The Other McCain

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Ukraine Unravels

Posted on | February 20, 2014 | 24 Comments

The news out of Kiev is troubling: At least 50 protesters reported killed, and the protesters say the number of dead is actually more than 100. The conflict is essentially one between Ukrainian nationalism and Russian imperialism. The current government in Ukraine is pro-Moscow and, unfortunately, Russian president Vladimir Putin holds the geopolitical trump cards. George Will observes:

Marx, whose prophesies were perversely predictive because they were almost invariably wrong, predicted the end of nationalism. Economic forces, he said, determine political, cultural and psychological realities. So capitalism, with its borders-leaping cosmopolitanism, would dilute to the point of disappearance all emotional attachments to nations. Ukraine’s ferment is an emphatic, albeit redundant, refutation of Marxism.

Read the whole thing.

 

Category: Russia, Ukraine

Comments

24 Responses to “Ukraine Unravels”

  1. PATR2014
    February 20th, 2014 @ 2:28 pm

    RT @smitty_one_each: TOM Ukraine Unravels http://t.co/4xszPeekIA #TCOT

  2. librarygryffon
    February 20th, 2014 @ 1:45 pm

    And our idiot pResident is drawing another Red Line, because that worked so well in Syria….

    It will take generations before this country is respected abroad again.

  3. Dianna Deeley
    February 20th, 2014 @ 1:46 pm

    I’m rooting for the protestors, but I think they’re going to be left in the lurch by both the Obama Administration and the EU.

    It’s so sickening.

  4. Quartermaster
    February 20th, 2014 @ 1:52 pm

    I don’t know that what is happening now is the final battle of the cold war. What appears to be the case, however, is that people are tired of corruption and they’ve been allowed to gather to the point of being a power and the regime is running scared.
    An anecdote that does seem typical of much of Ukraine, however, was experienced by an acquaintance who went to Kremenchuk, Ukraine to take a transition course for the Mi-8/17 before going to the Rock Pile for Dynecorp. He spoke a bit of Russian to some of the people there and was told, “We speak Ukrainian not Russian.” Kiev may be the mother of Russia, but the present crop don’t seem to have much truck with “Mother Russia.”
    Interesting aside – Mikhail Kalashnikov’s son was one of the instructors for the course.

  5. Quartermaster
    February 20th, 2014 @ 1:52 pm

    I think that’s the way to bet.

  6. Evi L. Bloggerlady
    February 20th, 2014 @ 1:56 pm

    The only “red line” right now is Putin can’t jump in on behalf of his thuggish friends right now because he is busy with the Olympics in Sochi.

    As far as Barack Obama’s protests, unless it is about climate change or cracking down on gay rights, the Ukraine Thugs pretty much know he is not going to do anything. And even with those two issues, he never does anything unless it is easy and a matter of political posturing. And the lefty media is not going to call the Ukrainian government on this, it is not like they closed lanes for a bridge (which something really really bad apparently).

  7. Adobe_Walls
    February 20th, 2014 @ 2:04 pm

    Saw photo yesterday don’t remember where showing two At/or small bore arty pieces concealed within a pile of tires. This is not to say there is ammo available.

  8. Jeanette Victoria
    February 20th, 2014 @ 2:27 pm

    This is so sad I was there during the orange revolution shopped on Kreschatik and spent a lot of time walking the Maidan. I hate this.

  9. RS
    February 20th, 2014 @ 3:03 pm

    IIRC about half the population of Ukraine are Ukrainians. The other half are Russians, transplanted over the years. It’s the latter who are calling the shots at the moment. Ukrainian independence has been a burr on the Russian saddle for a long, long time.

  10. librarygryffon
    February 20th, 2014 @ 4:07 pm

    He might do something if the protesters were Muslim.

    Am I getting too cynical in my not-quite-so-old age?

  11. Adjoran
    February 20th, 2014 @ 4:47 pm

    Ukrainians hate Russians. Centuries of Russians invading, oppressing, murdering, and raping Ukrainians may have something to do with it. That’s a big reason the people were incensed that the Russian puppet refused the trade deal with EU that would move Ukraine closer to Europe economically and help insure future independence.

    After the forced starvation of the early ’30s (Ukrainian farmers refused Stalin’s collectivization, so he transferred all the grain storage from regional depots to Moscow and refused to supply Ukraine with its own food), Stalin and the Soviets moved more and more ethnic Russians and Belarussians into Ukraine to administer the State. It was the only way to repress Ukrainian nationalism.

    As RS mentions, that is pretty much the divide in this struggle. The ethnic Russians want to a puppet state of Putin, the ethnic Ukrainians want closer ties with the West.

  12. Jeanette Victoria
    February 20th, 2014 @ 6:00 pm

    That is so very true NEVER EVER mistake a Ukrainian for a Russian. Having lived both in Moscow and Kiev Let me tell you I will take Kiev any day.

  13. Dianna Deeley
    February 20th, 2014 @ 6:07 pm

    Putin is capable of brazenly ordering Russian aid to the Ukrainian PM while hosting the Olympics. I half expect him to do so, smiling as doth the crocodile.

    After all, what do you think anyone is going to do about it?

  14. Evi L. Bloggerlady
    February 20th, 2014 @ 6:26 pm

    You mean Obama might give the protesters a thumbs up if they were Muslim? Probably. However, as Ukrainians they are probably Ukrainian Catholics so no such luck there.

  15. Dave Mears
    February 20th, 2014 @ 7:17 pm

    Marx was wrong about reducing nationalism- societies are made of a complicated web of rules with which we interact with each other. In so much as those rules remain different, we’ll always have an interest in creating separations. Those rules are naturally optimizing, as we look to others to see what works for them, but at the same time, new things are also being tried. If anything, the tendency toward larger and larger nations is countered by a counter tendency of groups inside that nation to polarize potentially leading to mitosis.
    What capitalism does do is make other nation’s citizens the buyers of our excess stuff and the sellers of stuff to us (buyers of our excess money?) making both parties richer. Since we become wealthier either as the buyer or the seller, (regardless of what liberals say) our interest in blowing them up and taking their stuff, and vise versa is reduced.
    It’s been said that capitalists would sell the rope the communists would use to hang us. That would be true, if our excess didn’t mean it was relatively difficult to put us in that position, but that being said, the communist would eventually hang themselves as well. After all, that is their nature, eliminate competing notions through violence rather than simply out growing them by having better ideas. So they would hang themselves. But they’d do it with second hand rope, as NO ONE would be left to make it for them, and it’s not as though communism is any good at producing anything itself.

  16. Quartermaster
    February 20th, 2014 @ 8:16 pm

    There are several possibilities as to what they could be other than Catholic. Uniate Orthodox, Russian Orthodox, Ukranian Orthodox, among others. Around Kiev you’ll find a rather healthy mix.

  17. Quartermaster
    February 20th, 2014 @ 8:18 pm

    Many of the ethnic Russians have no truck with Russia. The people that ran the transition course were mainly ethnic Russian, including the person who said the speak Ukranian there.

  18. librarygryffon
    February 20th, 2014 @ 8:43 pm

    But sadly, I only see Obama even thinking of doing anything if the protesters were Muslim. Anything else and he’ll let his friend Vlad have free rein while trying to talk tough so he looks good to the world.

  19. Nan
    February 20th, 2014 @ 8:59 pm

    Ukrainian Catholic and Uniate Orthodox would be the same.

  20. Quartermaster
    February 20th, 2014 @ 9:10 pm

    I don’t know. I’ve seen Orthodox writers refer to them separately as though they aren’t the same. The problem with that is while the Orthodox writers refer to them as separate people, both are in communion with Rome. Most of the Orthodox that I’ve seen writing about them dislike both cordially.

  21. Nan
    February 20th, 2014 @ 9:43 pm

    The Orthodox writers may not realize they’re the same; around the year 1600, through the Union of Brest and Uzhorod, certain Orthodox lands, taken over by the Catholic Hapsburgs, were brought into Communion with Rome. The deal was, while they had to make a few changes (primacy of Rome, filioque), they were guaranteed the right to practice their faith as they had been, thus, although Catholic, the liturgy is the same as the Orthodox use. This is one of my sister Churches; I don’t remember which Church was Brest and which was Uzhorod, but at one time, my natural parish had people from both churches and at some point later, a Ukrainian parish split off.

  22. Adjoran
    February 21st, 2014 @ 12:40 am

    Obama will bend over frontwards, that’s what!

    He’s got more flexibility now.

  23. The Mad Jewess
    February 21st, 2014 @ 1:29 pm

    Google: Ukraine, Soros, 2011.
    And google:

    Instructions For ‘Protesters’ Gear/Uniform In Tahrir/Maidan in Arabic & Ukrainian Languages Are Identical

    This is just another Egypt, Libya, Syria redux in Ukraine.

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    February 21st, 2014 @ 4:11 pm

    […] Ukraine Unravels […]