http://www.globalresearch.ca/ukraine-transition-government-neo-nazis-in-control-of-armed-forces-national-security-economy-justice-and-education/5371539

yeah. i guess it gives 'em a good line to run with. and it's not entirely unwarranted, even if it is exaggerated. but you just stormed parliament with bats and shovels and installed a fascist as deputy prime minister, yulia. maybe it's time to have an out-of-body experience and realize how that appears to the rest of the world, and put it into some context.

http://www.kyivpost.com/content/politics/tymoshenkoukraine-and-the-world-must-act-immediately-to-stop-russian-aggression-338081.html

i actually don't expect that sort of thing to fly. she's not a serious candidate on either side of the country. whatever the merits of her concern, i'd expect pretty much everybody on both sides to see through it.

in the end, we can't have patience for fascists. if the russians come down hard on these people, that's a war they're on the right side of.

i mean, if we want to talk history, russia has a pretty brutal history with fighting fascism. 20 million is a lot of dead people. that's something else we don't really realize in the west. well, i think we do know this, but it's not our mythology. wwII was primarily a conflict between germany and russia. russia was near obliterated in the process.

as much as ripping out the mongols was a part of the russian ethnogenesis, defeating the fascists formed a core of soviet identity. it's too early to have lost that.

so, the flip side is that that's a heavily emotional concern on the russian side.

it doesn't really matter where it pops up, to me. fascism is to be fought against everywhere, using all means possible.

that's not to put too much trust in the russians...

...but i can't do anything but support anything that takes these people out of power. it doesn't matter how they got there. uprising. coup. election. fascists cannot be passively allowed to govern.

under any circumstance.

'cause you know what they say about fascists: they're only good when they're dead.

korea's a stalemate, this is just bluffing. but it goes back to what i was saying.

http://en.itar-tass.com/russia/721379

any movement at all by the south is going to lead to a chinese occupation. that's how this mess started in the first place. that's a strategic and historical boundary. any attack on north korea is an attack on china.

so, the americans won't do that.

conversely, any attack from the north is an attack on japan, which will activate a flurry of defense alliances.

nothing can move on the issue without sparking a war between the united states and china.

so, nothing will move on the issue.

what north korea actually is is a buffer state.

they know they can squeeze some concessions out by being naughty...

...but, despite the rhetoric, the truth is that the situation is very stable and in no threat of changing any time soon.

and if some drunk general in north korea gets an ego trip or something? chinese occupation before the americans can blink. they won't have to take him out. the chinese will do that themselves.

that's spheres of influence again.

http://en.itar-tass.com/russia/721385
http://en.itar-tass.com/russia/721602

ok, let's just be clear that the rhetoric coming out of moscow and crimea and eastern ukraine is that putin is pledging support should the local governments request aid in putting down supremacist movements. they're talking about sending "peacekeeping troops", not invading and annexing the region.

yes, "peacekeeping" means "protecting strategic interests". regardless, this is all centered around the invitation. that's an extremely important point that the western media is completely misreporting in it's "putin to invade ukraine" headlines.

that doesn't negate anything i said. it was meant in that context, because "peacekeeping" means "occupying". but it's imperative that it's specified properly.

this is another interesting twist: might the russians have more leverage over the military than the parliament?

i'm sure there's still a soviet-era culture within it. and i'm sure they understand what's really happening.

http://rt.com/news/ukraine-navy-flaghsip-protest-389/

if the russians can orchestrate a military coup, that would eliminate the need to invade directly. it's of course not ideal, but what just happened puts those sorts of options on the table.

the negative side of it is that russia does support some brutal dictatorships in the former ssrs. belarus. kazakhstan. i don't think anybody wants to wish that fate on ukraine.

but the russians may see it as a pragmatic solution to restore order.

"The participants of the rally were demanding to hold a referendum on the future of the region, and particularly, on the status of Russian language. "

let's not lose sight of what the reaction is about: language rights, not successionism.

http://rt.com/news/donetsk-kharkov-ukraine-protest-365/

again, this is a big step forward in russia's recently more assertive behaviour. again, i have to point out that the russians have been patient to the point of being naive. it was a matter of time, if the americans continued their aggressive policies.

i'm starting to come to the conclusion that the box has now opened: that the donkey has startled the elephant in the room into stomping too hard and it has awoken the bear from hibernation.

if russia starts invading former ssrs, i don't think it will be limited to ukraine. i think it will be indicative of a larger shift in strategy that will include more assertive roles in the caucasus, central asia, eastern europe, iran and the arab world.

i'm not using the pandora's box analogy lightly. they've been trying very hard to prevent this. but when they make the decision to use force, they're going to be liberal about it.

http://en.ria.ru/world/20140302/188009718/Putin-Tells-Obama-Russia-Will-Act-In-Case-of-Ukraine-Violence.html

there's just a really big historical line here. it's about respecting spheres of influence. the historical boundary is somewhere through poland and across through to moldova. the baltic countries are historically on the other side of it, but they're also different, culturally, and so the russians could grit their teeth and deal with it.

but ukraine is the russian sphere, by any understanding of history. crossing that line throws a lot of stated and unstated understandings out the window. if the americans think they can meddle in ukraine, why wouldn't the russians think they can meddle in poland or latvia? or mexico? or cuba?

opening this box means discarding a desire for peace, however naive it may have been, and going back to cold war type geopolitics.

something else to keep an eye out for is how this connects with china's increasing concern about american containment policies. that's the basis for a strengthening alliance.

mercosur?

there's a lot of ways the russians can cause some havoc, if they want to. but they haven't wanted to. they've wanted peace.

that might be in the process of changing.

btw, how would the turks like to deal with an emboldened and better funded kurdish resistance movement?

if the americans wanted a world war, it looks like they've got it.

see, this is why these people will not win an election.

this puts putin's call into some more context, and provides some evidence that kiev is planning a larger invasion.

http://rt.com/news/russia-crimea-sieze-gunmen-344/

that being said, this is a baby step towards a more assertive russia and that's a cause for alarm if you're concerned about global peace.

i mean, the americans have been pushing the russians around for decades, now. just poking them with stick after stick. again, it's in the pnac. and they've refused to react. it's astounding that the russians have kept up good faith for so long, with the expansion of nato and the construction of missile shields and the containment policies. we've managed to dodge large scale war in yugoslavia (a few times), afghanistan, iraq, libya, syria....

....except the russians have said libya was too far, and they've pushed back in syria. but there hasn't been any troop deployment. until now, in ukraine. which is very close to home.

i'm from canada. i know what "peacekeepers" are. but it's not yet an invasion. it is, however, a suspension of the considerable russian naivete that has prevented a world war up to now. that's cause for concern...

ideally, the americans back off. i couldn't imagine somebody thinking they actually will.

http://rt.com/news/russia-ukraine-approve-miltary-371/

"There have been widespread reports of significant Russian military activity, including the movement of tanks, troops and helicopters, across the Crimea in recent days. But Russia has insisted that all the movements are allowed within the framework of a 1997 agreement with Ukraine about the use of naval bases."

ok, so that's the first thing. it's not an invasion because the area is already occupied by a substantial russian military presence. the ukrainians are saying they don't like this movement, but the russians are pointing out that it's permitted under the law. the western media seems to have taken this and run with it, not fully aware of the facts.

the second question is who the gunmen are, and the answer is apparently "self-defense squads", which americans should understand as militia groups. this is what is supposed to happen in america under the conditions of a foreign-backed coup.

the third question is what this authorization is about. crimea isn't really a province. it's an autonomous region. that means it has some sovereignty. i don't know what the exact legality of inviting russian troops into the region is, but if the idea of sovereignty means anything it means not having to ask kiev for permission. the legalities aside (they're not that important), moving troops in upon request is not an invasion in the sense it's usually used. and, yes, this guy was elected.

nor does it imply the imminent break up of the area.

so, these are three separate things:

(1) legally allowed movements
(2) militia groups protecting the people from foreign invasion, as they're theoretically supposed to.
(3) russian "peacekeepers" coming in upon request to occupy the region to protect their interests and "maintain order".

a possible (4) is a referendum, but i remain skeptical it will pass.

http://en.ria.ru/world/20140301/187992857/Crimean-Leader-Appeals-to-Putin-for-Help.html