Armed servicemen stand near Russian army vehicles outside a Ukrainian border guard post in the Crimean town of Balaclava March 1, 2014. Credit: Reuters/Baz Ratner
Pavel Polityuk and Anton Zverev, Reuters: Why Ukrainian forces gave up Crimea without a fight - and NATO is alert
KIEV/SEVASTOPOL, Crimea (Reuters) - The career of Sergei Yeliseyev helps to explain why Ukraine's armed forces gave up Crimea almost without a fight - and why NATO now says it is alert to Russian attempts to undermine military loyalty in its eastern European members.
His rise to become number two in the Ukrainian navy long before Russia seized Crimea illustrates the divided loyalties that some personnel in countries that once belonged to the Soviet Union might still face.
Yeliseyev's roots were in Russia but he ended up serving Ukraine, a different ex-Soviet republic, only to defect when put to the test. NATO military planners now believe Moscow regards people with similarly ambiguous personal links as potentially valuable, should a new confrontation break out with the West.
Read more ....
WNU Editor: There were many reasons why Ukraine's military forces gave up Crimea without a fight .... having a senior officer more loyal to Russia was the least of them. Before this mess started I have been to Crimea many times .... I love the wine that they make there, and as a tourist spot during summer one of the best places to be. The first thing that you will notice right away is that the majority of the population is ethnically and culturally Russian .... and while I was not there when the Ukraine provisional government took over after the revolution and started to hint that they would pass laws that would restrict the use of the Russian language .... I did not have to be there to know what the reaction among most Crimeans would be. As for a Ukrainian soldier based in Crimea during this time .... I could only imagine how he must have felt being there. He is facing a hostile population. A provisional government has taken over the government in Kiev at the barrel of a gun. The country's military forces are divided along ethnic and cultural lines .... as well as along political lines (those who are loyal to the new regime, and those are loyal to the previous one). The motivation to fight .... especially when you are faced with Russian special ops and a local population that supports them .... would have been difficult in any circumstance. As for NATO now being alert that there may be a fifth column that supports Russia among Baltic NATO member states .... what surprises me is not that .... the Russian populations in these countries are huge .... but how these governments are responding to these Russian enclaves. Purging Russians from official government positions and restricting the use of the Russian language may satisfy the nationalist tendencies of these governments .... but pursuing an official policy of discrimination rarely brings about peace, and it is a guarantee that relations with Russia will only get worse.
7 comments:
Again, you flawed logic here and it is bizarre. You seem reasonable on most things but act like a Putin fan boy when it comes to the Ukraine. I will say this again and again, the Ukraine is the victim here, not the Russians not the Ukrainians with Russian family trees who were manipulated by the Russians. The Ukrainians were violated in a major here and it looks like you bought into the Russian propaganda hook, line and sinker. This a fact not an opinion. I do not see the Ukrainians in any Russian territory but you do see the Russians in Ukrainian territory again that is fact. Is the Ukraine corrupt, of course yes, has the Ukrainian military whipped that ass on the battlefield, in again yes. Ukraine is the victim here not the Russians, get your opinion right.
Ha ha, same lame arguments as always. Greetings from Sweden
Crimea now belongs to Russia, whether the West likes it or not, and no amount of sactions or sanctimonious speeches at the UN is going to change that. The Russians simply do not care.
And considering the massive, festering problems that are developping both in the US and Europe, getting entangled with Russia over an obscure (for Westerners) peninsula would be foolish indeed.
Stephen,
Very respectfully the editor makes reasoned arguments that can be confirmed from other sources. The main victims hare are the eastern Ukrainians. The Kiev government has tried to oppress them with a corrupt, thug, chump government. As for the US, at best we jumped into a situation with our eyes closed not fully understanding precisely what we were getting into. At worst, we sponsored a coup against a democratically elected government attempting to replace it with one hostile to the Russians. Additionally part of the agreement to end Cold War likely included an agreement not to expand NATO into former Soviet Bloc and former Soviet Republics. Even if such an agreement did not exist there would have been no reason to do so in the first place!!
As for these "fifth columns," 1.)stop trying to oppress and persecute them. It just might work wonders. By oppressing and persecuting them one creates a fifth column and/or exacerbates the one that is already there. First step, stop the oppression of them. 2.)Something these governments may want to think about, US involvement here is only temporary and will be ending. A.)This is not advancing our national security, is hurting our economy, is costing enormous sums of money, and is placing our people in grave danger all for chumps who DO NOT have our interests at heart. B.)As a result the US people are growing extremely impatient with this and our frustration with this grows daily. Either the US will leave to focus on its own needs or it will be forced out either by sheer necessity or by foreign powers. The current situation CANNOT CONTINUE. These nations have Russia on their borders for centuries. The US is a temporary and fleeting phenomenon while Russia is essentially forever for these people. They may want to ponder this when deciding on courses of action.
Caecus,
I couldn't have said this any better myself. I've been saying this for awhile now. In fact, when the US chose to insert itself into the Ukrainian situation and impose sanctions on Russia over this I called it the twin stupidest decisions ever made by a major power in world history. I've largely been proven right. Already Germany has indicated its reluctance to impose additional sanctions. I'm pretty sure any support for this in Western Europe is going to be tepid at best and full of holes. The best thing to do when one finds themselves in a hole is to STOP DIGGING!!
This is what the US needs to do at this time. Additional sanctions = a deeper hole for the US, hasten the end of the dollar's inevitable end as world reserve currency, and all but ensure a hard landing when this does happen.
DJT ran on a saner direction involving working to improve relations with Russia. It's to bad that now suggesting saner polices gets one branded as "colluding with the Russians" or as a "Putin fan boy" or other ridiculousness.
https://www.google.ca/amp/s/www.engadget.com/amp/2017/06/13/russia-us-military-propaganda/
"Russia is going to great lengths to undermine the US military by not just spying on it, but trying to influence its members, according to a report from Politico. Operatives have been friending soldiers and veterans on social media, posting on popular sites and, of course, hacking members. The aim, according to experts, is to turn service members into a "fifth column" for Russia, and the military is struggling to stop it."
Warfare goes beyond the frontlines
After the Brits lost America, the Brits were much more accommodating to the French of Quebec.
American entreaties to join the U.S. fell on deaf ears.
Then Britain went on the screw over India.
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