Omega Owners Forum
Chat Area => General Discussion Area => Topic started by: Rods2 on 08 February 2015, 03:06:22
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http://euromaidanpress.com/2015/02/07/war-and-the-putin-negotiations/ (http://euromaidanpress.com/2015/02/07/war-and-the-putin-negotiations/)
Merkel and Hollande have been arch appeasers again and left a meeting with Putin where they have been trying to broker another ceasefire with their tails between their legs. There has been an article in the telegraph on this, with official Merkel and Hollande statements.
The reason why is that Putin is threatening to use nuclear weapons in Ukraine and the EU if the US and / or NATO countries supply Ukraine with defensive weapons.
http://euromaidanpress.com/2015/02/08/putin-threatens-to-use-nuclear-warheads-against-ukraine-eu/ (http://euromaidanpress.com/2015/02/08/putin-threatens-to-use-nuclear-warheads-against-ukraine-eu/)
Where I've been studying Putin for sometime, I'm well aware of the infinite value he places on his own life and the zero amount on everybody elses in the world, so an if I go as much of humanity goes with me is something I've known for sometime as a distinct possibility. There are rumours of discontent with his leadership amongst sections of the higher echelons in Russian society, especially the oligarchies which is going to increase the pressure on him but none the less the bully is going to have to be called.
http://euromaidanpress.com/2015/02/05/rift-emerging-between-putin-and-his-circle-russian-analyst/ (http://euromaidanpress.com/2015/02/05/rift-emerging-between-putin-and-his-circle-russian-analyst/)
With Reagan and Thatcher I have no doubt they would have faced such a bully down, much before now, and avoided a nuclear conflict, but with Obama / Rice, Cameron, Merkel and Hollande they are made of putty rather than iron!
Like Cuba such bullying is going to have to be called or we all cower and surcome to his nuclear threats and blackmailing, dangerous times lie ahead.
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I wondered who had given Merkel and Hollande the mandate to go and have discussions? Where is our mouse Cameron? (ah election year!)
I also wonder how good Putins personal body guards are? If the sanctions are really hurting the oligarchs it might not be beyond reason that they ordered a hit and replaced him with one of their amenable puppets. After all money is what really drives everything.
You are right we have dangerous times ahead. Still a war would resolve the Euro crisis at a stroke.
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What amazes me is that the events unfolding in Ukraine including Crimea are like a re-run of 1938/9. Don't hold your breath waiting for our illustrious leaders to open their history books. >:( >:( >:(
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http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/02/08/us-ukraine-crisis-kerry-idUSKBN0LC09A20150208 (http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/02/08/us-ukraine-crisis-kerry-idUSKBN0LC09A20150208)
Kerry denies there is a split between Germany and the US, where the US Government is being increasingly criticised on being out of step with Europe where Obama's untenable weak dealings with Putin are a little bit harder than Merkel / Hollande who will sell Ukraine out at any price. It is not their land and they have cars / ships they want to sell to Russia to keep their popularity and future votes as high as possible and they need to keep the Russian gas flowing to their countries.
Merkel record in Germany is one of always avoiding confrontation by basically giving in, she is known as the woman who has put German politics too sleep. Hollande is an idiot, the joke in the global presidential pack. >:( >:( >:(
The problem in the US is that you have a president who is a good orator but has not practical leadership experience, so there isn't any and has zero interest in foreign policy who doesn't read about 40% of his important briefs. Susan Rice Obama's FP expert is IMO probably not even as good as that useless EU bint Lady Ashton. The US is the world's policemen as between Obama / Rice between them they have managed to create tremendous global instability, where ruthless dictators and terrorist chance their arms to carve out growing empires.
This shower of sh*t is what represents Western security against a ruthless driven ex-KGB operator, which is why Ukraine is being sold out to Russia, as this pile of sh*t like Chamberlain want temporary peace at any price. >:( >:( >:(
Personally, in all of my lifetime I never known such a useless bunch of self-serving leaders as we have now in the West.
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Calm down Rods, you don't want another stroke! :o ::) ;)
I think you're probably right though in that the Western world has sat by and let Putin do what he likes in Ukraine. If anything the sanctions have just spurred him on. :-\
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My thoughts, for what they are worth, is that the leaders in the west just don't think Ukraine is worth getting into an all-out conflict with Russia for. It was, until recently, a soviet satellite and is not a member of NATO. Putin knows this, and will push it as far as he can.
If he decided to go further than Ukraine, then he knows the west would be left with no choice but to fight. That would be a different proposition.
The nearest analogy I can draw is what happened to Poland after the second world war. Their pilots came over here to fight with us and were fearless, but we still gave it to Stalin.
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And also, Rods, you know that if it came to a choice between giving up on Ukraine or risking your own peoples safety and security, you would do the same. The west feels no affinity with Ukraine and, if the worse did happen, it would be to stop Putin, not save Ukraine.
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My thoughts, for what they are worth, is that the leaders in the west just don't think Ukraine is worth getting into an all-out conflict with Russia for. It was, until recently, a soviet satellite and is not a member of NATO. Putin knows this, and will push it as far as he can.
If he decided to go further than Ukraine, then he knows the west would be left with no choice but to fight. That would be a different proposition.
The nearest analogy I can draw is what happened to Poland after the second world war. Their pilots came over here to fight with us and were fearless, but we still gave it to Stalin.
Spooky that part of Ukraine was basically part of Poland originally!
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Ukraine means 'in-land', 'native-land' and since the 16th century more commonly 'borderlands' and as a pivotal country in Europe, over the ages their borders and countries of influence have changed with parts of it for most of the time being a self ruled independent state. The formation of Ukraine as the Kievan Rus state started in 881 and grew until the 12th Century when it was the biggest state in Europe. All of the Rus states were ruled from Kiev so Ukraine actually existed before Russia did as a state. Ukraine is the mother of the Russian state, not the other way around like Putin likes to imply in his 'own version' of history for propaganda and annexation purposes.
Yes, the West part, West of the Dnieper river, has been part of Poland and at times other Western empires, which is why they are very Western looking. Putin's current war where the majority of Ukraine becomes part of the province New-Russia has not to date included this Western region as he has rightly concluded that trying to hold it against Ukrainian Partisan forces would make it too expensive in Russian lives. There is already considerable Partisan activity in the Donbass region and that will only get worse as Putin moves North and East.
The problem is that even if Putin annexes it the problem is not going to go away as there will be an Afghanistan situation in the heart of Europe. The much bigger danger is that to stay in power after most of Ukraine, and all of Moldova and Georgia are part of a Russian empire again, he will need need new enemies and wars. All of the immediate satellite '-stans' will work for a bit as he further expands his empire by taking them over to protect the 'Russian speaking populations', then he will be testing the water in the Baltics which are very difficult for NATO to defend, if they choose to do so. Personally, I don't think they will. Why would Aunty Merkel want to risk a war with Uncle Vlad to defend 3 very small countries?
The big advantage of backing Ukraine, with defensive weapons and financial help is that Ukraine as a non-NATO country is and will continue to do the fighting for the West and there won't be an infinitely more dangerous, direct NATO-Russian forces confrontation. So it is actually in the West's interests for Ukraine to do the fighting for them to a stalemate or even a partial victory. There two political reasons why this isn't happening: Obama / Rice long term global strategy that as long as you're nice to your enemies, eventually they will be as nice and dandy to you back, it is just going to take time. This resultant power-vacuum is why there is such horrendous global upheaval at the moment. With Europe it is all about their dependence on Russian gas, the biggest by far, by volume is Germany and Merkel is hoping, mistakenly IMO, the crocodile Putin will eat Germany last.
Poland has sensibly made the decision that they will need to fight Russia without US and NATO support and are modernizing and training to NATO standards and building up their military forces and civil defences up as fast as possible. Merkel has made it clear she is not interested in getting involved in any military conflict in any circumstances, East of the Oder river, which largely forms the German-Polish border.
One of the commitments of belonging to NATO is to spend 2% of GDP on defence. Only 4 countries do so: Estonia, Greece, UK and US. Germanies is 1.3% which is on the lower side of average for European countries. They expect like too many other European countries to have their collective defence on the cheap, with minimum spending and other NATO forces coming to the rescue if they get into trouble as a result.
Personally, I think the West is pinned its hopes on Putin falling due to a combination of economic sanctions and low oil price, if so it is an incredibly dangerous game as Putin has made it perfectly clear he intends to cling to power at whatever the cost, more strongly than a leech taking part in a bloodfest competition.
Putin allegedly killing 300 Muscovites by bombing apartment blocks to consolidate his power and as an excuse to start the Second Chechen war that killed over 300,000. This shows he will do whatever he has to do to anybody to stay in power. Any human life only has a slight worth to him if they are totally loyal and committed to work for his benefit, otherwise they are worth zero.
Unchecked, if he has to nuke a few billion people to stay in power he will do so and the danger of this will continue to grow as he gets bolder and consolidates his absolute position and authority as a ruthless Russian Dictator. More wise heads and sensible council are already ready gradually disappearing, replaced by more and more like minded flunkies, telling him what he wants to hear. The longer this continues the fewer sensible Kremin suits there will be around him to stop a human catastrophe.
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That's just one scenario, Rods, your scenario. You have a knack of making things sound like fact, but it isn't, it's merely conjecture. Granted, it's conjecture which may prove to be true, but you seem to be looking far into the future, and lots of events can happen in the mean time to change the course you have plotted.
You say he is willing to nuke billions of people to stay in power, but I think even he knows that there would be nothing left to rule. The old MAD (mutual assured destruction) scenario would happen and, personally, I dont believe he would allowed to get to that point.
Wait and see can sometimes appear as indecision, but it's better than ill thought out haste.
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Of course there is an element of conjecture, where many people are trying to mold the future and as outsiders, we only know what we are told about what happens at any leader's meeting, not what they don't want us to know.
But back to the immediate and conjecture: Was this another Ukrainian Partisan action last night or a drunk Russian terrorist having a Darwin moment and wondering what would happen if he threw a grenade into an ammo dump: Bangs like this are out of TB's league!
http://empr.media/video/conflict-zone/powerful-blast-of-russian-ammunition-in-donetsk (http://empr.media/video/conflict-zone/powerful-blast-of-russian-ammunition-in-donetsk)
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Agreement reached a few minutes ago, ceasefire from Sunday..... Apparently.
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Agreement reached a few minutes ago, ceasefire from Sunday..... Apparently.
Very good news if it holds and that's a very big if. ???
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Yes , good news.
I would like to see the details that were agreed that we won't be told.
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Agreement reached a few minutes ago, ceasefire from Sunday..... Apparently.
And will finish as soon as the froggies give ivan his helicopter carrier that they have built for Russia and been paid for but refuse to deliver because of all this shite ;)
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So, these "rebels" are suddenly all under Putin's command after all? ::)
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So, these "rebels" are suddenly all under Putin's command after all? ::)
Nah, its just a horrible rumour spread by the west ;D
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IMO unless Putin is under much more immediate financial pressure than the figures suggest or Obama has finally grown a pair and has told Putin he will send Ukraine defensive weapons, which pushes the Russian army casualties above what Putin can reasonably hide, then I'm very doubtful that the ceasefire will even stop the fighting, let alone hold if Putin has not achieved in secret Appendices the things that he has started the war over which are:
1. Ukraine agrees to never join NATO with a Donbas veto.
2. Ukraine agrees to never join the EU with a Donbas veto.
3. The Putin Donbas tail wags the Ukrainian dog on all important domestic issues, so the Ukrainian people continue to endure endemic corruption and are vassals of Putin and Russian Mafia gangs.
4. All other foreign policy is decided in the Kremlin and anything Putin disagrees with is voted on in the Donbass so Putins view always prevails.
5. Points 3 and 4 will make sure that the Ukrainian state and people remain very, very poor in a semi-failed state. Ukraine being a rich successful state like other ex-communist East European countries, with a free press and humans rights, will show the Russian people you can have it all and risk Putin suffering a Moscow Maiden. So Putin must have enough hold on Ukraine to make sure this never happens.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-31449981
Intense fighting has been reported in eastern Ukraine, a day after a peace deal was reached in Minsk.
I guess nobody told them.
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If they empty the arsenal before Sunday, it will save on packing ::)
Given that the ceasefire starts on Sunday, it rather suggests that the letter if the agreement has taken priority over the spirit of it, which to my mind rather misses the point :-\
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Yes I couldn't and still can't understand why they didn't order an immediate ceasefire. :-\
How many will die before Sunday? :'(
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Ah, I missed that the ceasefire hadn't taken effect yet, but you're right.. this isn't the 1800s when a rider had to be dispatched to the front lines to inform the men to stop fighting - I'm sure they have radios, mobile phones, computerised telecommunications etc.
"We have a ceasefire but we'll damn well keep killing them right up to the deadline" seems a little asinine, doesn't it.
I suppose Russia would say the Ukranians started it, as I can see why they'd want to continue to try and repel what they see as an invading force in their land, ceasefire or not..
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No real surprise as the Russian forces want to finish trapping 5-7000 Ukrainian troops is the Debaltseve salient. Russia is so desperate to do this that they have been reports of them using their air force (SU25's) to bomb Ukrainian positions. Russian deaths have been high where Ukrainian forces have given a good account of themselves defending their positions.
Personally, I think Ukrainian forces should have withdrawn from the salient sometime a go as there is only one road out of the area with lakes either side at the head of the area so it was always going to be very difficult to defend it. But it has the strategic value to Ukraine where it made life very difficult for the Russian resupply of Donetsk, where the main road was impassible to their supply convoys, where Ukrainian forces could attack them unless they were 'humanitarian' convoys allegedly supplying arms and ammunition to Russian forces.
When Minsk2 fails, Russia will then try to kick on in the spring all through South Ukraine, so they have a land bridge to Crimea and then into Moldova, to also stop their closer ties with the EU and potential NATO membership, in a bigger war which will include the use of the Russian air force to bomb many cities in Ukraine. In the meanwhile there will be more hand wringing from Obama, Merkel and Hollande as we inevitably head towards WWIII, which if any of them had any spines, could have been avoided by making Putin pay a far higher price in Ukraine.
Only good news today is that Canada have announced they will start supplying lethal weapons to Ukraine when Minsk 2 fails. Canada have been Ukraine's best western ally with much non-lethal aid, including volunteer medical teams supplied, to date.
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So, these "rebels" are suddenly all under Putin's command after all? ::)
Nothing I haven't been telling you for along time. It is a Russian invasion of Ukraine, it has been from day 1.
Igor Girkin was the FSB (KGB) leader that organised the attacks and takeover of Donetsk and surrounding areas Ukrainian administration buildings to form the DNR and was their military commander has been very honest on this after he was deposed.
The hard lesson that Russia is learning from what has happened in East Ukraine is the limits of their deniable hybrid wars. This is they don't work when you have a disinterested / hostile Russian population you are there to 'defend'. This is good as it will help to stop this happening in the Baltic countries. The other lessons is that employing Russian unemployed alcoholic bums with a bit of past military service as mercenaries is that they are not very good, are pretty uncontrollable, and are a definite liability by the time they are pissed on Vodka from the late morning onwards. One of the Ukrainian Oligarchs who has been supplying humanitarian aid to the Donbas has contraband confiscated by the Ukrainian authorities, where it contained a large percentage of tobacco and vodka. ;D ;D ;D
The Western MSM have been awful, it makes you realise how very poor they are, when you go to much more direct sources for news from both sides. The BBC is classed and joked about as a tragic laughing stock by those that know better. Like "How much they have earned off Putin to today for each use of the words 'rebels' and 'separatists'!" A big problem is that many Western correspondents covering Ukraine are based in Moscow and you don't get asked to leave Russia by broadly following the Putin propaganda line.
TBH covering what is happening in Ukraine through hundreds of direct sources has been a real eye opener for me on how very poor and manipulated the West's MSM are.
It has also exposed some sources for good like 'bellingcat' run by a Brit 'Elliot Higgins' where it is a forensic analysis website that is doing much good in gaining evidence on the shooting down of MH17 and also the use of chemical weapons by Assad in Syria which is still going on!
Another thing I have learnt is that the Kremlin always signal their intentions to test western reaction and if negative / push back against Russia they will reconsider, by they always get the green from Western indifference and slow reaction, which is why things are so very dangerous for Ukraine and Western Security right now.
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I agree with Rods, while the West is dithering over ISIS, Putin will keep pushing the envelope. The ceasefire is a meaningless peace (pun intended) of paper, just like Chamberlain's at Munich. >:(
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So, these "rebels" are suddenly all under Putin's command after all? ::)
Nothing I haven't been telling you for along time. It is a Russian invasion of Ukraine, it has been from day 1.
Hence the irony in my post. ;)
While he's taking the flack they are "rebels" and nothing to do with him. When the cards are on the table he's able to negotiate. Does he think we the west's leaders are daft? (Well, OK, I'll give him that one.).
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I agree with Rods, while the West is dithering over ISIS, Putin will keep pushing the envelope. The ceasefire is a meaningless peace (pun intended) of paper, just like Chamberlain's at Munich. >:(
What are they? Perhaps 20,000 fighters possessing some artillery and armour but no air force. They have an island of tenuously occupied territory in a sea of hostile regimes — those of Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Syria, Iran, Iraq and Iraq's Kurdish region. In total these command about two million troops who, with ample air power, can pulverise the Islamic State whenever the regimes summon the will to do so. This latter point will of course be the sticking point. We have seen Jordan break ranks but the others have vested interests, I suspect. Certainly Saudi Arabia.
Trouble is it is easier to latch onto ISIS than it is Putin.