Russian Ukraine War

[mateinone]

Don't be surprised to see another serious push towards Kiev, probably beginning from Belarus again. Stretching Ukraine's troops as widely and as thinly as possible is very likely one of the aims of the mobilization.

What I struggle with a lot is why the west continues to be bullied by Russia. Western governments have every right to stabilize a country at the request of that countries legitimate government, but because it is against Russia, the countries are very loathe to do so and in the mean time 10s of 1000s are dying. By enforcing a no fly zone, by attacking areas of opposition troops (especially because the sham referendums) they had every opportunity to push Russia completely out of the country and make Russia need to reassess the situation, it would have also sent a strong message to any other countries considering the same. We only need to look back to Kuwait and the swift response there, because of course Iraq is not a nuclear equipped superpower so the decision was easy.

Anyway on a slightly different now, I have done a translation of an excerpt from a memoir written by a Russian soldier who has since defected to France and I think his book is published or being published.

But I thought it is interesting to share, it shows some Russian's really do wonder why they are there, unfortunately asking these questions for most Russian's really is the same as asking if your own parents or children are evil, you simply cannot process this, there must be a better answer.

My translation is a mix of my own and Google's, my Russian is not fantastic and because of how they phrase things, it needed to be paraphrased a little, but the general gist is correct.

If we turn to sterotypes then the answer will be that I am a military man, a paratrooper, I am
obliged to follow orders and do not have the right to chicken out and not go to war when it
starts; I am obliged to serve for the good of my country and to protect the people of Russia.
But then common sense begins to argue and ask questions.

"Did Ukraine threaten Russia?"

Everyone says that Ukraine wanted to join NATO, but do we attack every country that wants to join NATO?
Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, and Poland are already in NATO. Finland is joining NATO now. Our plane was shot down over TUrkey not long ago, but we quickly forgot this, we have a dispute with Japan about the Kuril Islands. Hell the US borders us to the East. But all this for some reason is not a pretext for starting a war. We're not attacking them, or is that just for now?

It turns out that it is not the reason.

"If we had not attacked Ukraine, would they have attacked us?"

Many echo the TV, saying that we launched a preemptive strike, but how can you believe that Ukraine would have attacked Russia, Crimea, if the armed forces of Ukraine could not hold their own borders? They wage this war on the defensive, suffering huge losses. Everyone knows that defensive warfare is easier than attacking. How could this country (Ukraine), which can hardly defend itself, slowly losing its territories, attack? And would it not be easier for our army to strengthen the borders and defenses around Ukraine and, in the even of an attack, meet the enemy on the defensive, break their offensive capabilities and go on the counterattack? Indeed, in this case, our losses would have been much less, and the world community would not be able to accuse Russia of aggression and "condemn" our country as an occupier and invader. It turns out that the Ukraine was going to attack Russia was also a lie?

"Was Ukraine overrun by Nazism and did they infringe on the Russian population (of Ukraine)?"

I talked with people who were in Ukraine before the war, and, oddly enough, no one was able to remember a specific case where someone was infringed upon or offended them for having a Russian surname or for not being able to speak Ukrainian. And some isolated cases of domestic conflicts on ethnic grounds can be found in every country in the world.

"Did we attack to save the DNR and LNR?"

What is the DNR and LNR? Indeed, in fact and legality, these are two regions that were part of Ukraine and then rebelled and decided to become independent. Isn't this the same as if Karelia wanted to join Finland, Smolensk region to Lithuania, Rostov region to Ukraine, Yakutia to USA or Khabarovsk to China, isn't this the same? Why are we defending the LDNR? Did it make the ordinary people in the Donbas feel better? After all, in the Russian Federation we would not have tolerated this, just as we didn't give Chechnya indedependence, paying for it with thousands of lives. Why did we arrange the same without neighbours? But at the same time, the leaders of the LPR and DPR, despite the support of the Russian government were unable to provide their residence with social security and safety, which is why people fled en masse to Russia, Crimea and Ukraine. In conversation with people who fled the war in Donetsk and Luhansk, I did not hear about the cases of Nazism that are shouted about from our media. But all as one spoke about the fact that they fled from the war and that they just want to live and work in peace. If we tried in every possible way to help the people of Donetsk and Luhansk, then why didn't we just limit ourselves to providing Russia passports to everyone? We have plenty of empty land that no human hands have touched, please let them come, live and work with us. Why do we need the territory of a foreign state? What for? Are we short on land? People really believe that all those who wanted to live in Russia have not yet received Russian passports and moved to us?