Correct me if I am wrong on this... Elected government of Ukraine forced out by protesters; Russia & government of Ukraine that was formed somehow get into it; people in the eastern part of Ukraine vote with Russia but the west says this election (like the first one) doesn’t count; a truce is called; the current Ukraine government calls off the truce and fighting resumes.
The elected but deposed government is not considered to be the legitimate government, but the one that somehow formed and took over is. Both elections have been called illegitimate by the US because it didn’t like the results. The protesters who overthrew the elected government are legit, but the people who are opposed to the I-don’t-know-how-it-came-about government are rebels. And Russia is the only dishonest player in this?
Would someone explain to me how we know who is what, what is going on, and why anyone believes what really happens in this conflict? Does it not appear to the rest of the world that the US only promotes democracy when the people it wants to win are elected? And why do we trust any government, including our own, to tell us the truth?
As someone said, the first casualty of war is the truth.
You pretty much got it right...
The EuroMaidan “supporters” would like everyone to forget that if it weren’t for the coup, NONE of this would be happening, people wouldn’t be dying in droves, and Crimea would still have a Ukrainian Flag flying over it.
I'll try.
Elected president of Ukraine forced out by protestors because it reneged on a deal with the EU because of Russian pressure. Russians are miffed, because they consider Ukraine a vassal state, seize Crimea, conduct a sham election. Separatists in the east seize various towns with Russian help, claiming broad popular support. There is fighting on both sides, truces or not.
The deposed president flees to Russia, replaced by a democratically-elected president. Most of the MPs remain. No voting occurred in the separatist regions because the separatists, and Russia, wouldn't allow it.
The Russians, as always, claim it is our fault.
There was never any truce. The “truce” was a unilateral ceasefire called by the Ukrainian side which the Russian ethnic separatist terrorists never agreed to or abided by at all.
1)The elected government in Ukraine was not forced out. Yanukovych fled the country after the parliament turned on him due to the mass shootings. The interim government was the same one that was elected in 2012 all along. Yanukovych had also already been having people kidnapped and tortured by the Berkut, and acting unconstitutionally in limiting free speech, in his suppression of the Ukrainians.
2) Russia, which is likely behind the escalation in the first place (it was Russian trained SBU agents who did the shooting), invaded Crimea while claiming it was a spontaneous reaction. Putin admitted that the "concerned citizens" in Crimea were, in fact, Russian forces.
3) All the polls in both the East and South, and the actual election that occurred, which covered the majority of the East and South, all show that the separatists only enjoy a minority of support, and this by the communists and other criminal elements. The "election" that occurred was done at gun point, and had a soviet style result of something like 89 percent, which was the exact number they said it would be before the election even occurred.
4) At no time during the truce did the Russkies stop attacking, although they constantly claimed that the Ukrainians wouldn't stop attacking.
Lastly, the whole invasion of Ukraine is, publicly, in order to reestablish the USSR's borders. This is the explicit ambition of Russia's ultranationalists (who are either communists or national socialists, real live Nazis) to establish a "Novorussiya." The idea that the Ukrainians are Nazis is just what the Russkies say about everybody all of the time anyway if they oppose the Kremlin. These same idiots are just as likely to call you a "yid," or a closet Jew, while simultaneously accusing you of being a Nazi.