Ok, you don't need to read my posts here? Ever thought of that?

It's an ego boost tbh

If you need d2jsp to boost your ego, get help.

Your NAFO cope posting is all the help I need lol

Ok

I do gotta hand it to him, despite being mocked and consistently proven wrong for like...2 years straight? He still manages to show up here every day to copy and paste the latest wild ramblings of some eastern European grifter

In order to answer this question I need to first outline:

Prior to 2014 Ukraine was, broadly, within Russia's direct sphere of influence. That is to say that Russia had a degree of control over Ukrainian geopolitical affairs and the West (the US) to a degree, accepted this. After 2014 (where my position is it was a US Backed Coup) Russia did not have any control over Ukrainian geopolitical affairs except via threats from Russia. i.e. the Russian "control" from within the Ukrainian political system was now gone. The goalposts had "moved". The prize was Ukraine in Nato and Russia out of Crimea and the Black sea. Neither of these things are something that Russia would countenance either then or now.

After 2014 Russian assets (FSB or whoever) were employed to destabilize Ukraine, specifically its political structure but also to support the ethnic Russians being shelled in Eastern Ukraine (of which over 50,000 died). The most plausible aim of Russia after 2014 would have been to remove / replace the US backed government with a Russia backed government. This to my mind was Russia's overarching goal. i.e. to reclaim Ukraine within its sphere of influence. To my mind Russia was wholly incompetent, inefficient and ineffective at achieving this goal and has no hope of achieving this goal without the use of force. Russia was completely outplayed by the US in this regard.

So to answer your question : I would say that prior to 2014 Russian assets had control over the political will in Ukraine. After 2014 they did not. The destabilizing event was the coup in 2014 and the FSB were completely inadequate in their attempts to achieve Russia's goals.

If your question relates to the actual coup my response is: I dont care what either side did on the day. The means are not relevant, only the outcome. The outcome, for history, is that the US coup was successful. To elaborate and to clarify (noting I do not agree with the phrase the ends justify the means) When you and Djunior argue about what ships were sunk, what planes were downed, I dont care (the means) what I care about is the knock on impact - i.e. If Russia loses X amount of units then Option A they add more pawns or Option B they throw away the chess board. I do not believe that Option C Russia resigns, is realistic.

This post was edited by ferdia on Mar 5 2024 01:28pm

Interesting take, will respond. But just to be clear, 50,000 died?

As I understand it yes (at least) 50,000 dead in eastern Ukraine for the period 2014 up until the outbreak of the Russian invasion. To expand on this there is ample records available (which have been posted) which document the shelling (using cluster munitions) of Ukrainian civilian populations, by Ukraine, and there are interviews from Zelensky related to his (wholly negative) view of the ethnic Russians living within Ukraine.

Even now Ukraine is bombing civilian centre's but this is not palatable so we dont see it on the BBC etc. My view is that a news broadcaster should be impartial.

This post was edited by ferdia on Mar 5 2024 01:36pm

When I referred to FSB actions I should be more specific, I mean the actions taken against protestors. As in themselves firing rifles from buildings into protestors or enabling Ukrainian services to do so at the behest of Yanukovych; Who it is fair to say was elected predominantly by Russian speakers in Ukraine, reneged on the agreed path of Ukraine towards EU membership and eventually ended up as a Kremlin stalwart in Ukraine. Wrongly or rightly.

So I refer to the actions taken around the time of what you said was a "US backed coup" and consider the FSB actions as opposing and equivalent.

Since we are considering this early period is it right to include the casualties of what I assume you are referring to as the "the war in Donbas" period in particular 2014-2022?
Also I assume the 50,000 number are casualties directly resulting from that conflict and not specifically Ukrainian shelling of Russian speaking regions?
Happy to be wrong in that assumption following your clarification of this.

So I would add that yes the CIA likely had involvement in any regional instability. Yes John McCain made a speech in Kiev; And yet concurrently FSB snipers or Ukrainian snipers at FSB instruction literally fired into demonstrators. So are those events at least equally deserving of derision? I would attest they absolutely are.

Just on a more general level, if we take what is claimed to be true. That Ukraine was in Russia's sphere of influence. Is it not fair to assume that Russia would be the principle actor in creating unrest and instability in that sphere?
After all it plays into the widely accepted policy of Putin to incorporate all of or as many of the Russian speakers outside the country, into the Russian federation.

This post was edited by Prox1m1ty on Mar 5 2024 02:07pm