Servicemen march during Ukraine's Independence Day military parade in central Kiev, Ukraine, August 24, 2016.Gleb Garanich/Reuters
Defense One: In Ukraine, the US Trains an Army in the West to Fight in the East
For more than two years, some 300 American soldiers have been quietly helping train an enormous partner military in western Ukraine.
For more than two years, the U.S. military’s contingent of 300 or so soldiers have been quietly helping train an enormous allied military in western Ukraine. Meanwhile, Russian-backed separatists appear to be keeping pace some 800 miles to the east, showcasing entire parking lots full of new tanks and artillery just a 15-minute drive from the front lines.
“Every 55 days we have a new battalion come in and we train them,” said U.S. Army National Guard Capt. Kayla Christopher, spokesperson for the Joint Multinational Training Group-Ukraine, at Yavoriv Combat Training Center in western Ukraine. “And at the end of that 55-day period, we’ll do a field training exercise with that battalion.” The U.S. and partnered armies have trained seven battalions in the past roughly two years or so.
That’s what she calls the “main line of effort that you tend to see most of the time in the news.”
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WNU Editor: The U.S. military may be very good at training soldiers on how to fight .... but the U.S. military and their political masters back in Washington have a lousy history in understanding and/or appreciating the culture of the country that they are training the soldiers in, and how their actions may make a bad situation even worse. Ukraine is a perfect example on how U.S. involvement makes the situation worse. Ukraine is a deeply divided country made up of primarily two ethnic groups .... Ukrainians in the West, Russian-Ukrainians in the east. Supporting one side over the other never ends well .... and in this case doubly so because on the other side is Russia who has made it very clear that this is a red line that if crossed will mean war.
2 comments:
Maybe it’s just a plan to keep Russia occupied close to home, and stay out of the Middle East. Or similar to Truman’s thinking during WWII. "If we see that Germany is winning the war, we ought to help Russia; and if that Russia is winning, we ought to help Germany, and in that way let them kill as many as possible. . . ." he said as a Senator in 1941.
The Ukrainian problem is extremely important for Russia and for the Ukrainian people too. Overlooking this problem through a military confrontation is a huge, huge mistake. Are we ready to go to war with Russia? And vice versa?
For me, this is typically the kind of problem which could be ruled with direct negotiation between Russia and USA. Because they are the only one who have the trump (without word game) on this situation.
A good compromise would release pressure and stop the economic sanction between Russia and West. Every body will be wining.
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