There's propaganda being churned out from both sides sandancer. How does one choose which bits to accept and which to ignore? We are all unwitting victims of the environment and society we grow up in and are influenced by. We are unknowingly influenced from our first days. You sound like a passionate young man convinced of your own position. It's only as you grow older that you realise that the truth's of the previous generation can be somewhat tarnished. We should all learn to question the values of the society in which we find ourselves.
Amazing that every time I offer an alternate view to those from the western press I get called a loon. Point of my posts is to open people eyes to the incredible lies perpetrated by the west on behalf of the idiots running the Ukraine. Whether or not what I provide is 100% or not is up to the readers on here to decide. I'm not saying I'm right but believe that both views should be told.
so you still think the ukrainians and americans cooked this up to discredit russia, rather than the perfectly plausible, accepted version of events?
that mail story makes no sense - "the russian backed rebels wanted to shoot down a russian plane so it would crash into ukrainian territory, and the russians would invade". so the russians would support the rebels after they shot down a russian plane, on purpose? okay.
I tend to agree with the gist of your argument. I don't like it when a democratically elected government is overthrown by a fascistic mob, especially when they are backed by a bunch of lying gits in Washington and Westminster. If the people of Ukraine wanted to be rid of their government, they should wait until the next general election, like the rest of us. We saw Hague and Kerry openly support and encourage the uprising in Kiev. Why did the troubles kick off? The elected government decided to back out of the process to become a member of the EU in 2011/12. Their economy was being supported by Russia with gas and oil at mates rates. Russia imported a large portion of the Ukraine GDP and financial assistance was readily available. If Ukraine wanted to be a member of the EU, they would have to open their books to the IMF. Remember that Ukraine is in a similar position as Greece were in 2009, skint, almost bankrupt with high unemployment. Once the IMF gets involved, loans become available but austerity becomes the way of life. Government is cut and privatised, usually to foreign "investors". Human and civil rights are eroded and suddenly the banks dictate everything. Vlad Putin wasn't very chuffed when the fascists won the battle, so he stopped the gas and oil subsidies and called in the loans. As the situation worsens in Crimea and Donetsk we see Obama and Cameron push in their own sanctions. Russia have agreed new oil and gas agreements with China and Iran in retaliation. If Russia turns off their gas, that runs through Ukraine, to Germany and France we will see the EU economy brought to its knees. We all know that Crimea is part of Russia again and a few areas of eastern Ukraine will probably follow suit, but the shooting down of MH17 will take a long time to resolve, if ever. The incident is a disaster for the innocent people and families involved, but it has the potential to be a spark that will ignite a West versus East conflict, with some people visualising WW3. This could easily escalate.
but the mob hasn't overthrown the goverment. the will of the people was to join the eu and leave russia's sphere of influence. the elected government decided against this following influence from russia, and this sparked mass protests, forcing a new election which has brought in the pro-eu government the people want. russia doesn't want this, and so is trying to destabilise the country by arming the rebels. it is trying to foment civil war in a neighbouring sovereign nation to achieve its own political aims. that is what the western sanctions are about, trying to get russia to back off.
New elections for who? Certainly not the Russian majority in the east. They had there own election and then were subsequently invaded because the west of Ukraine didn't like the outcome. Russia back off from what? You keep spouting American rubbish about Russia. It's not 1953 anymore....
ukraine couldn't invade them because they were in ukraine, you dolt. why do you hate ukrainians? are you russian? are you vladimir putin?
Not after the election in the west of Ukraine. Keep up with it mate. It's hardly rocket science. http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/may/12/ukraine-crisis-donetsk-region-asks-join-russia So the western government recognise the Kiev vote but not the vote in Donetsk.
you've managed to twist the drivel you were spouting earlier into a valid point mate, so kudos for that. re: that, yes, in the eastern two states of ukraine the majority identify themselves as russian. should they join russia? maybe. there's no historic precedent (unlike crimea), but people have a right to self-determination. what is wrong though, is russia arming them to the teeth to force the issue; russian guns are dragging ukraine into civil war. with regards to mh17 being a ukrainian conspiracy, which is what you were bleating on about, i notice you have ignored both my summary of your original point, and my summary of the other "facts" you brought up earlier, that it was actually the rebels who did it, but they wanted to shoot a russian plane. you say you want to consider both points, but actually you prefer to indulge this lurid fantasy rather than see that it was a horrific mistake. you also seem to have it in for the ukrainians - you called them liars in this very thread - pretty unsubstantiated generalisation if you ask me. why do you want it to be a conspiracy so badly? why do you want the ukrainians to be blamed? it was a tragic, massive mistake, that happened because people who shouldn't have missile launcher had one, and they had one because the russians want to assert dominance over their former sphere of influence.
Don't worry about the gas tap being switched off and wrecking our economies. The west has been stocking up on gas for months. The UK's now up to 87% capacity. Liquid Natural Gas prices are coming down, new supplies are coming on-line and one of the biggest recent users, Japan, is bringing on-line 2nuclear reactors soon, which will bring prices down further. Russia can't damage the Western economies in the long-run, just in the short-term. And in an economic war, there'll only be one winner. That's not propaganda by the way Sanddancer, just plain economics, based simply on GDP's. Putin's shuffling himself back into a corner. It'll be interesting to see which we jumps, either into Ukraine with his armed forces, to support the rebels who also appear to be on the back-foot, or to back down, possibly under pressure from his financial backers, those oligarch's we hear so much about.
Makes sense, maybe they were just following procedure in the event of cabin pressure failure, and didn't notice the back half of the plane was missing!
I stopped reading this when I reached the bit quoting Russian Defence Agency. Cameron, Clegg, Salmon's, Farage, Milliband AND a small weasel called Brian all put together have lied less than Putin. I'll wait for independents analysis and not the Yanks either before making my mind up.
