ukraine invasion notes

1 files changed, 38 insertions, 0 deletions

diff --git a/hstr122/ukranine_invasion.md b/hstr122/ukranine_invasion.md
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..e897d56
--- /dev/null
+++ b/hstr122/ukranine_invasion.md
@@ -0,0 +1,38 @@
+Serhy Yekelchik (sp?)
+World expert on Russia Ukraine relations!
+
+
+War started April 2014.
+Western media treated war as though it only started 2022.
+War largely ignored until full-scale invasion.
+
+Azerbaijan Armenia conflict first with drones, but millitary intelligence made it impossible for Russia to hide preparation for invasion. 
+The West and Ukraine knew that Russia would invade. Faint hope otherwise.
+Remembering Hitler appeasement, few asked Ukraine to surrender. The difficulty to making concessions is that Putin insisted that Ukraine was an illegitimate state, that it was created from parts of Russia.
+He also published an article, Summer 2022, on "historical unity between russia and ukraine" same ethnic group, nation people.
+If you deny the specificity of the group in the country you are to invade, that sends a clear signal of genocidal intent.
+
+For Hitler, Mussolini, and many Americans at the time, racism was fine. Back then, one could make assumptions about the loyalties of the population based on what you know about their ethnic and cultural background.
+It seems that Putin walked into a trap, he denied the separate of Ukranians, and assumed that the Russian speaking Ukranians would welcome his invasion.
+He also thinks that those who are ethnically ukranian but culturally russian would have their loyalties with Russia.
+
+-Compatriot
+
+Russians trying to mobilize nationalistic support, arguing that USSR collapse was a huge mistake. So a compatriot is a citizen of a former soviet republic who is either Russian by ethnicity or Russian culturally.
+This construct led him to trouble. The United States and Great Britain share a language--but there was the trouble with the tea, establishing the fact that political community is consensus based.
+It's not enough to have the same language or ethnicity. Hitler would be the last politician to make this assumption.
+Irony--USSR victory of nazism. Putin not looking to history.
+
+December-February, Western communities assumed his army would not be enough to conquer nor control Ukraine. The only explanation is that Putin had poor intelligence.
+
+The war started not as usual. Truly stunning was the attempt to take the capital with a small number of paratroopers, on the assumption that if you dropped a few hundred paratroopers they would be able to take over the presidential admin building and ministry of defense.
+Russian propaganda that Ukraine is a nazi state, yet Jewish president. Russia employed similar rhetoric to Hitler's anti-semitism.
+"Ukraine fundamentally a neo-nazi regime"
+Most of Ukraine cities Russian speaking. High Russian population in cities vs country. So when the cities are mobilizing to fight Putin, proves that Russian ethnicity does not mean Russian allegiance. Plan to quickly take over high Russian population areas failed. Kharkiv.
+
+Some Western leftists assume that the Russia being the opposite of the US means it is good. Putin himself claims that Russia is a conservative Christian nation.
+
+Banning LGBTQ+ propaganda a "major victory"
+If you really like Western democracy, the West would force you to enter into gay marriage!
+
+Kyiv Euromaidan Revolution 2013.