Free Republic

I cannot agree more. I haven't been here for a long-long time, and...nothing has really changed. The same people peddling the same old prejudices.

Actually, I have been a subscriber to this magazine...not any more. Precisely because of this article. Not the article itself, rather the title they have given to it. The article is a usual crap, nothing really to talk about; the guy have never been to Russia proper, he went to Ukraine and Gergia and met some anti-russian folks, also he talked to some liberal Prof at U of Toronto. But the title...You cannot see it, they have never showed it anywhere, except the print version, probably ashamed of it. It is not "Back to the USSR". The title they have put on the front page, in bloody red shade, with Putin's face, of course, reads "Russia goes to hell". A bit wishful thinking on their part. But my subscription is over.

Basically, blind haters are always stupid. Those who are from Canada should remember the "evil reptilian kitten-eater from another planet". The same sort of stuff.

I am really tired of repeating the same all over again. The only thing Russia wants to "impose" on all those nations is for them to be reasonably friendly to Russia as their neighbor. No more, no less.

Russia is only too happy about Georgian sovereignty, believe me. It would be even happier if Georgia were to be sovereign and far from Russian borders. No such luck...

You fail to grasp that all this petty squabbling is the part of a strategy, and this strategy is not of Russia's making. Some people in Georgia, Moldova, Ukraine decided that anti-Russian stance would give them free ride to NATO and EU and that Western nations will be happy to provide for them as a devoted allies against Russia. As a final touch, smart people also built a couple of Potemkin villages called development of democracy and freedom. Western media are delighted to see young democracies freeing themselves from Russian "control". The best-case scenario for them is if Russia could be provoked to do something stupid, and Putin and his government are far from being the smartest guys around. Very simple. And they have reasons to believe they would succeed, this way has been paved already by Poland and Baltic states.

So when you decide to blast Russia again just understand that you are being used. And prepare to pay; these guys really cannot survive without living off somebody. They will be your best friends...while you pay. Good luck :-))

Actually, I thought you were Ukrainian. If you are a Pole explaining all this to you was a mistake.

I support Georgia, which has a right to its sovereign territorial integrity

And do not support the same right for China or Russia. They are our sons of the bitches, eh?

But I'll tell you this: if there was a solid territory in Poland, inhabited by a majority of Germans, and those Germans would be in favour of independence, or the reunification with Germany, I would say (mind you, I'm risking banishment now) : yes, let them have it.

How very fortunate the communists had expelled all Germans from those territories for you! When Serbs tried to do the same with Albanians in Kosovo they were bombed by NATO.

You seem to be really concerned about self-determination. How about Russians in Latvia? Should their capital Riga where over 50 percent population are not Latvians hold a referendum and become a free city? Then, how about Crimea with 90% Russian population? How about East of Ukraine? I am all for Donetsk to hold a referendum. The sooner the better pls.

Ukraine's independence is a thorn in Putin's Russia's flesh.

Absolutely not. Friendly independent free and prosperous Ukraine is a dream of every Russian leader if he is not a complete fool (or a die-hard communist). The keyword here is friendly. A non-friendly Ukraine would be a big problem both for Russia and Ukraine. This was a constant concern of every Russian government. In fact, sometimes I think Russia has made too many concessions to Ukraine so it would seem that Russia needs Ukraine more than Ukraine needs Russia. Over the past 15 years, Ukrainians has been very troublesome partners. I could never really understand why. Probably, phantoms of the past, but it is time to grow up and move on.

About elections. Putin has made a big political mistake so obviously taking sides in Ukrainian affairs. That was plain stupid but hopefully will be mended over time. At the same time, all these tales about OMONs and Russian dioxine are just lies and propaganda. Again, Yushchenko has made a political mistake either so openly confronting Russia before the elections. Unfortunately, quite a few people In Ukraine (especially among the elite) thought that confronting Russia (using Poland's and Baltic states' strategy discussed here) will give Ukraine a free ride to NATO and EU. I personally think this strategy, were it to work, would have meant big troubles to Ukraine. Fortunately, whatever our Polish friends may think, it is not going to work.

in the long run Ukraine's problems are the problems of all the post-soviet countries (that is that countries that had emancipated themselves from the Russian occupation)

There were no Russian occupation of Ukraine. Russia and Ukraine were the parts of the former Soviet Union. As such, by the way, both Russia and Ukraine are responsible for all atrocities of the communist regime, along with the "occupation" of the Baltic states, were we to call it this way. You probably do not want to remember that over the years there were more Ukrainian than Russian leaders of the USSR. So if I were you I would be cautious in using such vocabulary.

Wow!

Well, then little wonder some islamist or chinese communist thinks the same but with an opposite sign. Western nations are evil empires so they should be bombed and terrorists there should be supported.

I disagree absolutely with you (little wonder, eh?).

I agree but technically all these cases are about separatism. Taiwan was a part of China for many centuries. Tibet was conquered all right but technically it is a part of China. On the other hand, absolute majority of population in Kosovo is now Albanian and by all democratic means it should be allowed to join Albania. Any referendum will say this. You see, one cannot judge the situation using different standards. You probably like the UK and do not like China. So Ulster should stay where it is and Tibet should not. There are many other cases like that. Indonesia, for one. Why East Timor is luckier than Falklands or Ulster?

Russian policy in Caucasus in fact is not as bad as you think. Russia's prime interest is to prevent further war, either in Abkhasia or in Chechnya, as much as possible. Very simple.

All right. Please give me examples of Ukrainians (living in Ukraine) being in conflict with Russia. Over what?

Ukraine's problems are solely of Ukraine's making, do you want it or not.

It is the height of hypocrisy for Russians to lament support of the Chechens when they themselves support separatists in Georgia.

Agreed. At the same time, isn't it the height of hypocrisy for the US to support Kosovo albanians, Taiwan and Tibet, while not supporting separation of Ulster, for instance?

Just a small correction, Ivan: Norilsk supports R&D on fuel cells because catalysts there are platinum and palladium, also produced by Norilsk :-)) Purely nickel catalysts aren't efficient enough.

So she need good and honest neibors who will buy and pay.

And do not steal gas and oil and do not disrupt shipments which is exported to other countries. Unfortunately, honest and friendly neighbors were always in a short supply, from the West especially.

I remember once taking a train from Moscow to Berlin instead of flying as usual. My God, what a nothingness lies between Russian and German borders... I remember advices never ever even think of going through Poland. Fly or at least take a ferry to Helsinki if you do not want to be cheated or robbed or run into other troubles. Little wonder Russia wants to built pipeline across the sea.

Well, after reading the article and discussion:

Russia wants to keep Ukraine in its exclusive zone of influence and Poland perceives Ukraine as a EU member in the near future. Those two strategies are irreconcilable.

Absolutely wrong! The real situation is: Poland as well as some other EU member states and Brussels apparatchiks want to make Europe divided again, but now they want the new iron curtain built along the Russian borders. To advance their cause, they keep telling lies about "control" of Russia over Ukraine, Russian "aggressiveness", oil and gas "blackmail", etc. The real goal is to exclude Russia from building and keeping close relations with Europe. Such close relations are not in Poland's national interests because Poland then will stay forever a backward unimportant province of the EU. At the same time, close and conflict-free ties between Russia and EU are obviously beneficial to almost all European countries and the EU in general. Therefore, Poland is losing its positions in the EU. The real reason is not the issues of the past but that the EU's and Poland's interests are "irreconcilable".

Building new iron curtain is not in the interests of Ukraine either because then the strain between the West and the East of Ukraine may become unbearable. If Poland sincerely wishes Ukraine well it should stop pursuing policies which could easily result in breakup of this country. Exactly for that reason Russia works and will be working with Timoshenko and Yushchenko. Russia does not want to "control" Ukraine and never had (since at least 1992). At the same time, we do not want to loose our historic ties with Ukraine. We welcome Ukraine's stronger ties with Europe because such ties are our goal either. It is Poland who is trying to make these ties exclusive and "irreconcilable". So who "wants to keep Ukraine in its exclusive zone of influence"???

Poland's interests in Russia... are only THREE: [1] regulating the historical issues, [2] access to the Russian markets, and [3] supplies of Russian energy commodities.

Access to Russian markets... with WHAT? Except the Kaliningrad enclave, I do not know who in Russia may be interested in anything Poland can sell. Russian energy supplies...apparently, as follows from the discussion, Poland wants to get their supplies elsewhere and at the same time for whatever reason opposes the building of the Baltic pipeline. Why, guys? You wanna be independent? This pipeline will make you even more free and independent. Nobody will dominate your energy market (perceived Russian interest #1). That's a good deal, get off and forget about us and we'll forget about you with all your historical issues. Why not? As Rusivan has said, Russia has many things to do besides threatening Poland. Poland is Russian priority no. 999 out of 1000. However, we are interested in good relations with our Western European friends and we will not allow Poland and some other countries to spoil these relations.

A distinguished Russian philosopher of the XX century V.I. Vernadsky wrote in 1906 (the time of the 1st Russian revolution):

"There are three possible solutions how a Russian citizen must behave in this situation. The first solution is to join the reactionary government against the people; the second one is armed fight against the repressive forces of the government. The third solution is to do whatever possible to politically organize people in political parties. Only this third solution can help to avoid the catastrophe which is inevitable in the case of victory of either guardians of the past or dreamers of the future."

Well, the dreamers won. This indeed ensured a tremendous catastrophe for Russia and lots of troubles for the rest of the world. Now we see another dreamer, Mr. Kasparov, who wants a new revolution. He does not want to win the trust of people and win elections. He wants a revolution. And he pretends not to know what had happened 100 years ago.

People like Kasparov in the past had ensured that Russia has wasted 100 years and faces now the same problems. Enough is enough.

Putin to order assassination just as it happened with the president of Ukraine

Wis

If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it

Joseph Goebbels

Hey, Wis, you seem to be learning from the best. Don't you know that Yushchenko himself has stated the poison was made in Ukraine and Russia had nothing to do with this? You are a quick learner, Wis. Go ahead and repeat your lies several more times. Look for fools to believe you.

And President Bush was the only Western leader to unequivocally say sorry during the Beslan tragedy. I personally will never forget this.

My personal opinion about Iraq and what President Putin has said: I think that it had been not in the interests of the United States to plump into this mess. Many problems that are evident now were predictable then. The way the decision to go to war in Iraq had been made was not perfect either. However, all this belongs to the past. Now the US are carrying the heaviest burden in fighting the Islamic terrorists. This makes US, Russia and in fact all civilized world natural allies.

That's all very instructive but really irrelevant to Russia...

So you think that all criticism of Russia, especially here at FR, is due to some PR schlockmeister?

No. I am also fairly critical; after all, I did emigrate myself because I was pretty critical about what is going on there, and this decision was not easy. However, there is criticism and there is criticism. Look, I bet you have been upset and angry when AI compared Guantanamo to Gulag, haven't you?

I have posted here my opinion what Russian problems really are. Several other FReepers here know the situation and they all have similar views. A friendly knowledgeable criticism is always welcome. Nobody is perfect, and Russia is absolutely not perfect. However, the criticism should be fair. Otherwise, it is just PR scum. Russia was no better a year or two ago. There wasn't so much prejudiced and unfair criticism then.



;-))

Last November or December I noticed the attacks against Russia

Here is an explanation of these attacks.

Spinning Khodorkovsky

In order to win positive media internationally, Khodorkovsky brought in a savvy public relations executive ... Margery Kraus, president and chief executive of APCO Worldwide, a Washington subsidiary of Grey Advertising, one of the biggest advertising agencies in the world...With the advice of APCO, Yukos created the Open Russia Foundation in London in 2001 with a paltry $15 million "to build cooperation between Russia and the West." Henry Kissinger joined the board of the foundation and traveled to Moscow when the U.S. Agency for International Development signed on to a joint project with the foundation to promote "Russian democracy". (Also present at this event was George Bush Senior.) ... The foundation also gave $100,000 to the National Book Festival, a favorite charity of Laura Bush, the wife of President George Bush. APCO also launched a series of advertisements in March 2005 on the international and editorial pages of the New York Times website. ...One edition included an attack on the Khodorkovsky prosecution co-authored by Stuart Eizenstat (incidentally a member of APCO's international advisory board) and Jonathan Winer - both former Clinton State Department officials.

In addition to the media campaign, Khodorkovsky also pumped money into powerful and influential investment funds such as the Carlyle Group, run by Frank Carlucci, Secretary of Defense for President Ronald Reagan and a Deputy Director of the CIA during the Carter Administration.

http://www.corpwatch.org/print_article.php?&id=12236

This is just one citation I could google out right away. It is basically a common knowledge that Khodorkovsky, Berezovskiy and their likes spend millions of dollars every month for negative PR campaign against Russia and Mr. Putin personally. Lots of efforts are put in by Poland and Baltic states because good relations between Russia and the West will sink them into oblivion. So these attacks are little wonder.