What is happening in Ukraine

Dear Ladies and Gentlemen,

Dear Colleagues,

Dear Friends,

My name is Oleh Karpa; I am currently a PhD student at the Centre for Ships and Ocean Structures, Department of Marine Technology, NTNU. I am Ukrainian and at the present time I live in Lviv (Ukraine), where I finish writing my thesis.

I would like to take this opportunity to address the tragic events of the last year in Ukraine and the real horror of today as it is seen from inside. I kindly ask you not to ignore this letter and skip it with indifference, but to spend a few minutes and read.

Actually, the situation can be formulated quite laconically: Russia has launched a war against Ukraine. The Kremlin does not consider Ukraine a state, but a seat of war.

As you might well know, any war has a pretext and a purpose. Let me try to present some key points for both. The reason, in my opinion, lies in historical and geopolitical surfaces. From the historical side, it is important to mention that Ukraine, so to say, has the largest right to be called the heiress of an ancient East-European state – the Kyivan Rus', while the Russian Federation is actually the heiress of the Tsardom of Muscovy, which simply was the Ulus of The Golden Horde (The Mongols).

The Tsardom of Muscovy was renamed to the Russian Empire only in 1721 by Peter the Great (It probably would not have happened if Charles XII of Sweden had won the Battle of Poltava). The Russian Empire has nothing to do with the Kyivan Rus' – neither by the means of mentality nor culturally (see e.g. Cohen, A. (1998). Russian Imperialism: Development and Crisis. Greenwood Publishing Group.; Halperin, C. J., 1982, “Tsarev ulus: Russia in the Golden Horde,” Cahiers du Monde russe et soviétique, Vol. 23, No. 2, Autour du XVIIIe siècle (Apr. - Jun., 1982), pp. 257-263,

Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20169960).

The remains of traditional Slavic orders mostly in Novgorod Republic, Pskov Republic, Smolensk, etc. were erased and the people were massacred by several Grand Princes of Moscow (Ivan III Vasilyevich, Vasili III Ivanovich, Ivan IV Vasilyevich the Terrible – the Mongol regents).

The word Russia (Rossyya) was formed as modification of the word Rus' in Greek transcription and was simply stolen (cf. e.g. “How Moscow hijacked the history of Kyivan Rus'”). Unfortunately, even now, for example, in Scandinavian languages it is common to use the word “Russland” both for Kyivan Rus' as well as for Russia, which, in my opinion, is a historiographical error. The first great Tsars of the Russian Empire were fully aware of this development. It was not noble for them to start the history of Empire from the history of Batu Khan and his barbarian hordes.

It was not possible for them to admit the fact that the “Third Rome” is not one due to the vast influence of Islam from the Golden Horde, and because it is Kyiv “the mother of Slavonic cities” and the center of conversion to Christianity. For that reasons it has always been crucial for all Russian rulers (starting from Peter the Great and Catherine the Great) to have Ukrainian lands in general, and particularly the city of Kyiv inside or, at least, beside the Empire (the empire as such or the USSR – it does not matter).

In addition, it is important to mention that Crimea was always like a bur in the throat for the Kremlin:

The Crimean Khanate, as heir to the law of the Golden Horde, laid Russia (that is, Moscow) under tribute up to 1700.

Therefore, Crimea and the Crimean Tatars as a nation is subconsciously a symbol of shame for the Russians.

Nowadays, in Mr. Putin’s mind Russia cannot be considered a great powerful state without holding Ukraine as its part or a satellite. Besides that, Putin and his thievish and corrupted regime needs high ratings and people's support to win the elections in 2018 and to keep going. The war, effective propaganda, and people who sometimes truly and willingly believe, want to believe and accept such propaganda, raise his rating up to 88%.

While Yanukovych ruled over Ukraine and kept Ukraine as a corrupted Kremlin’s vassal, everything was “fine”. However, it became evident that Ukrainian society continuously tended to Europe, and, unlike Putin, Yanukovych would not be the president forever. It was also evident that:

A.     if Yanukovych would sign the EU association agreement during the Vilnius summit, Ukraine would be lost to Russia immediately. Yanukovych would return back home as a hero and very likely he would win the next presidential elections in spring 2015;

B.     without the EU agreement Yanukovych should not win the elections, but with any pro-EU winner Ukraine should be lost to Russia after 2015. So, what should Putin do to keep Ukraine close and resigned also after 2015?

The solution was to start a war/military conflict (or a civilian war fueled from the outside – it doesn’t matter how to call it) after the presidential elections. Kremlin’s success in the Russo-Georgian war in 2008, which might be considered as a repetition, and inert reaction of the international community to this act of aggression made Putin believe in another success in a bit greater action – this time in Ukraine.

By the way, the following reel was published in 2012. It is about some “fictional” events in Ukraine in 2015.

Shortly: it sounds out all that cliché Russia uses now: “A civil war in Ukraine!”, “Junta is in Kiev!”,

“South-East of Ukraine is with Russia!”, “Ukraine is not a state!”, “Chaos in Ukraine!”,

“NATO forces entered from the West!”; “Putin mobilizes the Russian army and the fleet to free the Crimea and Eastern Ukraine from NATO!”:
http://youtu.be/0WEml4NhNZk (in Russian only)

Thereby, the B) option has been chosen. In summer 2013 Putin threatened Yanukovych with annexation of the Crimea (most likely) and, probably, something else in case of signing the EU association agreement. The association was not signed in Vilnius, which caused the beginning of the Euromaidan. Then, after a violent dispersion of the protesting students, everything grew into the Revolution of Dignity. The capital city Kyiv drowned in fire:

http://youtu.be/6ThbGQZJ1x8;

http://youtu.be/cF7wqPR5irk.

One can talk a lot about the role of the EU/US leaders in these events; whether they should or should not demonstrate their support; whether they should or should not make a speech at the stage of the Independence Square, etc. Very likely, it added some oil to the fire – at least for the Russian propaganda machine, and helped the machine to manipulate with theories of all kinds of plots against Russia. Even if we assume for a moment that the Revolution of Dignity in Ukraine has been inspired and led by the CIA, the Mossad, MI-5, MI-6, or whatever, I don’t think it is possible to organize the protests all around the country in such a big scale, in every small or big city – I do believe, it was a need of the society. But above all, definitely, it would never ever be possible to “organize” people to die for the idea – the idea of worthy life in free democratic country. The idea is not to join NATO in itself, but to be sure that the State is safe – and NATO is the best tool to achieve this. The idea is not to join the EU in itself, but to live according to rule of law and equal opportunities, and it is believed that joining the EU and applying its rules “from above” now is a better way to achieve that than trying to change by ourselves “from below”. And the people were ready to stand for this.

There are many interviews, where the protesters say something like this: “In the first month we thought we should be beaten hard by the riot police, but we were ready to take and bear this; In the second month we thought we should be prisoned, but we were ready to take and bear this; Finally, in the last month we were sure we would be killed one by one or machine-gunned all together at once, but we were ready to take and bear this”. There are testimonies that Yanukovych was receiving directives from the Kremlin to disperse the Maidan brutally, cf. e.g. http://ukrainiancrisis.net/news/7445 (original in German: http://www.faz.net/aktuell/politik/ausland/ukraine-konflikt-sikorski-putin-verlangte-einsatz-von-gewalt-13388656.html)

And the result of this is known – the blood of innocent civilians (the Heavenly Hundred) has been spilled... It was a long period of mourning at that time. Time of lament and sorrow...

Nevertheless, the Yanukovych’s regime has fallen. Yanukovych himself and his milieu have taken flight to Russia by the order of the Kremlin. For the sake of justice, there is an alternative point of view presented by Mr. Oliver Stone. I do not wish to give any comments on this, since quite straightforward facts, witnesses and knowledge/comprehension of the ins and outs make his theory inconsistent.

Yet, one may Google it if one likes.

Thus, the situation in Kyiv (announcement of free democratic pre-term parliament and presidential elections, immediate preparation to sign the EU association, etc.) threw Putin into a great confusion and forced him to pull the trigger much earlier than he planned.

First, the Russian Federation has created the 2014 Crimean crisis by occupation and further annexation of the Crimean Peninsula. By the way, according to the Ukrainian intelligence it is known now that Russia started preparing to annex the Crimea at least in 2008. I hope one could not think that such a brilliant and clockwork military operation is possible without long and scrupulous planning and preparation.

Shortly after that the real WAR has begun. This hybrid, non-linear and cynical war has been organized, financed and driven by the Kremlin using the so-called Donetsk and Lugansk People's Republics and a batch of their “leaders” and “spokesmen” (Girkin, Borodai, etc.) as a cover.

Besides the hot war, an important issue here is the horrible information war started by Moscow. British journalist, TV producer and non-fiction writer, Peter Pomerantsev, warns about the weaponization of information by the Russian state propaganda (mainly “RT-Russia Today” TV channel: “RT America” and “RT UK” in English, “Rusiya Al-Yaum” in Arabic, “RT Actualidad” in Spanish). In one of the interviews Peter Pomerantsev also says that "Russia uses information as a weapon". "Nothing is True and Everything is Possible in Russia and its media," Peter Pomerantsev says during the presentation of his brilliant book of the same name, that is based on his personal experience of working in Russia (Highly recommended to open the links and watch that!).

Much more can be said about the victims of this war; about the Il-76 shoot-down  (49 killed), about the Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 (MH-17) shot down (all 298 people killed) by the Russian ballistic missile, and about the heroic defense of the Donetsk Airport. Please, follow the Los Angeles Times journalist and war correspondent, Sergei Loiko, for more details:

http://www.latimes.com/world/great-reads/la-fg-c1-ukraine-airport-20141028-story.html#page=1;

and http://www.latimes.com/la-bio-sergei-loiko-staff.html.

It is impossible to say nothing regarding the attacks of Russian-terrorist troops on civilians, most significant of which are the Volnovakha bus attack in which 12 people killed, and the latest offensive on the port city of Mariupol (30 civilians killed and 86 wounded).

It is an indescribable horror. There are funerals after killed soldiers almost every day around the country; National days of mourning are announced almost every month or several times a month. And yet it does not seem to be an end at all. It might seem Putin needs to create the so called "military belt" to join Transnistria, the Crimean Peninsula with Russian Federation by land. They would like to have all the strategic factories of Dnipropetrovsk, Kharkiv, etc., so particularly that is why they have invented the term 'Novorossia' and the legend that the Russian speaking Ukrainians are actually Russians, belong to the 'Russian world' (Russkiy mir) and need to be protected, which is just nonsense and certain Hitlerism. According to the latest news, the situation is developing fast and threatening not only to Ukraine, but also to Western Europe itself.

To crown it all, I would like to recommend you to follow the link below and to listen to the famous American historian Timothy D. Snyder and his one hour lecture: Timothy Snyder: Ukraine: From Propaganda to Reality.

Professor Snyder emphasizes that even though some might consider Ukraine as a distant Third World country, and its conflict as nothing but just another military conflict, it is a great threat to the existence of Western civilization.

I am sure and I have to be sure that such a massive lie, aggression and evil cannot be victorious. At the same time one has to remember that “All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing”

(Edmund Burke; disputed).

I dare say in addition, all that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men remain indifferent.

Please, do not be indifferent!

Sincerely

Oleh Karpa

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