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by somenameforme
787 days ago
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I actually agree with most of that. But you're missing some important timelines. The breakaway regions did not breakaway in May, they broke away immediately after the coup in March. And yes at that point Russia began plying them with support. The only thing that happened in May was the Donbas referendum. And that referendum was indeed most almost certainly illegitimate. Consequently, it was officially recognized by nobody - including Russia, who instead simply opined, somewhat tongue in cheek, that they "respect the will of the population of the regions." [1] Russia even tried to encourage the leaders of the breakaway regions to hold the referendum later (probably knowing they could not legitimately obtain the support required for action), but they chose to move ahead with a sham referendum anyhow. But the point here is that the civil war began in March. Could Ukraine have snuffed out the rebellious regions without Russian interference? Most likely, but countries feeding arms and support to rebellions that they support is pretty run of the mill geopolitics stuff (and was also 100% expected by the US per the diplomatic cables). Similarly, it's highly unlikely that the Ukrainian coup would have succeeded without US backing and direct involvement. In the 8 years that followed (until the invasion) Russia repeatedly tried to organize some sort of a cease fire and mutually agreeable solution for the breakaway regions - basically letting them have some sort of special administrative status while remaining part of Ukraine. This resulted in the Minsk accords. Those accords were then repeatedly violated, with both sides blaming the other, until the situation reached a climax in 2022. [1] - https://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/13/world/europe/ukraine.html |
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In the first stage, they captured Crimea. Then, on 12 April 2014, the war broke loose in Eastern Ukraine after 50 Russian commandos led by Girkin captured the town of Sloviansk. Sabotage groups sent to rile up people and sow confusion were active even earlier than that (Ukraine managed to detain a number of them).
There were no separatists, no rebels, no break-away regions, nothing before Russia manufactured them to create an appearance of a civil war and deprive Ukraine of foreign support. That was all a cover story for the military operation - on of the most effective deceptions in the history of warfare.