What happened to the Crimea bridge and why is it important?
aljazeera.com
Traffic on the single bridge that links Russia to Moscow-annexed Crimea and serves as a key supply route for the Kremlin’s forces in the war with Ukraine came to a standstill on Monday after one of its sections was blown up, killing a couple and wounding their daughter.
The RBC Ukraine news agency reported that explosions were heard on the bridge, with Russian military bloggers reporting two strikes.
RBC Ukraine and another Ukrainian news outlet Ukrainska Pravda said the attack was planned jointly by the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) and the Ukrainian navy, and involved sea drones.
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What? Do you have anything that shows the demographics significantly changed at all? The population was 76% russian in 2014 before Russia took it. You have data that shows that significantly increased?
No it was at 67.9%, up from 60.4% in 2001 down from 67% in 1989. Up from 6.6% in 1850 when Russification really started. Also note the suspicious absence of Tatars during the times of the Soviet Union and their return afterwards. And TBH I trust those censuses 2014 onwards about as much as I trust Russian referenda.
Also, "people speak Russian at home" is not, by a long shot, the same thing as "want to be part of Russia" much less "want to live under <currenttsar>'s boot" or "want to suffer yet another Holodomor". Crimea had a referendum just as the rest of Ukraine did and it didn't want to be part of Russia by a good margin. The question of "part of Ukraine or independent" was more split, but that turned towards "part of Ukraine" as Ukraine failed to treat Crimea badly and independence would be difficult for such a small country in such an exposed situation.
Then just speak to some people physically in Crimea? You're on the internet it's not difficult to seek out and have conversations with people in different places in the world.
Ukraine did treat Crimea badly though? Are you completely unaware of the political turmoil in Ukraine prior to any of this? Increasing ethnic persecution against Russians and finally banning the russian language is what started the separatism in these regions.
Of course. Because that's totally not something the FSB would do to sniff out partisans and shit. There's a war going on in case you haven't noticed and truth is always its first victim.
Neither was there prosecution nor was the Russian language banned. The Ukrainian army largely operates in Russian, FFS.
I suggest you have a good look at the reliability of whatever place you get your information from.
It's Russian propaganda, we know where they get their information from.
https://www.europarl.europa.eu/doceo/document/E-8-2014-010539_EN.html
This was put to the EU at the time by a greek parliamentarian that cared about what would happen to greeks in the region. But refers to the law change I am talking about which affected several other ethnic groups.
Why are you quoting a member of the Golden Dawn as if Nazis were a reliable source of information? Are you a Nazbol?
Lmao I had no idea he was to be honest. You're right. Let's get something else then. (And no I'm certainly fucking not.)
A couple of western media articles discussing the split the existing language law was causing in the country:
2000: Ukraine wages war on Russian language
2012: Russian language debate splits Ukraine
2012: Ukrainians(far right) protest against Russian language law
2014(when the law actually occurred): Ukraine Revokes Linguistic Rights
This last one is the most interesting, also 2014 from Time: Many Ukrainians Want Russia To Invade
Remember how that law never went into effect and in fact regions have the right to have secondary official languages? Including Russian?
Also, that it wasn't a law furnishing new modes of repression but a law repealing the granting of rights to minority languages? And the law was by an interim government? And Right Sector and shit massively lost votes after all that?
Yes, Ukraine had a political divide roughly among the Russian/Ukrainian native language rift, caused by Russia (Empire, USSR) by the Russification programme, by Russia (Federation) stoking it with hybrid warfare. Ukraine was torn between going to the west, into the EU (NATO wasn't nearly as popular), or towards Russia's economic bloc. Becoming part of Russia was never on the table, that's always been a small minority position of a minority position.
That very much changed towards majority support for NATO accession after the annexation of Crimea (and, no, Crimeans not being asked doesn't explain the shift), and to absolutely overwhelming after the 2022 invasion.
Russia overplayed its hand. Massively: They could've kept Ukraine in alignment limbo, maybe even have them turn eastwards, but they just had to get greedy and annex and invade. They've also lost all the hybrid warfare opportunities among e.g. the Russian minorities in the Baltic countries.
And maybe you should read more primary sources instead of random Anglo press articles. Or read the articles, for that matter, things like
which isn't exactly playing into your narrative.
Didn't you, just some comments ago, talk about talking to actual people? I have three Ukrainian families living in neighbouring flats, having fled the war. One of them ethnically Russian, though the kids are refusing to speak the language.
Yes, there had been grievances. Grievances so bad it justifies an invasion? Hell no, not just not the same ballpark, but not even the same galaxy. Moscow, OTOH, is checking all five points (one would suffice!) of the definition of genocide. It doesn't surprise me, or their parents, in any way whatsoever that the kids are refusing to speak Russian, they've seen shit.
I know what it was. The point here is not what it was but that it existed, what it did, and what environment it existed in.
At every point up until now I've been told that this didn't happen, just moments ago you called it a hallucination, and now you're seamlessly transitioning as if that wasn't the case.
If I had linked to Russian language content we both know exactly what you would have said in response. This conversation has proceeded along the lines of "deny, obfuscate, admit but deny significance." If I had given you a primary source, which would have had to be in the Russian language, then you'd have called it russian propaganda.
The only thing I ever said was that the entire reason this separatism kicked off was because of the language law introduced by the fascists in the maidan coup/revolution. I am absolutely correct about that. Had that event not happened we wouldn't be where we are today.
I've never said that. I'm really not that interested in talking about the invasion itself anymore as it doesn't help us end the war. I would prefer nobody were ever invaded, but that's not the situation we have right now.
You were told that "outlawing Russian" didn't happen. Which the 2014 thing didn't even attempt to do. The only people claiming such things are characters like the Nazi you quoted as well as Vatniks.
Depends on where it's from, Russia doesn't have a monopoly on the language and before the invasion press freedom wasn't completely dead in Russia. Still, finding sensible takes even among the Russian opposition would be difficult as liberal forces within Russia never really bothered to analyse Russian imperialism, being busy with battling corruption and authoritarianism. Random high-profile example: Navalny's take on Crimea.
There were Nazis among the protestors, yes, but they were a tiny minority. The protests started over Viktor Yanukovych betraying an election promise of his: EU accession talks. They then quickly became quite bloody with Yanukovic sending snipers and passing this kind of shit.
When the government is shooting at you you don't tend to question the deeper ideological stances of at least half-way decently organised people handing out riot shields to duck behind. Not really an opportune moment.
After Yanukovych's impeachment (which was a bit iffy the Rada played fast+loose with procedure but they had the authority and the votes) an interim president and government was installed (by that very Rada, not protestors) and him fleeing to his masters in the Moscow, the law happened (or rather didn't), then came new elections, both presidential and for the Rada, where right-wing parties of all ilk lost quite a number of votes. Oh, also, Russia invaded Crimea, Donbas, and Luhansk. There are decades where nothing happens; and there are weeks where decades happen, and all that.
That "Separatism", as in the founding of the "people's republics" was kicked off by Russian green men collaborating with local criminals. Doing it like that isn't too surprising Russia is practically a mafia state. Just because one happened after the other doesn't mean that one is the cause for the other.
I have another interesting tidbit on the snipers thing:
https://archive.is/cjHkh
This is an interesting article from the BBC going into the many sus things about this event and painting the picture that the far right was likely involved. One of the most interesting things about it is that the bbc has deleted it, which is the first instance of sussy journalistic war censorship I've seen. The original no longer exists.
It could also be that they took it down because it's all a collection of people saying different unprovable things.
What's for sure is that it was Berkut who sniped protesters, plenty of matched bullets to prove that one, they also are -- or rather were -- the exact kind of bastard cops to do such things, the whole organisation got dissolved in 2014 due to their brutality (not just sniping) during the protests.
Who started what and exactly who shot or tortured whom where and so on we'll probably never now, at least not better than we know now (there's been court cases). I also don't doubt that Berkut caught some bullets, Ukrainians aren't the kind of people who cower and retreat when being shot at. Russian special ops or Right sector escalating the situation or, heck, why not a Berkut Agent Provocateur. It's pointless, we'll probably never know. Well the Russians might still have written documentation about orders or something but on the Ukrainian side all available evidence has been gone over with a fine-toothed comb, nothing more to get there.
I couldn't care less what this fascist's take is, and I find it really sus that you admonished me on the mistake with whoever that golden dawn guy was but then refer to a fascist yourself while calling him a liberal.
A small group that functioned as a vanguard. And played the pivotal role in its success. This has been written about quite a lot. I assume you're familiar with vanguardism I've seen you use enough terms here to think you're a little above average in understanding of political ideologies.
The sniper thing is rather disputed, at least by my socialist friends in crimea. They claim this was performed by the right sector fascists. What the truth is of it though I'm not really sure, the research I'm familiar with seems rather inconclusive. Personally I think the picture is that there were probably both fascist and government shooters involved.
https://mronline.org/2021/12/11/the-maidan-massacre-in-ukraine/
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/266855828_The_Snipers%27_Massacre_on_the_Maidan_in_Ukraine
"Procedure" is whatever people will popularly accept in an event like this. You get to make it up as you go along and as long as the various factions willing to do violence will agree with it you're good.
There's some fuckery involved with Russia certainly but it's not as simple as that. Some of it was a communist effort. I don't know if it was you earlier in this thread but I did mention earlier that I have friends there that aren't around anymore. Several communists that were involved were killed, either in mysterious circumstances or going missing. The communist party of the dpr also endorsed Alexander Zakharchenkov as he was ideologically beneficial to their goals but he was killed in a cafe bombing and pro-Russia leadership (Strelkov) conveniently took over. Ukraine was blamed for that bombing but I am personally convinced it was Russia that did it to align the balance of power in the emerging states with themselves. Infighting in the party (along with the murders and disappearances) then later led to its merger with the CPRF which further convinces me that they were involved in eliminating the various groups that sought independent interests.
You know where those "fascist" accusations come from? Precisely that kind of stuff, "X belongs to Russia". Anyhow I cited him as an example of the opposition FFS, not because I share those kinds of view which should've been obvious. As to "liberal": That's exactly what he's classed as in Russia. After the 2022 invasion portions of the opposition did start to reflect on imperialism in a more thorough manner than "doing things by force bad but actually yes Ukraine is Russia" but with the current state of things, well, prison, keeping their head down, or in exile. Not to mention that opposition is not exactly a majority position the majority position is "I don't care about politics that's a thing for politicians I just want to have a job and a Dacha". Utter depoliticisation. Fatalism runs deep in Russia.
Well, point being that they didn't have to make it up but an ordinary impeachment procedure would've taken a while. In any case any iffiness resulting from that, questions about constitutionality etc. were made up for by elections not soon after. Also, Yanukovych already had fled, the office of president was de facto without incumbent.
Yet you referred to the whole thing as a "coup/revolution". It was, big picture and the result, neither of those two but the people not liking that the government they elected reneged on promises and then had themselves new elections for a new government: Neither did suddenly the military reign (coup), nor did the country get a complete make-over, new constitution etc. (revolution), it was a, well, let's call it a special electoral operation. In more established democracies those things happen more smoothly and without violence, but early elections aren't exactly a particularly rare thing. Yanukovych probably assumed his handlers would send him backup just as they had in Belarus.
Yanukovych's protest law btw was much iffier when it comes to constitutionality as the Rada didn't actually have the votes to pass it. Also, shit only really hit the fan once he doubled down like that.
Yeah I know but they're irrelevant in the grand scheme of things. Communists of the type you refer to exist all over Europe, they're tiny, cultist, splinter factions. Well-organised but without the manpower to do anything, least of all stage a revolution. Do I need to remind you that "done by people calling themselves communist" doesn't imply "popular support", which you were insinuating. In this situation they were useful idiots for the FSB.
This is just closed mindedness. You refuse to take on any new information, you have made up your mind what the situation is and utterly refuse to even consider listening to anyone with first hand experience.
No. This is just factually incorrect. The flashpoint that started the separatism was the repeal of the language laws that made Russian (and many others) one of the many state languages in these regions (majority russian ethnicity regions). This occurred in 2014 immediately following the Maidan coup/revolution.
This law change by the new far right bandera supporting government was the final straw in a long line of things that had led up to it, and was what created popular support for violent separatism among the local populations. Many people saw it as existentially important to separate themselves from Ukraine as they believed the Bandera supporters sought to kill or deport them all.
What you're citing there is a question to the Commission, not a research paper. The guy posing that question? A Greek Nazi, becoming MEP on a Golden Dawn ticket. Here's the answer:
Yes, the Ukrainian government has been actively trying to make Ukrainian the de facto, not just de jure, lingua franca of Ukraine, to halt secondary effects of Russification.
I'm not even going to address anything else you said. A Tankie relying on hallucinations of a Nazi to make points, how fucking classic.
Learn some research skills and source criticism and then maybe you'll be able to contribute to discussions.
Yeah this was just pointed out to me. Which is why I went and dug out some other stuff instead, I'm not particularly fond of relying on that one and won't be using it in future.
A couple of western media articles discussing the split the existing language law was causing in the country:
2000: Ukraine wages war on Russian language
2012: Russian language debate splits Ukraine
2012: Ukrainians(far right) protest against Russian language law
2014(when the law actually occurred): Ukraine Revokes Linguistic Rights
This last one is the most interesting, also 2014 from Time: Many Ukrainians Want Russia To Invade
Is this article a hallucination too? This aggressive response is quite unnecessary. Have a more academic conversation.
By me I just couldn't let it stand so I called it out twice, but there's no need to duplicate the whole thread.
Oh lol we're having the same conversation twice? I didn't even notice I often don't look at usernames. Sorry.
There is a loooong road from "has political turmoil" to "wants to be part of Russia."
Florida has political turmoil. Doesn't mean they want to be part of Spain because some people there speak Spanish.
Sure. But I assure you that when russian ethnicity people read twitter and see nafo and other morons (like half this comment section) saying all russians should die blah blah blah it only ends up pushing them to russia for safety. Even Navalny's people who I despise say this:
Like, what do you people expect the russians in Crimea, Donetsk and Luhansk to think exactly when they read half the shit they've seen from libs on Twitter, reddit, etc etc who have all behaved indistinguishably from fascists in their bloodthirsty calls for russian blood? They see it as attacks on themselves, not the russian army, not putin, they see it as ethnic threats and it has pushed fencesitting russians with family in both ukraine and russia (about half are mixed families) over to the russian side because they just don't feel the west can be trusted. They see them as wanting all russians dead, which you can hardly blame them for with all the behaviour you've surely seen online.
People are mean on the Internet? People are also mad at Russia because they've invaded a neighbor. People were calling out "death to America" for invading Iraq. It's how the world works.
Sure. But the point is that all those ethnic russians in all three of these regions, who are the majority of the population and were the majority before 2014 by a large margin, all have been pushed to russia because of it.
The political reality in these regions is that while before there were some mixed views on the issue, particularly among those with mixed families, now there are almost none among the majority russian ethnic population. Which is something of a problem if you consider yourself to believe in democratic outcomes.
Good for them. They can move to Russia.
And how do you intend to make that happen?
They can go to Russia. They don't have to.
What the fuck is your argument here? It seems to be "since some people kinda like Russia therefore Russia invading Ukraine is somehow okay".
I'm not making an argument. I'm trying to illustrate the reality here.
The majority of the population of these regions are russian ethnicity but were ukrainian citizens, born in ukraine. They used to be kinda split about the issue of separatism, but the constant endless genocidal rhetoric from liberals on the internet baying for russian blood has had the effect of making them support russia.
This is a problem for getting the regions back, because a majority of the population does not want to come back. Solving this is a necessary component of figuring out how to bring them back. You can sign whatever you want on paper saying "these are Ukraine again now" but if the population itself does not agree then the separatist civil war will just immediately restart.
The options available are either getting rid of them all (this is what the current far right faction of ukraine wants), or finding a way to make them want to be Ukrainian again instead of Russian. Saying things like "they can leave" doesn't help. It sounds a lot like what the american far right says about anyone who isn't white in america actually.
Yeah - okay bud.
Because it is so hard to believe that the majority ethnicity russian regions of the country might have become more favourable to russia as a result of everyone saying all russians need to be killed! Especially with opposition groups inside russia literally saying that is what has happened, which I already linked to. "Okay bud".
You're just completely disconnected from reality.
Do I intend, to go to Crimea, and forcibly relocate people? No. I have plans this weekend.