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I'm marveling at the idea of trying to intervene in this and the expectation of some of the participants that we would. Perhaps a speech supporting civil rights and the act of peaceful protest, which this does not seem to be.

I don't think we should do anything about violence against insurgents or protestors. These are individuals that choose to put themselves in harms way for their cause. We can speak out against it or whatever, but intervening? No.

Now, if and when it becomes such a problem that non-protestors are being targeted or there are humanitarian crises amongst the public (Syria, for example), then I think it's worth a debate.

I don't even know what's being protested. Maybe I didn't read closely enough, but I really have no idea what's going on.

Ukraine is balanced precariously between remaining a close partner of Russia, or joining the EU.

The government want to remain friends with Russia. Russia wants another ally, and the Ukrainian government are being given deals like this as what's commonly seen as a "reward" for staying loyal to Putin. It helps since the country is in financial difficulty and close to defaulting.

A significant number of people in Ukraine, however, don't care about that and want to move towards the EU, in the hopes of having higher standards of living and better trade with, and access to, the western world. The government is completely shutting out public opinion on this matter.

The conflict has been escalating until a few days ago, when the government decided to say **** it to civil liberties and put in place some rather heavy-handed laws, making it jailable offences to blockade public buildings, wear masks or helmets at demonstrations, erect unauthorised tents in public areas, and even made it arrestable to "slander a government official."
So now people are going crazy with riots over being ignored by an elected government, and violently or legally repressed by their rushed new laws.

I don't even know what's being protested. Maybe I didn't read closely enough, but I really have no idea what's going on.

And this is why my GF is awesome. She linked this on FB. heh.

http://imgur.com/a/lxkbH

I really wonder HOW people think we would intervene, logistically, and without risking wider confrontation with Russia.

Diamondeye wrote:

I really wonder HOW people think we would intervene, logistically, and without risking wider confrontation with Russia.

But come on! It would be the cold war all over again, just like the good old days!

I really wonder HOW people think we would intervene, logistically, and without risking wider confrontation with Russia.

Aizle wrote:

But come on! It would be the cold war all over again, just like the good old days!

If we directly intervened, that war would not be terribly cold.

Now we are declaring the Crimea's election illegal. Do we have any real reasons why it is less legal than the elections in the rest of the Ukraine? Declaring an election illegal because we don't like the results? Yeah, reason and citations guys. Is there any evidence of tampering? The only reason the Crimea is part of the Ukraine is because Stalin said so. It also is the financial backbone of the rest of the country, which is the real reason the Ukraine doesn't want it to leave.

Putin is playing the West like.a grand champion. So far he wins on style, technique, and showmanship. All we've really got is Freedom!

Sigh.

Author:	Micheal [ Fri Jan 24, 2014 6:38 am ]
Post subject:	Kiev
Getting pretty nasty over there. Do we offer help, and who to? How would we react if another country offered help to the protesters if one of our cities went into heavy anti-government protest? ----------------------------------- http://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/24/world ... world&_r=0 The link has a lot of pictures. Pretty brutal in places. Claims of Police Brutality in Ukraine Amid Talks to Quell Unrest By DAVID M. HERSZENHORN JAN. 23, 2014 Protesters clashed with police on Thursday in central Kiev. Sergei Chuzavkov/Associated Press KIEV, Ukraine — As opposition leaders negotiated with President Viktor F. Yanukovich to defuse Ukraine’s violent civil uprising, new evidence emerged of brutality by the authorities, including a video of a protester stripped naked except for boots by a group of officers from the feared Berkut riot police. The video shows the naked man standing on snow-covered streets, being photographed by one police officer while several others looked on. Another officer is seen grabbing the man by the back of the neck, forcing him to hold an ice scraper, then slapping him on the head and kicking him as he is directed into a police bus. Welts are visible on the man’s back as he climbs into the bus. The Interior Ministry, which oversees the riot police, issued an apology and said the episode was under investigation. Related Coverage The video stood to further inflame demonstrators who were still reeling from the first violent deaths in the two-month-long uprising, threatening to upend a fragile cease-fire. It seemed to reinforce evidence that the authorities or their surrogates were engaging in other brutal tactics, including the killings of protesters. Anatoliy Stepanov/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images Violent Protests in Ukraine Scenes from Kiev, where two protesters were killed during clashes with the police. There were also signs of spreading unrest outside of Kiev, the capital. In Lviv, in western Ukraine, protesters occupied the regional administration building. The Lviv area is a stronghold of support for European integration, the issue that set off the civil uprising in November. Demonstrators similarly laid siege to the regional administration in Rivne, also in the west, where they demanded that riot police officers deployed to Kiev be sent home. There were parallel actions in a number of other cities, including Cherkasy in central Ukraine, where several thousand demonstrators briefly clashed with the police who protected the administration building and at one point fired several shots in the air, the local news media reported. The protests, while not clearly coordinated, were all in response to the increasingly ominous situation in Kiev, where demonstrators near the Dynamo soccer stadium had clashed fiercely with the police throughout this week, burning police buses, beating some officers and setting large numbers of tires on fire. Among the most chilling developments were reports of demonstrators being kidnapped — in some cases at hospitals — or detained by the police and taken to undisclosed locations. Igor Lutsenko, a civic activist and leading organizer of the opposition movement who has been a strong advocate of peaceful protest, was grabbed early Tuesday morning at a hospital where he had brought another demonstrator injured by a stun grenade during clashes with the police. Renewed Clashes in Kiev Recent clashes Protesters tried to march to Parliament on Sunday but were stopped by riot police. Clashes continued here through the week. It remains unclear where the protesters killed on Wednesday died. Young men captured Protesters detained men they said were pro-government provocateurs in this area on Tuesday and took them to the Trade Unions Building for questioning. Protest barricades Protesters barricaded this portion of the city in December and have remained since. The size of the crowd varies and is smaller on weekdays. By The New York Times; satellite imagery from Digitalglobe via Google Earth. The second man, Yuriy Verbytsky, was later found dead on the outskirts of Kiev. Another body was found in the same area and also showed signs of abuse, Ukrainian news media reported. In an interview from his hospital bed on Thursday, Mr. Lutsenko described being forced into a van by men whom he described as “very professional” and taken to a forest where he and Mr. Verbytsky were beaten and interrogated, but mostly kept apart. Mr. Lutsenko, who was beaten severely at times on the head with wooden boards, had a tooth knocked out, and his left eye was blackened. There were bruises and cuts all over him. He said that at one point he was forced to kneel in the woods in front of a tree, a plastic bag was put over his head and he was told to pray. He said he was certain he would be killed. Instead, his captors left, and he trekked injured through snowy woods until he found a local resident who helped him. Mr. Lutsenko said his captors appeared to be former police officers based on the way they questioned him and repeatedly verified information that he supplied, and made clear they were aware of the cars and motorcycle registered in his name. He said that he was held in a sort of shed in the woods, and that once his interrogators confirmed his leadership role, they demanded information about the opposition’s plans — an absurd question given the chaotic and unpredictable nature of street protests over the last few days. Launch media viewer Demonstrators with a national flag at a barricade in downtown Kiev, Ukraine, on Thursday. Protesters had clashed fiercely with the police throughout the week. Sergey Dolzhenko/European Pressphoto Agency “They were kind of sadists,” Mr. Lutsenko said, “really brutal.” He said that he did not know Mr. Verbytsky before being asked to drive him to the hospital to treat an eye injury. Ukrainian news media on Thursday reported another disappearance. Dmitry Bulatov, the head of a protest group called AutoMaidan, was apparently detained along with other members of his group, which leads caravans of vehicles in demonstrations against the government. After continued clashes overnight, protesters battling the police in the Ukrainian capital agreed to the temporary cease-fire on Thursday morning as opposition leaders planned to attend a second round of negotiations with Mr. Yanukovich. The talks, scheduled for the afternoon, were repeatedly pushed back. Late Thursday, two opposition leaders emerged from the meeting with Mr. Yanukovich to urge a continuation of the truce. They said they had achieved a tentative agreement that would set free dozens of detained protesters and potentially create another occupied space similar to Independence Square, where demonstrators have camped out since early December. Launch media viewer Vitali Klitschko of the Udar Party spoke to protesters on Thursday in central Kiev. Sergei Chuzavkov/Reuters They also said that a package of legislation suppressing political dissent that was rammed through Parliament last week by Mr. Yanukovich’s supporters would be revisited at a special legislative session next week. There were howls of dismay among some of the protesters gathered to listen to the two leaders, the former boxing champion, Vitali Klitschko, who leads a party called the Ukrainian Democratic Alliance for Reform, and Oleg Tyagnibok, the head of the nationalist party Svoboda. Mr. Klitschko and Mr. Tyagnibok said the authorities had also given guarantees that the police would not fire on protesters with live ammunition, something that officials have denied ever occurred, even as demonstrators were shot to death during clashes with the police early Wednesday. The opposition leaders, who head minority factions in Parliament, have struggled to command the respect and support of protesters on the street. They were jeered and booed at a rally on Sunday to protest the new legislation. Despite the urging of a continued cease-fire, it did not appear that Mr. Yanukovich had given any major ground. The opposition leaders had been demanding early presidential elections — sooner than the regular vote scheduled for March 2015 — or the dismissal of some or all of the appointed government ministers. The general prosecutor’s office confirmed that two men had been shot dead during battles with the police, but a coordinator of medical services for the opposition has put the death toll at five. International consternation appeared to be mounting, and there were renewed calls for a peaceful resolution. The European Union said its foreign policy chief, Catherine Ashton, would visit Kiev next week. In a telephone call on Thursday with Mr. Yanukovich, Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. urged “an immediate de-escalation in the standoff,” and called on him to “immediately address the legitimate concerns of peaceful protesters,” the White House said.

Author:	Arathain Kelvar [ Fri Jan 24, 2014 12:45 pm ]
Post subject:
I don't think we should do anything about violence against insurgents or protestors. These are individuals that choose to put themselves in harms way for their cause. We can speak out against it or whatever, but intervening? No. Now, if and when it becomes such a problem that non-protestors are being targeted or there are humanitarian crises amongst the public (Syria, for example), then I think it's worth a debate.

Author:	Midgen [ Fri Jan 24, 2014 12:53 pm ]
Post subject:
Intervene? To what end?

Author:	Micheal [ Fri Jan 24, 2014 1:11 pm ]
Post subject:
Just hearing some of my tea partyish coworkers (yes, in the very liberal California state service extreme right wingers exist and should be working rather than arguing this on state time. I'm posting this on break.) I'm marveling at the idea of trying to intervene in this and the expectation of some of the participants that we would. Perhaps a speech supporting civil rights and the act of peaceful protest, which this does not seem to be. Just in case I'm way over in left field I thought I would check with the right leaning crowd here. My opinion, keep bloody well out of it and keep to protesting the violence against gays in The Russian Federation. Semi-boycott of the Olympics is about as confrontational as I want to get with them right now.

Author:	Lenas [ Fri Jan 24, 2014 1:21 pm ]
Post subject:	Re:
Micheal wrote: I'm marveling at the idea of trying to intervene in this and the expectation of some of the participants that we would. Perhaps a speech supporting civil rights and the act of peaceful protest, which this does not seem to be. It started out as peaceful protests for a long time, but the government still arrested people and murdered them. I read about a protester that was taken and eventually found beaten to death in the woods. It didn't get violent from the protest side until the government made protesting illegal.

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Kiev https://gladerebooted.net/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=10725	Page 1 of 2

Author:	Rorinthas [ Fri Jan 24, 2014 1:39 pm ]
Post subject:	Re: Kiev
Arathain Kelvar wrote: I don't think we should do anything about violence against insurgents or protestors. These are individuals that choose to put themselves in harms way for their cause. We can speak out against it or whatever, but intervening? No. Now, if and when it becomes such a problem that non-protestors are being targeted or there are humanitarian crises amongst the public (Syria, for example), then I think it's worth a debate. Sounds about right.

Author:	Midgen [ Fri Jan 24, 2014 2:21 pm ]
Post subject:
If these "Tea Partiers" are advocating intervening in this situation, then they aren't very good at being in the Tea Party...

Author:	Müs [ Fri Jan 24, 2014 3:34 pm ]
Post subject:
I don't even know what's being protested. Maybe I didn't read closely enough, but I really have no idea what's going on. And this is why my GF is awesome. She linked this on FB. heh. http://imgur.com/a/lxkbH

Author:	Lenas [ Fri Jan 24, 2014 4:16 pm ]
Post subject:	Re:
Müs wrote: I don't even know what's being protested. Maybe I didn't read closely enough, but I really have no idea what's going on. Reddit: Explain Like I'm Five - What's up with Ukraine? Quote: Ukraine is balanced precariously between remaining a close partner of Russia, or joining the EU. The government want to remain friends with Russia. Russia wants another ally, and the Ukrainian government are being given deals like this as what's commonly seen as a "reward" for staying loyal to Putin. It helps since the country is in financial difficulty and close to defaulting. A significant number of people in Ukraine, however, don't care about that and want to move towards the EU, in the hopes of having higher standards of living and better trade with, and access to, the western world. The government is completely shutting out public opinion on this matter. The conflict has been escalating until a few days ago, when the government decided to say **** it to civil liberties and put in place some rather heavy-handed laws, making it jailable offences to blockade public buildings, wear masks or helmets at demonstrations, erect unauthorised tents in public areas, and even made it arrestable to "slander a government official." So now people are going crazy with riots over being ignored by an elected government, and violently or legally repressed by their rushed new laws.

Author:	Rorinthas [ Fri Jan 24, 2014 4:30 pm ]
Post subject:	Re: Kiev
So I'm short former soviet governments behaving like soviet governments behave only now without the media blackout of the soviet regime? Sounds like nothing to see here territory.

Author:	Arathain Kelvar [ Fri Jan 24, 2014 5:20 pm ]
Post subject:	Re:
Müs wrote: I don't even know what's being protested. Maybe I didn't read closely enough, but I really have no idea what's going on. And this is why my GF is awesome. She linked this on FB. heh. http://imgur.com/a/lxkbH Thanks for posting that. Two thoughts: 1) Holy ** that went to hell fast. 2) Holy ** their previous prime minister is hot (Yulia Tymoshenko).

Author:	Diamondeye [ Wed Mar 12, 2014 4:45 pm ]
Post subject:	Re: Kiev
I really wonder HOW people think we would intervene, logistically, and without risking wider confrontation with Russia.

Author:	Hannibal [ Thu Mar 13, 2014 6:47 am ]
Post subject:
I think china should lobby the UN to send a peacekeeping force into Illinois to ease the humanitarian crisis in Chicago and Detroit.

Author:	Jeryn [ Thu Mar 13, 2014 8:33 am ]
Post subject:
I'd get a kick out of seeing soldiers from Turkey mosey into Crimea with no insignia, since there are people speaking Tatar both in Turkey and Crimea who presumably need protection from those crazy Ukrainians just like the ethnic Russians do. I mean come on, if you're going to Balkanize, go big!

Author:	Diamondeye [ Fri Mar 14, 2014 2:24 am ]
Post subject:	Re: Kiev
Putin probably won't push anything in the Baltics for that reason. He's more interested in preventing nearby countries from joining NATO if they haven't already than he is in picking a fight with NATO itself. It would be very hard for him to claim aggression by NATO for defending member states, and Russia is really not ready for a war anyhow any more than NATO is. Neither side has put serious effort into readiness for a conflict with the other in 2 decades. That, in itself, however, is dangerous. If things escalate for any reason, leaders on either side could get panicky due to the sudden confrontation with a situation they've been telling themselves for 20 years was in the past. This is really more of a danger with the Russian side because the U.S., Britain, and France aren't directly threatened by the initial conflict, nor are the nuclear-sharing NATO members who need US release of nuclear weapons to use them. Russia also has far more of a cultural fear of invasion and being threatened due to a history of being invaded and a total lack of sea buffer for protection that the US and Britain have, and nuclear weapons are more central to their tactical planning and doctrine, whereas for the U.S. all nuclear weapons are essentially strategic, even if their actual method of employment is tactical. Russia plans to offset enemy technological superiority with nukes, just like we planned to use nukes to offset their numbers 30+ years ago. None of that is likely, though; what Russia really wants out of this are buffer states that are tied to Moscow more closely than NATO. That ship already sailed with the Baltics, so they've turned to Georgia and Ukraine. Belarus is already closely tied to Moscow anyhow. Russia has it's own quiet little Warsaw Pact replacement too, the CSTO. Nations part of this organization cannot be NATO members. You rarely hear about this, but Russia has always had plans to re-establish itself in pretty much its Cold War situation, sans the communist ideology, and with better political management and presentation of its more heavy-handed actions.

Author:	Kaffis Mark V [ Mon Mar 17, 2014 11:51 am ]
Post subject:
Welp, now we're imposing sanctions, and Crimea held a referendum declaring itself sovereign and applying for admission into the Russian federation thingie.

Author:	Micheal [ Mon Mar 17, 2014 6:56 pm ]
Post subject:
Just putting stuff out there. Personally I would like the borders of the Ukraine to remain as they have been for quite some time. It isn't my call, and it isn't under the USA's authority to make that call. Our posturing has no teeth. From what I've seen so far, Putin is very much using his hard power to threaten, and his soft power to divert arguments. He is winning, IMHO, so far.

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Author:	Aizle [ Thu Mar 13, 2014 8:35 am ]
Post subject:	Re: Kiev
Diamondeye wrote: I really wonder HOW people think we would intervene, logistically, and without risking wider confrontation with Russia. But come on! It would be the cold war all over again, just like the good old days!

Author:	Diamondeye [ Thu Mar 13, 2014 2:50 pm ]
Post subject:	Re: Kiev
Aizle wrote: Diamondeye wrote: I really wonder HOW people think we would intervene, logistically, and without risking wider confrontation with Russia. But come on! It would be the cold war all over again, just like the good old days! If we directly intervened, that war would not be terribly cold.

Author:	Amanar [ Thu Mar 13, 2014 7:02 pm ]
Post subject:	Re: Kiev
Diamondeye wrote: I really wonder HOW people think we would intervene, logistically, and without risking wider confrontation with Russia. Very carefully. Sorry, it's the first thing that came to mind.

Author:	RangerDave [ Thu Mar 13, 2014 7:45 pm ]
Post subject:	Re: Kiev
Diamondeye wrote: Aizle wrote: But come on! It would be the cold war all over again, just like the good old days! If we directly intervened, that war would not be terribly cold. Indeed. What worries me isn't that we'll actually intervene in Ukraine but that Putin might be aggressive enough to try something in the Baltics. I doubt he's dumb/crazy enough to think we wouldn't defend an actual NATO member, but Russia is already hinting at doing the whole "Russian citizenship for ethnic Russians" thing they pulled in Georgia and Crimea before going in there. If it came down to it and Russia did ~~invade~~ send troops to protect Russian citizens in the Baltics, I don't see how we'd avoid a shooting war at that point.

Author:	Elmarnieh [ Fri Mar 14, 2014 7:14 am ]
Post subject:
We should totally do it for the nostalgia. Russia is our frenemy they'd get a kick out of it to.

Author:	Hopwin [ Mon Mar 17, 2014 12:34 pm ]
Post subject:
Also, Russia shot down one of our recon drones.

Author:	Micheal [ Mon Mar 17, 2014 12:54 pm ]
Post subject:
Now we are declaring the Crimea's election illegal. Do we have any real reasons why it is less legal than the elections in the rest of the Ukraine? Declaring an election illegal because we don't like the results? Yeah, reason and citations guys. Is there any evidence of tampering? The only reason the Crimea is part of the Ukraine is because Stalin said so. It also is the financial backbone of the rest of the country, which is the real reason the Ukraine doesn't want it to leave. Putin is playing the West like.a grand champion. So far he wins on style, technique, and showmanship. All we've really got is Freedom! Sigh.

Author:	Diamondeye [ Mon Mar 17, 2014 4:04 pm ]
Post subject:	Re:
Micheal wrote: Now we are declaring the Crimea's election illegal. Do we have any real reasons why it is less legal than the elections in the rest of the Ukraine? Declaring an election illegal because we don't like the results? Yeah, reason and citations guys. Is there any evidence of tampering? The only reason the Crimea is part of the Ukraine is because Stalin said so. It also is the financial backbone of the rest of the country, which is the real reason the Ukraine doesn't want it to leave. Putin is playing the West like.a grand champion. So far he wins on style, technique, and showmanship. All we've really got is Freedom! Sigh. It's pretty obviously illegal under the laws of Ukraine, who ostensibly hold the region, so it's "illegal" in that sense. Putin is basically taking a page from Palpatine's book - "I will MAKE it legal". It has nothing to do with whether the election is clean; it happened because a large powerful country wanted it to happen. Not wanting the most economically productive area of the country to leave is a perfectly valid national position, especially not when facilitated by a large, powerful neighbor that will then get that region. The obvious other side of your argument is that part of the reason Russia wants it is its economic value. Putin is playing the west, but not in the way that you think. He's demonstrating that hard power beats soft power, and no amount of international councils will stop a large country from doing as it pleases within the limits of its strategic capabilities. The problem with us is that we never learned the art of propaganda the way they did, so now our ability to play with the political footballs we have is limited.