Putin: Separatism in Chechnya is bad but good in Ukraine

[HT: DK]. Putin's authoritarian logic of anti-separatism in rebel Chechnya contradicts his official logic in rebel-held Donbas and Russia-annexed Crimea: "There is no one who can explain to the Chechen people why (separatism) is acceptable for Crimea and the Donbas but not for them."

It's unassailable. And as I wrote recently, likewise the logic of the Western leftwing press that once criticized "Putin's War" in Chechnya, (part of Russia), becomes illogical in their misguided defense of Putin's aggression in sovereign Ukraine.

Crisis in the Caucasus — Putin, Kadyrov and Ukraine

By Vitaliy Portnikov

December 6, 2014 | Euromaidan Press

The hysterical reaction of Ramzan Kadyrov to the events that took place in Grozny on the eve of Vladimir Putin’s address to the Federal Assembly even more than the fighting itself in the Chechen capital indicates that we are dealing with a new round of tension in the North Caucasus.

It appears that the battle between the Chechen security forces and the militants has ended. This would be the time to speak about stability and peace. However, Kadyrov cannot control himself. He has threatened to destroy the homes of the families of suspected militants and to expel them from Chechnya (and this despite the fact that they are leaving the republic as soon as possible). He is even threatening Ukrainian parliamentarians who dared to compare the situation in Chechnya with the situation in the occupied regions of Ukraine. Meanwhile, the comparison is clearly not to Kadyrov’s advantage. On the one hand, he is fighting for the territorial integrity of Russia and is ready to destroy fellow citizens who are advocating the independence of Chechnya. On the other hand, he is sending Chechen forces to fight against the territorial integrity of Ukraine and supporting other militants. Where is the logic?

There is logic here, however. Kadyrov is Putin’s vassal and ready to carry out any order of the Kremlin lord. It is more than logical. It is inevitable. If Putin goes, Kadyrov’s regime either will  be replaced by a new Russian president or it will be swept away by civil war in Chechnya. The conditions for such a war existed earlier as well. However,  they have only increased with the new unstable situation. The battles in Grozny are only the first drops of rain on the red-hot roof of new clashes in the long-suffering republic.

Kadyrov has established a real personal dictatorship in Chechnya . It was only through dictatorial powers and the support of his own clan from the Tsentoroi village that he has been able to suppress the resistance  of the supporters of independence and the opposition of the representatives from other clans, including those loyal to Moscow. But such a dictatorship is possible only when there is a relationship with a strong center. What happened in Grozny has demonstrated that Kadyrov’s enemies are no longer convinced of Putin’s power nor in the prospects of his vassal. Otherwise, they would not have succeeded in carrying out a daring operation on the very eve of a very important event for Putin and Kadyrov.

The fact that any crisis in Russia inevitably leads to destabilization in the Caucasus is not news. What is newsworthy is the fact that Putin, who has represented himself as the chief enemy of separatism, is also the main sponsor of separatism. It is this fact that may undermine further crackdowns by Kadyrov. There is no one who can explain to the Chechen people why (separatism) is acceptable for Crimea and the Donbas but not for them.

Putin and Kadyrov have destroyed their own glass house with the heavy stones of shortsightedness.

The Economist: Ukraine's economy is in the toilet

"Few people know that Ukraine is the world’s most unequal country, if you look at wealth (not income). The second-most unequal is Russia," noted The Economist.

And few people know that Ukraine's Maidan Revolution was not about the Russian language, or even about signing an agreement with the EU. It was about systemic corruption and political cronyism that was slowly yet unstoppably choking the life out of the economy, chasing out foreign investment and the country's best and brightest, and depriving a whole generation of smart, ambitious young Ukrainians of any kind of future where their hard work and merit could better their station in life.  

Russia's president Vladimir Putin cannot let the Maidan Revolution succeed in stamping out corruption and reforming the economy. Now he is perfectly content to let Ukraine be a freezing economic and political basket case with a Russian-fomented "frozen conflict" in its eastern Donbas region.

It is really that bad

By C.W.

November 20, 2014 | The Economist

URL: http://www.economist.com/blogs/freeexchange/2014/11/ukraines-economy

RFE/RL: Most of Ukraine's ethnic Russians are loyal to Ukraine (PODCAST)

Here's a summary of this podcast:

• According to one poll, 87 percent of residents in heavily ethnic Russian regions Kharkiv and Odesa want to be part of Ukraine. Only 5 percent want to be part of Russia or "Novorossiya."

• 50 percent say their opinion of Russia has gotten worse.

• 56 percent now have negative views of Russia's president Vladimir Putin.

• Twice as many want Ukraine's future to be with Europe than with Russia.

• Meanwhile, 70 percent of Ukrainians say their native language is Ukrainian, even if they don't speak "fluent" Ukrainian.  61 percent say they speak Russian and Ukrainian "equally well."

• The two big exceptions are Crimea and Donbas, where residents still prefer vertikalnuiu vlast' (vertical power), where they feel more powerless and want to be part of a paternalistic (Soviet) state that takes care of them. It's both cultural and economic that they want a strong state to take care of them. Both Crimea and Donbas, significantly, are filled with forced emigres from Soviet Russia,  but many more in Donbas.

• Umland notes that Crimea is different because it has a majority of ethnic Russians, and between 40 and 60 percent indeed wanted to become part of Russia. (Minus Crimean Tatars). But Natalya Churikova notes that in 2013, before the Maidan revolution and Russian propaganda took hold, about 10 percent of Crimeans said they wanted to become part of Russia.\
• Indeed, the Russian citizen, FSB officer and pro-Russian military insurgent leader Igor Girkin once complained that he couldn't find enough local volunteers in Ukraine to fight for the insurgency against Ukraine. He needed Russian troops and materiel. 

• And as both Umland and Churikova posit, Ukrainians in "Russian" cities such as Odesa, Kharkiv and Dnipropetrovsk refuse to be "reduced" to ethno-linguistic minorities or majorities; rather, (in addition to any patriotic feelings toward Ukraine), they look to what country or system offers them greater opportunities for political and self-expression. And Ukraine wins. They don't want to be part of "Putin's Russia" where "the state tells you what to do." 

• People in Crimea and Donbas, by contrast, argues Churikova, still think of Russia as Soviet Russia, and expect certain economic and social guarantees from it that, alas, will probably not be forthcoming, if Russian-controlled Crimea is any guide. Indeed, in Donbas so many were dependent on state employment and state subsidies that they had no sense of agency; they are turning to the side that seems more powerful, more capable of providing for them.

• Meanwhile, a week from Sunday, Ukrainians will vote for a new Parliament (Rada). But Donbas and Luhansk will probably not be represented for security and practical reasons. And so a "core Ukraine" with more Western values will have a stronger voice in Ukraine's new legislature. Hence, one could argue that Putin has done a lot to make Ukraine, politically, more pro-European and pro-Western! This tendency underscores that Putin's only real option now is to continue with a separatist gambit through military intervention, since Putin has succeeded, through military action, in turning most Ukrainians against him (and Russia).  

• Sadly, Ukraine's politicians and parties are lagging behind the progress of Ukraine's citizens and civil society. But without Russian meddling, this will change. 

• Umland and Churikova both agree that the language issue (Ukrainian vs. Russian) is an artificial one. For official state documents Ukrainian will remain the official language. And where most people speak Russian, as before Russian will be continued to be used and taught in schools, regardless of what the law says.

• ... As for the eastern Ukrainian oligarchs? The fact that the Akhmetov clan has seemed  to have very little influence in Donbas implies  that the pro-Russian insurgents, who are largely outsiders without any local constituency, must have enjoyed extraordinary support from Russia.

• ... Finally, Whitmore asked Umland and Churikova to speculate what will happen to Russia when, not if, Ukraine "gets to the West." Umland said that Putin "wants the Ukrainian experiment to fail" to discredit Ukraine's push to the West. And Umland thinks Putin is miscalculating that the EU would allow a destabilized Ukraine that could send thousands or even millions of refugees to the EU. Europe won't allow it. Churikova said that now in Russia "Ukraine means freedom" in all post-Soviet states and Putin will not allow it to spread; but it's a question whether Putin will direct all his forces to stop its spread. And what will happen when, and if, the Russian population "sobers up?" 

Podcast: Ukraine's Loyalist Russians

By Brian Whitmore

October 17, 2014 | RFE/RL - The Power Vertical

URL: http://www.rferl.org/content/podcast-ukraines-loyalist-russians/26642745.html

'Putin is winning' (Maclean's)

So here is Ukraine's defeat in a nutshell [emphasis mine]:

Putin’s willingness to continually escalate Russia’s intervention in Ukraine presented Poroshenko with a dilemma of his own. [Poroshenko] knew Ukraine’s armed forces could not defeat those of Russia, and NATO wasn’t coming. So he agreed to the ceasefire. The agreement, while providing for prisoner exchanges and amnesty for some fighters, does not outline what an eventual political settlement might look like. It is difficult to imagine one that both sides would accept. Poroshenko has already promised to protect Russian language rights and to decentralize political power. None of this has satisfied the separatist leadership or their patrons in Moscow.

If Poroshenko can take any comfort from the predicament in which he finds himself, it might be that he never really had any good options. The much-ballyhooed rapid reaction force that NATO announced is meant to protect existing members of the alliance. And not only has the West not provided meaningful military aid to Ukraine, it has also failed to mobilize sufficient financial resources to support Kyiv....

Let me underline that: Now that Ukraine's government appears willing to address the grievances given by the rebels and terrorists for starting their "civil war" in eastern Ukraine -- protection of Russian language; and special self-government status -- it's no longer enough for the pro-Russian separatists. This tells me that my instincts, (and the instincts of most Ukrainians), were correct: These issues were a red herring to begin with. Putin is pulling their puppet strings.

Alas, Western support for Ukraine against Russia has been too little, too timid. As former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Steven Pifer warned, the real danger of "escalation" may be in Western appeasement that emboldens Putin to go even further. And who will stop Putin if he decides to do so?  

The end of Ukraine?

By Michael Petrou

September 15, 2014 | Maclean's

URL: http://www.macleans.ca/news/world/the-end-of-ukraine/

Motyl: Ukraine must build a 'Mannerheim Line' in Donbas against Russia

Here's how Motyl concludes his op-ed about a future partitioned Ukraine:

[T]he Donbas enclave is finished, and, as deindustrialization continues, depopulation will proceed apace. Whoever inherits the mess caused by Putin and his proxies will have a ball and chain on his leg. Fortunately for Ukraine, it doesn’t—and in all likelihood will not anytime soon—control the enclave. Rightly or wrongly, justly or unjustly, legally or illegally, the burden of control, and the burden of governance, will fall on Putin. Bully for him. The day is not far off when the economic disaster that is the Crimea and the Donbas will burden Putin, and he will be hard-pressed to claim that his imperialism has served Russia well.

So, sure, let Kyiv proclaim that it will never ever give up its sovereign territories. But then let Kyiv build The Wall, beef up its defenses, and get down to the business of fixing the country. Kyiv has time on its side. As I’ve frequently suggested, Putin’s fascist regime is doomed. Let it choke on the Donbas and the Crimea. Let it degenerate into an exclusively repressive regime. Let its economy decay thanks to Western sanctions. And let it remain isolated from the rest of the world and Ukraine. And then, when Russians reestablish a democracy, as one day they surely will, The Wall can come down. 

By ceding any of Ukraine's sovereign territory, President Poroshenko will be vulnerable to opportunistic attacks from political rivals who will declare "no retreat" from Donbas and "no surrender" to militarily stronger Russia, even if the Ukrainian army doesn't stand a chance against Putin's mercenaries and armed forces.

Ukraine to Wall Out Putin, Literally

By Alexander J. Motyl

September 15, 2014 | World Affairs Journal

URL: http://www.worldaffairsjournal.org/blog/alexander-j-motyl/ukraine-wall-out-putin-literally

Have we lost Ukraine already?

Up until the last part of his essay, 'Have we lost already?', Vancraen is sadly accurate in his assessment of Putin's plans for Ukraine, and the West's feeble reaction.

The remainder of his essay, however, containing Vancraen's prescriptions for united US-EU-NATO action, are all strong and good but do not have a chance of being implemented, thanks to Western disunity and fecklessness, amounting to capitulation to Putin. 

Until now Putin has expertly gamed the West. At each peak of the conflict he has employed peace talks and soothing words as a stalling tactic with the EU; meanwhile, he continued pursuing what he has wanted: a "frozen" No Man's Land in eastern Ukraine (Donbas), a la Transnistria in Moldova and Abkhazia in Georgia; and a literally frozen Ukraine this coming winter, after a cutoff of Russian gas, making Ukraine too weak and depleted to oppose Russia further.

Soon Russia will have its revenge for the breakup and ethnic cleansing of Yugoslavia by doing the same to Ukraine, the largest country in Europe.

To my Ukrainian friends I must say, I'm sorry we let you down.  Now you'll have to make the best of it.

Just as you succeeded, miraculously, in a matter of weeks in resuscitating the Ukrainian army from the brink of death, directly with your pocketbooks and blood, so too you must bring the Ukrainian nation back to life. 

In the space that remains to you, liberate yourselves from corrupt thieves and oligarchs! In what remains of Ukraine, make it a real nation of free, united citizens that is hell-bent on joining the EU and exhibiting the European values of democracy, free expression and free assembly, equality before the law, government accountability, tolerance, entrepreneurship and social solidarity.  

If the words of Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. are true -- "The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice" -- then perhaps one day Ukraine will become a shining example to Donbas and Russia itself of what great feats free people can accomplish, and make Ukraine the envy of Europe. Слава Україні -- Героям слава!

Winter, war and refugees are coming

By Luc Vancraen

September 7, 2014 | Kyiv Post

URL: http://www.kyivpost.com/opinion/op-ed/luc-vancraen-winter-war-and-refugees-are-coming-363655.html

Ukrainian Independence Day parades: Compare & contrast

Whereas Ukraine put on a somber and patriotic Independence Day parade in Kyiv, in traditional national dress, without cursing or mocking anybody...

"Defiant Ukraine turns on military display"

... the terrorists and rebels in Donetsk garishly paraded Ukrainian POWs on the street to cheers of "fascists," "f-ing demons" and "faggots," then symbolically "washed" the street after them with a water truck:

"Kremlin-backed separatists humiliate Ukrainian army in Donetsk parade (VIDEO)."

UPDATE (08.25.2014): The forced march and intentional public humiliation of Ukrainian POWs in Donetsk was likely a war crime under the Geneva Conventions: "Donetsk POW March: When Is A Parade A War Crime?" 

The misled and brainwashed crowd in Donetsk was ready to tear their brothers apart like animals. 

Reconciliation in Eastern Ukraine will be a decades-long endeavor, but first Ukraine's victory there against Russian aggression must be secured.

Happy Independence Day to my Ukrainian friends!  You have suffered much already; may you endure till the end.  Glory to Ukraine!  Glory to the heroes!  Слава Україні -- Героям слава!

"Ukrainian Independence Day 2014: the long road to true Ukrainian independence"

Ukraine may be alone against Russia, but it is finally a nation

This is my hope exactly, as I've shared with my Ukrainian friends [emphasis mine]:

But while Ukraine may have lost Crimea, and may struggle to get a large slice of Donbas back under its control for an extended period of time, and while Europe has yet again disappointed, the big “win” for Ukraine is that the nation has been born.

Finally, after 23 years, Ukrainians do feel a sense of identity and affinity with the state of Ukraine. They have been willing to lie down their lives for the state, and will likely be willing to struggle to ensure its survival and success, irrespective of Russia having lopped off bits of its territory.

This is the big chance for Ukraine, to live to European values, and modernise the economy – because it has to, rather as Georgia did in 2008. Russia may have outmaneuvered the West and Kyiv to a stalemate, even a short term tactical victory over Crimea and Donbas. 

But importantly, over the longer term Russia has failed in allowing a new nation to be forged – 2014, could be the defining moment for Ukraine, equivalent to 1848 or 1861 in Europe, 1776 in the US, et al. 

Russia may hence have gained Crimea, and possibly bits of Donbas, but may have lost Ukraine permanently.

Such words, I know, are likely cold comfort to Ukrainians still reeling from the loss of Crimea, embroiled in a deadly war on their eastern border, and suffering from economic recession. 

Even so, Ukrainian nationalists have always known that breaking free of Russia's grasp would not be easy. Over the years Russia has used every means at its disposal to control Ukraine: trade sanctions; bankrolling pro-Russian political candidates, NGOs, political parties, academics and journalists; military pressure; infiltrating the government and other key organizations; gas exports; etc.  

Now, at last, Ukraine is breaking free. Let's just hope Ukraine doesn't break up in the process!...

West may be telling Ukraine to stand on its own against Russia

By Timothy Ash

August 15, 2014 | Kyiv Post

URL: http://www.kyivpost.com/opinion/op-ed/timothy-ash-west-may-be-telling-ukraine-to-stand-on-its-own-against-russia-360788.html

Russia preparing pretexts for invasion of Ukraine (Foreign Policy)

Very good summary of recent events in Ukraine and Russia, with strategic analysis by the editor of the Interpreter, an online journal about Russian media. 

We Come in 'Peace'

By Michael Weiss

August 7, 2014 | Foreign Policy

URL: http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2014/08/06/we_come_in_peace_mh17_ukraine_russia_prepares_for_war

U.S. Amb. Power: Russia can and must end this war in Ukraine

You can read the clinical part, but this is the upshot, according to U.S. ambassador to the UN Samantha Power:

"This war can be ended. Russia can end this war. Russia must end this war."

Unfortunately Ms. Power is speaking more strongly than President Obama himself. Why?

I understand that Mr. Obama is reluctant to involve U.S. power in yet another international conflict. The U.S. already has Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, Libya, etc. to deal with. And many Americans are more concerned about one Israeli killed by Hamas rockets than the American killed in MH flight 17, not to mention hundreds of others killed on the Malaysian Airlines flight from at least 11 countries, including at least 80 children.

But Ukraine is Europe.  Europe is different.  And the shooting down of this plane is international terrorism by any definition. Hopefully this will be wake-up call to the EU; but more importantly, it should be a wake-up call to President Obama and the United States. America must lead; America must bring this Russia-inspired and Russia-supplied and -supported war to an end.  

MH flight 17 showed that this war cannot be contained to Eastern Ukraine. Maybe that's how Russian president Vladimir Putin envisioned it a few months ago to boost his domestic approval rating, but no more: his heedless gorillas with guns have murdered 298  non-Ukrainians, including scores of Europeans. Russia is now at war with Europe, the West and the civilized world, in the bloodiest air catastrophe in history. (And now some of these pro-Russian militia groups are looting the bodies -- and taking some for ransom -- in what has been described as the "biggest crime scene in history.")

For my Russian-speaking friends, I urge you to read this article by Pavel Felgenhauer, a Russian military analyst who points out the obvious lies and logical inconsistencies in Russia's and the terrorists' arguments:  "Павел ФЕЛЬГЕНГАУЭР: Малайзийский «Боинг» — ошибка, которую никто не признает."

What President Obama should understand is that Russian public opinion is a non-factor. They are complete brainwashed zombies. So says prominent Russian liberal pundit Yulia Latynina:  "Юлия Латынина: Главное — чей это 'Бук'."  President Putin cannot be influenced from within Russian, only from strong outside Western pressure.

VIDEO: Russians interrogate female pilot captured INSIDE UKRAINE (subtitles)

The Russian regime's gall knows no limits!  They captured a female Ukrainian soldier Nadiya Savchenko on Ukrainian territory, and now they want to try her in Russian court.

Here is video of one interrogation in Russia (turn on the English subtitles):

http://amara.org/ru/videos/P2mmLM0sRKcf/info/dopros-plennoi-nadezhdy-savchenko-boitsa-batalona-aidar/

Article from the Kyiv Post: "Russian revenge: Ukrainian female officer faces court in Voronezh amid Ukrainian military's success in Donbas:"

Russia is not doing a very good job lately in hiding its connections with separatists in the Donbas. Nadiya Savchenko, female officer of Ukrainian army's Aydar unit who was captured in Luhansk Oblast on June 17, was transferred to prison in Voronezh, a Russian city not far from the border with Ukraine, reported television news program TSN.

Savchenko is being suspected in the murder of Russian journalists while participating in Ukraine’s antiterrorist operation, though local prosecutors have not come up with an official accusation yet, the senior lieutenant’s Russian lawyer said. However, her younger sister Vira said that the Voronezh court is going to have a first hearing within this case on July 9.

Incidentally, Ms. Savchenko is a veteran pilot who fought for U.S. coalition forces in Iraq. Pretty tough lady!

NYT: Russia sent tanks and missiles to separatists in Ukraine

This is the best (and worst) bit from this New York Times story:

A rebel leader, Denis Pushilin, told Russian state television on Friday that the separatists had tanks but that it was “improper to ask” where they had gotten them.

Nope, you never narc on your supplier, that's the first rule of separatist warfare.

To add absurdity to farce, earlier on June 6, the Kremlin propaganda machine "Voice of Russia" said that the Ukrainian army's use of tanks on its own territory against armed and murderous separatists violated the Geneva Conventions.  So... what does Russia call a foreign power sending tanks and artillery into another country, unannounced, to be used by unlawful combatants, and hitting civilian targets?  

The U.S. State Department said, "We are confident that these tanks came from Russia." But that's not all:  "We also have information that Russia has accumulated multiple rocket launchers at this same deployment site in southwest Russia, and these rocket launchers also recently departed."  

Seriously though, what's the U.S., NATO and Europe going to do about this?  The West has Russia dead to rights.  So now what??

"A failure by Russia to de-escalate this situation will lead to additional costs," said a State Department spokeswoman. 

Additional costs?  Oh no, anything but that!  I'm sure Russian President Vladimir Putin is checking his mega-sized wallet right now to see if he can cover the bill.... 

The NYT says "the convoy was too small to serve a military purpose." I think this was a trial balloon. Putin is waiting to see how the West reacts. If they wimp out, Putin will send more tanks and heavy weapons, it's that simple.

(Putin is also doing it, coincidentally or not, just when Iraq's army is imploding; so maybe he figures the U.S. will be too distracted by events there -- and the stupid conservative blamesmanship going on -- to react adequately to events in Ukraine.)

Time to sack up!  Freedom isn't free.  This tinpot dictator must be put in his place, for the sake of liberty and security in Europe and international law.

Russia Sent Tanks to Ukrainian Separatists, U.S. Says

By Andrew E. Kramer and Michael R. Gordon

June 13, 2014 | New York Times

The State Department said Friday that Russia had sent tanks and other heavy weapons to separatists in Ukraine, supporting accusations Thursday by the Ukrainian government.

A convoy of three T-64 tanks, several BM-21 multiple rocket launchers and other military vehicles crossed the border near the Ukrainian town of Snizhne, State Department officials said. The Ukrainian Army reported Friday that it had destroyed two of the three tanks and several other vehicles in the convoy.

“This is unacceptable,” said Marie Harf, the deputy State Department spokeswoman. “A failure by Russia to de-escalate this situation will lead to additional costs.”

A Western official said that intelligence about the movement of the tanks and other weapons into Ukraine was shared on Friday with NATO allies. Secretary of State John Kerry complained this week about the flow of Russian arms to separatists in Ukraine in a phone call to Sergey V. Lavrov, the Russian foreign minister.

The spokesman for President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia, Dmitry S. Peskov, said Friday that a Ukrainian armored personnel carrier had crossed into Russia for unclear reasons and was abandoned there. The Russian state news agency reported that the Russian border service said the occupants had then fled back to Ukraine

At the meeting of the Group of 7 industrial powers last week, President Obama warned Mr. Putin that the West would impose “additional costs” on Russia if its provocations were to continue.

The T-64 is an obsolescent tank no longer in active use by Russian forces, but still stored in southwest Russia.

“Russia will claim these tanks were taken from Ukrainian forces, but no Ukrainian tank units have been operating in that area,” the State Department said Friday afternoon. “We are confident that these tanks came from Russia.”

“We also have information that Russia has accumulated multiple rocket launchers at this same deployment site in southwest Russia, and these rocket launchers also recently departed,” the State Department added. “Internet video has shown what we believe to be these same rocket launchers traveling through Luhansk.”

Even before the State Department’s statement, Ukraine was having one of its better days Friday in eastern Ukraine, with government forces winning control of the port of Mariupol, the second-largest city in the separatist region of Donetsk.

The Ukrainian assault in Mariupol left five pro-Russian militants dead and four Ukrainian soldiers wounded, and ended with the hoisting of a Ukrainian flag at City Hall as the military routed the last separatists from the city’s administration buildings.

In Friday’s confrontation, videos posted online showed Ukrainian soldiers standing over captives who were lying face down with hands clenched behind their heads. The videos also showed soldiers displaying trophies of the battle — captured orange-and-black ribbons and shoulder patches of a pro-Russian group, the Russian Orthodox Army — and speaking with prisoners freed from the occupied buildings.

In that pro-Ukrainian forces — volunteer patrols of factory workers, a Ukrainian nationalist battalion called Azov and the Ukrainian military — had controlled most of Mariupol for weeks, the action was as much a propaganda victory as a military one.

In fighting near the besieged town of Slovyansk, a Grad ground-to-ground rocket of the sort said to be in the weapons convoy from Russia killed one person and wounded several others. Residents said the rocket went off course and hit a vegetable market in the village of Dobroyepole.

Over the long term, Ukraine, with its far larger though badly equipped and poorly trained army, has more forces, and it is unclear how long the separatists can hold out without more support from Russia. That is something Moscow cannot offer openly without risking more severe Western sanctions.

The result is misdirection and sleight of hand, and a conflict of endless puzzles and mind games.

The daytime journey of the three tanks through eastern Ukraine, which was filmed in multiple videos and witnessed by Western reporters, could not have been more obvious, and yet the convoy was too small to serve a military purpose. Was it a warning?

A rebel leader, Denis Pushilin, told Russian state television on Friday that the separatists had tanks but that it was “improper to ask” where they had gotten them.

Russia ratcheted up the economic pressure on Ukraine on Friday in their dispute over natural gas supplies and prices. Gazprom’s chief executive, Aleksei B. Miller, said that the company, a state-controlled energy giant, would not negotiate further with Ukraine over gas prices until Kiev paid its debts for past deliveries, and would adhere to a Monday deadline demanding prepayment for future supplies.

War Nerd: Eastern Ukraine is Putin's ploy to distract the West

Besides Gary Brecher's throwaway insults at Ukraine's interim government, (he obviously takes his cue from friend, russophile journalist Mark Ames), this article is worth reading.

Basically, Gary's thesis is that Putin's support for the uprisings in Eastern Ukraine is meant to distract Kyiv and the West from Putin's annexation of Crimea [emphasis mine]:

The new leader of Ukraine, Petro Poroshenko, understands what’s happening in Donetsk perfectly well: "Russia’s goal was, and is, to keep Ukraine so unstable that we accept everything that the Russians want," Poroshenko said in theinterview. "I have no doubt that Putin could, with his direct influence, end the fighting."

Sure, Putin could end the fighting, but that would be a waste of combustible human material—and it’s a rule of Great Power politics that you never burn your straw dogs wastefully. Like Poroshenko says, Russia’s goal here is not to annex Eastern Ukraine—not at the moment, anyway. In the long run, perhaps. But it’s too soon to send tanks over the border with the Russian flag flying. Much better to stir this new Kashmir, let it simmer, use its misery.

"Crimea; that was worth keeping. Donetsk isn't." So Gary sums up Putin's reasoning.

The "brave" pro-Russian separatists, true believers in Great Mother Russia in Gary's narrative, are Laoist "straw dogs" that Putin is using now, but will let Ukrainian President Poroshenko burn. Putin will keep just enough of these straw dogs alive, supplied, hopeful, so that he can re-ignite the insurgency whenever it suits him.  

Gary for whatever reason insists that Russian spies and Spetznaz (special forces) are not involved in Ukraine, as if this is crucial. Personally I think they are; and nobody knows what is happening on Russia's side of the border. At a minimum, there is a massive coordination campaign.

More importantly, it has been proven that Russia is arming, supplying and paying these mercenaries, er, volunteers from Russian hinterlands like South Ossetia, Chechnya and Ingushetia, as well as Ukraine's near neighbor Rostov-on-Don (Vostok Battalion).  (Hello! Ordinary Russian "volunteers" don't possess convoys of Kamaz trucks, mortars, RPGs, the Russian military's latest automatic rifles, etc.)

It has been proven that Russia was making bank transfers and shipping cash on trains over the border; but Ukraine's government has mostly put a stop to it. Russia's risible proposal to the UN Security Council to create "humanitarian corridors" in Eastern Ukraine was an attempt to give Russia's supply lines to Eastern Ukraine an official UN mandate.  The rest of the Security Council, not to be fooled so easily, shot down Russia's proposal. (Gee, ya think maybe Russia had no credibility because it opposed humanitarian corridors in Syria, where Russia supports embattled dictator Assad against the rebels?)

Recent rebel attacks on border guard stations are likewise their attempt to keep open Russia's supply lines of matériel and fighters to Eastern Ukraine.

As a commenter on a news site remarked: "Cut the Russian terrorist pipeline. Blow up every bridge. Plow up every airport. Hunt the bandits down one by one. Post them on facebook, since they enjoy using this as a vehicle for terror."

I'm inclined to agree. Putin is not accepting the Ukrainian contingent of these murderous rebels (many of them criminals) into Russia's bosom; and they refuse to leave their home, Donbas. They can't be negotiated with; things have gone too far, they've killed too many. All that can be done is seal off the border, hunt them down, and hope the rest will stay in hiding.  

My guess is that, eventually, somebody from the Party of Regions, or another credible Eastern politician, will be tasked with negotiating a ceasefire.  Meanwhile, the Kyiv government will pass protections for the Russian language and start a process to give more autonomy to Ukraine's oblasts, thereby taking away the rebels's only political grievances.  Then the majority of Eastern Ukrainians' desire to return to "normal life," (naturally, as part of Ukraine), will overwhelm all other considerations.

War Nerd: What’s happening in Eastern Ukraine is very simple, rational, and straightforward

By Gary Brecher

May 30, 2014 | Pando Daily

URL: http://pando.com/2014/05/30/war-nerd-whats-happening-in-eastern-ukraine-is-very-simple-rational-and-straightforward/

Stop forcing Ukraine into a 'West vs. Russia' narrative?

I have a lot of sympathy with where writer Oliver Bullough is headed here.  Indeed, the Euro-Maidan movement started in 2013 as an internal struggle against endemic corruption, lies and bad governance, personified by President Yanukovych's regime and his ruling Party of Regions, whose sole mission, sans anything resembling an ideology, was to consolidate power from the presidency down to the level of every village in Ukraine.

Writes Bullough:

This is what the revolution is about: Ukrainians trying to wrest control of their country from the oligarchs of Donetsk, Dnepropetrovsk and elsewhere who – with help from east and west – have robbed them for 23 years. The left should be cheering them on.

The east against west story does have one beneficiary: the Kremlin. In Ukraine Moscow is trying to preserve a crooked regime against the wishes of Ukrainians who want to live with dignity, because the old ways made it money. It also fears a united and stable Ukraine would join Nato. That's why Russia is sheltering Yanukovych, and threatening not to recognise the elections on 25 May. Russia is deploying its propaganda apparatus to present this as an ideological struggle rather than a mercenary one. RT, the channel formerly known as Russia Today, addresses the outside world, while state television channels bombard Russian-speakers with denunciations of the "fascists" in Kiev.

But let's not forget that Yanukovych was always "Putin's man" in Ukraine, starting in 2004 when Putin bankrolled Yanukovych's presidential campaign and Putin spoke out against the Orange Revolution.  And Yanukovych's "power vertical" was a direct emulation of Putin's regime in Russia.

Secondly, the Ukraine conflict quite openly ceased being an internal Ukrainian struggle the moment Russian troops left their Crimean bases in February 2014 and took over the parliament of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea in southern Ukraine.  

Thirdly, now less openly but still quite actively, Russia is supporting, arming and coordinating the actions of pro-Russia separatists in eastern Ukraine (aka Donbass).

Having said that, I believe, as Bullough is trying to say, that internal corruption and bad governance are still at the heart of this crisis.  If Ukraine's new government can truly tackle corruption, then they will have addressed the main grievance of most of Ukraine's population, and win a respect and legitimacy that no government has enjoyed since Ukraine's independence. 

(The language issue is a red herring; people in Kyiv and Lviv speak Russian freely everyday without a thought of suffering persecution; this is just a Russian-inspired media lie.)

However, if the new government cannot manage to make Ukraine less corrupt, or says one thing and does another, then it risks the wrath of a second "Euro-Maidan"... but one that could be much more violent and chaotic, and set off a true civil war.... 

Hopefully Ukraine's self-serving and often puerile politicians understand what's at stake, and will do what's right and necessary to pull the country back from the brink of dissolution!  

Stop forcing Ukraine into a narrative of Moscow versus Washington

By Oliver Bullough

May 19, 2014 | Guardian

URL: http://gu.com/p/3pc4k

Referendums in east Ukraine were a Russian farce

My man Mark Rachkevych at the Kyiv Post nailed it. I especially liked this paragraph [emphasis mine]:

When Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and other Kremlin officials say that Kyiv should negotiate with the “southeastern regions,” they mean with people that are under their control. They are not genuine leaders who enjoy popular, grass-roots support. They are lackeys financed and armed from abroad who kill, torture, and kidnap innocent people, and who have terrorized millions more. After all, recent surveys say that 70 percent of residents of southeastern Ukraine are for a united country.

Rachkevych concludes with this important warning [italics and emphasis mine]:

Still, Moscow’s pressure has already moved the goal posts in Kyiv’s policy. Ukraine’s interim government has signaled it is willing to allow for regional and local governments to set language policy, among other compromises. Decentralization is also on the table: letting local governments expand their tax bases, establish municipal police departments as well as other policy decisions that would be delegated to them.

And the calls for Crimea's return are muted as the interim government struggles for survival until the May 25 presidential election.

Some steps, such as the decentralization of government, are necessary to shed the Soviet legacy of governance, but not federalization, which is the Kremlin’s code wor for dismembering Ukraine.  Federalization is a powerful, unifying force when a nation-state is being formed. It has the opposite effect when one exists like Ukraine.

That’s precisely why the May 11 mimicry of a vote is a farce. It was the latest, unequivocal Russian step to dismantle Ukraine. 

That is why the West -- and the U.S. especially! -- cannot play dumb or give in to Putin's cynical gambit to dismantle Ukraine as a functioning state.

Why the poll on self-rule was a farce

By Mark Rachkevych

May 12, 2014 | Kyiv Post

Acting President Oleksandr Turchynov rightfully called the May 11 ballot in eastern Ukraine's Luhansk and Donetsk oblasts a “farce.”

But it wasn’t a travesty because it violated the constitution, or that more than 100,000 pre-completed ballots were seized in favor of secession ahead of the vote. Or that there was a dismally low turnout, multiple voting occurring, or that proof of residence wasn’t a criterion to cast a ballot.

It was a sham because Moscow was behind the vote, just as it was behind the annexation of Crimea and now, the slow-motion invasion of eastern Ukraine, and the recent unrest in Odesa, Kharkiv and other regions.

It is all a Kremlin charade to impose its will on and cover up a foreign policy debacle on Ukraine after the democratic EuroMaidan Revolution in February toppled the criminal regime of disgraced ex-President Viktor Yanukovych. Putin and his minions in the state-controlled press corps had defended Yanukovych’s corrupt government until the very end.

EuroMaidan signaled the second slap in the face of Russian President Vladimir Putin, who ended up on the wrong side of history – again – after twice backing the ex-convict Yanukovych (the first time was during the 2004 presidential election that led to the Orange Revolution and Viktor Yushchenko's election as president).

So, the former KGB colonel, in his unabashed contempt for Ukraine as a nation, had to create an alternative, make-believe reality to invade.

Eschewing accepted policy norms, and institutions like the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe or the United Nations to voice his grievances – primarily that his “Russian compatriots” were under threat of violence and were being discriminated – Putin primitively used force. And he’s shown he is willing to expend more resources than the West to get his way despite a looming third round of sanctions that would hurt Russia’s economy. Those resources include a cadre of media hounds who not only distort the news, but also manufacture it to shameless depths of bawdiness.

Just as the world has watched Russia transform into a fascist state, there is mounting evidence that the unrest in eastern and parts of southern Ukraine are led from Moscow and financed either through state-owned banks or Yanukovych and his inner-circle. Ukraine’s Security Service has captured Russian agents and military officers, as well as other subversives who were trained and received instructions from their handlers in Crimea and elsewhere. Russian sleepers have been activated and mercenaries with combat experience in the Russian military are on Ukrainian territory using Russia-supplied arms and weapons.

When Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and other Kremlin officials say that Kyiv should negotiate with the “southeastern regions,” they mean with people that are under their control. They are not genuine leaders who enjoy popular, grass-roots support. They are lackeys financed and armed from abroad who kill, torture, and kidnap innocent people, and who have terrorized millions more. After all, recent surveys say that 70 percent of residents of southeastern Ukraine are for a united country.

Kyiv has made it clear that it won’t engage with armed terrorists hiding behind masks and human shields, and likewise, whose chief handlers are sheltered behind the Kremlin’s walls. Still, Moscow’s pressure has already moved the goal posts in Kyiv’s policy. Ukraine’s interim government has signaled it is willing to allow for regional and local governments to set language policy, among other compromises. Decentralization is also on the table: letting local governments expand their tax bases, establish municipal police departments as well as other policy decisions that would be delegated to them.

And the calls for Crimea's return are muted as the interim government struggles for survival until the May 25 presidential election.

Some steps, such as the decentralization of government, are necessary to shed the Soviet legacy of governance, but not federalization, which is the Kremlin’s code wor for dismembering Ukraine. Federalization is a powerful, unifying force when a nation-state is being formed. It has the opposite effect when one exists like Ukraine.

That’s precisely why the May 11 mimicry of a vote is a farce. It was the latest, unequivocal Russian step to dismantle Ukraine. Sadly, Russia is succeeding. It still has the initiative and Ukraine's government, the European Union and the United States will have take tougher actions quickly to reverse the Kremlin tide.

Putin wants a new world order

(HT: TK). It wouldn't be the first time the West gave into a little bully. Sometimes, however, acquiescence don't satisfy bullies, it emboldens them.

Vladi­mir Putin’s new world order with the West

By Lilia Shevtsova

May 8, 2014 | Washington Post

Lilia Shevtsova is a senior associate at the Carnegie Moscow Center and author of “Putin’s Russia.”

The post-Cold War order that emerged from the breakup of the Soviet Union was doomed to fail because it rested on a belief that post-Soviet Russia was no longer a problem. Even when Western leaders realized that Russia under Vladimir Putin was becoming a problem, they exchanged political acquiescence with the Kremlin for economic benefits. Liberal democracies agreed to play a game of “let’s pretend,” in which they viewed Russia as a “normal country” while the Russian elite became integrated into the West — and corrupted the Western system from within.

That trade-off, many Western observers hoped, would keep Moscow from stirring up trouble beyond Russia’s borders. How could people whose ill-gotten gains are kept in Western banks and whose children attend Western schools be ill-disposed toward the West?

Putin’s invasion of Ukraine made it clear that he has stopped pretending. The Kremlin will not limit itself to cracking down on opposition within Russia’s borders.

The survival of Putin’s system is based on a permanent search for internal and external enemies. Ukraine has become the testing ground for a Kremlin that seeks to eliminate the very idea of revolution — not only in Russia but also in the former Soviet bloc — and to force the West to accept its right to do so.

The dismemberment of Ukraine also exposes the mechanism of the Russian matrix, in which foreign policy is the main instrument of domestic agenda. Those worrying only about Russian imperialism are wrong: Land-grabbing and “defending” the Russian-speaking population in other countries are the means to turn Russia into a state at war, making Putin a wartime president and strengthening his position at home.

Putin not only seeks to revisit the results of the end of the Cold War; he also wants a final say in establishing the new world order.Briefly, the Kremlin offers a new trade-off: In return for continued economic benefits for the West, Russia wants Western consent to its interpretation of the rules of the game.

This does not only undermine the Western vision of Kantian perpetual peace. It also creates new traps — for both sides.

On Russia’s side, the Kremlin has appropriated liberal rhetoric to legitimize its intervention in Ukraine. It demands that Kiev reform the Ukrainian constitution and allow for regional referendums on the right to secession and federalization.  Meanwhile, however, Russian citizens do not have such rights; advocating for them, in fact, can land one in jail.

So the Kremlin’s external rhetoric is undermining the legitimacy of the Russian regime. There will come a time when Russia’s Tatarswill say, “Why can’t we have a right to self-determination?” There will come a time when Russians will ask, “Why can’t we have a right to a referendum and a right to oppose the authorities?” In other words, we are witnessing a situation in which the Kremlin’s bid for survival is turning into a suicidal marathon.

The liberal democracies are not doing much better. Caught off-guard by Putin’s maneuvering, liberal democracies tell the Kremlin that if it stops further aggression, the West just might accept the new status quo. In fact, the April 17 Geneva agreement among the United States, European Union and Russia revealed the West’s inability to stop Russia’s efforts to destabilize Ukraine. Western demands for “de-escalation,” demarcated with fuzzy “red lines,” only provoked Moscow into moving further. By refusing to offer Ukraine real prospects for joining the Euro-Atlantic community through either European Union and/or NATO membership, the West is leaving Ukraine in a gray zone of uncertainty, vulnerable to falling into the Russian orbit.

While the Western sanctions that have been imposed so far have started to bite, they paradoxically strengthen Putin’s “besieged fortress” logic of survival. The Russian leader’s call this week for pro-Russian separatists in Donetsk to put their independence referendum on hold was not a surrender; it is an invitation to Kiev to accommodate the Kremlin’s interests, this time through “dialogue.”

[Meanwhile, Russia's state television Channel 24 in Donbas was telling people in each town where and when to find polling stations to vote on the referendums, so Putin's statements cannot be taken seriously. - J]

This call for dialogue by a leader who has limited political life in Russia to his own monologue sounds like cognitive dissonance. However, the Kremlin’s goal is more likely pragmatic: to switch to the role of peacemaker and strike a new Faustian bargain with the West, persuading it to agree to Ukrainian limited sovereignty and the right of external forces to teach Ukrainians what is right and what is wrong.

I’ll bet that Western leaders, tired of their Ukrainian headache, might agree with the bargain. And the Kremlin will join the Ukrainian “round table” moderators. Instead of an invader, Putin will be seen as the architect of the new postmodern reality.

Isn’t it hilarious?