Posted on 02/22/2020 3:24:15 AM PST by tlozo
Russia could regain its status as “a global rival” for Western powers through some degree of “integration” with Ukraine, Russian President Vladimir Putin said...
Putin made the comment while reiterating his belief that Ukrainians and Russians are “the same people,” a claim widely perceived as a means to justify Russian influence over former Soviet nations. His reference to “integration” is even more unusual, and incendiary, according to Western analysts, given that the two countries have been locked in conflict since Russia’s annexation of Crimea and invasion of Ukraine in 2014...
Multiple Western analysts noted that Putin has been pressuring Belarus to form a new political union with Russia, a political shift that could enable him to remain president of the expanded Russian state. That effort is anchored in an ambiguous 1998 political agreement between the two countries. Ukrainian authorities never signed such a deal, and the current conflict has alienated the two peoples despite Putin’s long-running effort to deny that Russian military forces invaded Ukraine.
“The Ukrainians understand now that the Russians, particularly this group in the Kremlin, are no longer their brothers,” another former U.S. official familiar with Russian-Ukrainian issues told the Washington Examiner. “From the Ukrainian standpoint, it's ludicrous to even contemplate.”
Alisa Muzergues, a foreign policy analyst at GLOBSEC, echoed that assessment and added that the attempt to maintain influence in Ukraine is partly a way to appeal to the domestic Russian population.
“Putin is striving for recognition of Russia as a superpower, but while having limited capacities, it can only have a direct influence on its immediate neighborhood,” she told the Washington Examiner. "And Ukraine is indeed a crucial player in this game of Putin’s influence due to a number of reasons: economic, cultural, historic — but also it is important for his influence inside Russia.”...
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonexaminer.com ...
....” there are paid trolls right here on FreeRepublic”....
Name them.
“There was no Russian invasion of Ukraine”
Suck up that Russian RT propaganda.
You are simply a useful idiot, now.
Isn't that like speaking to Sudeten Germans in 1937?
“What is the mechanism of Russians killed 13k Ukrainians in your opinion?”
Christ Ivan, learn better English, or go back to Novorsibirsk.
“US sends advisors to Syria because the government allegedly kills some ‘opposition”
Tovarich. GFY Ivan...Russian PoS
If you are throwing accusations you need to back it.
Name the Russians trolls and say what of their arguments are wrong.
You aren’t doing it.
Your type is throwing accusation not based on facts and when confronted wit the factual evidence you are getting lost just to appear in another discussion spitting the same nonsense.
I was more that once accused of being a liar but always managed to prove my point and the accusers disappeared.
Don’t you think this ‘Russian troll’ bullcrap is out of fashion? Especially since your girl Hillary failed at it big time.
“No one ‘took Crimea away’ from Ukraine, Crimea exercised their natural right to self determination”
Incorrect - useful idiot. Having permission from Putin to have an election in Ukraine is not legal.
The election is considered illegal by Ukraine and is an illegal annexation by the entire world, less the Russian criminal state.
Not at all, I think you are one of the most informed on East European affairs here to think this way.
Those areas have a lot of ethnic Russians.
Yeah, Trump wanted closer ties, but Trump slaughtered over 200 former Spetznaz Wagner boys.
I guess that getting closer.
Putin thinks that about all Slavs. They are "brothers" and Russia is "The Big Brother".
The opinion of ‘all of the World’ is barely important for the residents of Crimea who now have the first world infrastructure and four times the incomes they had in Ukraine. They’d vote the same way many times over.
Trump didn’t do it. Mattis did it to stroke his ego and it is the reason why he is not in his position anymore. This acted hurted US interest big time.
Not at all. Bulgarians, Czech and Polish aren’t a part of it. Generally I disagree with Putin about Ukraine too. In my opinion Crimea should stay Russian and the rest of Southeast independent. The rest of Ukraine has no business to be supported by Russia.
„Kurica nie ptica, Polsza nie zagranica”.
IIRC Putin even suggested that Western Ukraine could become independent and even join NATO. I don’t know whether or not Kiev would be part of it, though. I can’t see Russians just letting Kiev go.
I support Putin. He has all the right enemies.
LOL.
The US political sphere doesn’t revolve around your pathetic Mother Russia.
It was a beautiful thing, killing those pawns of Putin.
Almost as awesome as when the Javelins stopped the tanks and mechanized cold.
1. You are a Russian...your English sucks (signs of the inept Russian collapse I suppose)
2. Your propaganda is weak ass cold war shit. It is as effective as the Soviet Union.
3. You’re not in commisar kangaroo Soviet court. Your weak questions are propaganda deflections.
4. I don’t debate commies, I kill them.
“It is hard to argue with a person engaged in manifests for discussion instead of factual argument. Especially a person ‘invited by the US Embassy’ for revolution.”
I wasn’t invited for revolution. I did see people in the main square of the capital living in the cold winter in tents protesting. They protested peacefully for fair and free elections. Pure, verified, fact.
Eventually, their Supreme Court ordered another election and I understand you’re not happy about this, right Ivan?
Too bad.
You are misinterpretating this statement. Khruschev’s post-Stalinist propaganda in USSR was very pro-Polish. If Stalin considered Poland a sort of Soviet North Dakota, Khruschev considered it a sort of Canada. That was the idea. A lot of things Polish were admired post WWII contrary to every other period in history before when Poland was considered a backward province.
The meaning of the kurczak adage was that the travelling abroad from the Soviet Union was restricted to the Warsaw Pact, Cuba and Vietnam.
The point of adage was that the Poland was the foreign country most similar to Russia at every respect and it didn’t produce much cultural experience travelling to Poland comparing to any other foreign country.
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