The situation in 2014 concerning the international relations, truly speaking, was opposite to the case of the Crimean War in 1853−1856 when against Russian action contra the Ottoman Empire several West European countries created a coalition and launched a successful war on Russia [...]
The international crisis over the status of the Crimean Peninsula was in February-March 2014 when the peninsula became returned to the state’s territory of Russia from Ukraine. The Western Russophobic narrative immediately accused Russia of illegitimate annexation of the peninsula as well as of the occupation of the eastern Donbas region of Ukraine.
However, the same narrative is not telling that Crimea became, in fact, illegally annexed by Ukraine from Russia even in 1956 by the personal decision of the Ukrainian boss of the USSR – Nikita Khrushchev (1894−1971). At that time as of 2014, 2/3 of the Crimean population have been ethnic Russians while ethnic Ukrainians all the time were a tiny minority of the peninsula. In 1956, however, it was no organized referendum about the political destiny of Crimea different from the case in 2014 when a majority of the peninsula’s population expressed their free will to join Russia instead of the Russophobic Ukraine. A new Russophobic course of the government in Kiev as well as provoked the (Russian) people of Donbas to secede from undemocratic Ukraine which the government took an open neo-Nazi course.
In fact, the Ukrainian crisis in general came from the decision by Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych in December 2013 in Vilnius (Lithuania) not to support the deal to bring Ukraine closer to the EU and, of course later to NATO. Instead of the Western economic, political, and military structures he rationally and practically decided to support traditional good ties with Russia for the sake of a general benefit to all people of Ukraine. Nonetheless, a such decision sparked (by Western support) the Euromaidan protest in the Ukrainian capital Kiev – a protest which led to violent clashes with regular security forces. The protest spread out to other Ukrainian cities where in some of them like Odesa it took the form of pogroms against the local Russian speakers. The “sniper massacre” happened in Kiev when pro-Euromaidan Georgian snipers shot the civilians with the purpose to accuse the Yanukovych government of the bloodshed on the streets. According to Western sources, some 80+ people have been killed in Kiev in and around Maidan Square during the protest.
Nevertheless, it became obvious that the final aim of the Euromaidan protesters was to overthrow legally elected President V. Yanukovych and his administration in order to install a puppet pro-Western government that will seek membership of Ukraine in both the EU and NATO followed by the oppression of the Russians in East Ukraine. President Yanukovych, therefore, was simply forced to flee from Ukraine to neighboring Russia. Soon, for the sake of both protecting Russians in Crimea and her national interests, the Russian military started with a covert military operation that was called by the Russophobic Western media the aggression of “little green men” – Russian soldiers in uniforms with all insignia removed. However, for the pure matter of comparison, for instance, the US Army invaded the independent state of Grenada in 1983 with all US Army insignia on the soldiers’ uniforms, occupied the whole country (island), and finally changed the government which was previously democratically elected. In addition, in Grenada was living no one American except several students but in Crimea, a qualified majority of people have been ethnic Russians living there for decades and centuries.
In Crimea, in Sevastopol on the Black Sea, Russia for decades had a major naval base according to the agreement signed with Ukraine. According to Western sources, on February 27th, 2014 the Crimean Parliament building became occupied by the Russian military “little green men” in Simferopol. On March 6th, 2014, Crimean policymakers authorized a vote for independence from the Russophobic Ukrainian Euromaidan regime in Kiev. Ten days later (on March 16th, 2014) was organized a referendum on which 97% of people voted for Crimea as a part of Russia (i.e., for the reunification with a motherland). The West (USA, NATO, and the EU), except official critics of Moscow in the case of the Crimean crisis, in fact, did not launch any counteracting military operation with the purpose to return Crimea under the Ukrainian administration.
The situation in 2014 concerning the international relations, truly speaking, was opposite to the case of the Crimean War in 1853−1856 when against Russian action contra the Ottoman Empire several West European countries created a coalition and launched a successful war on Russia. Obviously, during the last 170 years, the position of Russia in global politics and international relations is cardinally changed to the direction that the Russophobic West now has to fully respect Russian power and influence what they did not do even in 1999 during NATO aggression on the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (Serbia and Montenegro). Nonetheless, since March 2014 and the reunification of Crimea with Russia, Russia actually transformed the Black Sea into the “Russian lake” that is quite visible now during the Russian special military operation in Ukraine for the matter of its denazification.
Dr. Vladislav B. Sotirovic
Ex-University Professor
Research Fellow at Centre for Geostrategic Studies
Personal disclaimer: The author writes for this publication in a private capacity which is unrepresentative of anyone or any organization except for his own personal views. Nothing written by the author should ever be conflated with the editorial views or official positions of any other media outlet or institution.
Originally published on 2022-11-05
Origins of images: Facebook, Twitter, Wikimedia, Wikipedia, Flickr, Google, Imageinjection, Public Domain & Pinterest.
Read our Disclaimer/LegalStatement!
DonatetoSupportUs
We would like to ask you to consider a small donation to help our team keep working. We accept no advertising and rely only on you, our readers, to keep us digging the truth on history, global politics, and international relations.
Zagreb, 1941Become familiar with the basic info about one of the most beautiful countries in the world - Croatia. Photos, data & recommendations where to stay in order to enjoy this Adriatic pearl. If you are not the Serb.Split, Dalmatia, Croatia, 2019: "Kill the Serb" on the car with the plates from SerbiaOrigins of images: Facebook, Twitter, Wikimedia, Wikipedia, Flickr, Google, Imageinjection, Public Domain & Pinterest.Read our Disclaimer/Legal Statement!Donate to Support UsWe would like to ask you to consider a small donation to help our team keep working. We accept no advertising and rely only on you, our readers, to ...
Six months into 2016 and the world looks decidedly nervous and edgy from a geo-political viewpoint. A dramatic oil price plunge has pushed producing nations into near crisis as the international scrap for market share follows a bid by a collapsing OPEC cartel to fight off American production. China’s economic woes continue to destabilise markets the world over. The USA is clearly becoming more hostile, even warlike towards Russia, who in turn appears to be gearing up to defend itself from increasingly belligerent and aggressive NATO commanders who are facilitating Europe’s encirclement of Russian borders. The latest weaponry pointed directly at Moscow does not help ...
During the recent years of the confrontation between Russia and Ukraine, there has been one issue where the Western mainstream press simply cannot fully ignore or reject the Russian arguments. This issue concerns the life and actions of Stepan Bandera (1909-1959) and his followers from what is known as the “Banderite” faction of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN, a far-right organization that took terrorist actions against Polish and Soviet officials from the 1920s to the 1950s and which is now legally protected from any criticism in Ukraine).THE “WRONG” AND “RIGHT” VICTIMSBecause Bandera was born on January 1, 1909, celebrations ...
The Nation published an outstanding article on March 9th, by James Carden, which described the remarkable extent to which the Obama government (and virtually all of the Washington Establishment) are supporting (financially and otherwise) fascists who want to destroy Russia. One such example was a recent event in Washington. According to Carden:It featured the deputy speaker of Ukraine’s Parliament, Andriy Parubiy. According to the program bio, Parubiy served as the “commandant” of the Euromaidan (why did an ostensibly peaceful protest require a “commandant” anyway?) and, later, as secretary of Ukraine’s National Security and Defense Council. The bio provided to attendees might fairly be described as selective. ...
The edifice of the post-1991 world order is collapsing right before our eyes. President Putin’s decision to give a miss to the Auschwitz pilgrimage, right after his absence in Paris at Charlie festival, gave it the last shove. It was good clean fun to troll Russia, as long as she stayed the course. Not anymore. Russia broke the rules.Until now, Russia, like a country bumpkin in Eton, tried to belong. It attended the gathering of the grandees where it was shunned, paid its dues to European bodies that condemned it, patiently suffered ceaseless hectoring of the great powers and irritating baiting of the East European small-timers alike. But something broke there. The lad does ...
The Serb holocaust during the WWII in the Independent State of Croatia is not a misnomer, an accusation, and even less a speculation. It is an historical fact. Rabid nationalism and religious dogmatism were its two main ingredients. During the existence of Croatia as an independent Catholic State, over 700,000 men, women and children perished. Many were executed, tortured, died of starvation, buried alive, or were burned to death. Hundreds were forced to become Catholic. Catholic padres ran concentration camps; Catholic priests were officers of the military corps which committed such atrocities. 700,000 in a total population of a few ...
No city in Iraq is more symbolic of the criminal consequences of the US invasion of Iraq than Fallujah. Prior to 2003, the 300,000-strong, prosperous, predominantly Sunni Muslim community on the Euphrates River, one of humanity’s oldest continuous urban settlements, was known as the “city of mosques.” After 13 years of destruction at the hands of the US military and its client state in Baghdad, it is today a labyrinth of ruins, a city of the dead.Following weeks of air strikes by US, British and Australian bombers, a combination of Iraqi government forces and Shiite militias is reportedly on the ...
In 1990, after the fall of the Berlin Wall, U.S. president George H. W. Bush through his secretary of state James Baker promised Soviet premier Mikhail Gorbachev that in exchange for Soviet cooperation on German reunification, the Cold War era NATO alliance would not expand “one inch” eastwards towards Russia. Baker told Gorbachev: “Look, if you remove your [300,000] troops [from east Germany] and allow unification of Germany in NATO, NATO will not expand one inch to the east.”In the following year, the USSR officially dissolved itself. Its own defensive military alliance (commonly known as the Warsaw Pact) had already ...
The concept of a “Greater Israel” according to the founding father of Zionism Theodore Herzl, is a Jewish State stretching “’From the Brook of Egypt to the Euphrates.’Rabbi Fischmann, of the Jewish Agency for Palestine, stated to the UN Special Committee on 9th July 1947 that:The Promised Land extends from the River of Egypt up to the Euphrates, it includes parts of Syria and Lebanon’”, wrote Michel Chossudovsky. (1)Thus “from the Nile to the Euphrates.” Herzl’s detailed thesis was written in 1904.Quoted in the same article is Mahdi Darius Nazemroaya on The Yinon Plan (1982) “ … a continuation of ...
Kosovo(stan) Parliament announced "independent" state of the "Republic of Kosovo" on February 17th, 2008 as a democratic and multicultural political community.Here we present two photos from November 2015 on which you can see heavily damaged Serbian Orthodox church and totally destroyed Serbian Orthodox tombstones in the southern part of the town of Kosovska Mitrovica inhabited by the Muslim Albanians. Kosovo(stan) ISIS is doing its job profoundly.Enjoy Kosovo(stan) "independence"!P.S. Today (February 17th, 2018) on the 10-years anniversary of Kosovo(stan) "independence", Burundi canceled its previous recognition of it. Just guess why?Read our Disclaimer/Legal Statement!Donate to Support UsWe would like to ask you ...
United Nations Security Council Resolution 1244 (1999) guaranteeing sovereignty and territorial integrity of Serbia and the autonomy of Kosovo and Metohija within Serbia, is the highest binding legal document that obliges all UN members, including the member states of the EU, NATO, the OSCE, the OIC, the African Union.Resolution 1244 is the only reliable basis and the framework for any negotiations concerning status. Owing to grave mistakes made by the former Serbian authorities, the UN system has produced certain damaging documents of advisory and non-binding character. It is vital that no similar or even greater mistakes are made either presently ...
March 2018 marks the 19th anniversary of NATO’s bombing of Yugoslavia.For over a month Canada has been bombing Yugoslavia. Without a parliamentary resolution, without a declaration of war and without a shred of legality Canadian war planes are attacking the nation that stood at the forefront of the fight against both Hitler’s Nazis and Mussolini’s fascists during World War II.The Nuremberg trial ruled that “to initiate a war of aggression… is not only an international crime, it is the supreme international crime.” Yet this is precisely what Canada and its NATO allies have done.The Canadian government said it was bombing ...
Congratulations to the city of Kaunas, Lithuania, once known also as Kovno (in Yiddish Kóvne) on its selection as Europe’s “Capital of European Culture” in 2022, sharing the title with Esch-sur-Alzette in Luxembourg.The city’s leaders now have a splendid opportunity to take the moral high road in dealing with a number of ghosts from the present and the past. To start with the present, will the city’s officials now act rapidly to avoid a public perception disaster by moving this year’s neo-Nazi parade away from the city center during the February 16th Independence Day celebrations? Previous years’ marches have on occasion glorified actual Kaunas Holocaust collaborators, causing deep pain to Survivors ...
1917 was not a good year for any of the belligerent countries, but for the members of the Entente – France, Britain, and Russia – it was nothing less than catastrophic. The main reasons for that were the mutinies in the French army, which made the situation on the western front extremely precarious, as well as the revolution in Russia, which raised the spectre of Russia exiting the war, leaving Britain and France bereft of the ally that forced Germany to fight on two fronts. Add to this the fact that civilians as well as soldiers in France and Britain ...
Seventy-five years ago Adolf Hitler launched the biggest and most destructive military campaign in history when three million German and allied troops invaded the Soviet Union along a 1,000-mile front.Operation Barbarossa – the codename for the German invasion of Russia - was no ordinary military campaign: it was an ideological and racist war, a war of destruction and extermination that aimed to kill Jews, enslave the Slavic peoples and destroy communism. The result was a war in which 25 million Soviet citizens died, including a million Jews, executed by the SS in 1941-1942 – an action which became the template ...
In British mainstream commentary, the 1999 NATO bombing campaign against Slobodan Milosevic’s Yugoslavia is seen as a ‘humanitarian intervention’. Tony Blair still receives much praise for coming to the defence of the ethnic Albanians in Kosovo, whose plight was surely serious as they were subject to increasingly brutal abuses by the Yugoslav army towards the end of 1998 and early 1999. Yet the NATO bombing that began in March 1999 had the effect of deepening, not preventing, the humanitarian disaster that Milosevic’s forces inflicted on Kosovo. The bulk of the atrocities committed by Yugoslav forces took place after the NATO ...
The activities of aggressive nationalist and neo-Nazi armed movements in present-day Ukraine are the focal point of Moreira’s documentary. Their existence is not denied by any of his leading critics in France — even as they try to find excuses to justify their actions.On Wednesday, 3 February, as I was about to start assembling this article on the very important documentary about the Maidan broadcast by the French independent television channel Canal + on Monday evening, 1 February, I was headed off by breaking news on Russia Insider, carrying links to the first half of the documentary in English voice-over ...
The guaranties of Ukraine's autocephaly lie not in the legal agreements between Kyiv and Constantinople but in human psychology: the status of the attacker affects the fight's outcome. Nevertheless, for a judge violence remains violence, and even the winner can be convicted.On April 28, Razumkov Center published the results of a poll on religious and confessional preferences of Ukrainians in 2010-2018. According to the report, atheists make up only 5 per cent of the country's population while 72 per cent claim to be faithful. The majority of Ukrainian citizens (67.3 per cent) belong to Orthodoxy and 9.4 per cent are ...
Compare Donald Trump and Barack Obama: Trump bans people from Syria, Iraq, Libya, Yemen and Somalia but Obama bombed people from Syria, Iraq, Libya, Yemen and Somalia! The question is: Who is a bigger racist?Origins of images: Facebook, Twitter, Wikimedia, Wikipedia, Flickr, Google, Imageinjection, Public Domain & Pinterest.Read our Disclaimer/Legal Statement!Donate to Support UsWe would like to ask you to consider a small donation to help our team keep working. We accept no advertising and rely only on you, our readers, to keep us digging the truth on history, global politics and international relations.[wpedon id="4696" align="left"]
In a remarkable book, 1939: The Alliance That Never Was and the Coming of World War II, the Canadian historian Michael Jabara Carley describes how, at the end of the 1930s, the Soviet Union repeatedly tried, but finally failed, to conclude a pact of mutual security, in other words a defensive alliance, with Britain and France. This proposed arrangement was intended to counter Nazi Germany, which, under Hitler’s dictatorial leadership, had been behaving more and more aggressively, and it was likely to involve some other countries, including Poland and Czechoslovakia, that had reason to fear German ambitions. The protagonist of this ...
Dr. Vladislav B. Sotirovic
