.PID: SX 4.5/P/6.0W5 RB10275
.MSGID: 1:135/382 07e0d0d3

 Without true freedom of speech and the press no one can have any
 idea what is going on in Russia. However, any govt that puts a
 woman's music group in prison for protest songs, and for a long
 time, is not a govt I believe is honest.

  BK>> I wonder about that. I wonder if, maybe, he's got it backwards. I
  BK>> wonder if the result of doing nothing might not be what leads to
  BK>> the war nobody wants.

  BK>> We have long been told that Hitler might have been stopped,
  BK>> probably would have been stopped, if the other nations had stepped
  BK>> in with his first aggression against the Sudentenland, against
  BK>> Austria, against those who could not defend themselves.

  BK>> What makes anyone think Putin is any less than Hitler?

 AK> Your words are a twaddle unless you see the columns of
 AK> Russian tanks and troops marching along the Ukraine roads.

 Once that happens it's too late. What we do know is those troops
 and tanks were massed on the Ukraine border, but have recently
 been withdrawn.

 What Putin has accomplished is to give the former Soviet states
 reason to believe he is trying to reconstitute the Soviet Union.
 That gives them reason to ask for more US military aid,
 including the anti-missile systems that had been canceled a few
 years ago.

 ...

 AK> Who told you that countries cannot split up? Why do you
 AK> think that Ukraine cannot split like Yugoslavia,
 AK> Czechoslovakia?

 I have no problem with countries splitting up. What I do have is
 when one portion wants to secede, and the reports are of masked
 gunmen patrolling the cities. If they are legitimate, why are
 they masked?

 If the people who live there want to split off, I don't have a
 problem with that. I do have a problem with it being done by
 masked gunmen.

 AK> It is not pro-Russian forces are fighting
 AK> in eastern Ukraine. It is the Russian people who always
 AK> lived there, in eastern and southern Ukraine, and they were
 AK> extremely insulted when pro-western rebels removed their
 AK> candidate (Yanukovich, who won democratic elections) from
 AK> power.

 Being insulted is not ground for shooting up the place, and
 killing people. It is not grounds for seizing power. Now, how
 many Russian people live there? And why are Russians living in
 Ukraine and claiming the right to decide who rules the country?

 AK> Rebels in Kiev were minority, but they captured
 AK> power by force, violating all democratic institutions and
 AK> election results.

 By force? It seems most of the force was used against them.
 According to what I have seen, the constitution was rewritten
 after Yonukovych took power, not by a constitutional convention
 or such, but by the courts. The protestors started out demanding
 the previous constitution be reinstated.

 ----------------------------------------------------------------
 http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-25182830

 But it was the deaths of at least 88 people, many of them
 protesters shot dead by uniformed snipers in 48 hours of
 bloodshed, that ultimately brought him down.
 ----------------------------------------------------------------

 AK> Putin is not Hiller, just because Russia is not a fascist
 AK> Germany.

 AK> Russia doesn't want to rule over the world and
 AK> topple those governments it doesn't like. It is somebody
 AK> else.

 Russia maybe not, Putin I'm not so sure of.

  BK>> When Obama declared he was pulling our troops out of Afghanistan
  BK>> and Iraq the Republicans ranted and raved about how no one would

 ...

 AK> It easy to explain. When you conquer a country _by military
 AK> invasion_ you, as a rule, can find collaborators only among
 AK> bastards, traitors and thieves. So, it is no wonder when

 Afghanistan was the base for the 9-11 attack. Iraq was a war for
 oil. We should have been out of Afghanistan quickly, and never
 in Iraq. I was talking about the republican reaction to a screw
 up series of wars, vs doing nothing or something now.

 ...

  BK>> No matter what the status of the Ukraine and it's government,
  BK>> Russia is clearly an outside invader. Failing to come to their aid
  BK>> would be a clear sign to Putin that the West really is too weak to
  BK>> stop him. Not too militarily weak, on that we outweigh them in
  BK>> spade, but too weak morally.

 AK> It is not correct. Ask people from Israel or the US what an
 AK> invasion looks like. So far you can't tell of Russian
 AK> "invasion". People must be very accurate in such things.

 Putin has backed off. However, it certainly appeared he wanted
 to cut the Ukraine up.


 http://tinyurl.com/lsgsoqd

 washingtonpost
 ousted-ukraine-president-warns-of-civil-war-criticizes-us-for-
 aiding-current-government

 Yanukovych last appeared in public Feb. 28, in a news
 conference also in Rostov, when he asserted he was still the
 legal president of Ukraine and that he was not calling upon
 Russia to intervene militarily.

 The next day, Russia's parliament authorized President Vladimir
 Putin to send troops into Ukraine, and soon thereafter Russia
 asserted that Yanukovych had requested the intervention the day
 after he spoke to the press.

 ...

 Ousted Ukraine president warns of civil war, criticizes U.S.
 for aiding current government

 ...

 "The cities are being patrolled by masked gunmen," Yanukovych
 said in a statement to the press in the southern Russian city
 of Rostov-on-Don.

 Yanukovych, who read from a statement in Russian and did not
 take questions, accused the West and the United States of
 backing fascists in Ukraine - another regular allegation being
 made by Russian authorities.

 ...

 On March 6, after gunmen took over the parliament building in
 the Crimean regional capital, Simferopol, a pro-Russian
 leadership was installed. Then the regional parliament voted
 behind closed doors for Crimea to leave Ukraine and join
 Russia, setting a referendum for Sunday to validate their
 decision.

 Some links to look at.

 Wall street journal
 http://tinyurl.com/ohlh6ys

 http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-27633117

 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2014_Ukrainian_revolution


BOB KLAHN bob.klahn@sev.org   http://home.toltbbs.com/bobklahn

... I'm not lost -- I'm "locationally challenged"
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