How the Ukraine crisis ends

[humble3d]

How the Ukraine crisis ends

By Henry A. Kissinger, Published: March 5

Henry A. Kissinger was secretary of state from 1973 to 1977.

Public discussion on Ukraine is all about confrontation. But do we know where we are going? In my life, I have seen four wars begun with great enthusiasm and public support, all of which we did not know how to end and from three of which we withdrew unilaterally. The test of policy is how it ends, not how it begins.

Far too often the Ukrainian issue is posed as a showdown: whether Ukraine joins the East or the West. But if Ukraine is to survive and thrive, it must not be either side’s outpost against the other — it should function as a bridge between them.


Russia must accept that to try to force Ukraine into a satellite status, and thereby move Russia’s borders again, would doom Moscow to repeat its history of self-fulfilling cycles of reciprocal pressures with Europe and the United States.

The West must understand that, to Russia, Ukraine can never be just a foreign country. Russian history began in what was called Kievan-Rus. The Russian religion spread from there. Ukraine has been part of Russia for centuries, and their histories were intertwined before then. Some of the most important battles for Russian freedom, starting with the Battle of Poltava in 1709 , were fought on Ukrainian soil. The Black Sea Fleet — Russia’s means of projecting power in the Mediterranean — is based by long-term lease in Sevastopol, in Crimea. Even such famed dissidents as Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn and Joseph Brodsky insisted that Ukraine was an integral part of Russian history and, indeed, of Russia.

_http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/468225/Battle-of-Poltava

The European Union must recognize that its bureaucratic dilatoriness and subordination of the strategic element to domestic politics in negotiating Ukraine’s relationship to Europe contributed to turning a negotiation into a crisis. Foreign policy is the art of establishing priorities.

The Ukrainians are the decisive element. They live in a country with a complex history and a polyglot composition. The Western part was incorporated into the Soviet Union in 1939 , when Stalin and Hitler divided up the spoils. Crimea, 60 percent of whose population is Russian , became part of Ukraine only in 1954 , when Nikita Khrushchev, a Ukrainian by birth, awarded it as part of the 300th-year celebration of a Russian agreement with the Cossacks. The west is largely Catholic; the east largely Russian Orthodox. The west speaks Ukrainian; the east speaks mostly Russian. Any attempt by one wing of Ukraine to dominate the other — as has been the pattern — would lead eventually to civil war or break up. To treat Ukraine as part of an East-West confrontation would scuttle for decades any prospect to bring Russia and the West — especially Russia and Europe — into a cooperative international system.

Ukraine has been independent for only 23 years; it had previously been under some kind of foreign rule since the 14th century. Not surprisingly, its leaders have not learned the art of compromise, even less of historical perspective. The politics of post-independence Ukraine clearly demonstrates that the root of the problem lies in efforts by Ukrainian politicians to impose their will on recalcitrant parts of the country, first by one faction, then by the other. That is the essence of the conflict between Viktor Yanukovych and his principal political rival, Yulia Tymoshenko. They represent the two wings of Ukraine and have not been willing to share power. A wise U.S. policy toward Ukraine would seek a way for the two parts of the country to cooperate with each other. We should seek reconciliation, not the domination of a faction.

Russia and the West, and least of all the various factions in Ukraine, have not acted on this principle. Each has made the situation worse. Russia would not be able to impose a military solution without isolating itself at a time when many of its borders are already precarious. For the West, the demonization of Vladimir Putin is not a policy; it is an alibi for the absence of one.

Putin should come to realize that, whatever his grievances, a policy of military impositions would produce another Cold War. For its part, the United States needs to avoid treating Russia as an aberrant to be patiently taught rules of conduct established by Washington. Putin is a serious strategist — on the premises of Russian history. Understanding U.S. values and psychology are not his strong suits. Nor has understanding Russian history and psychology been a strong point of U.S. policymakers.

Leaders of all sides should return to examining outcomes, not compete in posturing. Here is my notion of an outcome compatible with the values and security interests of all sides:

1. Ukraine should have the right to choose freely its economic and political associations, including with Europe.

2. Ukraine should not join NATO, a position I took seven years ago, when it last came up.

3. Ukraine should be free to create any government compatible with the expressed will of its people. Wise Ukrainian leaders would then opt for a policy of reconciliation between the various parts of their country. Internationally, they should pursue a posture comparable to that of Finland. That nation leaves no doubt about its fierce independence and cooperates with the West in most fields but carefully avoids institutional hostility toward Russia.

4. It is incompatible with the rules of the existing world order for Russia to annex Crimea. But it should be possible to put Crimea’s relationship to Ukraine on a less fraught basis. To that end, Russia would recognize Ukraine’s sovereignty over Crimea. Ukraine should reinforce Crimea’s autonomy in elections held in the presence of international observers. The process would include removing any ambiguities about the status of the Black Sea Fleet at Sevastopol.

These are principles, not prescriptions. People familiar with the region will know that not all of them will be palatable to all parties. The test is not absolute satisfaction but balanced dissatisfaction. If some solution based on these or comparable elements is not achieved, the drift toward confrontation will accelerate. The time for that will come soon enough.

LINKS AND MORE VIA THE LINK BELOW...

_http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/henry-kissinger-to-settle-the-ukraine-crisis-start-at-the-end/2014/03/05/46dad868-a496-11e3-8466-d34c451760b9_story.html

ONE READER'S OPINION

Markus Lochmann wrote:
3/5/2014 6:27 PM GMT-0500
I really admire Henry Kissinger, who is a great Idol of mine since I was a little child and the Helsinki Conference went on in 1975. But as a Finn/German I have to fundamentally disagree. The policy stated here is cold war thinking. The world has changed though. I believe the Ukraine, Finland, Georgia and Sweden should join NATO as soon as possible. We are not dealing with a communist Russia now, there is no dualism of systems this time around. We are dealing with an upcoming dictatorship in Russia - where the leadership of an autocrat has left the realm of rationality. The Soviets were cruel, but they had several correction loops in their system; the KGB, the politbureau, and last but not least the communist party. Putin has no correction loop left what so ever. The party is completely submissive to him. So is the Russian "parliament". Nobody dares to challenge the great leader - and if you follow closely Russian state media these days it sounds and looks like straight out of North Korea. Therefore rationality is no longer the basis of Russian decision making, but dictatorship and submission are. I think, we cannot sacrifice the people of neighboring countries to Russia as a "buffer zone". These people want and deserve freedom, human rights and the wealth of capitalism just as all the other eastern European countries which joined the EU and NATO in the 1990s. The West must keep up the pressure and help the Ukrainian people to free itself from the hollow grip from Moscow. Putin won't listen to anything but power. Mrs. Clinton is right.

__http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/henry-kissinger-to-settle-the-ukraine-crisis-start-at-the-end/2014/03/05/46dad868-a496-11e3-8466-d34c451760b9_story.html

[ffi]

As much I hate to admit it but Putin is right on this one:

-the democratically elected leader of the Ukrain was ousted by a violent mob incited by foreigners. I have seen a clip of Verhofstadt the EUSSR supreme commisioner to be (or whatever) inciting the mob, making all sorts of promisses to that mob should they succeed (lot's of money from the EUSSR, visaless entry into the EUSSR etc etc.) I wouldn't have believed it if I hadn't seen it

-The current government of the Ukraine is unconstitutional and illegitimate

-The Crimea historically has been part of Russia, the vast majority of inhabitants are ethnic russians, not ukrainians. Crimea was gifted to the Ukraine by Chrutchov, himself a ukrainian, in the USSR-era. This was just moot at the time because it only had some administrative consequences as the Ukraine and Russia were part of the same country (the USSR)

-Every region and all peoples of the world have a right to self-determination, including the people on the Crimea (and easter Ukraine). They should be able to determine themselves if they want independence, be part of the Ukraine or Russia.

-Putin's troop are in the Crimea on invitation of the crimean government

watch Verhofstadt and van Baalen (a dutch mep) speak at Maidan, it is really shocking (not because he's really ugly and has a terrible accent):

Edited March 8, 2014 by ffi

[GrandPa]

The Looting Of Ukraine Has Begun: Edit

According to a report in Kommersant-Ukraine, the finance ministry of Washington’s stooges in Kiev who are pretending to be a government has prepared an economic austerity plan that will cut Ukrainian pensions from $160 to $80 so that Western bankers who lent money to Ukraine can be repaid at the expense of Ukraine’s poor. It is Greece all over again.

Before anything approaching stability and legitimacy has been obtained for the puppet government put in power by the Washington orchestrated coup against the legitimate, elected Ukraine government, the Western looters are already at work. Naive protesters who believed the propaganda that EU membership offered a better life are due to lose half of their pension by April. But this is only the beginning.

The corrupt Western media describes loans as “aid.” However, the 11 billion euros that the EU is offering Kiev is not aid. It is a loan. Moreover, it comes with many strings, including Kiev’s acceptance of an IMF austerity plan.

Remember now, gullible Ukrainians participated in the protests that were used to overthrow their elected government, because they believed the lies told to them by Washington-financed NGOs that once they joined the EU they would have streets paved with gold. Instead they are getting cuts in their pensions and an IMF austerity plan.

The austerity plan will cut social services, funds for education, layoff government workers, devalue the currency, thus raising the prices of imports which include Russian gas, thus electricity, and open Ukrainian assets to takeover by Western corporations.

Ukraine’s agriculture lands will pass into the hands of American agribusiness.

One part of the Washington/EU plan for Ukraine, or that part of Ukraine that doesn’t defect to Russia, has succeeded. What remains of the country will be thoroughly looted by the West.

The other part hasn’t worked as well. Washington’s Ukrainian stooges lost control of the protests to organized and armed ultra-nationalists. These groups, whose roots go back to those who fought for Hitler during World War 2, engaged in words and deeds that sent southern and eastern Ukraine clamoring to be returned to Russia where they resided prior to the 1950s when the Soviet communist party stuck them into Ukraine.

At this time of writing it looks like Crimea has seceded from Ukraine. Washington and its NATO puppets can do nothing but bluster and threaten sanctions. The White House Fool has demonstrated the impotence of the “US sole superpower” by issuing sanctions against unknown persons, whoever they are, responsible for returning Crimea to Russia, where it existed for about 200 years before, according to Solzhenitsyn, a drunk Khrushchev of Ukrainian ethnicity moved southern and eastern Russian provinces into Ukraine. Having observed the events in western Ukraine, those Russian provinces want to go back home where they belong, just as South Ossetia wanted nothing to do with Georgia.

Washington’s stooges in Kiev can do nothing about Crimea except bluster. Under the Russian-Ukraine agreement, Russia is permitted 25,000 troops in Crimea. The US/EU media’s deploring of a “Russian invasion of 16,000 troops” is either total ignorance or complicity in Washington’s lies. Obviously, the US/EU media is corrupt. Only a fool would rely on their reports. Any media that would believe anything Washington says after George W. Bush and Dick Cheney sent Secretary of State Colin Powell to the UN to peddle the regime’s lies about “Iraqi weapons of mass destruction,” which the weapons inspectors had told the White House did not exist, is clearly a collection of bought-and-paid for whores.

In the former Russian provinces of eastern Ukraine, Putin’s low-key approach to the strategic threat that Washington has brought to Russia has given Washington a chance to hold on to a major industrial complex that serves the Russian economy and military. The people themselves in eastern Ukraine are in the streets demanding separation from the unelected government that Washington’s coup has imposed in Kiev. Washington, realizing that its incompetence has lost Crimea, had its Kiev stooges appoint Ukrainian oligarchs, against whom the Maiden protests were partly directed, to governing positions in eastern Ukraine cities. These oligarchs have their own private militias in addition to the police and any Ukrainian military units that are still functioning. The leaders of the protesting Russians are being arrested and disappeared. Washington and its EU puppets, who proclaim their support for self-determination, are only for self-determination when it can be orchestrated in their favor. Therefore, Washington is busy at work suppressing self-determination in eastern Ukraine.

This is a dilemma for Putin. His low-key approach has allowed Washington to seize the initiative in eastern Ukraine. The oligarchs Taruta and Kolomoyskiy have been put in power in Donetsk and Dnipropetrovsk, and are carrying out arrests of Russians and committing unspeakable crimes, but you will never hear of it from the US presstitutes. Washington’s strategy is to arrest and deep-six the leaders of the secessionists so that there no authorities to request Putin’s intervention.

If Putin has drones, he has the option of taking out Taruta and Kolomoyskiy. If Putin lets Washington retain the Russian provinces of eastern Ukraine, he will have demonstrated a weakness that Washington will exploit. Washington will exploit the weakness to the point that Washington forces Putin to war.

The war will be nuclear.

[dMog]

neither of you two have a grasp of the reality here

[SnakeMasteR]

Enlighten them, what is the reality?

Russian troops are there for a reason, from one day to the other. They mark the boundaries, by force if needed.

[AlexCross]

If Ukraine breaks from Moscow, will be their end as a country. Beeing near a stricted system, it doesn't mean a bad thing. If they get " their freedom", their country will be selled for few bucks, they won't have their identity as a country. It is the biggest mistake that they did and I hope they won't have Romania's future, when 70% of the population voted for the president resignation, and then, an US official came, and after he left, the Constitutional Court ruled to not take into consideration the people's voice, and decided to invalidate the votes. Something that I don't think it happened in any other European country.

Edited March 8, 2014 by AlexCross

[ffi]

neither of you two have a grasp of the reality here

Thank you for your thoughtful insights, I am almost convinced I was wrong, however you could have inserted a Godwin to win the argument for good....

[dMog]

??

[AlexCross]

Don't believe what you see at TV.

[AlexCross]

This will happen to Ukraine if they breaks from Moscow: Their country will be sold, with all their natural resources for few bucks. Romania has the largest amount of gold and silver resoruses in the world, that sits under the most beatifull place, place that now is destroyed. Romania will get only 6% of all that gold, only 6% of its natural resources. 2 mountains will be leveled for 6%. Better live in a strict regime, than to be a puppet of big corporations.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QfCNZIe3fYM

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QyjIibrI8Bw

They'll take the gold and leave behind the dying nature and a dying country.

Ukraine is fighting for a fake freedom.

Edited March 9, 2014 by AlexCross

[ffi]

They have no idea what it means to be in the EUSSR, we all want out of this nightmare and they want in :wtf:

[dMog]

They have no idea what it means to be in the EUSSR, we all want out of this nightmare and they want in :wtf:

that would be because they have been under that lovely umbrella of Russian influence for some generations now...check out some history on how the Ukraine has been treated..first thing you should look up is the famine and how that happened in that county...lets see you and the other s blame the USA for that one http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/archives/ukra.html just the tip of the iceberg as to how kind the Russians have been to those citizens... by the way you do not have successful and popular uprising without 99% of the people agreeing in the rising up against a repressive government...that would be what Putin is all upset about...he lost his puppet

[ffi]

You confuse the USSR with Russia, those are two different countries

[dMog]

You confuse the USSR with Russia, those are two different countries

will reply to your posts...no actually i am not... Putin's actions have all but proved he will take his country back the glory days of soviet russia.with him with dictatorial power..his actions speak to this end...any dissension is dealt with harshly ans is getting worse...

[AlexCross]

Considering that ~20% of the citizens of Ukraine are Russians, I find his decisions legit. Let's see what they'll vote at the referendum. At least a part of the Ukraine will be saved.

Edited March 9, 2014 by AlexCross

[AlexCross]

the United States will not recognize the results of the Crimea vote and will, with the European Union, impose penalties on Russia if it annexes the strategic region, senior U.S.. officials warned that any Russia moves on east and south Ukraine would be a grave escalation requiring additional responses.

Did the US and EU just said that they don't care about the people's voice? They have voted, it's their vote, nobody can take that from them.

Edited March 16, 2014 by AlexCross

[dMog]

would be the same thing as the Russian community in new york city saying they had a vote to join Putin's Russia..what do you really expect the rest of the world to say ??? or are you really that naive...if so just say so... and we can stop the discussion right here and now

[AlexCross]

My friend, Crimeea voted 93 percent to quit Ukraine, Crimeea was a part of URSS. You can make these types of comparations, we're talking about 93 percent of votes, not 0.2.

[SnakeMasteR]

Under international law, there is no " russians come with soldiers and create a referendum for annexation of the Krim" and the referendum is 100% legit. 22.000 russian soldiers, closed boundaries and only air traffic from Moskau is allowed, a government head of the Krim who made it to his new job just about a time when russian militia was present, Krim was and still is part of ukrainian territory and for the referendum, there weren't even votelists, they belong to Kiew and now ask yourself how can there be 93% verified voters, when Kiew has the list of voters and then you know why there only is air traffic from Moskau. Even a dog, a chicken could vote and it would be counted.

:lol:

[AlexCross]

Crimean Prime Minister Sergey Aksyonov, elected in an emergency session earlier in the week, said he asserted sole control over Crimea's security forces and appealed to Russia "for assistance in guaranteeing peace and calmness" on the peninsula.

[J.D]

Even a dog, a chicken could vote and it would be counted

Yeah, not legit IMO but neither is the Power in Kiev - before kicking a President out of office, you must allow ALL of Ukraine to vote that person out of office .I know they will be voting soon but if ALL sides want the rule of Law, you cannot depose a sitting President, you have to wait until the next election . -_-

[SnakeMasteR]

He can thank god, that he is still alive.

[AlexCross]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qs_FF87mf0Y

I'm happy that someone fights for these people. They look so happy. Why to force 2 communities to live together?

Edited March 17, 2014 by AlexCross

[J.D]

Why to force 2 communities to live together?

Fair point AlexCross but Yesterdays vote on the ballot paper did not have the options to:

eg, Stay as we are (eg within Ukraine) and other options .

[dMog]

the black sea fleet is there does anyone really think putin will allow control of that area to someone other than the russian military