Ukraine Invasion - Please do not post videos showing attacks/similar

[thep02]

Not a chance. The path to the EU offers Ukraine access to a market for Ukrainian goods and services nine times larger than Russia. It also offers a path towards lower levels of corruption, fairer dealings and the rule of law. Putin's Eurasian Union offers crony capitalism, oligarchism and criminality. The "deal" on offer was a clumsy bribe and not to be trusted - Russia has reneged on previous deals with the Ukraine, including the one where they promised to stay out of Ukrainian politics in return for the Ukraine giving up its Soviet era nuclear weapons.

Russia in its current form is unsustainable. It's only a matter of time imo before we see Russia in some form making moves to join the EU. I fully expect this to happen within my lifetime.

No it doesn't in actuality as Ukraine can't produce anything to eu standards and will have to rebuild all its power stations and upgrade all road and rail transport with no grant money all with a population of nearly 50m, tragedy lies ahead.

I would support a split of the crimea and Ukraine as for a variety of reasons they hate each other.

 

[scorza]

No it doesn't in actuality as Ukraine can't produce anything to eu standards and will have to rebuild all its power stations and upgrade all road and rail transport with no grant money all with a population of nearly 50m, tragedy lies ahead.

I would support a split of the crimea and Ukraine as for a variety of reasons they hate each other.

And what better motivation to produce stuff to EU standards than being able to sell to the EU. They aren't going to be expected to rebuild all of its power stations and travel infrastructure overnight lol.

This is a well-worn path to integration proven by many former Soviet nations. A deal with the EU will facilitate increased external investment in the Ukraine - something that they really need, not massive bribes going straight into the pockets of the oligarchs and their cronies.

Put simply, the Ukraine has a bright future if it moves towards eventual EU integration. If it joins Putin's customs union then its only future is corruption, crime and more civil unrest.

 

[Zethor]

Strawman again? I never argued Russia is a brilliant neighbour, I pointed out that is not simply destructive as you seem to think. World is not as black and white as you might think. You will find out later in life. .

Yes, not that destructive and to support this point of view, you present.. Belarus. I believe there's no shade of grey in dictatorship or chronic corruption, which is what Russia/Belarus stand for right now. I won't judge you for thinking otherwise but I think your opinion would've been different if you had felt their touch on your own skin or that of your close ones.

You seem to think gdp per cap is the only measure that matters, I have explained many times now why you are wrong, yet you still choose to believe in your own personal unsubstantiated criteria. That's normally what trolls do.

I've never claimed it's the only measurement that matters. I stated it's the measurement of my personal choice. You prefer another, good for you but that doesn't invalidate mine nor does it warrant the pointless insults.

The support for intergration for EU is around 50%

That's all that matters. It's pointless to poll the regions separatly because Ukraine is a Unitary Republic.

"A unitary state is a state governed as one single unit in which the central government is supreme and any administrative divisions (subnational units) exercise only powers that their central government chooses to delegate. "

 

[Nerusy]

Yes, not that destructive and to support this point of view, you present.. Belarus. I believe there's no shade of grey in dictatorship or chronic corruption, which is what Russia/Belarus stand for right now. I won't judge you for thinking otherwise but I think your opinion would've been different if you had felt their touch on your own skin or that of your close ones.




I've never claimed it's the only measurement that matters. I stated it's the measurement of my personal choice. You prefer another, good for you but that doesn't invalidate mine nor does it warrant the pointless insults.



That's all that matters. It's pointless to poll the regions separatly because Ukraine is a Unitary Republic.

"A unitary state is a state governed as one single unit in which the central government is supreme and any administrative divisions (subnational units) exercise only powers that their central government chooses to delegate. "

After I called you out on a strawman you go into yet another strawman, who was arguing about shades of dictatorship? Nobody but you with yourself.

I do not have a preferred measure, as an educated person on the subject I look at all the measurements and use them appropriately. You reject all but one measurement, I acknowledge all of the measures, that what makes you biased and uneducated. It's not a difference of opinion, it's a difference between being informed and you being uninformed. Fact of the matter is, Russia is not a poor country and I have proven that to you with statistics, it's your choice to be ignorant and refuse to acknowledged any other statics other than gdp per cap.

Last point, indeed there is not much incentive to poll them separably but that was not my point, the point is that the country is divided on the subject 50-50 and the numbers you yourself linked support my claim.

 

[Schlong&Stable]

It's worth noting that The Ukraine and Poland were both in a similar economic position in the early 90's. Now Poland's economy is twice the size of The Ukraine, thanks to access to European markets.

There is no future for The Ukraine with Russia. The latter is going to struggle to support itself in the next year when the oil glut comes, never-mind support The Ukraine.

 

[areksnumbr1sxylady]

I'm surprised to see quite a few pro-Russian voices around here. Almost every nation that has been 'blessed' with Russia as a neighbour has suffered from it, at various times in history. The bloodiest failed experiement in human history started in Russia (communism).
The fact that they are a governed by a corrupt, totalitarian, soviet nostalgic doesn't help either.

Given these facts, Russian hate shouldn't be a surprise.

Yeah we in UK have great history dont we? Of helping people during our Empire times....

We also have great modern history of bombing countries to middle ages.... In relevantly modern history what good have we done for any countries we intervened into?

 

[Jordeh]

found some high quality videos of the riots

http://vimeo.com/85772373
http://vimeo.com/87111967
http://vimeo.com/87325160

amazing stuff

 

[SS-89]

Wow! Those videos are crazy.

 

[Guerrilla]

Some shocking stuff in those videos.

 

[jas72]

This is pretty amazing

But with one downside, the current President has no support what so ever... The Russians consider him as a wet-wipe and no longer have faith in him what so ever...

Russian population of Ukraine is afraid that anti-Russian government will be installed (it is already happening).

Moreover, most industry is located in the Pro-Russian side of Ukraine and they worry that with introduction of "new world" technology they will be out of jobs and with the government ideology that Russians must go, they are afraid there will be no support for them what so ever.

I love the repeated use of "what so ever"

As for Ukraine I don't really care i'm in my 40s and life far to short to care about this stuff.

 

[do_ron_ron]

Yeah I had a look at my message and was like, yeah I cant even bother to re-read it myself...

So in short my opinion;

Its great that they ousted a stupid President, but it seems that they have given way to ultra nationalists who have Nazi tendencies and already showed it in the square by waving flags of Nazis and cheering for calls of ethnic cleansing of Ukraine from Russians, Russians make up something around 40% of Ukraine population.

Ukranians seem to not understand that no one offered to join EU, they think that if they sign the deal they will be able to work in EU.

Ukranians also dont seem to realize that the deal that was offered to them will ruin whole countries industry. While the Russian deal has seemed to be economically a lot more viable, but they seem to have this belief that once they join EU, they will live like Germany or UK... Completely dispersing countries like Portugal,Greece,Baltics saying that they will never be like them.

Currently, very anti-Russian and Nationalistic people are getting into power in Ukraine, they simply openly discriminate against Russian population, they are talking about banning Russian language completely and removing and banning all things reminding them of Russia or Soviet Union, while Nazi flag and insignia are allowed..... They see Nazis as liberators.

Overall it seems we supporting radicals once again, just like we do in Syria... I wonder how Germany feels about proposition of Ukraine government to teach kids that Nazis were pretty much the good guys and those who carried out ethnic cleansing were also good people fighting for freedom. This isnt being made right now, but the people who are getting into power right now are from very radical parties and they talked about this a lot, but been dismissed as idiots before.

I listened to Radio4 at 10pm during November and December last year and the nightly news program had a piece on the Ukraine every couple of days. They had correspondents from various radio and TV stations across Europe and experts from UK and European universities giving their views and latterly an ex EU commissioner.

The main points were the Ukraine is bust Greek style. Support for the EU(at that time), depending on who was asked was 50-55%. The East and South were mainly against the EU deal and pro-Russian. The EU commissioner said that the EU had handled it badly because they knew Ukraine's problem but with Greece, Spain etc they did not really want another basket case at this time.
The EU offered a trade agreement only while Russia offered cash to keep them afloat, cheap gas and continued imports of their goods. That was the position the Ukraine had at that time. Also mentioned was that some the goods the Russians imported from the Ukraine would not have sold in Europe due to being inferior(something Newsnight on BBC2 confirmed)
When you look at the main news however you would think, as stated above, that it was the people protesting against a dictator.
The EU commissioner had a warning that the Ukraine would face 10-15 years of mass unemployment, the mass closure of Soviet era factories and decimation of services before they turned things round but that was only if the EU dealt with it's problems and there was no further shocks to the world's economy.

Personally I cannot see they had much alternative than to bin any EU trade agreement.

 

[thep02]

^^ Agreed.

 

[areksnumbr1sxylady]

People also seem to forget that there are numerous protests all around EU against EU...

Just one of those countries,

What if Russia backed the protesters and started issuing sanctions and funding them? Cause thats what we did in Ukraine, funny thing is that if you have this point of view, you get labeled "putinist" and asked if you are "Russian" and generally dismissed....

 

[scorza]

As I predicted, while the West is preaching working together with Russia for a stable Ukraine, in scenes reminiscent of Kaiser Wilhelm prior to WW1, Vladimir Putin is preparing for an invasion by ordering a combat readiness review for Russian troops along the Ukrainian border.

 

[Zethor]

The main points were the Ukraine is bust Greek style. Support for the EU(at that time), depending on who was asked was 50-55%. The East and South were mainly against the EU deal and pro-Russian. The EU commissioner said that the EU had handled it badly because they knew Ukraine's problem but with Greece, Spain etc they did not really want another basket case at this time.
The EU offered a trade agreement only while Russia offered cash to keep them afloat, cheap gas and continued imports of their goods. That was the position the Ukraine had at that time. Also mentioned was that some the goods the Russians imported from the Ukraine would not have sold in Europe due to being inferior(something Newsnight on BBC2 confirmed)
When you look at the main news however you would think, as stated above, that it was the people protesting against a dictator.
The EU commissioner had a warning that the Ukraine would face 10-15 years of mass unemployment, the mass closure of Soviet era factories and decimation of services before they turned things round but that was only if the EU dealt with it's problems and there was no further shocks to the world's economy.

Personally I cannot see they had much alternative than to bin any EU trade agreement.

The EU offered a trade deal that did not have any conditions regarding Ukraine's foreign policy where as the Russian "offer" did have such a condition - ditch the EU. That's the issue here, the Ukrainians have had enough Russian abuse after decades of USSR occupation followed by decades of blackmails, corruption and political pressure. If Russians cared about the Ukrainians or at least the 20% ethnic Russians living in Ukraine, they would offer the cheap gas/loans regardless of decisions related to the EU.

The alternative was to politely tell the Russians that Ukraine is a sovereign country and an agreement with, ironically, Russia's main trade partner, the EU, should not affect their relations. This is the 21st century, shaking fist international relations doesn't work anymore in this part of the world.

 

[thep02]

As predicted synagogues are now being attacked and huge crowds of Russian, Tatars and Ukrainian men and boys are massing in the Crimea, while street thugs and gang leaders are jockeying for positions in a new govt, more great work by the Atlantacists in the eu.

 

[Zethor]

As predicted synagogues are now being attacked and huge crowds of Russian, Tatars and Ukrainian men and boys are massing in the Crimea, while street thugs and gang leaders are jockeying for positions in a new govt, more great work by the Atlantacists in the eu.

Every former communist country that signed an agreement with the EU or joined it experienced decreased corruption, increased productivity/growth, literacy and pretty much all aspects of life improved. The issues in Ukraine are not the EU's fault, they are the direct result of constant Russian bullying diplomacy.

 

[do_ron_ron]

The EU offered a trade deal that did not have any conditions regarding Ukraine's foreign policy where as the Russian "offer" did have such a condition - ditch the EU. That's the issue here, the Ukrainians have had enough Russian abuse after decades of USSR occupation followed by decades of blackmails, corruption and political pressure. If Russians cared about the Ukrainians or at least the 20% ethnic Russians living in Ukraine, they would offer the cheap gas/loans regardless of decisions related to the EU.

The alternative was to politely tell the Russians that Ukraine is a sovereign country and an agreement with, ironically, Russia's main trade partner, the EU, should not affect their relations. This is the 21st century, shaking fist international relations doesn't work anymore in this part of the world.

As was mentioned in the various progs, Ukraine is a Greece - bust - unable to service its debts. There was only one deal on the table that would not cause massive upheaval for the next 10-15 years.
The EU is still trying to sort out the last load of basket cases within Europe.
As happened with Poland, the educated and skilled will move to the west, these are the people they will need.

As for anti-Russian feeling, as todays news makes clear there is a sizeable percentage of Ukrainians that want closer ties with Russia.

They are between a rock and a hard place. It is not a case of which is the best choice but which will do less damage.

 

[do_ron_ron]

Every former communist country that signed an agreement with the EU or joined it experienced decreased corruption, increased productivity/growth, literacy and pretty much all aspects of life improved. The issues in Ukraine are not the EU's fault, they are the direct result of constant Russian bullying diplomacy.

I prefer the words of the EU commissioner I heard.
10-15 years of mass unemployment.
Decimation of pensions and services.
Mass closure of factories.
The skilled and educated migrating to the west, the type of people the country needs.

The former countries like Poland all went through that process but the world was a different place. Firms rushed to take advantage of cheap labour in these countries. Not any more. There has been a world recession. Wages in the west have been forced down by the recession.

It certainly was not the EU's fault it was the Ukraine's, You cant have it both ways saying it is

...Ukraine is a sovereign country... This is the 21st century, shaking fist international relations doesn't work anymore in this part of the world.

the direct result of constant Russian bullying diplomacy.

 

[jas72]

Every former communist country that signed an agreement with the EU or joined it experienced decreased corruption, increased productivity/growth, literacy and pretty much all aspects of life improved. The issues in Ukraine are not the EU's fault, they are the direct result of having half your population as russian immigrants and criminals.

Fixed