Stupid question, I know: Why shouldn't Ukraine split in two?

[MannyGoldstein]

The left side becomes part of the European bloc, the right part of the Russian bloc. It makes sense in terms of what the different parts of the country desire, I think.

There used to be a Czechoslovakia...

[TheMightyFavog]

1. Ukraine would lose Black Sea access, I think

Not good for them.

[MannyGoldstein]

4. Looks like they'd get that yellow strip. nt

[Pretzel_Warrior]

2. Pretty cavalier about another nation's territorial integrity

Also, why doesn't Iraq fracture into 3 nations, Syria into three or more....

[MannyGoldstein]

3. Ok. Why not, if it'll increase the peace?

There are several examples of it working well. Do you have counterexamples where it did not?

[dsc]

5. Sudan

and Ireland on edit I mean Northern Ireland.

[Fumesucker]

9. Ireland is worse off as an independent country than it was as part of the UK?

I suspect you might get some argument from many Irish on that point..

[dsc]

10. I meant Northern Ireland

from Ireland as a whole

[Chathamization]

20. For a couple of reasons

One, partitions are much, much messier than simply cutting up a map. As another poster said, you end up with Northern Ireland's or Kashmirs - places where people end up on the wrong side of the line and spend the next few decades trying to get on the right side (while the other half of the population there is fighting to make sure they don't end up in the same position. In other areas, you get mass violence and ethnic cleansing as the minority groups flee to the country that's theirs.

Two, I don't think it's a great idea to either encourage the notion that countries are for a single ethnicity, or that armed ethnic separatists movements are a good idea. We've had plenty of bad experience with both of those.

[Igel]

99. It won't.

You'll get the following.

1. Nobody be happy with "their" portion. Just ethnic Russians? Well, look at that right strip. It's partially ethnic Russians. But the ethnic Russians will say it has to be all ethnic Russian, some will say it has to be some part ethnic Russian, but since it's also ethnic Ukrainian (how the map labels it predecides how most people will understand it) others will say it has to be all ethnic Ukrainian. And if you split it, not only do you have to decide if it's 38% Russian, 39% Russian, 40% Russian, but also which bits are going to be Russian and which bits Ukrainian.

What could possibly go wrong?

2. Ethnic Russians will also, to improve their status and simply hurt the other side, want all the Russian speakers in their camp. Some may opt that way; others won't. But with Putin in arguing, what the speakers want will be decided in the Russian media, just as many DUers have decided based on just what they see and what they know, not thinking there might be more that they don't know and it might be important. It won't be decided by the people, whatever those sitting safe and warm 8000 miles away might think.

3. Russia supervised ethnic cleansing of Abkhazia. Nobody cared. In S. Ossetia many "liberals" who just like what Russia does for whatever reasons decided that the ethnic cleansing in S. Ossetia was a good thing. It punished the evil Saavashkili. Yeah, we hate collective punishment, and it wasn't Saavashkili himself who was ethnically cleansed, but it was "close enough": A lot of Georgians were punished collectively in order to hurt a politician DUers and Russians despised.

We forget that a great thing that happened to the USSR in response to WWII was the mass ethnic cleansing of Poles. To make Russia happy Poland was moved a couple of hundred miles west--it punished Poland and gave Russia the Polish territory it coveted in the partition of Poland with Hitler; and it punished the Germans and created a refugee mess for both countries. Stalin was pleased. He, and many Russians, have a mindset that often the best way to help yourself is to hurt others--and to hurt them on suspicion that they may either hurt you, may want to hurt you, or may just make you look bad. You don't actually have to benefit (although it's best if you benefit while make everybody else suffer).

Will Ukrainians do the same thing? If not to start off, then in response to having hordes of refugees they'll respond in kind. Such things become ethnic cleansing parties.

4. There's the inevitable self-cleansed folk that feel forced to leave.

5. There are claims and calls for reparations. In response to the ethnic cleansing of Germans from the Czech Lands, 50 years later there were claims. There's still an outstanding claim from Italy against Slovenia for the mutual ethnic cleansing agreed upon after WWII there--Slovenia accepted Slovenes and distributed Italian property to them but Italy confiscated Slovenian property and left the Italians that arrived with nothing.

It's always the more powerful who presses the claims. Germany against Cesko and Poland, Italy against Slovenia,

6. It doesn't help to find a "fair" solution when one side is occupying another, has nuclear weapons, and a seat on the UN Security Council and surrounds you on two sides. We think Israel's unfair to the Palestinians? They only have 2 out of 4 advantages, and that's if you accept that Israel has nuclear weapons and would use them 3 miles from their border.

7. It'll take a long time for the disinformation to die down. Russians are truly terrified about all the horrible things that have been happening to them. No, nothing horrible's been happening. But if Putin says they're facing real threats, that their rights have been trampled, that they've been grievously wronged and they need protection, then, well, they believe him rather than the people they distrust and feel have been ungrateful to them. Remember: The ethnically Russian sections were *the* prosperous sections under the USSR. Now they're poor with high unemployment. Yanukovich was "conservative" in that he, like the Communist Party, wanted to have a lot of state subsidies and interventions to keep the former proletariat happy. What was must continue--the essence of conservatism. They wanted plans to keep production going to obsolete plants, subsidies to the firms and companies, etc. The more laissez-faire Ukrainians--who weren't proletarian and were pretty much battered by Stalin and Soviet policy for anywhere from 45 to 70 years--are trying to take away their rights, their entitlements, and, again, are being ungrateful towards their superiors, the elder brother, Russia.

(Why the destruction of statues of Lenin? Why the resentment of that destruction? Think of "oppressor" versus "hero" in ethnic terms. It's like the destruction of statues of Robert E. Lee by an African-American group.)

The response from the US will be mixed, as it was after Vietnam. For some, there was immediate justice and peace becauses their beautiful minds were no longer troubled by the conflict. It wasn't until over a decade later that a lot of people could even admit that N. Vietnamese was repressive. Others quickly focused on the boat people and reeducation camps. Some noticed that with N. Vietnamese support, Laos almost immediately fell. While Pol Pot didn't get support from the N. Vietnamese late in the game, he was an ally for a while and for longer sheltered in N. Vietnamese territory in Cambodia--we like to point out that Israel "started" Hamas by funding it briefly decades ago, but reject the same kind of accusation when it's even more aptly placed at the feet of a group that many on the left rather liked in the '60s.

So it'll be if Ukraine's partitioned. It'll be immediate nirvana. The ethnic cleansing, corruption, strong-arming, injustices, refugee camps will simply not exist for those who can worry about making sure they have the right level of medical benefits or are trying to get from 7.0 to 6.9% unemployment. Our inconveniences are far more important than massive social disruption.

There's a Russian proverb, svoya rubashka blizhe k telu, "Your own shirt's closer to your body", that means your personal interests are more important than the (or any) interests of other people. Yup: Looking out for #1.

Putin knows the saying and it has no taint of atavism. So do Americans, but we act like we don't--we disparage those who express the idea but it's really just disparaging those who *say* it out loud, because it's something we pretty much all do in practice. Form over substance.

[Cali_Democrat]

117. increase peace?

so naive....

[Fumesucker]

6. Scotland looks as if it might be on the way to splitting with the UK

I've even heard rumbles of Welsh independence..

[Pretzel_Warrior]

11. PM me when that happens. Hint:

Probably at least 50 years after Quebec breaks from the rest of Canada which will never happen.

[joshcryer]

55. Only if the UK allows it.

Which they probably will, but that's beside the point.

The UK could at any point modify the Scotland Act 1998 and prevent Scotland's referendum from being relevant.

[WhaTHellsgoingonhere]

15. slippery slope, will lead to men marrying their dogs

[sabrina 1]

46. Why did Czechoslovakia choose to split in two, and why is it our business what they do? Ireland is

split, if the people want that, who are you to tell them no? And it really is none of our business, is it? Maybe we should listen to people around the world, especially after the devastation we have caused in so many of the places we HAVE interfered, they have been telling us to leave them alone, Egyptian protesters, Tunisian protesters the only people who ever ask for your help now, are Right Wingers in these places. Like Syria, which is why in the end this president decided, as the UK did that the 'opposition' was violent and dangerous and should not be supplied with weapons.

How about we take care of this country, we can't afford to help our own people we are told, we have to 'cut programs' due to a lack of money. Well where is all the money coming from to pay for these foreign interventions, the world survived long before we even existed, I'm sure it can sort itself out way better, look at Iraq if you want an example, all by themselves. And we should stop supporting DICTATORS also, and homophobic Televangelist influenced governments like Uganda with our tax dollars.

People are sick of the money being wasted on all these foreign adventures.

[davidpdx]

69. Caring about outcome of an invasion of another country doesn't necessarily mean

military intervention. We have a duty to stand up for other countries like the Ukraine or injustice whether it be abroad or at home. Your isolationist, pro-Russian propaganda is getting old.

[malaise]

87. Unless of course 'we' are doing the invading of other countries

or supporting the 'protestors' to overthrow the elected governments.
The rest of the world finds the 'exceptionalist' US propaganda just as old.

[Igel]

101. It was entirely internal, along fairly well-established internal borders.

The Slovaks wanted to go free from Czechs. There were differences of opinion, and most of the political power was in the West. There was also an East/West split that went back a long ways, with Czech Lands being more pro-Western and Slovakia being more East- and South-looking.

The Czechs assumed, with some accuracy, that the Slovaks, having benefited from the Czechoslovak economic policy under Soviet rule, believed they had the better chance to be an economic engine. They'd take off and didn't want to have to either lose industrial dominance or bail out the Czechs. Slovakia had the heavy industry.

The Czechs were also better educated and believed they'd have a good go at prosperity without the Slovaks.

The Czechs would benefit from changing the social order. Less state planning, less emphasis on social planning, and being a bit more laissez faire so that individual initiative mattered more. That would lead to less money for maintaining all the benefits that were showered on the self-styled proletariat, those who worked in industry and in factories. The Slovaks were afraid that all the heavy industrial workers would suddenly lose their perks, perks that the farmers enjoyed less. (Yes, there wasn't a clean split here: Slovak farmers and others didn't want to split; the ironworkers in Kladno weren't happy with the new economic order in the West. However, it was a clean ethnic split, the ethnic animosities were concentrated in areas that were nearly 100% Slovak or Czech so there wasn't much actual hatred in evidence. That allowed it to be a neat, orderly split by referendum and agreement on both sides.)

A side effect of the split, however, was ethnic cleansing and persecution. The Hungarians in the south of Slovakia had been allowed to stay Hungarian (unlike the Slovaks in Hungary, which had been forcibly assimilated in the previous 50-70 years). The Slovaks, nationalistically proud of their new-found independent state, took down Hungarian signs, made Slovak the national medium of instruction, and generally pissed off the Hungarian minority. I thought of them as a juvenile nation, one that needed to grow up and, to some extent, finally did--it was the first time the Slovaks had their own state.


The rest of your post is basically a trope. My mother loved it. No intervention was worth it: Let all the South Americans get killed, she had her problems--men made more than women, and some women felt like they had no place to go if they were battered. (She had no use for non-women-based civil rights. Headstart wasn't to help the kids, it was to be daycare. Rwanda? Maybe they deserved it, let them work out their own problems, our problems are worse.) Space program? Waste of money. Environmental regulations? Waste of money. Interstate system? Waste of money. NIH? Unless it helped poor women, a waste of money. Instead of "guns or butter," a viable argument, she wasn't past "education or butter." A high-school drop-out, the only reason for a college education was to make more money. Everything had a $ amount attached to it. And she voted straight-party (D) from the time she turned 21 until the year she had her voting rights stripped by reason of mental incompetence. (Even got over calling Obama "that damned n****r" after HRC lost and ended up voting for him.)

Her motto was "Looking out for #1."

[sabrina 1]

109. What does your last paragraph have to do with this conversation? Are you saying that those of us

who oppose and have since they began under Bush, the US invasions of other countries, are mentally ill? That is how I read it, but you are free to correct me if I'm wrong.

As for the history lesson on Czechoslovakia, I am well aware of the history due to having spent quite a lot of time in Europe with friends in Slovakia, Spain, the UK, relatives there and in Ireland, totally destroyed economically, France and Italy. Some friends in Greece, another EU nation whose economy and sovereignty have been destroyed. Many of these former first world countries are now under the thumb of the IMF and the World Bank, the corruption in their governments and Banks more or less, like here, not dealt with as it should be.

If you are here to attack democrats for opposing invasions and those calling for them of other nations, to imply as it appears you were trying to do, that Democrats here are insane, or racist, do so directly, I prefer directness rather than 'implications' that way there is no misunderstanding and we can deal directly with the false assumptions.

[Spider Jerusalem]

7. "Why shouldn't Germany have annexed the Sudetenland? After all, it had a German-speaking majority!"

Neville Chamberlain? Is that you?

[MannyGoldstein]

13. I don't believe that I called for annexation.

Did I write something confusing?

[Spider Jerusalem]

16. You seem to be confused.

With the Russian army in the Crimea, what do you think the endgame of "Ukraine splitting in two" would be? An independent "Eastern Ukraine"? Or de facto annexation by Russia? (See: South Ossetia as a likely outcome.)

[MannyGoldstein]

18. So you want us to go to war with Russia?

Or am I misunderstanding something?

[Spider Jerusalem]

28. Not really, no.

Putin probably wants it even less, though. He may be many things, but I don't think "insane" is one of those things.

[MannyGoldstein]

33. So you think Russia won't dominate a united Ukraine

But would dominate an "Eastern Ukraine" state?

Seems to me that the Russians want to own the East, and will take the East or the entire thing if need be.

[Spider Jerusalem]

37. Yes and yes

the numbers: 71% of the population of Ukraine are ethnic Ukrainians. Ethnic Russians are only a majority in some parts of the east and notably in the Crimea. A majority of Ukrainians prefer a future in Europe to being a constituent state of a reconstituted Russian Empire. The Russians care about Sevastopol and the base for their Black Sea Fleet more than anything else; they need warm-water ports if they want a blue-water navy. That means the Black Sea (and their base in Syria, hence their support for Assad).

The diplomatic solution would be for the Ukrainian government to guarantee the Russian lease on the base in Sevastopol and pledge a referendum on the status of the Crimea.

[MannyGoldstein]

38. Didn't most Ukrainians vote for Russian-leaning politicians?

That would tend to indicate that many - probably in the East - prefer to associate with Russia.

[BainsBane]

48. Right, because having 70 people massacred in the streets by the pro-Russian govt

is a winning formula for electoral success. They put him out of power. Obviously they don't want him the pro-Russian elements to rule any more. You know that as well as anyone else.

You also know that there is no chance the US will become involved militarily.

[MannyGoldstein]

49. So they didn't vote for his government? nt

[BainsBane]

51. I want to make something very clear

I know exactly what you are doing. Don't mistake me for a fool.

[MannyGoldstein]

54. You seem to want to change the conversation

I've noticed that you do that when things get challenging.

[11 Bravo]

105. Hell, Manny, you could post a fucking recipe for meatloaf and ...

someone would show up to accuse you of having an ulterior motive.

[MannyGoldstein]

110. I'm going to try that.

Let's see what happens!

[MannyGoldstein]

58. I look forward to continuing this discussion

this thought that you began. When you have some time.

[BainsBane]

123. You'll have to talk to Chris about that

Sadly, our neutral location is no longer available.

[thucythucy]

90. My understanding is that the deposed president

campaigned on a platform of closer ties to the EU, but then did a 180 once elected. He compounded the outrage this caused by proposing very Putinesque legislation making most dissent illegal and most dissenters criminals, then using lethal force to counter what had until then been mostly peaceful demonstrations.

That said, a peaceful partition might well be the best solution. This could be said of all manner of conflicts around the world. Just as many African boundaries, drawn up by European colonialists, bear no relation to the nations and communities that actually exist (same as much of the Middle East) many of boundaries of the former Soviet republics have more to do with internal Soviet machinations of the time, than actual demographics.

Whatever happens, a military solution imposed by the west is clearly out of the question.

Best wishes.

[MannyGoldstein]

91. Looks like he campaigned on closer ties to EU *and* Russia

But in the end, the Soviet leaning folks voted for him, the EU leaners against:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=4588728

[thucythucy]

97. Looks like he was a pretty run of the mill politician,

except for the parts about making dissent illegal and shooting down protesters in the street. Had that not been the response to the demonstrations, we might not be where we are today.

Then again, I don't pretend to understand what's going on in Ukraine today, or for that matter in much of the rest of the world. I would of course prefer peaceful solutions to all these problems, but that doesn't look very likely at the moment.

Part of the issue here is the living history--that is, people in Ukraine have a living memory of what it's like to live under Russian domination, and it wasn't pretty. So the stakes for them are higher than anything Americans might experience. Look at the outrage Obama gets met with over something as innocuous at health insurance reform. "FEMA camps" "death panels" etc. Imagine if there was an actual history of that sort of widespread tyranny, of genocide and forced starvation and relocations etc., all within living memory here. Political power shifts in a climate like that are more than a game of who wins and who loses--it's life or death. If I thought my government was on the verge of returning me to a state of foreign domination--a domination with which I or my family had personal experience--I'd probably be out in the street myself.

In a situation like that, people are far less likely to trust a democratic process--hence the unwillingness to wait for the next election. Again, it didn't help that the immediate response to opposition in the streets was an attempt to shut down dissent and physically exterminate some of the dissenters.

What I wish for is a peaceful, prosperous, democratic Ukraine. What will actually happen is anybody's guess.

What was that statement by Joyce? "History is the nightmare from which I'm trying to awake"? That's not it exactly, but it's close.

Best wishes.

[laundry_queen]

108. Good post. nt

[randome]

102. In America, we vote in Conservative assholes.

By your way of thinking, we should sit back and do nothing because the voters decided our fate.
[hr][font color="blue"][center]Precision and concision. That's the game.[/center][/font][hr]

[MannyGoldstein]

103. That's exactly right!

In an alternate universe.

[treestar]

75. Answer the question

It was a reasonable question.

[sabrina 1]

53. Why shouldn't a country do whatever it wants without our interference? Other countries have chosen

to do so and seem to be doing just fine. It's not a new concept. Why is eveything OUR business? I guess it's that American Privilege thing, we have no clue most of the time about any of these countries, but we are ready to cheer for invading them regardless.

Manny did not suggest annexing any part of Ukraine. He asked why, like Czechoslovakia eg, they might not do the same thing, if that is what the people want. The Czech Republic and Slovakia seem to be doing just fine.

Why would you want to stop them if that is their choice?

[newfie11]

68. +1. Nt

[davidpdx]

70. Laughable

"Why shouldn't a country do whatever it wants without our interference?"

So the Russians invading is ok?

Yeah you are just a fucking riot.

[joshcryer]

71. No silly, the vote under military occupation.

The non-interfering military occupation.

They will vote to split from Ukraine, they will split, and the military occupation will stay indefinitely.

Right out of the US playbook.

Why shouldn't Russia get a stab at it after having done so before with the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact?

It's not fair!

[sabrina 1]

116. I'm going to conduct an experiment here, I hope you don't mind if I use YOUR comment to do so.

Starting with, I have no idea why it was directed to me.

So, could you explain why you directed a comment to me, that had zero to do with anything I said?

Or better yet, link to, what I suppose you either imagined or confused with someone else, but just to be sure, the comment where I said this: "So the Russians invading is ok" ....

As for your use of the word 'fucking' in the context in which you used it, thanks! Although how you would have access to that kind of personal info, is beyond me!

[BainsBane]

120. +1

[DFW]

73. A brief footnote to that

The Czech Republic is doing OK. They always had the better part of the "marriage" anyway, and Prague is everybody's favorite city to visit in Eastern Europe (with good reason). Slovakia was always the poor cousin, and the main reason it split off is that the corrupt and authoritarian Slovakian leadership at the time of the Velvet Revolution didn't want its authority questioned by a democratically elected humanist like Havel. Slovakia is still the poor cousin, and Bratislava won't be another Prague if you give it a century to catch up. Slovakia is one of those "be careful what you wish for" cases. The Czechs were only too happy to let them go.

[sabrina 1]

107. Perhaps, I have friends in Slovakia who recognize eg, that they have an unemployment issue eg

but are very proud of their independence. And considering the economic conditions in the rest of Europe, at this point, they are not alone.

Coups have unintended consequences also most of the time. Eg, Ukraine appears to be splitting on its own with the potential for the spreading of violence across the entire area including Crimea.

An election might have avoided the divisions that appear to be now opening wide.

People die in coups, I am in favor of using the democratic process to settle issues. If the discontent with the Government is as widespread as it appears, I fail to see why they did not move the elections forward, as Yanukovich agreed to do, and avoid the violence and division that is now occurring.

[DFW]

113. There is a difference between being proud of your ethnicity and changing your nationality

Slovakia, proud as it may be of its independence, got a raw deal economically by separating. It was decided ofr anything but pragmatic reasons.

Case in point--some 15 years ago I was with my wife in Canada where a bunch of people speaking Italian arrived at the same spot we were. I noted, in Italian, "the Italians have arrived." One of them, good-naturedly, but firmly, immediately said "we are not Italians!" I immediately corrected myself: "the Ticinesi have arrived." This brought immediate smiles and "eh, bravo!" all around, probably because they thought no American or Canadian would know where (or what) Ticino is. They were very proud of their identity as Ticinesi, but if you ever suggested their breaking away from Switzerland, were they are a small minority, to join Italy, they'd think you had a screw loose.

As for elections, they were never the forte of Yanukovich, and I doubt any referendums would have been seen as binding if they didn't come out the way the ones counting the votes wanted them to. Stalin looms large still in those parts, and his mantra is as strong there as it is with our Republicans: "Those who cast the votes decide nothing. Those who count the votes decide everything."

Republicans hate it when I call them Stalinists, by the way. Cryin' shame, ain't it?

[sabrina 1]

118. But would they go back is the question, I have no idea what the general feeling among

Slovakians is regarding the raw deal they got, or whether they value their independence more than, let's face it economic status is more often than not, very temporary, getting a better economic deal by remaining part of Czechoslovakia.

But there seems to be a relative peace there, compared with Ukraine. You could point to N. Ireland also where some would prefer to join the Republic of Ireland while others are adamantly opposed to it mainly for, despite the general impression people get, economic reasons not to mention the Irish Republic at the moment, isn't enthusiastic about such a move. And while there has been a relative peace established, so long as the differences in cultural heritage remain an issue, can a country ever be truly at peace?

[JVS]

8. Western Ukraine likes having a big country, but they seem to resent the fact that ethnic Russians...

and Russian-friendly Southeasterners get to vote and that the resulting elections may lead to a government that is friendly to Russia. So either they learn to get along with the Southeast or they should form an ethnically pure, ultranationalist hellhole in the Western part of the country.

[Tommy_Carcetti]

17. Ukraine should not be forced to answer to Russia. Period.

For centuries, the Russians have been playing that game, to the bloody detriment of Ukraine.

They are two different countries, and Russia needs to stay the hell out of Ukrainian affairs.

[JVS]

21. If the democratically elected government chooses to have a trade pact with Russia, that is...

not adequate grounds for a coup. Southeastern Ukrainians are going to vote for politicians who favor an amicable relationship with Russia. Western Ukranians should learn to accept that rather than topple the government. If they are not willing to accept that, then they should partition rather than trying to force their political will onto the Southeast.

[joshcryer]

56. That is almost certainly Putin's plan.

Having actual fascists as an ally of the US would be perfect for the propaganda machine.

[TwilightGardener]

12. If they want that, they should be allowed to arrange it--without a foreign army

pointing a gun to their heads and ignoring their borders.

[Tommy_Carcetti]

14. Because it won't actually split in two.

Russia will either annex eastern Ukraine for itself, or it will prop up East Ukraine as a puppet state. And it will continue to exert pressure on the remaining portion of Ukraine.

Not to mention that there are still a large amount of ethnic Ukrainians in the Eastern part of the country. And that the high amounts of ethnic Russians in the eastern part is a direct result of Russification by the Soviet Union, and therefore it shouldn't be cause to split the country in two.

[MannyGoldstein]

19. So what's your better solution? nt

[Tommy_Carcetti]

22. Ukraine stays united.

Rights of all minorities in Ukraine, including ethnic Russians, are guaranteed.

Any ethnic Russians who don't like that scenario are welcome to move back to Russia. It's not like they'll have to learn another language.

[Fumesucker]

23. Ukraine, Love It Or Leave It

[Tommy_Carcetti]

25. It's a seperate country from Russia for a reason.

Different people, different culture.

Ethnic Russians should be welcomed to stay, but they have to understand that they are in another country, and Ukraine is not a part of Russia.

[Fumesucker]

34. Someone should tell the Hawaiians

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overthrow_of_the_Kingdom_of_Hawaii

On July 6, 1846, U.S. Secretary of State John C. Calhoun, on behalf of President Tyler, afforded formal recognition of Hawaiian independence. As a result of the recognition of Hawaiian independence, the Hawaiian Kingdom entered into treaties with the major nations of the world and established over ninety legations and consulates in multiple seaports and cities.[4] Though there were threats to Hawaii's sovereignty throughout the Kingdom's history, it was not until the signing of the Bayonet Constitution in 1887 that this threat began to be realized. On January 17, 1893, the last monarch of the Kingdom of Hawaii, Queen Lili'uokalani, was deposed in a coup d'état led by seven non-native subjects of the Hawaiian Kingdom, five American nationals, one English national, and one German national,[5] all who were living and doing business in Hawaii and opposed to her attempt to establish a new Constitution.

The coup efforts were supported by American minister to Hawaii John L. Stevens and the invasion of U.S. Marines, who came ashore at the request of the conspirators. The coup left the queen imprisoned at Iolani Palace under house arrest. It briefly became the Republic of Hawaii, before eventual seizure by the United States in 1898.

The overthrow was led by Lorrin A. Thurston, a grandson of American missionaries, who derived his support primarily from the American and European business class residing in Hawaii and other supporters of the Reform Party of the Hawaiian Kingdom. Most of the leaders of the Committee of Safety that deposed the queen were American and European citizens who were also Kingdom subjects. They included legislators, government officers, and a Supreme Court Justice of the Hawaiian Kingdom.[6]

[Tommy_Carcetti]

86. Just because we've done it, doesn't make it any less right.

And just because we invaded Iraq for no justifiable reason doesn't mean Russia should do the same.

[Fumesucker]

88. What it ~does~ mean is that we look like total hypocrites when criticizing them

[Chathamization]

106. What about those of use that were criticizing the US Government for those actions?

It seems just as much hypocrisy to say it's only wrong if our country does it as it does to say it's only right when our country does it.

[Democracyinkind]

76. Crimea has never really been seperate from Russia but on paper. bt

[Tommy_Carcetti]

83. It once belonged mainly to the Ethnic Tartars.

The Russians saw it as a valuable military and vacation spot, and thus they conglomerated on that spot.

And the Tartars were almost all forcibly removed by Stalin.

[Democracyinkind]

85. Yes. Point being, strategically, the Crimea is essential to Russia.

They never really let it go, always had a port there, and will try to hold onto it. They consider it a matter of national security, as we would say.

[MannyGoldstein]

24. You say that in my scenario, Russians annex territory and some ethnic groups are screwed

But in your scenario, Russia keeps its hands off and ethnic groups move

Am i stating that correctly?

[Tommy_Carcetti]

26. Ethnic groups can stay or ethnic groups can go.

That's up to them.

I don't see any problem with ethnic Russians living in Ukraine, just so they realize that they are living in Ukraine and not in Russia.

[MannyGoldstein]

27. Why would Russians stay away from a united Ukraine

But not a divided one?

[Tommy_Carcetti]

31. I don't know. We're talking in hypotheticals here.

What should happen and what will happen are not always the same. And we don't know what will happen at this point.

In my opinion, Ukraine should remain united. I don't know if it will.

[backwoodsbob]

72. so if a bunch of Americans move to southern Canada

can we annex Canada because....a bunch of us live there?

[JVS]

43. According to the Belavezha accords, the ethnic Russians have a right to stay put AND to have...

their votes counted just like any other Ukrainian citizens. Right wing Ukrainian ultranationalists can't just take over the government because they don't like election results.

[joshcryer]

47. Good point.

We'll see if the Ukrainians in power are smart enough to invoke them or if they're going to go the stupid route and escalate a fight.

[JVS]

63. Hopefully they'll start communicating with the Easterners.

and the Western side and the Eastern side negotiate a settlement, which would most likely result in a trade pact with Russia. They have mutual interests, in large part because the East's industrial complex (which does the heavy lifting in Ukraine's economy btw) needs low Russian oil and gas prices to survive and Russia would prefer to keep gas lines to the West flowing through Ukraine

[joshcryer]

65. It needs to not come with debt to equity swap extortion though.

Belarus fell for this before with Russia and are effectively now a client state. Putin has found Gazprom to be a very powerful litigator.

Russia would do itself some good to get rid of the entire western regions as a clinger on, it would result in a much more robust economy for the Ukri-Russia state that he could build. This would no doubt cause the west to become even more polarized and the fascist elements would gain more followers.

Russia really has no need to agree with a settlement, but it probably would if it could gain legitimacy for taking half a country resources effectively. That clearly is the only way the west can get out of this short of a long protracted civil war they would undoubtedly lose.

[JVS]

67. I think Belarus' client status has a lot more to do with Lukashenko's refusal to do any political...

reforms. For the first few years of the post-cold war that kind of thing was allowed to slide on the world stage, but now that they're nearly 20 years into dictatorship it seems only natural that they've noticed that only Russia will play ball with them. It's a lot like how only China is willing to maintain good relations with North Korea.

[Tommy_Carcetti]

84. And in those accords Ukrainians have a right to be free of Russian incursion on their soil.....

...beyond the existing naval base.

Which is exactly what Russia is doing right now, and exploiting the situation while the Ukrainians are at their weakest.

[alittlelark]

29. If they vote to do it...cool, if not MYOB

This region will do what it chooses to do... they do not need advice from the US or u.

[MannyGoldstein]

30. It's not advice.

Just a thought experiment.

But I'm flattered that you want me to refrain from,influencing the outcome.

[penultimate]

39. It is interesting how so many here seem to forget this is a discussion board

and they take anything that challenges their P.O.V as an affront and should not be tolerated. I'm not saying the person you're responding to is doing that, but I see that a lot on here.

[MannyGoldstein]

40. Welcome to my world.

Voila!

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10024577580

[TeeYiYi]

122. Manny...

...I was being 'ironical'. Unfortunately, polls don't have a sarcasm thingy option.

TYY

[Autumn]

114. It's only a small group of people but they sure are vocal.

And most of them also post in other places.

[jsr]

32. We have enough problems.

[bif]

35. I spent two weeks in Ukraine a couple years ago

They should remain independent of Russia. However, Russia till has a heavy hand on what goes on in Ukraine. They hate the Russians. But there are a lot of ethnic Russians still living in eastern Ukraine. So it's a difficult situation.

[JVS]

36. Only 17% of Ukrainian citizens are ethnic Russians.

If Russian-friendly politicians are elected by the general population of Ukraine even assuming complete ethnic Russian support for them, that still leaves about 40% or so of ethnic Ukrainians voting for Russian-friendly politicians as well.

[polly7]

82. Carnival in Crimea

by Pepe Escobar / February 28th, 2014

Time waits for no one, but apparently will wait for Crimea. The speaker of the Crimean parliament, Vladimir Konstantinov, has confirmed there will be a referendum on greater autonomy from Ukraine on May 25.

Until then, Crimea will be as hot and steamy as carnival in Rio because Crimea is all about Sevastopol, the port of call for the Russian Black Sea fleet.

If the North Atlantic Treaty Organization is a bull, this is the red flag to end all red flags. Even if you’re deep in alcohol nirvana dancin’ your troubles away at carnival in Rio — or New Orleans, or Venice, or Trinidad and Tobago — your brain will have registered that NATO’s ultimate wet dream is to command a Western puppet Ukrainian government to kick the Russian navy out of its base in Sevastopol. The negotiated lease applies until 2042. Threats and rumors of reneging it have already emerged.

The absolute majority of the Crimean peninsula is populated by Russian speakers. Very few Ukrainians live there. In 1954, it took only 15 minutes for Ukrainian Nikita Krushchev — he of the banging shoe at the UN floor — to give Crimea as a free gift to Ukraine (then part of the USSR). In Russia, Crimea is perceived as Russian. Nothing will change that fact.

http://dissidentvoice.org/2014/02/carnival-in-crimea/#more-53152

[penultimate]

41. That should be something that decided internally without outside influences...

Which of course will never happen, because there will always be various actors in the background trying to influence things. But when it's as strong handed and blatant as the current Russian tactics, that's unacceptable. Wouldn't it be similar to France flying troops into Quebec in support of separatists there, and then people saying "why not just let Quebec become it's own nations?" That might fly when it's Quebecois voting on it, but a foreign military power facilitating it kinda muddles the situation.

[MannyGoldstein]

42. Agreed.

But we might only have bad options here.

[penultimate]

50. I don't think we have any option here, to be honest.

Of course I'm just some guy with a relatively limited view of everything. We have about as much power to stop Russia as they had to stop us from going into Iraq. Sure the CIA and various other such groups could cause problems for them, but an actual war just doesn't seem like the gain is worth the potential risk. Which sounds harsh and disconnected when worded like that, but I figure that's how the decision makers think.

One thing I was wondering is if it would turn into a long bloody asymmetrical conflict for the Russians if they went all in. Given the events that started all this, I don't think it would end up being a clean and quick thing for the Russians if they go too far.

[TBF]

94. I'm curious

if you find the tactics of the US/EU just as unacceptable?

I find both repulsive FWIW.

[penultimate]

95. With respect to Ukraine?

I'm not sure, as I haven't seen any concrete evidence of what they have done. I've seen plenty of vague accusations that they orchestrated the protests and revolution on the ground, but I have yet to see any evidence of them fomenting violence. The closest things would be some tapes between the US ambassador to Ukraine and another diplomat discussing the events unfolding and looking for ways to influence them. That right there is not a shocker in itself, as that is what diplomats. I have little doubt that the Russians were in there meddling with things too. Again, that is expected and hardly means they are root cause of the problems, simply trying to steer the situation in a direction they want. It seems to me that Russia is now overstepping its boundaries by deploying its military to capture ports and to surround the military bases in Ukraine. Very few people here would defend the US, UK or France if they did something similar, but many seem to think it's fine and dandy if the Russians do it.

[TBF]

98. No

as I said it is not ok if Russia does it. Putin is a jackass, imo.

I'd like to see the EU/US and Russia out of Ukraine. Let the Ukrainians (instead of the 1%) decide how they would like to run their country.

Who do you think is funding the fascists?

[penultimate]

104. Is there any evidence of money being used to directly fund fascists?

By fascist, I'm assuming you're referring to the 'Right Sector' which took part in the wider protests. Much like you could have went to any anti-war protest and found groups of militant leftists whose main interest was not just peace, that doesn't mean the entire protest was illegitimate.

[joshcryer]

44. Because this is the map of ethnic Ukranians:

Crimea at best has an argument (there are legitimate arguments that Russians held the territory the longest as well).

Either way you're looking at an imperialist chopping up of a country with the left overs left to be subjugated to the better off regions (which, btw, are the eastern and south eastern regions; much higher standard of living).

This would be extremely polarizing. At minimum to keep the peace and break the inequality down the west would have to join NATO and the EU. Then you've just polarized a region that is maybe 10% fascist into being 50%+ fascist. What an ally that would be.

[MannyGoldstein]

45. Then why did most of the country vote for

a Russia-leaning government?

[joshcryer]

52. Viktor Yanukovich was for EU integration before he was against it.

Putin basically bribed Yanukovich into siding with Russia and now he's executing his plan to fuck the country before its demographics could become more pro-EU (as the country can see what being pro-Russia has done to its economy, particularly with the 2009 crash).

[MannyGoldstein]

57. Pro-Moscow Yanukovych 'to win Ukraine election'

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/8503177.stm

Seems like he didn't run for office on EU integration.

[joshcryer]

59. "European Union membership remains Ukraine's strategic goal" - Yanukovych

Yanukovych, for his part, underlined Ukraine's economic growth, which the World Bank forecast will hit 3.5 percent for 2010. He reiterated that Ukraine continues to seek EU membership as one of its top aims.

"I underscored once again that European Union membership remains Ukraine's strategic goal," he said.

Another topic for discussion during the summit was the frozen conflict in Transdniester, the separatist region of Moldova neighboring Ukraine.

edit, sorry, forgot the link: http://www.rferl.org/content/article/2227271.html

He was wheeling and dealing in the EU until Russia offered him a better deal, on paper (the deal itself was bullshit extortion, but he got his pockets lined no doubt).

[MannyGoldstein]

61. Link?

Thanks.

Apropos of nothing except the half-finished Harpoon Long Thaw White IPA in front of me, we used to have relatives in Moldova. They fled to Israel about 20 years ago.

[joshcryer]

62. See edit.

[Vattel]

79. also apropos of nothing, and because I drank Smuttynose IPA last night,

my Grandma was born in the Ukraine. Her dad was an ethnic-Ukrainian and her mom was an ethnic-Russian. So I am biased in favor of a united Ukraine.

[MannyGoldstein]

111. Smuttynose IPA is in our regular rotation

Good stuff!

[MannyGoldstein]

64. Seems like he was playing two sides against each other

Also seems like the folks who wanted closer ties to Russia voted for him, while those who wanted closer ties to the EU voted against him.

Night night. I'll reply to anything else in the AM.

[joshcryer]

66. Now you know how politicians work.

I would even wager he said the pro-EU stuff in Ukrainian while the pro-Moscow stuff in Russian.

[MannyGoldstein]

92. I never understood that.

Thanks for bringing me up to speed.

[joshcryer]

60. "Ukraine's integration with the EU remains our strategic aim." - Yanukovych

One of the front-runners for 2010 is Viktor Yanukovych, the man whom Russia backed five years ago, and who eventually turned out the loser in the Orange Revolution.

Today, he is trying hard to shed the image of being "Moscow's man".

...

"I remain committed to a balanced policy, which will protect our national interests both on our eastern border - I mean with Russia - and of course with the European Union," he said.

"Ukraine's integration with the EU remains our strategic aim."

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/8391317.stm

Before the elections. That article is also instructive as to how he played the ethnic Ukrainians who wanted to be closer to EU's standard of living.

[Democracyinkind]

77. This is the case, no doubt.

But who was fooled by it?

My Ukrainian friends have always thought of him as the Russian candidate and Timoschenko/Juschtschenko as team Europe. I don't think that many people there voted for Janukowitsch expecting him to lean to the west.

[newthinking]

115. The leaders of the "Orange Revolution" said some awful things that were not in our press

They scared the Russian speaking population and added to that were those who did not like the tone. That (along with what appeared to be ineffective policies) is why the Party of regions regained power.


Fact is that most of the country is not aligned with the coup. They are not interested in fighting each other and tend towards peaceful passivism.

In the last term Yanukovich became much less popular, but even so most of the population is not aligned with the Nationalists and what they have done. Most Ukrainians are "live and let live", and the reality of this situation is much of the country is ambivalent if not somewhat fearful of what is happening in Kiev.

I find it fascinating that folks here seem to believe that corruption only occurs in the party of regions. There is indeed a problem with corruption but the parties now in power were doing the same damn thing. And those MPs will maintain their power.

[MannyGoldstein]

121. Very interesting, thanks. nt

[reformist2]

74. No questions! The Powers That Be don't like anyone asking any questions!

[DFW]

78. What a minorty part of the country desires may not be best for the country, that's why

Yes, Czechslovakia split up. That was an easy one. The Czechs had a tourist-money gold mine in Prague, a west only too eager to throw money at a country led by Vlaclav Havel, and a brand new democratically elected government. The Slovaks had a Soviet-style holdover leadership and nothing to offer the Czechs except a drain on their economy. The Slovaks got the raw end of that deal by separating, and the Czechs were only too happy to wave goodbye.

The Ukraine, like other ethnically diverse countries in Europe (Spain, Finland, Switzerland, Romania, etc.) has plenty of reasons to split up, but more to stay together, especially if you're NOT an ethnic Russian with an axe to grind. Being under Putin's yoke is not always fun and games, and if you're a political dissident, it can be downright fatal. Besides, the Ukies didn't enslave the Russians, put them to forced labor, or even force them to speak Ukranian under pain of punishment.

Quite aside from the question of sending Russian occupation troops in as a fore-runner of a territorial grab, it is (or should be) up to the Ukraine as a whole to let part of the country go or not (I recall a guy named Lincoln being faced with a similar dilemma), not Vladimir Putin, and not even the Russians living in the Crimea. Sweden isn't sending troops into Finland to protect land where the Swedish-speaking minority lives. France and Holland aren't doing it with Belgium. Italy isn't doing it in Ticino. Hungary isn't doing it in Transylvania. The last time there was a messy split-up, it was very bloody, sent a million refugees my way, many of whom are still here, and led to the formation of a few wobbly and uselessly independent states (Crna Gora, Croatia, Republic-formerly-known-as Macedonia, etc. etc). Ethnic Serbs still live in Croatia. Ethnic Croats still live in Bosnia. Ethnic Albanians still live in Macedonia. So, it was all for what? Yugoslavia was a artificial creation of World War I, granted, but it became a cool place to be before the nut cases decided that killing was more fun than sex. In the seventies, I used to hang out in Marshal Tito Square in Zagreb with long haired 20-somethings who used to be perfectly at ease with kids from other parts of Yugoslavia. The biggest conflict was when someone made a comment, and a local would say, "yeah, but you're a Serb!" and everyone would have a laugh. It was one mellow scene, and it needed some heavy stirring up to get a cool group of people like that to abandon their guitars and exchange them for sniper rifles. Putin is an expert at that kind of stirring up. It's what he was trained to do. I've been to the villa where he lived while he was a KGB hotshot living in East Germany while the rest of the East Germans were living in pre-WWII apartments. Not like Yanukovich's digs in Kiev, but some pretty fine real estate just the same. THAT'S the kind of Russian he's really protecting. Putin cares about the rest of the Russians cheering him in Ukranian streets about as much as Rick Perry and Tom Corbett care about their adoring penniless rednecks who can't wait to find out how great it is to get cancer from fracking.

At the end of the day, there will be some saber rattling and even some minor skirmishing if enough people on the ground miscalculate, but we're not getting involved, NATO isn't getting involved, and both Putin and Obama know it. There will be some posturing. Then Putin will get away with as much he can, and we can all wring our hands, calm down after a while, and shout "NEXT!"

[newthinking]

119. The parties that took power represent less than 30% of the electorate

It must seem real strange to folks that somehow the Party of Regions won recent elections, because according to what we are told in the press only a minority are interested in what they have to say.

No, fact is that there is a very broad spectrum of people that are in the middle, more like our "independent voters". From my experience most Ukrainians are not like what we saw in the streets. They are not nearly as invested in the issues as they are discussed in the western press. The multitudes are as comfortable with parties like Regions as they are with the alternatives.

The current administration in Kiev does not have nearly the kind of comprehensive support that they would like the world to believe. Thus things have become extremely unstable.

Can anyone explain why Kiev has not made the serious overtures that would tone this all down? Like making an effort to provide some representation in Parliament for the rest of the country? And move the date of elections back, as there is no way that there will be a fair election so soon after they ousted much of the party and while they are essentially making their opposition feel like their lives and their families lives are in danger.

[pinto]

80. Thorny situation there. Interesting discussion of it all here.

I'm learning a lot more about the region. Thanks all.

[pampango]

81. The Czechs and Slovaks both agreed. The Czechoslovak parliament approved it.

None of that has happened under past or present Ukrainian governments. If/when it does, you would have a strong case.

In the case of Czechoslovakia it was not just the Czechs or not just the Slovaks that wanted to split into 2 countries. It was both and the national parliament then enacted laws to put it into action. And, of course, neither group was occupied by or under threat by a powerful foreign army at the time of the breakup.

In general I think that the suggestion that different ethnic groups cannot live together is right wing claptrap. Firing up one ethnic/racial group ('US' the "good" one) to distrust another ethnic/racial group ('THEM' the "bad" one) is a typical right wing divide-and-conquer strategy.

[TBF]

93. I wonder if anyone cares

what the people of Ukraine want. All the people - not just the 1% who manage the resources.

[MineralMan]

96. It depends on whose perspective you're thinking of.

The name "Ukraine" means roughly "borderland" in Russian and he other slavic languages, and that's its role for the Russians. It's a buffer, more or less, historically. It buffers Russia from the Black Sea area. That's not so important today as it once was, but that's the origin of the name.

In more recent times, having a warm water port became essential for Russia, along with the former Soviet Union. The Crimean peninsula also was also a logical recreational area for Russians with wealth, given its moderate climate and long coastline.

For Russia, there is no benefit whatever in splitting that region. For Russian, that would simply fragment the area, reducing its value.

For Ukrainians, it's another issue altogether. Ethnic and Linguistic Russians dominate Crimea and are well established in eastern Ukraine. The rest of the country, however, has some rich natural resources to be exploited. The Ethnic Ukrainians have been tired of being exploited for a very long time. They wouldn't mind a split so much, in all likelihood.

So, it's far from a stupid question, Manny. It's just that we aren't players in the game, really. We don't understand the area. We don't have much presence in the area, and we should stay the fuck out of the area. It's not our issue, nor should it be. We can engage in diplomatic conversations about it, but that's the limit of our capabilities in Ukraine. Beyond that, we should not meddle. That's my opinion.

[randome]

100. There are no stupid...oh. Hi, Manny.

I'm kidding! Really!
[hr][font color="blue"][center]TECT in the name of the Representative approves of this post.[/center][/font][hr]

[Nye Bevan]

112. Great idea. Perhaps a conference could be held in a city such as Munich

to work out the details of the handover. Er, partition, that is.

[Autumn]

124. Interesting.