RUSSIA-UKRAINE

 

#RussiaUkraine 

After WW2, as the power equations changed and the US emerged as one of the two great powers while most of the European nations went into a decline, the US adopted a policy wherein it started supporting various regimes and nations across the globe. Even UK was given aid by the US at one point in time. That initiative of the US consolidated his position and led to NATO and other strategic partnerships.

A time came when East and West Germany, belonging to two different military alliances, decided to unite. As the tools to dismantle the Berlin Wall were being gathered in 1988-89, USSR expressed its apprehensions about NATO's footprint in its neighbourhood. Michael Gorbachev was then assured by the US that despite unification, no NATO expansion would be allowed in the E/Europe.

When USSR got balkanised and the first Russian PM, Yeltsin, addressed the two houses at Washington, he expressed his desire to join NATO (Gorbachev had similar views) to ensure lasting peace and end of power tussle in the world.

However, the mother of all worldly problems, the USA, had other ideas. The huge defence industry mafia didn't like the proposal because a peaceful world would mean no sales of weaponry.

Not only Russia was kept away, but the US has also spared no opportunity to needle Russia since the 1990s. Unlike its post-World War 2 stance, it got aggressive with Russia. Bosnia conflict, NATO expansion in Russian bac
kyard continued. Sanctions, too, were imposed many a time.

Look at the NATO flags in the E/Europe; the assurance given to Russia was tossed out of a ventilator long back.

With CIA induced rebellion in Ukraine and Ukraine's fervent appeals to the EU and NATO to let it in, the window for action was closing fast. Any delay would have seen a NATO flag on the soft underbelly of Russia. 

Putin, therefore, has done what any nation worth its salt would do. Yes, war kills ppl; it is a bad thing to happen. But then Gita tells us that when the war is the only option left to counter the evil, let there be no hesitation in picking up your weapon.

I am not for war but I am with Putin on this issue (not that it matters, really)

The war will end the day a commitment not to flirt with NATO is extracted. If that be so, let it happen at the point of a bayonet; the sooner the better. Many are trying to create a villain out of Putin though unsuccessfully (remember, how we Indians went gaga over Biden and Kamla!). The roots, as stated earlier, lie in the US' interventionism (it is worse, if not as bad as the Chinese expansionism).So, the ongoing conflict started in 2014, when Biden was in the foreign office. CIA engineered a coup in Ukraine.

They removed the pro-Russian Ukrainian president who took refuge in Moscow. CIA's tools then took power by force and installed a pro-American government.

 After the coup, anti-Russian laws were immediately enacted.  Except that Ukraine is a country divided in two, in the west, they are Ukrainians, nationalists and neighbours to Europe, in the east and in the Crimea they are Russians.

 Russia with a coup has taken back Crimea without firing a shot (because 90% are Russians and have held a referendum).  While persecutions have been carried out in the other provinces (fines if you speak in Russian, shootings on those who prayed in Russian).  OSCE data speak of 14,000 civilian and military deaths in Donbas in 7 years.

 In 2014 there was the Odessa massacre, but they talked too little about it on TV.  The Ukrainians set fire to a union that was full of old people, women with children, those who escaped the fire were shot to death.

 Putin has repeatedly denounced the genocide in Donbas (14,000 dead) but no one in the Western media has elaborated.

 Then Trump came and Ukraine was left alone, he didn't care.  There was a ceasefire and the Minsk agreements were made which provided for the recognition of the two republics by Ukraine as regions with special status.

 This leads to the election of Biden, who immediately stated that Putin is a killer and that he would have made him pay.

 Biden's son Hunter has several pipelines in Ukraine and a millionaire business.  Biden has asked for Ukraine to join NATO, which is unacceptable for Russia.  Unacceptable because the missiles would be aimed 300 km from Moscow.  Because they would be focused on Beijing, China has supported Russia with very high gas contracts.

 Since December, the American hysteria about the start of the war has begun.  They pumped Zelensky to bomb the Donbas again to take it back by promising him military aid.  He fell for it.  Russia sat at the table with all the presidents and with all the foreign ministers but to no avail.  Nobody wanted to negotiate, but they argued that Ukraine has the right to join NATO.  Russia has offered to demilitarize Ukraine and make it a buffer state, like Switzerland, for the transit of gas and goods, but without weapons.  He was told no.

 I would add that the US has placed 14 chemical weapons manufacturing laboratories in Ukraine in recent years, along the entire Russian border.  Therefore a threat of not only missiles.

 At this point, it is not difficult to understand Putin's reaction, acclaimed by the pro-Russian populations of Donbas as a liberator of those areas that must not be annexed to Russia but given back to their freedom after the massacres of recent years.

All this reminds me of the events of 1947. In my native region of Rajouri-Poonch-Mirpur, a total of more than 50,000 Hindus and Sikhs were massacred and no one ever spoke about it! 

The power of narratives is huge but thanks to social media, truth now emerges faster than before.

Written by:-  Col (read) Ajay Kumar  Raina