There's no logic behind russia's pretexts.

In 2014-15 they started shelling civilians in Donetsk and Luhansk regions, then used that as a pretext to increase their military presence by pretending it's all local militias fighting back the shelling the ruskies themselves started.

The pretext was fully fabricated, the militias theatre was fully fabricated. Nothing made sense. To anyone with a pinch if intellect the truth was obvious...

Yet, the legend of Ukrainians murdering other Ukrainians for using russian language has rooted so much, even now some ppl believe that bs.

In case of Bulgaria, ruskies could attack, then attack again pretending russian-speaking population needs protection in the light of the first attack.

And right-wing nutheads in EU gonna believe that, and blame NATO for offensive expansion

Logic

Whatsoever

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blagie 5 hours ago | parent [-]

That's not really accurate.

Russia's pretexts were largely true.

Ukraine did ban Russian language schools. That's technically a human rights violation. Native language education has been considered a human right since the late 1800s.

It's a common violation. Belarus did the same thing for Polish, Poland for German. Etc. Lots of Muricans want Murica to be an English-language Christian nation too, and laws sometimes reflect that. Certainly Murican education standards favor English speakers.

Euromaidan was a bit anti-rule-of-law.

Many Russian minority groups were mistreated in Ukraine.

All of that is true.

None of it merits an invasion.

Best propaganda is usually all true but selective of facts. In any group of more than a million people, some will do something bad. There are instances of Poles assaulting Ukrainian refugees, and vice-versa. It sounds bad, but with over a million refugees, it's statistically impossible for it to not happen. It makes for good propaganda for Russia too; both sides are starting to be riled up.

Good propaganda has elements of truth. Even if you read Hitler, you'll see a mixture of truth and fiction. The verifiable facts lend credence to the fabricated ones.

The dumb thing is Ukraine has doubled down on all of that since the invasion. The right thing to do would be to:

1) Open up a Russian-language elementary school

2) Don't mention Bandera, or better yet, apologize to Poland and open a park recognizing Polish victims or something similarly symbolic.

That's the right thing to do, and with that, the credibility of the propaganda simply disintegrates. If you're ever falsely accused, the trick is to do the exact opposite.

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adrian_b an hour ago | parent | next [-]

You are right that the Russians have been frequently somewhat mistreated in the former Soviet Republics where they have become minorities.

However, this is an extraordinarily hypocritical claim, because this has followed a time when for various durations, between a half of century and two centuries the Russians have mistreated the minorities of those places in a much more ferocious way, inclusively by robbing them, murdering them or sending them to forced labor in Siberia.

In Ukraine, there are many places with Russian colonists who have been installed after WWII in the houses that before the war belonged to various other nationalities, which were then killed or dispersed to Siberia by the Russians.

Yes, Russians have been mistreated after the separation of the Soviet Republics, but this is much, much less than what their fathers have done around WWII and before it, and many of them have still inherited what their fathers have stolen from the other nationalities.

Had the Russians treated better the others when they had the power, they would have not been so hated, so they would have been much more likely to be treated correctly.

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azan_ 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

What you've listed here is not what russia lists as a reason for attacking Ukraine. And even if it was, it's still really shitty pretext.

	▲	blagie 4 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		Yes, these are very much among Russia's pretexts. There were others as well. Most have at least some basis as well. For example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/422nd_Unmanned_Systems_Regimen... And yes, it is still a really shitty set of pretexts.

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api 5 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

As with many conflicts this one goes back a long way. Ukraine gave up its nukes to Russia in exchange for a non aggression pact that the invasion broke.

Also bad for the world. The lesson, as with Iran and Iraq, is: you’d better have nukes and never give them up. This is the opposite of the lesson we want if we want to contain proliferation.

The global taboo on use remains. If someone breaks that and gets away with it we are into civilization ending danger territory.

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somenameforme 3 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Ukraine never had its own independently controlled/operated nukes. The USSR deployed nukes on various territories but all command and control was completely centralized within Russia. Ukraine/Belarus/Kazakhstan returned the Soviet nukes to Russia under the same agreement and received some nonbinding assurances and cash in exchange - it was nothing like a formal pact. Had any of these countries tried to reverse engineer the nukes, they'd likely have been invaded by the US, Russia, and most other major world powers, so it was largely an offer they couldn't refuse.

Russia claims those assurances ended with the US actively advocating on the ground in Ukraine for the overthrow of their government in 2014, as the assurances included not interfering in domestic politics or using economic coercion. But the US also sanctioned and was working to overthrow Belarus as far back as 2006, so those assurances had been pretty much dead for a long time.

Outside of that I completely agree with everything else you said, especially with people not appreciating how far back these conflicts go. The whole Bandera stuff has no real parallel in the West, so I think most people wouldn't really be able to 'get it' even if they had the facts, which they overwhelmingly do not.

	▲	adrian_b 2 hours ago \| parent [-]
		Ukraine had the nukes in physical possession and they had enough expertise to eventually disassemble them and replace the electronics. Choosing to not do this to avoid a hypothetical external aggression was a bad choice, because they were invaded anyway.

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dust42 5 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

> As with many conflicts this one goes back a long way. Ukraine gave up its nukes to Russia in exchange for a non aggression pact that the invasion broke.

From the Guardian (12 days ago): "Kyiv’s decision to honour second world war fighters who killed about 100,000 Poles has revived simmering tensions". Bandera was a Nazi collaborator and today's Ukraine politics worships Bandera. Lots of streets are renamed to honor him. Eastern Ukrainians are considered second class - or as some politicians said: "There are 2 million people too many".

The US (look up Nuland and her quote about 'fuck the EU') fueled with $5B the nationalism in Ukraine. Now imagine, the US would fuel with $50B the nationalism in Belgium and the the flemish would attack wallonie. You know what would happen? France would support the wallonie. Nothing to see here.

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koiueo 5 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

1) there are plenty of russian schools in russia

2) Poland is not your concern, Vasily

	▲	ifwinterco 2 hours ago \| parent [-]
		That's the point he's making though - this kind of response just validates Russian propaganda, makes Russia look good and makes Ukraine look bad. If you want Ukraine to win the information war then this isn't that helpful? Unless of course you are actually pro-Russian and you're just playing this game at a higher level in which case... congrats because that is effective