Category Archives: Ukraine

Ukraine crisis showcases Russian military revamp

Reuters reports: Holding military drills on Ukraine’s border and sending bombers to the edge of NATO airspace, Russia’s newly reformed armed forces are in just the kind of regional confrontation it was redesigned for, experts say.

Moscow has increased defence spending by about 30 percent since its 2008 war with Georgia, and those who study it say the money has been spent not just on hardware but on a much more flexible military structure.

The result, they say, is a more streamlined force that can mobilise key units in a matter of days and support President Vladimir Putin’s goal to reassert Russian influence over countries it once controlled within the former Soviet Union. [Continue reading…]

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Kiev struggles to break Russia’s grip on gas flow

The New York Times reports: As Ukraine tries to contain a pro-Russian insurgency convulsing its eastern region, a perhaps more significant struggle for the country hinges on what happens beneath the ground here in a placid woodland in the far west, on the border with Slovakia.

This is where about $20 billion worth of Russian natural gas flows each year through huge underground pipelines to enter Europe after a nearly 3,000-mile journey from Siberia. It is also, the pro-European government in Kiev believes, where Ukraine has a chance to finally break free from the grip of Gazprom, Russia’s state-controlled energy behemoth.

In an effort to do this, Ukraine has for more than a year been pushing hard to start so-called reverse-flow deliveries of gas from Europe via Slovakia to Ukraine, thus blunting repeated Russian threats to turn off the gas tap.

An agreement signed last week between Slovak and Ukrainian pipeline operators opened the way for modest reverse-flow deliveries of gas from Europe, where prices are much lower than those demanded by Gazprom for its direct sales to Ukraine.

But the deal, brokered by the European Union and nudged along by the White House, fell so far short of what Ukraine had been lobbying for that it left a nagging question: Why has it been so difficult to prod tiny Slovakia, a European Union member, to get a technically simple and, for Ukraine and for the credibility of the 28-nation bloc, vitally important venture off the ground? [Continue reading…]

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Who’s in control? A dispatch from Kiev

Alina Polyakova writes: On May 1, Ukraine’s acting president Turchynov admitted that it lost control of eastern Ukraine. The following day, on May 2, the government launched a military offensive to take back eastern cities from militants. In Slavyansk, two military helicopters were shot down, allegedly by the pro-Russian forces. In Odessa, the death toll from clashes between protesters continues to increase. At the same time, a new group calling itself “little black men” emerged in Kharkiv. In an ominous Youtube video, a group of about fifty men dressed in black military gear and balaclavas stand armed in a field while a scrambled voice announces that “for every little green man [in Kharkiv], there will be a brigade of ‘little black men.’” The picture emerging in Ukraine is one of complete chaos. No one, not even the Kremlin, seems to be in control. [Continue reading…]

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Putin as a fascist leader bears total responsibility for crisis in Ukraine, commentator says

Paul Goble writes: Had Vladimir Putin accepted the Maidan’s ouster of discredited Ukrainian president Viktor Yanukovych and agreed to accept the results of the upcoming elections, nothing that has occurred in Ukraine since that time would have happened, according to a Ukrainian commentator.

“Thousands of people would not have suddenly discovered in themselves an unconquerable desire for federalism,” Dmitry Litvin says. “Thousands would not have learned the meaning of ‘legitimacy,’ a term they had not been acquainted with. [And they] would not have suddenly decided they could not live … without state status for the Russian language and constitutional reforms”.

“If in short one man by the name of Putin had not decided that Ukrainian affairs are his affairs, then we now would not have to be catching terrorists and burying dozens of victims of resistance.” But that reflects an even deeper problem, one with which Russians, Ukrainians, and the world must deal.

That one man could do this is the clearest illustration of the Fuherprinzip, “the principle of the vozhd [great leader],” Litvin says. That principle, he continues, is “the central element of the state system under fascism.” Whatever the leader does or thinks must be what the entire society does and thinks.

To that end, the Ukrainian commentator continues, “the information milieu in Russia has been cleansed in such a way that outlets disseminate the worldview of the leader, his relation to people and events –and nothing more, except for entertainment.”

A second element of fascism in Russia requires is the articulation of “an historical mission,” something for which the leader “’was called’ to power” to realize. As defined by Putin, “Russia’s mission today is not distinguished from the mission of other fascist states – the defense of genuine traditional values from the influence of ‘destructive elements.’”

To be sure, Litvin continues, fascism “at the time of its first appearance in Europe” during the interwar period “declared ‘Judaism’ as the source of the destruction of genuine values and harshly rejected all forms of non-classical relations to life, art, labor, and science,” blaming these on the Jews.

Now, in fascism’s “second appearance in Europe,” the source of such destruction is Americanism. The Russian media under Putin’s direction is portraying Americanism as the primary enemy in just the same way Nazi media portrayed Jewishness and demanding that Russians do everything they can to fight against Americanism and its agents. [Continue reading…]

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Behind the masks in Ukraine, many faces of rebellion

The New York Times reports from Slovyansk: The rebel leader spread a topographic map in front of a closed grocery store here as a Ukrainian military helicopter flew past a nearby hill. Ukrainian troops had just seized positions along a river, about a mile and a half away. The commander thought they might advance.

He issued orders with the authority of a man who had seen many battles. “Go down to the bridge and set up the snipers,” the leader, who gave only a first name, Yuri, said to a former Ukrainian paratrooper, who jogged away.

Yuri commands the 12th Company, part of the self-proclaimed People’s Militia of the Donetsk People’s Republic, a previously unknown and often masked rebel force that since early April has seized government buildings in eastern Ukraine and, until Saturday, held prisoner a team of European military observers it accused of being NATO spies.

His is one of the faces behind the shadowy paramilitary takeover. But even with his mask off, much about his aims, motivations and connections remains murky, illustrating why this expanding conflict is still so complex.

Yuri, who appears to be in his mid-50s, is in many ways an ordinary eastern Ukrainian of his generation. A military veteran, he survived the Soviet collapse to own a small construction business in Druzhkovka, about 15 miles south of here.

But his rebel stature has a particular root: He is also a former Soviet special forces commander who served in Afghanistan, a background that could make him both authentically local and a capable Kremlin proxy.

In this war, clouded by competing claims on both sides, one persistent mystery has been the identity and affiliations of the militiamen, who have pressed the confrontation between Russia and the West into its latest bitter phase.

Moscow says they are Ukrainians and not part of the Russian armed forces, as the so-called green men in Crimea turned out to be.

Western officials and the Ukrainian government insist that Russians have led, organized and equipped the fighters.

A deeper look at the 12th Company — during more than a week of visiting its checkpoints, interviewing its fighters and observing them in action against a Ukrainian military advance here on Friday — shows that in its case neither portrayal captures the full story. [Continue reading…]

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How Russia conquered Eastern Ukraine without firing a shot

James Miller writes: Ever since it became clear that Russian forces were operating in Crimea, it’s been a pretty safe assumption that almost any information flowing out of Moscow has been BS used to justify Russia’s Ukrainian land grab.

But Russia had been slowly choking off dissent and independent media long before its takeover of Crimea — it’s just that the Kremlin accelerated the process once the crisis began. And that was no accident, as the dissemination of propaganda is a crucial part of Moscow’s strategy to gain control of eastern (and perhaps the rest of) Ukraine.

On the surface, it appears that Vladimir Putin is poised to use the same strategy he employed in Crimea. Soon after then-president Viktor Yanukovych fled Ukraine, spetsnaz (Russian Special Forces) airborne units joined with personnel from the Black Sea fleet who were already stationed on the Crimean peninsula, then proceeded to capture government buildings, erect checkpoints, and eventually gain control of the entire region. With the peninsula under Russia’s military control, Moscow installed allies in the Crimean government, held a referendum, and used the result — an unconstitutional sham in which even children voted — to justify the official annexation of Crimea into the Russian Federation.

A close look at what’s been happening in eastern Ukraine reveals key differences, however. For starters, eastern Ukraine didn’t already have Russian military installations and troops stationed there. In addition, eastern Ukraine is much larger, with a far bigger population. Traditional thinking holds that in order to control a region that large, Russia would need a full-scale military invasion — and with tens of thousands of troops and armored vehicles stacked up just a few miles from Ukraine’s border, many observers are waiting for those forces to inevitably pour in.

But that may never need to happen, because Russia has a weapon at its disposal in eastern Ukraine that has arguably proved more effective than all of its military hardware could have ever been. This weapon has already defeated anything the interim government in Kiev — or the entirety of the international community, for that matter — has wielded against it.

That weapon is the Kremlin’s propaganda machine. [Continue reading…]

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Portrait of Donetsk militants: Disgruntled soldiers, naïve idealists and reluctant revolutionaries

Lily Hyde reports: Harassed Dmitry Chas doesn’t know what day it is, or exactly how long he’s been in round-the-clock charge of the Dynamo roadblock outside Horlivka, a city of 250,000 people north of Donetsk.

But one thing he is sure of: he’s not a terrorist.

“We’re so fed up with what’s being said about us: that we’re wild; that we’re armed,” he said, hurrying to pull on a balaclava to hide his face. “To occupy a building can seem like the work of terrorists, but this road block protecting the town shows that the town supports this goal; that it isn’t terrorism, it’s from the people.”

The armed takeover of state buildings and one whole city in regions of eastern Ukraine has been blamed by the Ukrainian government and media on Russian agents and paramilitary groups from both sides of the border.

But many small-town locals like Chas seem to be closing their eyes to the ominous proliferation of weapons on their streets, or a possible wider geopolitical agenda. They have joined the movement calling for greater independence from Kyiv out of a simple sense of grievance, disillusionment and despair.

“I’m not a politician, I just want my town to be peaceful and to know what’s going to happen tomorrow,” said Chas. “After those revolutions in 2004 and 2014, there’s no faith in tomorrow. I want to be confident that my kids will finish school and institute and get a job; not like now, when you work and work and then there’s a revolution and you lose your job and have nothing to feed your children. We’re just sick of it.”

Chas, a father of three, lost his job as a grocer after the 2004 Orange Revolution. Most people in Horlivka have forgotten what it’s like to have job security, or hot water or money to spare. A people who largely define themselves proudly as workers, without employment many Donbas residents feel lost and abandoned by the rest of the country. [Continue reading…]

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Ukraine crisis: The strategic importance of Slavyansk

RUSI Analysis: The Ukrainian military operation that began this morning (2 May) in Slavyansk seems to have been directed against a lesser problem for the Kiev government than anything that has happened recently in Donetsk, Luhansk or Kharkiv. But there are hard strategic reasons why this small city has become the new focus of the Ukrainian crisis over recent days. It is at the centre of an escalating game of deterrence that both Kiev and Moscow are playing against each other.

In the event of a conventional Russian military invasion of the territories of eastern Ukraine it is highly unlikely that Kiev’s troops could do more than buy a certain amount of time. In any direct military confrontation Ukrainian forces would lose. That does not mean, however, that the government in Kiev is without any military cards to play.

Kiev knows that it has a strategic reserve of Kalashnikov assault rifles and other light weapons stored in Ukraine as a mobilisation reserve dating back to Soviet times. It has hinted quietly but strongly in back channels between Ukrainian and Russian military establishments that it might be prepared to open this strategic reserve of weapons to an eastern Ukrainian population prepared to resist any Russian military incursions. Since the stockpile consists of up to five million weapons, the prospect would be a nightmare for Russian military planners if they realistically prepared to move into eastern areas of Ukraine. The prospect of civil war and an anti-Russian insurgency on an unprecedented scale with unpredictable consequences represents a real – if extremely dangerous – bargaining chip for Kiev. [Continue reading…]

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Ethnic Russians: Pretext for Putin’s Ukraine invasion?

ethnic-russians

National Geographic: It’s been more than 20 years since the disintegration of the U.S.S.R., but the effect of that breakup on its people remains a daily reality for many. Almost overnight, some 25 million ethnic Russians became a diaspora. By 2003, about eight million of them were reabsorbed by Russia. About half of that number came from Central Asia, where relations between Russians and the indigenous Turkic nationalities were often strained.

Relations have also been fraught with difficulty in the Baltic countries where ethnic Russians have been particularly vocal about feeling disenfranchised after independence. About one-third of ethnic Russians living in Latvia are considered “non-citizens” and not allowed certain rights, including the right to vote or hold office. The country has been reprimanded by the UN for failing to encourage integration, yet, at the same time, intermarriage between ethnic Latvians and Russians has increased after independence despite official tensions. Intermarriage has long been common between ethnic Russians and Ukrainians as well — yet another factor that could complicate identity issues as parts of Ukraine vote on whether to secede.

Are there other post-Soviet countries with large Russian populations that could soon face the kind of upheaval that Crimea and eastern Ukraine are experiencing? Historian [Alexei] Miller says the answer doesn’t just lie in where you can find ethnic Russians on a map — but also on whether the Kremlin might benefit from becoming entangled in yet another crisis.

“What Putin is doing in Ukraine is not caused by the wish to save Russians but by geo-strategic motives,” Miller says, adding that Russia’s motivations may be much like those of the U.S. when it says it is fighting for democracy—in countries that happen to have oil riches. The question other former republics must ask, he says, is, “Do we really treat Russians fairly enough, and does Putin have enough important strategic interests in our country to use discrimination of Russians as an instrument of his involvement?”

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How Putin has turned organized crime into a tool of statecraft and war

Mark Galeotti writes: When U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry accused Russia of trying to impose its will through the “barrel of a gun and the force of a mob,” he could just as well have said “the force of the mob.” After all, this is the new model of asymmetric conflict in which Moscow is using myriad covert, third-party, and deniable agents to extend its power. Among them are local gangsters, both petty and powerful, who are providing everything from local political allies to street muscle. In the process, Moscow is demonstrating the extent to which organized crime can be used as a tool of statecraft and war.

Although Russian state agents clearly are working in eastern Ukraine, from Spetsnaz special forces to intelligence officers, the exact number is hard to define. In any case, it is undeniable that the overwhelming majority of the camouflaged gunmen seizing buildings, blocking roads, and skirmishing with loyalist forces are either locals — including defectors from the notorious Berkut special police — or else irregular Russian volunteers who have been allowed or encouraged to cross the border and join the conflict.

Some in the new generation of local paramilitary commanders — warlords, we’d call them in other settings — appear to be gangsters who have spotted an opportunity to convert underworld might into upperworld power. The infamous Russian lieutenant colonel who appeared to introduce the Horlivka police to their new commander in mid-April was later identified as a local criminal, for example. More seriously, a closer look at some of the figures emerging as power brokers in the Russian-dominated east reveals distinctly dubious ties.

To a large extent this reflects the endemic criminalization of the Ukrainian state under successive leaders. Like Russia, Ukraine experienced a massive upsurge in organized crime in the 1990s, when new political and economic systems were being created at a time of catastrophically weak state control. Overt gangsterism in the streets was matched by the rise of a new elite who often blended political, economic, and criminal enterprises. Unlike Russia, though, there was no subsequent reassertion of the primacy of the state, something that did not so much eliminate organized crime as house-train it, bringing it back under the dominance of the political elite.

As a result, Ukraine headed into this current crisis already undermined and interpenetrated by criminal structures closely linked to cabals of corrupt officials and business oligarchs. However, a particular problem is the extent to which many local gangs — and not just in the Russian-speaking east — are connected with Russian organized crime networks. In Crimea, not only was the new premier, Sergei Aksyonov, allegedly a mobster nicknamed “Goblin” in the 1990s (he has denied this, but the one time he tried challenging the claim in court, his case was dismissed), but the new political elite is drawn largely from the former one, richly seeded with known and identified criminals. [Continue reading…]

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U.S. sanctions on Russia have so far had little tangible effect

The New York Times reports: As it tries to punish Moscow for its intervention in Ukraine, the White House asserts that the sanctions it has imposed have had a “significant impact” on Russia’s economy, but their real effect so far, according to economic specialists, appears to be more psychological than tangible.

White House officials have pointed to the fall of the Russian ruble and Moscow stock markets as evidence of the success they have had in pressuring the Kremlin. Yet the ruble and Russian markets fell before President Obama began imposing sanctions. Today, in fact, both the ruble and the markets are slightly stronger than they were before the first sanctions were announced.

Russia’s economic downturn predated any action by the United States or Europe and, to some extent, predated the Ukraine crisis. Specialists said the volatility surrounding Ukraine has clearly aggravated Russia’s economic problems by sapping international confidence, punishing its credit standing and increasing investor wariness, but it is not clear how much of that stems specifically from the sanctions. [Continue reading…]

The Wall Street Journal reports: Angela Merkel is carrying a clear message from Germany’s business lobby to the White House: No more sanctions.

Several of the biggest names in German business — including chemical giant BASF, engineering group Siemens AG, Volkswagen AG, Adidas AG and Deutsche Bank AG — have made their opposition to broader economic sanctions against Russia clear in recent weeks, both in public and in private. (Read the latest updates on the crisis in Ukraine.)

As a result, Germany’s position on additional, tougher sanctions is unlikely to shift, barring a dramatic escalation of the conflict in Ukraine — a message Ms. Merkel is expected to deliver to President Barack Obama when they meet in Washington on Friday, officials in Berlin say. [Continue reading…]

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NATO official: Russia now an adversary

The Associated Press reports: After two decades of trying to build a partnership with Russia, NATO now feels compelled to start treating Moscow as an adversary, the alliance’s second-ranking official said Thursday.

“Clearly the Russians have declared NATO as an adversary, so we have to begin to view Russia no longer as a partner but as more of an adversary than a partner,” said Alexander Vershbow, the deputy secretary-general of NATO.

In a question-and-answer session with a small group of reporters, Vershbow said Russia’s annexation of Crimea and its apparent manipulation of unrest in eastern Ukraine have fundamentally changed the NATO-Russia relationship.

“In central Europe, clearly we have two different visions of what European security should be like,” Vershbow, a former U.S. diplomat and onetime Pentagon official, said. “We still would defend the sovereignty and freedom of choice of Russia’s neighbors, and Russia clearly is trying to re-impose hegemony and limit their sovereignty under the guise of a defense of the Russian world.” [Continue reading…]

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Pro-Ukrainians worry their views are being lost in focus on pro-Russia protests

McClatchy reports: Katarina Butko smiled Monday evening as she looked at what she’d organized: a line of 15 cars decorated with the yellow and blue flag of Ukraine. They were seconds away from leaving on a motoring campaign around town, “to wake the sleeping pro-Ukrainian people.”

The idea was simple: Polls consistently show that residents of this region of southeastern Ukraine bordering Russia overwhelmingly believe in a united Ukraine. But a small, loud and violent minority has grabbed international headlines and scared residents into hiding their beliefs.

The driving, honking tour was scheduled to last an hour. It had to be abandoned about 30 minutes later, though, when pro-Russian separatists, some wearing masks, some not, some stumbling from drink, attacked the caravan with baseball bats and more. Butko’s car was put out of service when a Molotov cocktail smashed the front window.

But a later rally attracted what Ukrainian media reported to be 5,000 people, a reflection of a reality that many here believe the international media misses by focusing on the violence with which such gatherings have ended.

“There really aren’t many active pro-Russians around Donetsk these days,” said Yuri Temirov, vice dean of international relations at Donetsk National University. “But those few are very aggressive. The aggressive pro-Ukrainian side tends to focus more on petitions and legal frameworks for ending the crisis here. This doesn’t make for very exciting newscasts.” [Continue reading…]

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Donetsk referendum wording mentions neither Ukraine nor Russia

McClatchy reports: Having lived through a month of pro-Russian separatists storming and seizing government buildings to raise the Russian flag, Donetsk residents will be asked May 11 to answer a single question in a hastily organized referendum.

That question, according to a government official who said he was present at a meeting Tuesday where the wording was agreed on: “Do you support the creation of the Donetsk People’s Republic?”

What would a “yes” vote actually mean? Officials admit they aren’t sure. In fact, one noted that more than a desire to join Russia, or be a separate nation, the vote is an attempt to persuade the central government in Kiev to listen to this populous, industrial region. Regional council member Nikolai Zagoruiko said that if the central government would agree to two long-standing demands, the vote might never have to happen.

“If they would agree to make Russian a second official language of Ukraine — so that everyone can understand the state documents they must read and sign — and agree to give Donetsk more local control over the taxes we collect to send to Kiev, so that we can make this a better place to live, we would probably be satisfied,” he said. “In fact, if they did those two things, I’m sure the referendum could be postponed, and eventually forgotten about.” [Continue reading…]

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Why does the press help pro-Russian thugs?

Jamie Dettmer writes: Talking with pro-Russian separatist gunmen is like living a Ukrainian version of the Western movie Appaloosa, where the judge sits listening to the testimony of hired hands providing alibis for the ranch owner who’s murdered the sheriff. The testimonies here are word for word the same, providing an alibi, it would seem, for Russian President Vladimir Putin: “I am not a separatist,” say the hired hands. “I want a federation; the ouster of [Russian-friendly] President Viktor Yanukovych was a crime; I am here to protect ethnic Russians from fascists and to protect our language.” If they varied their lines, they would be more believable.

But then what is happening in eastern Ukraine is more about theater, albeit with deadly consequences, than anything else. And the audience — the international media — sits watching the play and filming and tweeting the performance. And whoever is behind this understands the appetite.

That became clear at the weekend when the media meekly colluded in the play trotted out for their consumption that day: the parade by pro-Russian separatists in Slovyansk of the kidnapped members of a military mission of the Organization for Security and Cooperation (OSCE). In a statement today Germany’s foreign minister, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, said that displaying the captives was an affront that is “revolting and blatantly hurts the dignity of the victims.”

Worryingly, no Western reporter covering the press conference sought to discover before the event whether the OSCE team members were participating voluntarily or were being coerced, which is standard media practice before interviewing captives or prisoners of war. [Continue reading…]

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Ukraine says militants now control the east

The New York Times reports: It is by now a well-established pattern. Armed, masked men in their 20s to 40s storm a public building of high symbolic value in a city somewhere in eastern Ukraine, evict anyone still there, seize weapons and ammunition, throw up barricades and proclaim themselves the rulers of a “people’s republic.” It is not clear who is in charge or how the militias are organized.

Through such tactics, a few thousand pro-Russian militants have seized buildings in about a dozen cities, effectively establishing control over much of an industrial region of about 6.5 million nestled against the Russian border.

Day by day, in the areas surrounding the cities of Donetsk and Luhansk, pro-Russian forces have defied all efforts by the central government to re-establish its authority, and on Wednesday, Ukraine’s acting president conceded what had long been obvious: The government’s police and security officials had lost control. [Continue reading…]

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Ukraine and the fear of war in Europe

Der Spiegel reports: Following the apparent failure of the Geneva agreements, the inconceivable suddenly seems possible: the invasion of eastern Ukraine by the Russian army. Fears are growing in the West of the breakout of a new war in Europe.

These days, Heinz Otto Fausten, a 94-year-old retired high school principal from Sinzig, Germany, can’t bear to watch the news about Ukraine. Whenever he sees images of tanks on TV, he grabs the remote and switches channels. “I don’t want to be subjected to these images,” he says. “I can’t bear it.”

When he was deployed as a soldier in the Ukraine, in 1943, Fausten was struck by grenade shrapnel in the hollow of his knee, just outside Kiev, and lost his right leg. The German presence in Ukraine at the time was, of course, part of the German invasion of the Soviet Union. But, even so, Fausten didn’t think he would ever again witness scenes from Ukraine hinting at the potential outbreak of war.

For anyone watching the news, these recent images, and the links between them, are hard to ignore. In eastern Ukraine, government troops could be seen battling separatists; burning barricades gave the impression of an impending civil war. On Wednesday, Russian long-range bombers entered into Dutch airspace — it wasn’t the first time something like that had happened, but now it felt like a warning to the West. Don’t be so sure of yourselves, the message seemed to be, conjuring up the possibility of a larger war. [Continue reading…]

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How a passive police force is fueling Ukraine’s crisis

Dan Peleschuk reports: A rally by pro-Ukraine supporters here on Monday night got off to a smooth start.

Hordes of armored police were dispatched to guard protesters as they marched peacefully down the city’s main street.

But when pro-Russian thugs wearing masks and brandishing crude weapons caught up to them, mayhem ensued. The tight police cordon peeled away, leaving the pro-unity protesters open to vicious beatings.

It’s not the first time that’s happened.

Whether it’s protecting eastern Ukraine’s embattled pro-unity protesters or defending local administrative buildings from seizures by anti-government rebels, law enforcement here has proven largely useless. Instead, it’s playing into the hands of pro-Russian rebels, further inflaming a crisis that’s threatening to tear the country apart at the seams.

Observers say a mix of pervasive corruption, split loyalties and sense of self-preservation is to blame. [Continue reading…]

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