As I marvel at the courage and resourcefulness of the Ukrainian people in resisting Russia's invasion of their country, I've also wondered where it comes from. That led me to be curious about their history. Ali Rogan from the PBS NewsHour provided this brief overview, which I found very helpful.
Rogan notes that in 1932 Soviet leader Joseph Stalin deliberately imposed a famine in Ukraine, killing at least 3 million people in just one year. It became known as the Holodomor, a combination of the Ukrainian words for “starvation” and “to inflict death.”
In 1929, as part of his plan to rapidly create a totally communist economy, Stalin had imposed collectivization, which replaced individually owned and operated farms with big state-run collectives. Ukraine’s small, mostly subsistence farmers resisted giving up their land and livelihoods.
In response, the Soviet regime derided the resisters as kulaks—well-to-do peasants, who in Soviet ideology were considered enemies of the state. Soviet officials drove these peasants off their farms by force and Stalin’s secret police further made plans to deport 50,000 Ukrainian farm families to Siberia...
Collectivization in Ukraine didn’t go very well. By the fall of 1932...it became apparent that Ukraine’s grain harvest was going to miss Soviet planners’ target by 60 percent. There still might have been enough food for Ukrainian peasants to get by, but...Stalin then ordered what little they had be confiscated as punishment for not meeting quotas.
As millions of Ukrainians were starving to death, Stalin also launched a "Russification program."
The famine was accompanied by a broader assault on Ukrainian identity. While peasants were dying by the millions, agents of the Soviet secret police were targeting the Ukrainian political establishment and intelligentsia. The famine provided cover for a campaign of repression and persecution that was carried out against Ukrainian culture and Ukrainian religious leaders....All those targeted by this campaign were liable to be publicly vilified, jailed, sent to the Gulag (a system of Soviet prisons and forced-labour camps), or executed.
The Soviets stifled any mention of the Holdomor for more than half a century, but it has obviouslyplayed a large role in Ukrainian public memory. In 2006 (just a year after Ukraine's Orange Revolution) a law was passed that officially recognized it as genocide and provided for the construction of the Holodomors’ victims Memorial in Ukraine. Holodomor Remembrance Day is now observed on the fourth Saturday of November.
The statue in the picture up above was created by Ukrainian sculptor Petro Drozdowsky and is titled "Bitter Memory of Childhood," dedicated to the most vulnerable victims of the Holodomor - children. It stands at the entrance to the memorial.
One only needs to see her mournful gaze to get an inkling of the rage Ukrainians must feel at the thought of being subjected to the rule of a tyrant who idolizes Joseph Stalin.
On Wednesday, Secretary of State Antony Blinken asked the crucial question when it comes to the war Russia is waging in Ukraine, "what is Putin's endgame?" As he went on to explain, the Russian president made a serious miscalculation in the beginning. He underestimated both the resilience of the Ukrainian people and the unity of the response around the globe. In other words, Putin's initial endgame has seriously failed. What does he hope to accomplish now? In order for us to provide an off-ramp for the Kremlin, we need to know what Putin is willing to accept as a settlement.
There are those who are suggesting that we're seeing some subtle shifts that could create an opening for a cease fire.
[I]n recent days, the language has shifted, with the Kremlin signaling that Mr. Putin is no longer bent on regime change in Kyiv. It is a subtle shift, and it may be a head-fake; but it is prompting officials who have scrambled to mediate to believe that Mr. Putin may be seeking a negotiated way out of a war that has become a much bloodier slog than he expected.
Russia has offered terms under which they will stop the war "in a moment." Here's what Dmitry Peskov, the Kremlin's spokesperson, told Reuters:
"We really are finishing the demilitarisation of Ukraine. We will finish it. But the main thing is that Ukraine ceases its military action. They should stop their military action and then no one will shoot," he said.
On the issue of neutrality, Peskov said: "They should make amendments to the constitution according to which Ukraine would reject any aims to enter any bloc."
He added: "We have also spoken about how they should recognise that Crimea is Russian territory and that they need to recognise that Donetsk and Lugansk are independent states. And that’s it. It will stop in a moment."
A lot of people have focused on the "issue of neutrality" and the demands related to Crimea, Donetsk and Lugansk. But the suggestion that Russia will finish the "demilitarization of Ukraine" is rather ominous. Also, the suggestion that it is Ukraine that must stop their military action is clearly doublespeak. It is Russia that instigated this invasion of a sovereign country.
When Ukrainian President Zelensky was asked about these demands during an interview with David Muir, here is how he responded:
“Regarding NATO, I have cooled down regarding this question a long time ago, after we understood that NATO is not prepared to accept Ukraine,” Mr. Zelensky said in an interview with ABC News on Tuesday.
Ukraine was also willing to discuss how the breakaway territories “will live on,” Mr. Zelensky added. “What is important to me is how the people in those territories are going to live who want to be part of Ukraine. The question is more difficult than simply acknowledging them.”
There are two things to keep in mind when it comes to Zelensky's statement about NATO. Many people have responded to his comment by saying that he's changed his mind about Ukraine joining the alliance. But read what he actually said, "I have cooled down regarding this question a long time ago." In other words, this isn't anything new.
Secondly, as Peskov made clear, the Russian demand is that Ukraine alter their constitution to reject any aims to enter any bloc. That would include joining the European Union, which is a move that Ukraine has already initiated. It is also interesting to note that Zelensky's Servant of the People Party has proposed a new security agreement as an alternative to the country joining NATO. But Putin wants Ukraine to be alone and isolated, making them much more vulnerable.
One statement Zelensky made during that interview represents the heart of the issue and goes against everything Putin stands for. He said, "I'm ready for a dialogue. We are not ready for that capitulation because it's not about me, this is about the people who elected me." In other words, while Zelensky represents the people of Ukraine, they are the ones who will ultimately decide. That is the foundation of democracy that Putin both fears and abhors.
In the end, I don't see much of an opening in Russia's latest demands. When it comes to deeds rather than words, Putin is showing his hand by training his fire on civilian rather than military targets (like the bombing of a maternity hospital).
U.S. intelligence agencies say Mr. Putin has been frustrated by the slow pace of the military advance and is likely to double down on using brute force, which could mean far more destruction and much higher civilian casualties. Russian forces have stepped up rocket, artillery and air attacks on cities, hitting a growing number of civilian targets; Ukrainian officials say the Kremlin, so far unable to win military victory, is instead trying to destroy Ukrainian morale.
In other words, Putin's current endgame is to destroy Ukrainian morale in order to force them to capitulate. As long as that remains the case, there is no acceptable off-ramp.
A few days ago Glenn Greenwald "speculated" about U.S. intentions in Ukraine.
Some have speculated that the US goal isn't to protect Ukrainians -- that's the pretext -- but rather sacrifice Ukraine by turning it into Syria or Afghanistan where war rages for years and destroys the country, bogging down Russia. No proof, but US actions consistent with that.
Greenwald ignores the fact that it was Russia that invaded Ukraine and seems hell-bent on destroying the country, all while claiming that the goal of the U.S. is to turn Ukraine into Syria or Afghanistan.
Prior to admitting that there was no proof for his theory, Greenwald used the passive voice of "some people have speculated," which is interesting given that, until that time, I hadn't seen anyone else make those claims. But shortly after Greenwald's tweet on March 5, it became a talking point among several Putin apologists.
Appearing on Tucker Carlson's show two days later, retired US Army Col. Douglas Macgregor said that the U.S. government's plan was to "complete the destruction of Ukraine by turning it into a quasi Afghanistan." To put that comment in context, Macgregor is the man that Trump nominated in July 2020 to be the U.S. Ambassador to Germany. He has been such a racist Putin puppet that even the Republican-controlled Senate rejected his nomination.
With that, Aaron Maté chimed in.
On the Biden admin's strategy in Ukraine:
"I do think the plan is to prolong the fighting… to complete the destruction of Ukraine by turning it into a quasi-Afghanistan." - Ret. US Army Col. Douglas Macgregor pic.twitter.com/6hNO744yB3
Maté, who used to write for The Nation, has made a name for himself recently by going on right wing sites to promote the idea that the whole Trump-Russia investigation was a hoax. But given the fact that Putin's paranoia has been based on the idea that somehow the United States has been behind pro-democracy colour revolutions, take a look at what he wrote about the link between the 2014 Euromaidan protests and Russia's war against Ukraine.
Putin has carried out a major escalation of a conflict that has raged for eight years, at the cost of more than 14,000 lives. It began with a US-backed, far-right-led 2014 coup that ousted Ukraine’s democratically elected government in Kiev. In its place came a regime chosen not by the Ukrainian people, but by Washington.
Next it was Tulsi Gabbard's turn. She made an appearance on Fox News host Laura Ingraham's show Tuesday night and said this:
Nothing the Biden administration has done has helped make this situation better or helped de-escalate the situation...This war machine, this power elite in Washington. They want to turn Ukraine into another Afghanistan, turn it into a killing field for this long term insurgency is supported and they bleed out and cripple -- kill as many Russians as possible for who knows how long.
That would be the same Tulsi Gabbard who tried to sell herself as an anti-war candidate in the 2016 primaries - all while supporting the war crimes committed by Russia in Syria.
So after-the-fact, Greenwald is right: some pro-Putin apologists have been talking about how the goal of the U.S. in Ukraine is to turn it into another Afghanistan. How did they all latch onto the same talking points? Was it a coincidence? Did they simply follow Greenwald's lead? Or is there someone behind the scenes feeding them these lines?
These folks become enraged when accused of promoting Putin's talking points. But, as much as I'd like to avoid being a conspiracy theorist, it's hard to ignore this kind of coordination.
Over the last few years, we've heard a lot about anti-democracy movements all around the world, with growing concern about the rise of fascism. But more recent history can obscure the fact that, at the end of the 20th Century and the beginning of the 21st, protests erupted against dictatorships in what became known as the Colour Revolutions and the Arab Spring. Some of the countries that were affected include:
1989 Czechoslovakia's Velvet Revolution
2000 Yugoslavia's Bulldozer Revolution
2003 Georgia's Rose Revolution
2004 Ukaine's Orange Revolution
2009 Iran's Green Movement
2009 Tunisia's Jasmine Revolution
2010 Kyrgyzstan's Melon Revolution
2011 Russia's Snow Revolution
2011 Egypt's Lotus Revolution
2011 Yemeni Revolution
2011 Syria
2011 Libya
While many of these movements didn't end well, they almost always began when people rose up against a corrupt authoritarian regime, usually provoked by an event like a stolen election or a new unpopular policy. Notice that the list includes the so-called "Snow Revolution" in Russia. Here is how Al Jazeera reported what was happening at the beginning of the protests.
To be clear, all of those pro-democracy movements scarred the shit out of Vladimir Putin. His response was to blame the U.S. Writing specifically about the 2011 protests in Russia, Michael McFaul said this:
Even before the parliamentary vote, Putin began to develop the argument about American manipulation of Russia’s internal politics. “We know that representatives of some countries meet with those whom they pay money — so-called grants — and give them instructions and guidance for the ‘work’ they need to do to influence the election campaign in our country,” he said in November 2011. This was false, but American interference seemed very obvious to him: “They try to shake us up so that we don’t forget who is boss on our planet.” The popular demonstrations a month later appeared to confirm his suspicions.
In 2013, Gen. Valery V. Gerasimov, the chief of the general staff (equivalent to our Joint Chiefs of Staff), published an article in the Military-Industrial Courier stating that, "the Arab Spring...had shown that 'nonmilitary means' had overtaken the 'force of weapons in their effectiveness.' Deception and disinformation, not tanks and planes, were the new tools of power. And they would be used not in formally declared conflicts but within a vast gray between peace and war." It became known as the Gerasimov Doctrine. But as Mark Galeotti explained, it wasn't so much a "doctrine" as a justification.
Gerasimov was actually talking about how the Kremlin understands what happened in the “Arab Spring” uprisings, the “color revolutions” against pro-Moscow regimes in Russia’s neighborhood, and in due course Ukraine’s “Maidan” revolt. The Russians honestly — however wrongly — believe that these were not genuine protests against brutal and corrupt governments, but regime changes orchestrated in Washington, or rather, Langley.
Then, in 2014, Putin gave a bizarre speech in which he suggested that the West was attempting to declaw the Russian bear.
Sometimes I think, maybe it would be better for our bear to sit quiet, rather than chasing around the forest after piglets. To sit eating berries and honey instead. Maybe they will leave it in peace. They will not. Because they will always try to put him on a chain, and as soon as they succeed in doing so they tear out his fangs and his claws...
Once they've taken out his claws and his fangs, then the bear is no longer necessary. He'll become a stuffed animal. The issue is not Crimea, the issue is that we are protecting our sovereignty and our right to exist.
So after annexing Crimea, Putin publicly stated that Ukraine wasn't the issue. Instead, it was about protecting Russia's sovereignty against attacks from the West. This statement from Max Fisher in response to that speech caught my eye.
This idea is popular among Russians; since the fall of Soviet Union, and especially the economic catastrophes of the 1990s, there has been a sense of lost greatness and lost pride in Russia. Putin is telling Russians that they are still a great world power, and blaming any feelings of national shortcoming not on failures of Russian leadership but on Western aggressors whose very existence just further proves that Russia is an equal and competitor.
That reminded me that in 2017, Jay Bookman wrote that Trump "understood when no else did that loyalty to that ideology was an inch deep among the GOP base, and that the true unifying force was resentment." It seems that (surprise, surprise) Putin and Trump were playing from the same page. Putin's speech was the equivalent of "Make Russia Great Again."
It is also interesting to note that many of the colour revolutions began with claims of voter fraud following an election. To the extent that Gerasimov proposed using the kind of nonmilitary means Putin envisions being used against Russia, this summary from Molly McKew is instructive.
The U.S. electoral system is the heart of the world’s most powerful democracy, and now—thanks to Russian actions—we’re locked in a national argument over its legitimacy. We’re at war with ourselves, and the enemy never fired a physical shot.
She wrote that about Russia's attempt to interfere in the 2016 presidential election. But it takes on even greater meaning when it comes to Trump's Big Lie and the January 6 insurrection. In a way, they were trying to mimic the origins of the colour revolutions.
By pointing all of this out, I'm not suggesting that Putin is some kind of genius. Rather, the picture this paints is of someone who is obviously paranoid about losing power, which is an indication of weakness, not strength. In addition, there is a remarkable symmetry between the tactics Putin has employed and those exhibited by the former guy. Perhaps that's some kind of cosmic coincidence. But I doubt it.
People all around the world are marveling at the courage and resourcefulness of the Ukrainian people. When it comes to the latter, here's a pretty good example.
People asked in the Mud and Truck maintenance threads earlier what the Ukrainians could do to make the rasputisa mud worse.
They opened the Kyiv reservoir to accomplish just that.
The Russians pushed three Tank/Mech divisions into a flood plain the Ukrainians flooded https://t.co/39SCHaOZwd
Rasputisa is the Russian word for muddy roads that hinder travel in the fall and spring. So if this story is true, Ukrainians have made it almost impossible for heavy tanks to enter Kyiv by opening a reservoir north of the city to halt their progress.
Nothing speaks to the courage of the Ukrainian people more than this video:
Ukrainians march towards Russian soldiers while getting shot at. Everyone must watch this video. pic.twitter.com/gclsykDS9P
Rep. Ted Lieu retweeted that video with the comment, "Watch this 15 second video and you will understand why Russia will never win the war in Ukraine."
According to reports, it is this kind of courage and resourcefulness that has hindered Vladimir Putin's plans to win this war against Ukraine in a matter of days. While still causing untold suffering and death, his troops are disorganized, hungry, and out of fuel.
But Putin shouldn't have been surprised by this reaction from the Ukrainian people. Here's why: in 2013, the country was poised to enter into a political association and free trade agreement with the European Union (EU). But at the last minute, Putin's puppet President Viktor Yanukovych, refused to sign the agreement, instead choosing closer ties to Russia.
That is when the Euromaiden protests began. It all started with young people gathering with chants of "Ukraine is part of Europe." When police responded by beating the protesters to clear the square, people of all ages and from all over Ukraine joined the protest with shouts of "All together we are strong." Things escalated from there.
Evgeny Afineevsky captured the 93-day protest in the documentary titled "Winter on Fire: Ukraine's Fight for Freedom" (now available for streaming on both Netflix and YouTube). He talked about the experience here:
While difficult to watch at times, one of my favorite moments in the documentary happened when the Verkhovna Rada (Ukrainian parliament) passed laws outlawing the wearing of motorcycle helmets and hard hats. Here is how the people responded:
In the end, the Ukrainian people prevailed, despite massive violence inflicted on them, and Yanukovych snuck off to Russia in the middle of the night.
That is what Putin is facing in this war against Ukraine. But like tyrants throughout history, he continues to think that he can intimidate these people into submission. He couldn't be more wrong.
When people describe Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, they often refer to him as the "comedian-turned-president." But that descriptor leaves out a lot.
Keep in mind that Zelensky's father is a professor of cybernetics and his mother used to work as an engineer. Before beginning his career as a comedian, Zelensky himself earned a law degree from the Kryvyi Rih Institute of Economics. He didn't just perform as a comedian, but developed his own production company, Kvartal 95 Studio, in 2003.
The man the Kremlin holds in dismissive contempt, President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine, has emerged as an online hero. His Twitter account has leapt by hundreds of thousands of followers a day (he now has 4.3 million). Often dressed in olive-green fleece and cargo pants, he has accused Russia of war crimes, signed a formal application to join the European Union, and morphed into a symbol of hope and grace under pressure.
As Russia pursues its ruthless invasion, Mr. Zelensky has used social media adroitly to outmaneuver his nemesis, President Vladimir V. Putin. So, too, have many of the 44 million citizens of Ukraine. TikTok, the video-sharing app with more than a billion active users, has shaped views of the conflict and contributed to an intense wave of global sympathy for Ukraine. Call it Resistance 4.0, the influencers’ war against an unprovoked Russian invasion.
We all know from experience how Vladimir Putin weaponized social media by using bots to spread lies that sowed division. But at least for now, Zelensky has turned the table by "outmaneuvering his nemesis." The images of the two presidents stand in stark contrast.
An example of how Zelensky has used his iPhone to record video messages to both Ukrainians and the world, he posted this as Russia tried to spread a rumor that he had fled the country.
"The president is here." President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine posted a video on social media showing him standing alongside other government officials, saying that the country’s leaders had not fled Kyiv as Russian forces entered the city. https://t.co/VPxc01QGAGpic.twitter.com/F91xlEp7we
On social media, it has been interesting to watch the development of messages the Zelensky government wants to promote. One of the most powerful has been the one about how to react to captured Russian soldiers. Early on, the government announced that it had set up a hotline for the mothers of Russian soldiers captured or killed in Ukraine. Here is Zelensky's message:
“Our soldiers, our border guards, even simple farmers are capturing Russian soldiers, and all of them are saying the same thing. They don’t know why they are here. These are not warriors of a superpower. These are confused children who have been used.”pic.twitter.com/FdGokVcS29
During a meeting of the General Assembly, Ukraine's Ambassador to the UN read the last text messages between a Russian soldier and his mother.
As a result, here is how the people of Ukraine are responding:
Video shared on Ukrainian channels of a captured Russian soldier apparently being fed by locals. The post says he burst into tears when he was allowed to video-call his mother. So many of these troops are just teenagers, with absolutely no clue what this war is really for. pic.twitter.com/oCPUC8cKcO
When offered a chance to leave Ukraine by the U.S. government, Zelensky is quoted as saying, "The fight is here. I need ammunition, not a ride." That is precisely how memes like this come to dominate social media:
Regardless of what happens to Zelensky in the end, books will be written about this comedian-turned-president who so effectively led his people in resistance to the Russian military.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy exemplifies this quote from William Shakespeare's Twelfth Night:
"Some are born great, some achieve greatness, and others have greatness thrust upon them." pic.twitter.com/8YmJeckdSs
But let's not forget that he knew exactly what he was doing and found a way to inspire both the citizens of his country and the world with his authenticity and courage.
When Trump tried to blackmail Ukrainian President Zelensky in July 2019, it wasn't the first time he abused his position as President of the United States by meddling in that country's affairs.
Just to be clear, the recent succession of Ukrainian presidents looks like this:
2010-2014 Viktor Yanukovych
2014-2019 Petro Poroshenko
2019-present Volodymyr Zelensky
Yanukovych was Putin's puppet in Ukraine and was ousted from office by the Euromaiden protests in 2014. We haven't heard much about the presidency of Poroshenko, who was elected after Yanukovych fled the country for asylum in Russia. But in 2018, Andrew Kramer reported this in the New York Times:
But in Ukraine, where officials are wary of offending President Trump, four meandering cases that involve Mr. Manafort, Mr. Trump’s former campaign chairman, have been effectively frozen by Ukraine’s chief prosecutor...
The decision to halt the investigations by an anticorruption prosecutor was handed down at a delicate moment for Ukraine, as the Trump administration was finalizing plans to sell the country sophisticated anti-tank missiles, called Javelins.
Kramer went on to report that, just prior to halting investigations into Manafort, Ukrainian law enforcement allowed Konstantin V. Kilimnik, who was also under investigation in Ukraine for espionage, to flee to Russia, putting him out of reach for questioning. We now know that Kilimnik was a Russian agent who had probably been involved with the GRU hacking of the DNC and the Clinton Campaign. He met with Manafort on at least two occasions during the 2016 campaign.
In other words, the dots seem to be connected: Poroshenko halted investigations into Manafort and Kilimnik in exchange for Javelins...the same weapons Trump later used in an attempt to extort Zelensky.
But it gets worse. According to reporting by Josh Kovensky at TPM, Trump and Giuliani thought they had a deal with Poroshenko for political dirt just prior to the Ukrainian election in April 2019.
By late February, the Wall Street Journal reported last week, Poroshenko was open to a deal pushed by [Giuliani co-conspirators] Parnas and Fruman in which the Ukrainian leader would get electoral help via a state visit to the U.S., while he would give Trump a lift by announcing investigations into the Bidens and potential Ukrainian interference in the 2016 elections.
About a month later, Poroshenko's prosecutor general, Yuriy Lutsenko, started feeding stories to now-disgraced reporter John Solomon, including accusations that Ukrainians had interfered in the 2016 election, a smear campaign against Ambassador Marie Yovanovitch, and attacks on the Bidens.
But a funny thing happened on the way to that criminal conspiracy. Zelensky won the election against Poroshenko in a landslide. That sent Trump and Giuliani scrambling.
When Poroshenko lost in a landslide to Volodymyr Zelensky on April 21, it set off a mad scramble in Trumpworld to make inroads with the new government. It’s no coincidence that the flurry of activity in early May which has been the focus of investigators comes in the weeks after Zelensky’s win and before his May 20 inauguration.
The available evidence suggests that Trump, through Giuliani, was scrambling to re-up the deal with his new Ukrainian counterpart.
That is what led to the now-infamous phone call between Trump and Zelensky, as well as Trump's first impeachment.
To get some idea of how enraged Trump was at Zelensky's election, which foiled his deal with Poroshenko, just listen to Ambassador Volker's testimony about a meeting with the president in May 2019 (a month after the Ukrainian election).
Trump and his defenders tried to pretend that their concern was about corruption in Ukraine. But as Rep. Jim Himes put it so succinctly during the House impeachment hearings, "President Trump wasn’t trying to end corruption in Ukraine, he was trying to aim corruption in Ukraine at Vice-President Biden and at the 2020 election.”
Trump was successful at aiming Ukrainian corruption when Poroshenko was president. He got them to back off investigations into Manafort and Kilimnick in exchange for weapons and had a deal ready to go to influence the 2020 U.S. presidential election. Zelensky walked a tightrope over his first few months in office, but ultimately foiled their efforts.
