t know”; and only 2% “Fully disapprove.” Or, to put it simply: 93% approve; 3% don’t know, and 4% disapprove. This poll was publicly issued only in the polling organization’s own report, which was made available only in Russian (the Ukrainian Government’s main language for international business) and therefore not comprehensible to English-speakers. It was titled, “СОЦИАЛЬНО-ПОЛИТИЧЕСКИЕ НАСТРОЕНИЯ ЖИТЕЛЕЙ КРЫМА Исследование проведенное GfK Ukraine по заказу компании” or “SOCIO-POLITICAL SENTIMENTS IN CRIMEA: Research conducted by GfK Ukraine on the order of the company.” On February 10th, an English-language article reported and summarized the poll’s findings.
During the 16 March 2014 public referendum in Crimea, 96% voted to rejoin Russia. One question on the post-referendum, April 2014, U.S.-sponsored Gallup poll in Crimea, was headlined, “Perceived Legitimacy of March 16 Crimean Referendum” (on page 28 of the poll-report), and 82.8% of Crimeans agreed with the statement, “The results of the referendum on Crimea’s status likely reflect the views of most people here.” 6.7% disagreed. According to the newer poll (4 February 2015), 96% were for annexation to Russia, and 4% were opposed, which happens to be exactly what the 16 March 2014 referendum had actually found to be the case. But, continuing now with the description of the April 2014 Gallup poll: its “Views of Foreign Parties’ Role in the Crisis — Crimea” (p. 25), showed 76.2% of Crimeans saying that the role of the U.S. was “Mostly negative,” and 2.8% saying the U.S. role was “Mostly positive”; while Crimeans’ attitudes towards Russia were the exact opposite: 71.3% said Russia’s role was “Mostly positive,” and 4.0% said it was “Mostly negative.”
An accurate reflection of the reason why Crimeans, during the lead-up to the referendum, were appalled by America’s extremely violent and bloody takeover of the Ukrainian Government (as the EU itself had confirmed), was given on Crimean television shortly before the referendum, when a former criminal prosecutor in the Ukrainian Government, who lived and worked in Kiev and saw with her own eyes much of the violence but was not personally involved in the events, quit her office, and got in her car and drove back to her childhood home in Crimea, now unemployed, because she was so revulsed at what had happened to her country. On this call-in show, which was watched by many Ukrainians, she explained why she could no longer, as a lawyer and a supporter of the Ukrainian Constitution, support the Ukrainain Government — that it was now an illegal Government. She closed her opening statement, just before taking the calls from people over the phone, by saying, “Despite that our ‘great politicians’ who seized power by bloodshed, are now claiming that we don’t have the right to decide our own future — citizens of Crimea, you have every right in the world. Nobody is allowed to usurp power.” She subsequently became a criminal prosecutor in the new Crimean government, enforcing now the Russian Constitution, in Crimea.
However, anyone who says that Russia “seized Crimea,” is clearly lying or else is fooled by people who are.
Here, then, are highlights from a typical Western ‘news’ report about Russia’s President, Vladimir Putin, in the issue of TIME magazine (December 10th online, December 22nd issue on newsstands), headlining “Vladimir Putin, The Imperialist,” in which Putin was a “runner-up” as the “Person of the Year” — a year when, actually, Obama overthrew Ukraine’s Government and replaced it with one run by racist-fascist (or nazi) haters of Russia, who were setting up to yank the remaining years on Russia’s lease of its crucial Black Sea Naval Base in Crimea, and the Crimeans were imminently fearing a Ukrainian invasion (the author was Simon Shuster):
His decision in March to invade and then annex the region of Crimea from Ukraine marked the first growth of Russia’s dominions since the fall of the Soviet Union. …
With the conquest of Crimea, a derelict peninsula about the size of Massachusetts, Putin at last restored a scrap of Russia’s honor, says Gorbachev, by “acting on his own,” unbound by the constraints of U.S. supremacy and the table manners of international law. …
That name [Crimea], redolent with the history of Europe’s 19th century wars, has become a byword in Russia for national revival, a taste of the imperial glory that a generation of Russians have long hungered for. …
Already expelled from the G-8 club of wealthy nations in March after the annexation of Crimea, Putin was further ostracized at the G-20 summit. …
So, was Putin’s taste of empire worth the cost to Russian prosperity? For those who carry the grudges of Russian history, it was. …
Russia now seeks to position itself as an alternative to the Western model of liberal democracy—and it’s had some success. Right-wing politicians in France and the U.K., not to mention Central and Eastern Europe, are not shy about declaring their admiration for Putin. The ultraconservative government of Hungary, a member of NATO and the European Union, has announced its intention to develop as an “illiberal state” modeled on Russia, cracking down harshly on civil society. …
Putin will face challenges of his own as the West begins to rally against his aggressiveness. …
Make no mistake, though: Russians also remember that their country once dominated a sixth of the earth’s landmass and stood as a global player second to none. That is the role Putin seeks to regain. …
Nothing was said about the Black Sea fleet, nor about any strategic issue. Nothing was provided in order to help readers understand what was happening. Readers’ Cold-War buttons were being pushed; that is all. America’s aristocracy despises its public, whom they merely manipulate and control.
Here is an article about (and linking to) U.S. President Barack Obama’s “National Security Strategy 2015,” in which Obama uses the term “aggression” 18 times, 17 of them referring to Russia. Obama never once cites a reason for applying that term; for example, unlike Simon Shuster, he doesn’t even so much as mention “Crimea.”
And, here is the best video that has yet been issued on Obama’s February 2014 coup, the coup that installed the Ukrainian regime that has been carrying out the ethnic cleansing operation, which Ukraine calls their ‘Anti Terrorist Operation,’ in the Donbass region, though it’s really the anti-resident operation there.
That fate of ethnic cleansing or local genocide — the fate which befell the residents of Ukraine’s Donbass region, the region that’s shown in dark purple in this election-map for the man whom Obama overthrew in February 2014 and which is the area that voted 90% for him — is the fate that Crimeans were protected from when they rejoined Russia.
Russia’s using its troops, who were permanently stationed in Crimea already and didn’t need to ‘invade’ anything in order to protect the residents in Crimea so that they could hold their referendum in peace, is what blocked the seizure of Crimea by the newly installed Ukrainian regime.
The invader was the United States, in its typically sneaky post-1950 way: a coup d’etat. What Dwight Eisenhower’s, Allen Dulles’s, and Kermit Roosevelt’s CIA operation had done to Iran in 1953, Barack Obama’s and Victoria Nuland’s operation did to Ukraine in 2014: a violent coup installing a far-right government — in Obama’s case, even a nazi government (and see this and this and this).
That — and the firebombings and other horrors that Washington’s Brookings Institution think tank want U.S. taxpayers to finance yet more of in Donbass — is what RussiaprotectedCrimeans from.

The aggressor here is not Vladimir Putin; it is Barack Obama. All honest news media (such as here and here and here and here and here and here and here) are reporting that. For economic analysis and reporting on these and other events, here is an excellent general news source. (It autotranslates if viewed in google’s chrome browser.) As for dishonest ‘news’ media, such as TIME  and Fox ‘News,’ they serve a different purpose than truth; so, none of them will be listed here, where the only interest is truth.
PS: For further insights into the lying that is prevalent in the West regarding Crimea, Ukraine, and Russia, see this remarkably honest testimony to the U.K. House of Lords’ 20 February 2015 Committee report, “The EU and Russia: before and beyond the crisis in Ukraine,” linked there on p. 108 as “RUS0012” and titled “Irina Kirillova MBE – Written evidence,” in which that Cambridge university professor describes the profound disappointment of ordinary people she had encountered in Russia, as they saw the misrepresentations in the West regarding the situations in Russia, Ukraine and Crimea. Outside of the English-speaking world, and especially in the regions that are not controlled by the U.S., the fakery of ‘journalism’ in the English-speaking world is becoming shockingly more evident than it formerly was. As usual, however, the House of Lords’ final report ignored these realities; and, throughout, it starts with the assumption that Russia is aggressive and that the West is merely responding to that. This professor’s written testimony was thus ignored. Most of the other individuals in the “Appendix 2: List of Witnesses” were the Anglo-aristocracy’s usual Russia-haters, such as Ian Bond, Director of Foreign Policy, Center for European Reform, saying that, “The most important thing is that the EU, as a rules-based organisation, should follow a rules-based approach to Russia,” as if that would be something alien to Russians. This type of bigoted condescenscion was rife throughout the report. If those people are as blind to evidence and science as they put themselves forth as being, they are dangerous in any governmental role; and to call the U.K. a ‘democracy’ is questionable, at best. Britain is an aristocracy, not a democracy. And the U.S. is at least as bad. In regards to the relationships between Russia, Ukraine, and Crimea, the West might be as bad as Ukraine, and should just quit the entire matter and try to start over from scratch, which means to let the nazis whom Obama placed into power there sink, not provide them with more weapons. Or, if more weapons are provided to them, then the rest of the West should issue sanctions against any nation that does that. Under liars and fools the West is drifting towards a totally unwarranted nuclear conflict with Russia.

PACE deputies threatened to be put on black list for supporting Russia

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February 2, 2015
Sunday Night with Vladimir Solovyev
Translated by Kristina Rus
(Video 58:00 – 1:06)

Vladimir Solovyev: 

Russian delegation again left Strasburg without having found mutual understanding with most of the members of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe. It was clear before the beginning of the session that the right to vote will not be granted. Why did they go there? Hoped for common sense? And what will be the consequences? Ultimate exit from this platform and exit from the Council of Europe?

I have to point out that the Europeans were surprised by your comment about your exit, are they that clueless? Do they live in their own world?

Alexey Pushkov, the Chairman of the State Duma Committee on International Relations: 

Some of them thought, that although we informed them, in case of sanctions, and in particular – stripping the right to vote, which was the main sanction applied to us, that we will leave until the end of the year. But they thought, so what, “they came here, threatening us, putting pressure on us.” Someone shouted that the Russian delegation is blackmailing them, that if “we approve the sanctions, they will leave, so we should approve the sanctions on principle”.

And part of them didn’t understand, that when they approved the sanctions, and when we congratulated them with such a wise decision, after which nothing in Ukraine depends on them anymore, and all the contacts with Russia are cut, they realized that they cannot demand anything from us.

They wanted to meet with Savchenko and we were prepared to help with this issue in Moscow, if we stayed in PACE, now that we left, PACE will have no access to Savchenko for sure. Other international organizations may have such access, but PACE is excluded from this issue.

They wanted to make a Human Rights report in Crimea. And we allowed such possibility, while we insisted on a Human Rights report in Eastern Ukraine, where they are violated much more then in Crimea. And we told them, yes, we may consider an opportunity for you to go to Crimea and work on such report. Now this issue is closed.

Parliamentary Assembly excluded itself from the process of resolving Ukrainian crisis and from the dialogue with Russia about Ukraine. I think some of them understood that this will happen.  But  they wanted to isolate Russia and push us out. But some of them only got it now.

After our departure on Friday they started to actively discuss what will be their next steps. “The Russians said, we can meet with Savchenko, we can go to Crimea”, and then someone said: “Wait, the Russians are gone!”

And Ukrainians said, “The Russians offered … we should take their offers!” – “Well, then go talk to the Russians!” But where are they? They are already in Moscow!

I think that PACE punished itself in their anti-Russian push, to show us that we are not agreed with, that we have to be punished,  limited in our rights, they forgot that they lost Russia, a key player in Europe.

Now they are getting it. And we hear again talk that the dialogue with Russia is very important, and they can’t afford to loose it. And so on and so forth.

You asked, why did we go there. And I want to answer that question. There are not that many platforms in Europe where we can say the truth about Ukraine. And we speak the truth about Ukraine there.

We relentlessly bring up the issue of Odessa Massacre. We tell them, do you really think, that several dozen people can burn themselves, shoot themselves in the face, suffocate themselves? We talk about the refugees. We talk about the bombings of residential neighborhoods, about the murdered children We talk about what goes on in Eastern Ukraine, the number of killed and wounded in Eastern Ukraine.

If we are not there then no one will talk about it. Only our delegation goes against the mainstream. And sometimes I am asked, if there are any results. Yes, there are results.

I have to tell you that now 64 deputies, about more then 30% of deputies voted against the sanctions. And in April, when we were first stripped of the right to vote, only 20 people voted against.

So we are moving this agenda ahead, and there is much more skepticism towards Ukraine, much less faith.

There are people whom we have established very good relationships with. These is the left faction, some of the socialists, some of the conservatives. Many people came to our defense, representatives of the Serbian delegation, French, Norwegian.

We have to see that this is a platform on which an information war is waged.

V.S.: If this is a platform where a war is waged, then why did you leave?

We left because Russia is not prepared to play a role of a statist.

V.S.: Then why did you go, the British said it will be “good bye”!

Sergey Zheleznyak, Deputy Chairman of State Duma of RF:

The thing is, every year each national delegation is reviewed. The sanctions which were enacted last year expired by the end of 2014. And even at the session of the profile commission, which reviewed this issue, the spread was with a difference of only one vote a day before the parliamentary session.

We paid attention to the extraordinary efforts taken by Western diplomatic missions and international organizations to adjust the positions of those deputies who demanded to keep our privileges. There was talk that those who support Russia will have no political future in their own countries. And those delegates from countries other then EU were directly threatened, that if they support Russia, they will be put on black lists, and won’t be able to go …

V.S.: Who told them?

In private conversations with various representatives of Euro-bureaucracy and a large number of Trans-Atlantic lobbyists, who very officially are acting …   Their lobbyists are not just better then ours but much more tougher.

The truth is on our side, but what was remarkable is not only what was done but how it was done.
I was the author of all the adjustments for the final project of a resolution from our country.

When I was preparing them, I set politics aside on purpose and only followed the norms of common sense and international law. For example, if PACE is against volunteers from Russia, then it should be against volunteers from all countries, and not just Russia. When I was told, “no, the ban should only be for volunteers from Russia”  And I said, therefore this is a paradox – that means volunteers from Abkhazia, South Ossethia, Belorus, and other countries may be there? They said, this is not as important, our task is to force Russia to follow our line.

The paradox is that they think that our participation in PACE is a privilege, which we can be blackmailed with. For us only a fair dialogue is acceptable. And we were prepared to have it, but we weren’t heard.

Many important points here including this:

If we are not there then no one will talk about it. Only our delegation goes against the mainstream. And sometimes I am asked, if there are any results. Yes, there are results.

I have to tell you that now 64 deputies, about more than 30% of deputies voted against the sanctions. And in April, when we were first stripped of the right to vote, only 20 people voted against.

 It’s easy to forget this — telling the truth matters. It and our example influence other people. It’s very difficult most of the time to see results or the changes to dominant modes of thinking. And it’s very easy to get discouraged and give up. But speaking the truth brings results. There are always some who listen, some who are curious, some who still ask questions and don’t automatically believe the dominant narrative. And they influence other people — their family, their friends, their co-workers, their neighbors.

Speak up.

It is vital.

Tell the truth and keep telling the truth in as many creative ways as possible to as many people as possible.

Push outside of your comfort zone.

Don’t leave it to the “experts” or the “activists” or the politicians.

If you care about Ukraine, Iraq, Syria, or South and Central America, about freedom, every single person must tell what he or she knows if we are to have any hope of breaking the chokehold of tyranny, of brutality, of evil, of societal and earth murder.

The Korsun massacre, February 20 2014 – what really pushed Crimea away from Ukraine (VIDEO)

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February 21, 2015
Antifashist
Translated by Kristina Rus

While the Ukrainian Euro-maidanites are celebrating the anniversary of the bloody coup, the supporters of Antimaidan begin to mark their own tragic dates. Exactly one year ago, on February 20, a bestial gang of Nazis from the “Right Sector” attacked a convoy of buses with Crimeans near Korsun, perpetrating a real slaughter and a massacre of the opponents of a nationalist coup.

Eight buses with Crimeans, who participated in Kiev in Antimaidan rallies, were returned home [after their opponents have won]. Near Korsun in Cherkasy oblast, the convoy was ambushed by the armed thugs from the Right Sector. As became known later, the Nazis were aware of the movement of the column and were expecting the Crimeans.

The captured buses were burned, their passengers were brutally tortured, beaten and humiliated. Several people were beaten to death and murdered.

A testimony of one of the victims of torture by the Right Sector scum soon appeared online:

“We were going home from Kiev with the guys on a bus. There was a roadblock. They started to shoot at us, throwing Molotov cocktails,” – shared her experience victim Oksana. “When I came out, I was hit, then they started to pull the boys”. The Crimean activists of “Stop Maidan” were attacked near Korsun-Shevchenkovsky, when they returned from Kiev. On the bus there was also an injured man, for whom an ambulance was called earlier. “And they started to beat us. Boys, girls – they didn’t care – remembers Oksana. “Then they took the men, and they came back already half naked. Forced them to kneel on broken glass and sing the Ukrainian anthem, shouting “Glory to the Heroes”. They took the phones, passports, beat them and took them away. We were left on the bus for nine hours, and then released”. The attackers spoke Ukrainian, and forced the Crimeans to speak the state language. Their actions were marked by frenzied brutality and hatred for the Crimeans.

“Now I like the situation in Crimea. At that time, when we were in trouble, not one military, nor the police saved us. No one would give a damn. When they let us go, told us to pass a message that they will soon arrive in Crimea, and it will be much worse than in Kiev. I’m glad that someone will protect us.”

Remembering those tragic events, well-known political analyst Vladimir Kornilov noted that, despite the horror of what happened, this massacre was destined to become the impetus, which roused the Crimea for the following complete liberation from the aggressive Ukrainian banderovshina, sinister shadows of which were already hanging over the peninsula.

“I want to remind you that until then Crimea rather inertly reacted to what was happening in Kiev. Some dear to me Crimeans publicly spoke, saying, “this is not our war”. I even argued about this with some Crimean political scientists. Some went to Kiev to protest on Antimaidan, but mostly among the masses there was not a lot of emotion. But when the Crimean survivors of this massacre came home and talked about who came to power in Kiev, Crimea exploded, then it realized that it is time to act and defend yourself! Personally, I count the beginning of the reunification process of Crimea with Russia starting from that day. [It was still more then two months until the Odessa massacre – K.R.]

So the Ukrainian Nazis had done everything they can in order to start this process,” – said Kornilov.

Kristina Rus:

 When the Western press cheers “the democratic aspirations of the Ukrainian people shown on Maidan” they conveniently forget and ignore the aspirations of those mostly Russian-speaking Ukrainians from Crimea and South-Eastern Ukraine, who were protesting nearby in Kiev against the Maidan. Unfortunately it took a bloody civil war to open the eyes of the most, and those few people who had the foresight of what’s to come and understood what was in store for Ukraine did not have the time and the funding of the Right Sector and Maidan organizers to adequately prepare and make any difference from the start.

 But when the determination and brutality of the Ukrainian ultra-nationalist thugs became apparent after their deeds in Korsun and Odessa became known to the public, most Ukrainian citizens became horrified by what the Maidan had unleashed and were forced to make a decision if this is the kind of country they want to leave in.