Mike says:

To know Ukraine, know its history. Until 1945 the area known as Ukraine was controlled by whichever Empire carried the big stick, Russia being the last.

Stalin, who I believe wanted to stack the United Nations with known votes created what now is the nation of Ukraine to do so. Stalin could have just swallowed the area into Russia as was done in the past.

It was also part of the Soviet plan after the war to seed areas in their control with loyal Russians. In the Ukraine this plan was called Ukrainianization. After starving millions of Ukrainians the Russian needed to repopulate the areas where millions died. The genius of the plan was that for every Ukrainian used to repopulate 2 Russians accompanied them. And we make fun of Soviet long range plans!
 
Here we are 1991 and the people who now we can officially call Ukrainians voted for independence. That vote was telling in that the majority of no votes came from these seeded areas.

So here we are today. From 1991 until present in that area the Soviet preparations for the time when the West would be more focused on events inside their countries then out. It would be a no hassle, done deal takeover. And it will be.

I believe Biden told Putin the time was right with the Afghanistan withdraw.

Tim adds:

I can't say I disagree Mike.

Ukraine was one of the "Russias" insofar as it was part of the region of Rus. In fact, it was once the civilized part of Russia. Kiev was the great power in the region while Moscow was nothing at all, or just a small trading village. But the coming of the Mongols changed all that; they torched a buffer zone to keep Europe from counter-attacking, and Kiev and the rest of Ukraine were the zone. They would ride back in periodically and burn it out. So for a couple of centuries Ukraine was the true Borderland (hence it's name).

It diverged from Russian culture at that point.

It was such a pity because it was as civilized as any European area at the time and would have been a leader in Westerrn civilization. But after the Mongols the prince of Moscovy rose, and he learned everything he knew from the Golden Horde. He used their tactics, their secret police, their suspicious nature to take over their territory.

And as you say, they kept a tight grip on Ukrain. They couldn't afford it to rise again. It was a danger; a natural invasion route from Europe, and an area with great natural resources.

Your late history is pretty much accurate. Stalin murdered a large swath of the country and repopulated with loyal Russians. And now Putin's using them as a justification for invading the country again.

I doubt he'll annex Ukraine, but it won't matter; it'll be a puppet state, much like ByeloRussia (White Russia) is now.

And Biden did nothing. He could have prevented this had he been even remotely competent.

Put was encouraged by Biden's weakness. Putin was flush with cash thanks to Biden's war on fossil fuels and his push for "green" tech at the expense of oil. The price of gas shot up, and Putin became rich enough to do this. (See my article on the Georgian war in Pajamas Media. https://pjmedia.com/blog/timothy-birdnow/2008/10/24/drill-here-drill-now-helped-end-russia-georgia-war-n18506 ) He had Biden's gross mishandling of Afghanistan to show America wouldn't act. And he had the fact that Biden's family was deeply involved financially with Ukraine; it suggested he was bought by them. That is significant; better to take steps to remove the Ukrainian government than let them continue to partner with the American President. Especially with elections coming up this year.

And the U.S. was preoccupied with so much foolishness. Biden was cracking down on the political opposition and Putin knew a large number of Americans would be lukewarm in supporting him at best. The trucker protests in Canada were an echo of what was coming in the U.S. too, he knew, and so the time was ripe. It was no coincidence he launched this invasion in winter; Europe will want to stay out so they don't freeze. They will push Crazy Joe to not act.

The time was ripe for this, and Putin has always dreamed of doing it, ever since the U.S.S.R. came undone.

And now, if this succeeds, China will likely seize Taiwan.

We are moving inexorably towards world war.

And once again we will show ourselves fickle and unreliable allies. We made a promise to Ukraine to defend them from the Russian bear in return for their destroying their share of the Soviet nuclear stockpile. They did - and now we are reneging on the deal.

Biden is going to make Jimmy Carter look downright competent.

Squeezing Russia is the key to ending this. Drill baby drill! A major drop in energy prices would do the trick. But I fear Biden's handlers will tell him this means to push even harder for "renewable" energy to get us off of the "dependence on fossil fuel" as opposed to drawing the correct lesson, that it was the dependence on "renewable energy" that made this possible for Putin, as it gave him a monopoly on reliable fuel.

With an inflation rate over 8% in Russia Putin needed this as a distraction to the public. But then, so does Joe Biden with inflation over 7% here. Neither man can afford to back down. This will be the straw that will break the camel[s back come November if Biden fails here, I suspect. He is going to have to go to war or risk a Democrat slaughter. Putin can't afford not to win here either.

We are on a runaway train, with another heading down the track towards us and no Casey Jones to toss us off.

Posted by: Timothy Birdnow at 10:32 AM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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