Russian Barbarism: Executing POWs

Since the start of the Russo-Ukraine War of 2014-15, news and social media have been filled an ample of amount of stories about Russian war crimes committed against the civilian population and soldiers. The destruction of MH-17 is perhaps the most blatant example of this.

The latest case pertains to documented evidence that Russian troops have been executing Ukrainian prisoners of war in clear violation of the Geneva Convention.

Article 13 of the convention regarding treatment of prisoners of war unmistakably declares:

“Prisoners of war must at all times be humanely treated. Any unlawful act or omission by the Detaining Power causing death or seriously endangering the health of a prisoner of war in its custody is prohibited, and will be regarded as a serious breach of the present Convention. In particular, no prisoner of war may be subjected to physical mutilation or to medical or scientific experiments of any kind which are not justified by the medical, dental or hospital treatment of the prisoner concerned and carried out in his interest.

“Likewise, prisoners of war must at all times be protected, particularly against acts of violence or intimidation and against insults and public curiosity

“Measures of reprisal against prisoners of war are prohibited.”

News of this shocking evidence was brought to light last week by Amnesty International. The global human rights nongovernmental organization, which viewed a video account, described the incidents as “execution-style” killings by what it called pro-Russian armed groups in Donbas.

“The new evidence of these summary killings confirms what we have suspected for a long time. The question now is: what are the separatist leaders going to do about it?” Denis Krivosheev, Europe and Central Asia Deputy Director at Amnesty International, said in a statement.

“The torture, ill-treatment and killing of captured, surrendered or wounded soldiers are war crimes. These claims must be promptly, thoroughly and impartially investigated, and the perpetrators prosecuted in fair trials by recognized authorities.”

Amnesty International favors use of “pro-Russian” but the murderers could just as easily have been Russian regular army commanders.

Footage reviewed by Amnesty International shows Ukrainian soldier Ihor Branovytsky, one of the defenders of Donetsk airport, taken captive and interrogated. The video, posted on YouTube, shows signs that he was hit in the face. He remained in captivity until he was killed. For their dedication to defending the airport, Ukrainian soldiers were nicknamed “cyborgs” – which has evolved into a modern-day badge of honor in Ukraine.

According to Amnesty International, several individuals claim to have seen Branovytsky being shot and killed point-blank by a separatist commander. His body was returned to his family earlier this month and he was buried in Kyiv on April 3. Ukrainian security services have opened an investigation into his killing.

Amnesty International has also confirmed seeing other videos documenting the captivity, and pictures of the dead bodies, of at least three other members of the Ukrainian armed forces, reportedly being held in a morgue in Donetsk. There are signs of bullet wounds to their heads and upper parts of their bodies, apparently the result of execution-style killings. The soldiers were captured by Russian forces in Debaltseve during February 12-18, when the defending Ukrainian forces were encircled there.

Amnesty International cited a report in the Ukrainian newspaper Kyiv Post on April 6, which published a phone interview, reportedly made with Arseniy Pavlov, better known by his nom-de-guerre “Motorola.” Pavlov, who claims to be a Russian national and the leader of the pro-Russian armed group known as “Sparta Battalion” operating in eastern Ukraine, claimed he had “shot dead” 15 soldiers captured from the Ukrainian armed forces. He is believed to have killed Ihor Branovytsky.

“This chilling ‘confession’ from a separatist fighter, alongside video evidence and testimony from witnesses, and the mounting evidence of abuses of captives by both sides, highlights the urgent need for an independent investigation into this and all other allegations of abuses in this conflict which began a year ago,” said Krivosheev.

Amnesty International said this type of behavior is tantamount to a war crime.

“Summary killings are a war crime, plain and simple. The leaders of the self-styled ‘Donetsk People’s Republic’ in eastern Ukraine must send their members a clear message: those who fight with them or on their behalf must respect the laws of war. They must urgently remove from their ranks anyone suspected of responsibility for ordering or committing serious violations of international humanitarian law and human rights abuses, and fully cooperate with any independent investigation,” said Krivosheev.

Russian terrorists in Ukraine are holding at least 300 Ukrainian POWs, according to Ukrainian Defense Ministry spokesman Yuri Tandyt and it’s believed that some of them have been transported across the border to an uncertain fate into Russia.

Under the Minsk ceasefire accords, POWs and other detainees were to be returned to their national representatives.

The Associated Press, in fulfilling its journalistic obligation of presenting both sides of the issue, reported that Eduard Basurin, a spokesman for Russian mercenary terrorists, denied the claims, saying that footage of soldiers being taken prisoner could not serve as evidence. “Accusations without facts are nothing. Nobody has shot anybody," Basurin was quoted as saying.

Can you imagine a correspondent or news service during World War II, such as Edward R. Murrow, quoting a spokesman for the Nazis, the Gestapo or SS who denied Nazi war crimes and killing Jews en masse?

After World War II, Nazis were brought to trial in Nuremberg for war crimes and crimes against humanity. Ukraine and the free world must immediately begin preparations to bring Russians who committed war crimes in Ukraine – those who actually shot the POWs and those who gave the orders – to trial in The Hague. This issue cannot be swept under the diplomatic rug and the execution of Ukrainian POWs as well as the Holodomor should not be granted statutes of limitation for the sake of improving relations with Moscow. 

Putin Shamelessly Denies Russian Troops in Ukraine

Russian President Vladimir Putin, in his four-hour encounter on April 16 with journalists – if you can call Russians who write about current events journalists – continued to demonstrate without batting an eye or missing a beat his uncanny showmanship and skill of lying, fabricating, manipulating and twisting an event into something it never resembled.

While the 240-minute transcript offers a great deal of fodder for examination, analysis and reconstruction, I’d like to address one particular one, which deals with the pressing question of whether or not Russian soldiers have invaded Ukraine.

During this annual charade, Irina Khakamada, a Russian politician who ran in the Russian presidential election of 2004 and is a member of The Other Russia coalition, directly asked Putin about the presence of Russian soldiers in Ukraine.

Khakamada constructed her query in two parts with the first one dealing with the murder of Boris Nemtsov. Her interest in these two issues could lead some unfamiliar readers to presume that she is an opposition figure but in reality she’s probably in Putin’s camp with a license to pose visibly tough questions and even criticize the President of Russia.

The Ukrainian newspaper Day on May 13, 2014, pointed out that Khakamada irritated Ukrainians by calling Putin a winner “who carried out a special operation without a single fired shot, and said that Crimea has always needed Russian identification.”

Moderator Yekaterina Mironova called on Khakamada, noting that she is well known and she has a question about Ukraine.

She asked: “At Boris’ funeral, Western journalists approached me and said – this information is also available on the internet – that Boris Nemtsov had received certain information about the presence of Russian troops during the events in southeastern Ukraine. At the funeral, the Western journalists kept asking me the same question. Can you finally say, can you say it in so many words whether or not our troops have been there?”

Two curious points emerged in her questions. The first pertains to her use of the word “events” in southeastern Ukraine. This resembles some free world leaders’ timid refusal to call that event in Ukraine a war that was launched by Russia against Ukraine. The second point is her request to finally say “in so many words,” which means Putin can keep his reply brief.

And Putin obliged Khakamada, saying: “Finally, the question of whether Russian troops are present in Ukraine… I can tell you outright and unequivocally that there are no Russian troops in Ukraine.”

In 26 words he set the record straight and corrected numerous legitimate sources, including NATO and eye witnesses, who have testified that Russian soldiers are fighting side-by-side with Russian mercenaries from Russia, Chechnya, Asia and southeastern Ukraine in an undeclared war against Ukraine.

There were other questions about Ukraine in the meeting but no one dared to return to the question of Russian troops in Ukraine.

Khakamada’s first question about the murder of Nemtsov also elicited a cynical reply from Putin. She asked “what do you think about the way the investigation is moving along and is there a chance that we will learn who ordered this heinous murder, which is more reminiscent of a terrorist act?”

Putin’s reply was far longer than his remarks about Russia’s war with Ukraine but the point that related to her question asserted:

“I believe a killing of this kind is a shame and a tragedy.”

“The question of whether those behind the murder will be found remains open. Of course, we will find out in the course of the work that is currently being done.”

As for Putin’s denial about Russian troops in Ukraine, for the past 14 months news media have been filled with an abundance of documented reports of their incontrovertible presence in Ukraine. An interesting article filled with supporting photographs appeared on April 3 in Vice News (www.news.vice.com) with the headline “Russian Soldiers Have Given up Pretending They are Not Fighting in Ukraine.”

“For the past year, the Kremlin has strenuously denied that its troops are supporting pro-Russia rebels in eastern Ukraine — but fighters on the ground are apparently no longer bothering to keep up the farce,” wrote Alex Luhn. “St. Petersburg native Dmitry Sapozhnikov, who went to Ukraine in October to fight alongside the rebels, told the BBC Russian service in a candid interview from Donetsk that Russian military units have played a decisive role in rebel advances, including the operations in February that led to the capture of the transport hub of Debaltseve. Russian officers directly command large military operations in eastern Ukraine, he noted.”

Luhn also wrote: “Throughout the conflict, which the United Nations says has killed more than 6,000 people, evidence of Russian military support for the rebels has mounted.

“Ten Russian paratroopers were captured in Ukraine last August, and NATO published satellite photographs showing what it described as Russian tanks crossing the border that summer. Rebel leader Alexander Zakharchenko even admitted around the same time that active-duty Russian troops were fighting with his men, though he claimed that they had chosen to fight while on vacation.”

He also said: “Russian officials including President Vladimir Putin have repeatedly denied that their soldiers are in Ukraine, arguing that the Russians who are fighting there are all volunteers.

“Sapozhnikov himself is one such volunteer, a leader of a fringe monarchist party in St. Petersburg who said he left his business renovating homes to help defend Russian speakers in eastern Ukraine and oppose Kyiv’s shift toward the West. As the leader of a special forces unit of the Donetsk People’s Republic, he also took part in the bloody battle for the Donetsk airport, which the rebels captured in January after months of fighting.

“He admitted the Russian military has been instrumental to their success.”

The free world cannot overlook Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the involvement of its regular armed forces, tanks, aircraft and other military equipment in a war that is not about annexing southeastern Ukraine but re-subjugating all of Ukraine into Russia’s prison of nations.

Noteworthy Article on Nuclear Disarmament; Except …

I recently read a brief but noteworthy analysis of the understandable need for global nuclear disarmament.

The article presented readers with a comprehensible blend of often cited buzzwords, including global confidence building, peace, stability, non-proliferation, international security, nuclear test ban, human development and so forth as well as threats veiled as advice.

Written by a high-ranking governmental official, the treatise begins rather auspiciously by stating the obvious that “one of the most important tasks in the field of international security is to free the world from the threat posed by weapons of mass destruction.”

The writer, a distinguished diplomat in his own right, goes on to state that “Global stability and nuclear deterrence remain the facts that we have to live with. Without trust and consensus, the current challenges in the field of nuclear disarmament are doomed to persist for a foreseeable future. Hopefully, the time will come, sooner rather than later, when nuclear disarmament issues are properly addressed based on respect and trust among nations.”

Indeed, due to their monstrous proven and hypothetical dimensions of mass death and destruction, nuclear weapons unquestionably threaten the existence of Earth and the lives that inhabit it and consequently must be banned.

At a United Nations conference for non-governmental organizations on disarmament held in 2009 in Mexico City that I attended as a UN staff member, Miguel Marin Bosch, a Mexican diplomat, not the one who penned the words that I cited previously but who successfully fought for the establishment of a nuclear-free zone in Latin America in 1967, noted that the machete has been known for killing a vast number of people throughout history perhaps more than nuclear bombs but eloquently stated: “Nuclear weapons are intrinsically dangerous. They pose an unparalleled threat to the very existence of humankind. They do not enhance a country’s security but rather imperil the survival of all nations. That should be the point of departure of nuclear disarmament efforts.”

The impassioned nuclear disarmament debate has attracted in the course of seven decades ferocious supporters and opponents. Even today the governments of the evident nuclear powers, the US, Russia, England, France and China – Ukraine used to a member until it voluntarily surrendered its nuclear stockpile to Russia in exchange for the free world’s guarantee of its independence – are filled with officials firmly on one or the other side of the fence as well as those who straddle it. But supporting nuclear disarmament doesn’t mean pacifism and opposing nuclear disarmament doesn’t mean war mongering.

Fortunately, mankind hasn’t had to endure nuclear devastation since 1945.

However, as for the lofty aspirations enunciated in the cited passages above, they are entwined in one major hypocritical fault. They were expressed at the end of last month by Dr. Alexander Yakovenko, Russian ambassador to the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, and deputy foreign minister in 2005-11, in an article on the website of Russia’s broadcast propaganda mouthpiece Russia Today that is meant to indoctrinate the gullible about Moscow’s irreproachable decency.

Beyond theoretical anti-nuclear rhetoric, Yakovenko devoted a couple of sentences to listing imaginary Russian efforts at global confidence building in support of nuclear disarmament. He wrote:

“Russia is constantly advocating for further limitations and reductions of nuclear weapons stockpiles, along with strengthening international regimes of arms control and non-proliferation.”

In actuality, Russia has done nothing to live up to its advocacy for limiting and reducing nuclear weapons stockpiles. Modern Russia does not even match the defunct Soviet Union’s military policy. While the USSR claimed it would adhere to a no first use policy for nuclear weapons, modern Russia dropped that pledge. The revised Russian military doctrine of December 2014 foresees the use of tactical nuclear weapons in the case of a conventional attack that threatens the very existence of the Russian state. Given the strengthening of Russia’s paranoia and harangues regarding its own perceived encirclement by NATO as well as its full-blown war with Ukraine, today’s Russian historical “we will bury you” threats should not be regarded as bluffs.

As of September 2014, Russia had 1,643 strategic warheads deployed on 528 ICBMs, SLBMs, and strategic bombers. Russia’s defense budget has grown by more than 50% since 2007, and a third of it is devoted to nuclear weapons, according to The Economist.

Furthermore, the same source that published Yakovenko’s fiction, Russia Today, on October 6, 2014, revealed more evidence of Russia’s nuclear war preparedness:

“Russia recently announced a planned overhaul of its entire nuclear arsenal by 2020, as part of a wider rearmament program that has been budgeted at $700 billion.
“Although Moscow has not provided a detailed breakdown of how it achieved the upgrade of nuclear capacity over the past months, experts on both sides of the Atlantic have speculated that the rise has been due to the armament of one – or possibly two – Borei-class nuclear submarines.

“Those are equipped with Bulava missiles – widely considered one of the most expensive projects in Russia’s military history – which, after problem-plagued gestation, have finally been deemed ready for deployment…
“Russian President Vladimir Putin has recently boasted that the supersonic missiles, which can rapidly change their trajectory, cannot be shot down by any missile defense system in the world, however sophisticated.
“Russia has also invested in mobile Yars systems, and there are plans to revive the nuclear missile trains common in Soviet times. 

Yakovenko also wrote: “Among other things that affect global stability and deterrence, trust between Russia and the West is diminishing. Some of the critical Russian concerns are left unaddressed.”

Indeed, trust between the free world and Russia has finally begun to diminish thanks to imperialistic Russia’s undeclared war with Ukraine. In the course of the past 14 months Russia invaded Ukraine via Crimea then illegally annexed the peninsula. Then several weeks later again invaded Ukraine by way of the eastern oblasts and established its colonial administrations in Luhansk and Donetsk. After witnessing such wanton, unprovoked violence against a peaceful neighbor, it’s no wonder that the free world’s trust in the Kremlin is diminishing.

Since the beginning of the Russo-Ukraine War of 2014-15, the news media has regularly quoted western experts and Russian officials about Russia’s escalation of its war with Ukraine and its blatant threat of using nuclear weapons to solidify its control over captured Ukrainian territory and push NATO back from the former captive nations.

Among what he called unaddressed concerns Yakovenko included “the Russian initiative on the prevention of the placement of weapons in outer space.”

The placement of nuclear weapons in outer space is hardly a serious option nowadays when Russia is in fact more interested in moving missile delivery systems to occupied Crimea and its borders with the Baltic States. The Russian military is expected to deploy nuclear-capable Tupolev Tu-95 and Tu-22M3 strategic bombers on the Crimean peninsula. Additionally, the Kremlin is setting up an Iskander missile deployment in Kaliningrad, the Russian territorial exclave on the Baltic Sea coast, for a military exercise. Russia’s state-run TASS news agency quoted a source close to the Russian Defense Ministry who noted, “Strategic missile carriers TU-22MS will be transferred to Crimea in the course of a surprise combat readiness inspection.”

In recent weeks it became evident that Putin had instructed his military commanders to place the faux peace-loving country’s nuclear weapons on full alert just in case the US and NATO decide to oppose Russia’s subjugation of Crimea.

Prominent Soviet-era dissident Mustafa Dzhemilev, spiritual leader of Crimea’s minority Tatar ethnic group, spoke of Crimea’s nuclearization during a press conference at the UN last month: “Crimea that used to be a tourist area is being turned into a military base... and the most alarming is that Crimea is likely to return into a nuclear weapons base.”

Russian threats against the former captive nations are well known but Putin’s global nuclear intimidations do not stop there. Other European countries have also been targeted.
Russia's ambassador in Denmark Mikhail Vanin said a couple of weeks ago that Moscow could aim nuclear missiles at Danish warships if Denmark joins NATO’s missile defense system.

Vanin said he believes the Danes do not completely understand the consequences if Copenhagen decides to join the US-led ballistic missile defense. “If this happens, Danish warships become targets for Russian nuclear missiles,” said Vanin.

Sarah Lain observed in the International Business Times: “The increase in snap military exercises, greater presence of Russian bomber patrols around European airspace and increased naval activity, particularly around the Baltics, are deliberate. Although Russia claims these are routine, and they do not violate international rules, they are intentionally provocative given the current tension with Europe.

“However, it is a more tenuous argument against NATO in the Baltics, when the Baltic States are already members. This may be a sign that Russia is becoming more extreme in its threats, in part because it is running out of options to leverage its position. Russia's threats of nuclear force show an escalation in, and at least rhetorical willingness, to extend the conflict beyond Ukraine. The Russian government and its press machine have also presented a new challenge in their alternative interpretation of facts to create a new narrative in justification of Russian policy. This makes meaningful negotiation and compromise very difficult, thus increasing the risk.”

It would be foolhardy to disparage Russia’s nuclear saber rattling. The Economist noted: “Others want nuclear weapons not to freeze the status quo, but to change it. Russia has started to wield nuclear threats as an offensive weapon in its strategy of intimidation. Its military exercises routinely stage dummy nuclear attacks on such capitals as Warsaw and Stockholm. Mr Putin’s speeches contain veiled nuclear threats. Dmitry Kiselev, one of the Kremlin’s mouthpieces, has declared with relish that Russian nuclear forces could turn America into ‘radioactive ash.’”

Hopefully no country on Earth will rain atomic bombs on another country. But, realistically, death and destruction are not only the result of a nuclear conflagration. As conventional wars show, including today’s Russian war against Ukraine, tanks, artillery, missiles and conventionally armed soldiers also shed innocent blood. Russians have killed more than 6,000 in Ukraine alone in the past 14 months. The Russo-Ukraine War of 2014-15 certainly cannot build confidence in anyone about Russia’s peaceful intentions.

Yakovenko’s article is nothing more than a flagrant lie that attempts to exonerate Russia’s aggression against Ukraine while promoting a nonexistent nuclear disarmament program.

Carl Bildt, a Swedish politician and diplomat who was his country’s prime minister from 1991 to 1994, and international affairs observer who recognizes the threat Russian poses today, recently noted that Russia’s trustworthiness and credibility are at their lowest levels in history. In other words, everything that is said and written that emanates from the Kremlin's officialdom is a falsehood that is meant to disinform civilized men and women.

Global terrorists, war mongers and aggressors may come and go but so far the one with the greatest staying power is Russia and no amount of hypocritical theatrical tears about global disarmament can relieve it of its guilt. The conversation about nuclear disarmament must go on but without deceitful Russia, which should be banished from the global table.

60,000-plus Russian Reasons Why Peace is Failing

With 60,000 fresh Russian troops and associated military hardware stationed on the Ukrainian border and ongoing Russian shelling of Ukrainian positions, why are world leaders and pundits bemoaning the lack of peace, ceasefire and progress in ending what they call the Ukrainian crisis but in reality is the Russo-Ukraine War of 2014-15?

Ukrainian and Russian sources last week confirmed this massive, intimidating buildup of Russian firepower near Ukraine.

First Deputy Chairman of the Ukrainian Verkhovna Rada Andriy Parubiy said on TV channel 5 on Saturday, March 28, the likelihood of a full-scale Russian attack remains high.

“The likelihood of a full-scale attack by Russian armies is high and remains high. All our intelligence indicates it. There is a concentration of Russian troops on the border and not only in Donetsk and Luhansk but extending up to Kharkiv, a huge expansion of Russian troops is taking place,” he said.

In an interview with “Novoe Vremia” on Friday, March 27, Parubiy, who a couple of weeks ago made the rounds of Capital Hill, updating lawmakers on Russia’s war against Ukraine, predicted that the next invasion could come before May 9 and would be designed to dramatically “demonstrate the might of the Russian army.”

Not only did last week see an escalation of Russian violence against Ukraine, but also a new series of threatening actions against all corners of the world that are setting off alarms among military and civilian officials. Russia has been intensifying the pace of military exercises in Eastern Europe and even the Arctic region.

Bloomberg News reported that Russian bomber aircraft are being sent to Crimea while forces in the Baltics and southern regions have been put on full alert in military exercises ordered by President Vladimir Putin.

Reuters reported that the latest military exercises have taken on a threatening posture. “While the most recent installment is not the largest exercise Russia has conducted, the areas involved and the forces included seem to have been deliberately chosen to send a warning to NATO; the exercise itself seems to simulate a full-scale confrontation with NATO through the forward deployment of nuclear armed submarines, theater ballistic missiles and strategic bomber aircraft. Strategic weapon systems, including assets that are part of Russia's nuclear capabilities, have also been deployed to locations near NATO's borders,” Reuters reported.

The news agency said the more notable systems involved are the Iskander mobile ballistic missiles and fighter aircraft that are being deployed to Kaliningrad, Tu-22M3 long-range strategic bombers that are being deployed to Crimea, and ballistic missile submarines that have been sent to sea with protective escorts.

The initial announcement about the exercise focused on the role of the Northern Fleet, Reuters reported, explaining the main reason of the drill was to test deployment times to Russian positions in Novaya Zemlya and Franz Josef Land. The agency further said Russia has increased its military presence in the Arctic, and the exercise highlights Russia's plans for the Arctic region.

However, the news service continued, though the obvious focus of the exercises is in the Arctic, operations have extended to include military activities along the Finnish border, the deployment of strategic weapons systems to Kaliningrad and Crimea, and positions throughout the Baltic Fleet, Black Sea Fleet, and in the western and southern military districts.

“This combination lifts the exercise beyond a simple deployment of ground forces and naval exercises in the Arctic and forms a nuclear narrative,” Reuters said.

With an eye toward the war in Ukraine and the faux truce, Reuters noted that “these exercises are an aggressive signal, particularly since they immediately follow Putin’s mysterious disappearance last week.” It also said “Russia has an interest in flexing its military muscle to remind everyone of the havoc it could wreak and to dissuade anyone from taking radical action in Ukraine.”

Reuters and others are inclined to point out that Washington unfortunately has been careful in addressing the war in Ukraine, even delaying the deployment of 300 US troops to western Ukraine as part of a training exercise. For its part, the US government maintains that this deployment is still an option and could order it as early as April. On the positive side, the US Congress favors American military aid for Ukraine.

One of the firmest supporters of Ukraine, Lithuania, as well as other former captive nations in the Baltic region, has been taking visible steps to defend its independence and sovereignty in case Russia crosses its border.

Jonas Vytautas Zukas, Lithuania’s chief of defense, said in several American newspapers Lithuania has learned a few lessons from the war in Ukraine.

According to Zukas, the situation in Ukraine has demonstrated that unconventional threats should be tackled instantly, using suitable military measures, even if martial law has not yet been imposed. The Seimas, Lithuania’s parliament, wisely adopted the Statute on the Use of the Armed Force on December 16, 2014, which proactively states that use of the military is now possible in peacetime when responding to unconventional threats that differ from armed aggression: for example in cases of provocation, attacks by armed groups, armed people crossing the state border etc.

Further, considering Russia’s widespread disinformation campaign, Zukas said another lesson is a better understanding of the importance of the informational war. He asserted that success in the information space plays an important role in an armed conflict. The armed forces and the media must ensure that society has access to objective information, he said. Capabilities are needed to ensure information and cyber-security, strategic communication and anti-propaganda activities.

The Russian war in Ukraine also taught that society – the nation – has to be prepared to act if there is a war, Zukas said. In early 2015 the Ministry of National Defense introduced a publication titled “What We Must Know to Prepare for Extreme Situations and War.” Zukas said a joint mobilization and civic resistance system is being developed. All-important concepts of public-spiritedness and patriotism are currently being promoted, and information about the Lithuanian armed forces and opportunities to undergo military training is also being advertised. Under President Poroshenko, Ukraine has also finally seen the merit of similar public-spiritedness and patriotism.

President of neighboring Estonia Toomas Ilves Hendrick recently said Europe has to have a backup plan that will provide new sanctions against Russia that could make it think twice about launching another war against its neighbors.

Speaking in Brussels, the headquarters of NATO, Ilves said anything could be expected from Russia. If new sanctions against Russian aggression do not stop Putin, EU countries should have a backup plan, he said.

“As for the Ukrainian crisis, it’s about security of the entire Europe rather than of a separate nation. In this connection, Europe must take a clear point of view, show its determination and strength. We are now discussing whether to arm Ukraine or step up sanctions against Russia. If it is decided not to do any of these things, does Europe have Plan B?" said Ilves.

Beyond boots and rifles, a senior Polish general has warned fellow NATO members that Russia will wage “hybrid war” through propaganda and “information aggression” to achieve its geopolitical goals in the region.

Gen. Stanisław Koziej, head of the president’s National Security Bureau, said last week that while many members of NATO are cutting defense budgets, Russia is increasing its defense spending — and aggression — in ways that “must be stopped.”

Latvia fears that a war of words between Russia and the West could degenerate into something worse, with “devastating” consequences, according to its foreign minister.

“I do hope that we all understand that any provocations, any deterioration of the situation, may lead to consequences that would be devastating to everyone, including, of course, to Russia,” Latvian Foreign Minister Edgars Rinkevics told Reuters.

He said a peace plan reached in Minsk in February is floundering, and warned that a “worst case scenario” – the full resumption of hostilities, could not be ruled out.

“But in that case, we should understand that ... there will be grave economic consequences for those who instigate that,” he said, referring to European Union sanctions already imposed on Russia.

“I hope that the Russian leadership in Moscow fully understands that, and is not going to get into irresponsible adventures.”

Beyond Russia’s threats against traditional European targets, there were reports last week that Moscow is eyeing increased subversion in Mexico and South America.

While the White House is not committed to supporting Ukraine with anything more than political and moral support – indeed Ukraine did receive 10 out of 200 camouflage-colored Humvees to ward of Russian invaders – US legislators favor a concrete show of military support for Kyiv.

American lawmakers voted overwhelmingly last Monday to urge President Obama to provide Ukraine with lethal weapons to defend itself against Russian aggression.

The House of Representatives approved the resolution in a broadly bipartisan 348-48 vote, heaping further pressure on the Obama administration to end its delays in providing weapons and other heavy military equipment to Kyiv forces.

The measure urges Obama to provide Ukraine with “lethal defensive weapon systems” that would enhance Ukraine’s ability to “defend their sovereign territory from the unprovoked and continuing aggression of the Russian Federation.”

House Speaker John Boehner described the vote as a call to action, and said Congress broadly supports more military aid. “Without action from this administration, Russia’s aggression will continue to be left unchecked,” he said after the vote.

This action also has the support of top US generals. Air Force General Philip Breedlove, a thought leader in this category, said last Sunday in Brussels the US should consider sending defensive weapons to Ukraine.

“I do not think that any tool of the US or any other nation’s power should necessarily be off the table,” said Breedlove, NATO’s top military commander. “Could it be destabilizing? The answer is yes. Inaction could also be destabilizing.”

Political and military observers have admitted that Vladimir Putin is behaving like Hitler did 75 years ago and that Putin must be stopped before he launches another campaign against an unsuspecting neighbor. Some have correctly elaborated that while a Hitler may have periodically surfaced in individual countries, but in Russia, all of its leaders – tsarist, communist and federal presidents – are imperialists by nature. So why is there inaction?

“If a Russian invasion of the Baltic States could not be deterred or defeated, the North Atlantic Council and the US president would be faced with a very unpleasant choice: conduct a costly counteroffensive and risk nuclear escalation, or abandon the Baltics to renewed subservience to Moscow. Such a catastrophic failure to uphold the mutual defense responsibilities of NATO could cripple or even destroy the North Atlantic alliance, one of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s primary goals. It is therefore of paramount importance to deter Russian aggression before it happens,” urged Terrence Kelly in US News & World Report.

Former foreign ministers of Sweden and Poland, Carl Bildt and Radosław Sikorski, warned the EU about the Putin’s warlike intentions concerning Ukraine, but Brussels was asleep, Bildt said in an interview with Radio Liberty last week, according to Ukrainian newspaper Yevropeiska Pravda.

“And then [we should] make certain that we truly help them with all the reforms necessary, because Ukraine is going to go through a tough time and they need our solidarity, sympathy, and support. These things, I think, are the priorities,” Bildt said.

Sensing a threat to its island nation, British officials are also advocating that London urgently rebuild defense capabilities abandoned after the Cold War to face growing global threats, including from Russia, a committee of lawmakers warned on last week. The Commons Defense Committee, which examines the spending and policy of the defense ministry, said nuclear capacity, tanks, warships and aircraft were needed to deter Putin.

“The world is more dangerous and unstable than at any time since the end of the Cold War,” the report said, referring to Russia’s annexation of Crimea and seizure of territory by Islamic State and Boko Haram militants. “But the UK’s current defense assumptions are not sufficient for this changed environment... The UK must rebuild its conventional capacities eroded since the Cold War.”

Russia’s war against Ukraine is not a local issue. It has ramifications for the entire world. Russia has destabilized peace around the world with its belligerence and it must be held responsible for its hostility. Peace and security of the entire planet is at stake.

Ukraine’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations, Ambassador Yuriy Sergeyev, speaking last Friday in Allentown, PA, urged the global community to watch the war in Ukraine because it isn’t a national or regional issue.

“The entire globe has been challenged,” he correctly observed, referring to the Russia's takeover of Crimea. “The whole system of international order has been destroyed.”

With an armed Russia salivating at the prospect of invasion and subjugation, global peace and countries near and far are at risk.

Short of implementing USAF Gen. Curtis LeMay’s Vietnam War era formula for victory by bombing the enemy into the Stone Age, free world leaders today should think relentlessly about how to contain Russian expansionism. First of all, they must emphatically and in unison declare to Russia the detrimental consequences of pursuing its current belligerent policies. The free world should maintain economic and trade sanctions against Russia, Russian businesses and oligarchs. They should initiate a campaign to expel Russia from the UN Security Council, which its representative Vitaly Churkin abuses with lies, fabrications and disinformation. Moscow should also be banished from all global events and shunted to the sidelines of any conference, mission, project or plan. Take away the World Cup 2018 from Moscow. Russia must be universally condemned as an outlaw, aggressive and terrorist state.

If there is any hope of transforming Russia into law-abiding, civilized member of the international community of nations and bringing peace and stability to all countries, then the free world must persuade rich and common, famous, infamous and nameless Russians that their only course to redemption is not via far-right rallies but rather without Vladimir Putin.

Russia takes Crimea from Paradise to Hell on Earth

It’s been a year since Russia launched the Russo-Ukraine War of 2014-15 by invading Ukraine via Crimea, home of Crimean Tatars and a picturesque vacation play land on the Black Sea.

Throughout Russia’s war with Ukraine I focused on the political and military battles in the eastern oblasts of Ukraine. However, Moscow’s conquest of Crimea should not be demeaned because Crimean Tatars are suffering as much as all Ukrainians are due to Russian aggression.

The Kremlin executed its fiendish plan several days after the conclusion of the inauspicious Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia. I point out this timeline because it shows that Vladimir Putin and the Russian hierarchy had the audacity to engage in seemingly warm and friendly discussions with world leaders for many months and agree to host what is considered the epitome of the world’s festival of peace while plotting an unprovoked military attack on a peace-loving neighbor. But with each day, as the war spread around Ukraine to the east, and the number of sorties over the EU by Russian jets increased, Moscow’s plans started to fill out the missing lines.

In the ensuing 12 months Russia held a fabricated referendum, illegally annexed the peninsula and converted Crimea into a penal colony akin to Devil’s Island and the once nuclear-free cape into a citadel of Russian nuclear weapons and strategic bombers. This escalation of Russia’s nuclear posture and visible threat to global peace and stability should enrage all citizens of the world – Ukrainians, Crimean Ukrainians and others.

In a single cold-hearted fell swoop Russia violated the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, a host of other military and geopolitical agreements, and the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.

Led by their spiritual leader septuagenarian Mustafa Dzhemilev, a Soviet-era dissident and laureate of Poland’s Solidarity Award, Crimean Tatars have been the backbone of the resistance to Russian occupation and Crimea’s liberation campaign. Russia has responded with arrests even of those Crimean Tatars who have merely maintained their cultural rights.

Crimean Tatars, who had finally returned to their ancestral land after Soviet Russian deportation and half a century of fighting against the empire, find themselves oppressed by the latest manifestation of Russia’s totalitarian nature. They still nurture horrible memories of the 1944 deportation that ripped them from their native land. With Russia again controlling their land and lives, they fear pressure is building once more. They are again being forced to succumb to new tyrants or leave their motherland.

Dzhemilev recalled those tense days a year ago:

“The ‘green men,’ or, in other words, Russian saboteurs, first appeared in Sevastopol, where they began seizing administrative buildings, and four days later the same thing started happening in Simferopol. There were 110 of them. After this appeared tanks, helicopters, APCs, columns of soldiers. This happened later. At that time Ukraine was asking – in order to avoid bloodshed – not put up any resistance. There were high expectations that the international community would not allow for this international delinquency in the 21st century. But nothing happened.

“All possible measures are being undertaken to compel the Crimean Tatars to become obedient Russian citizens. Since it appears highly unlikely, the main stakes are on creating conditions, which would force them to leave the Crimean territory. At the same time, large numbers of ethnic Russians are being brought in from the Luhansk and Donetsk oblasts, and are being settled close to the Crimean Tatar villages – seemingly, in case of any possible conflicts. Raids in search of the so-called banned literature and weapons are being carried out. In fact, the term ‘banned literature’ is a novelty for Ukraine, we didn’t know what it was a while back.

“It is a large list of approximately 2,600 book titles, which are constantly being added, and which, as it turns out, you are not allowed to read, not allowed to store, it constitutes a crime. Each person who reads is at risk of being searched, while he might not even be aware that he owns banned literature. Above all, people are fear-ridden about people going missing (initially a person disappears, and then he is usually found dead). I think, mandatory conscription into the Russian armed forces would contribute to the further exodus of Crimean Tatars from their land.

“If you aren’t registered, you pay a large fine, then a criminal case is initiated and you are faced with up to five years of incarceration. I don’t know a single Crimean Tatar who would have wanted to serve within the Russian army. Hence, I fear that they will be moving: either looking for a job or joining the Ukrainian army. But in this case, their family members would be victimized. Therefore, there is now a tendency to leave and to bring along one’s family members. So it turns out that, the Crimean Tatars, who came back to their motherland after the deportation, after half a century of fighting against the totalitarian Soviet regime, have yet again found themselves under a totalitarian regime which is worse than the Soviet one. And they are forced to leave their motherland all over again.”

At least five Tatars have been kidnapped since then, and two more are missing, according to human rights observers. Two Tatars have died under mysterious circumstances.

Other harassment has been more noticeable. Russian security forces shuttered the headquarters of the Tatars’ representative body, the Mejlis, in September, because its leaders had not registered it in Russia. The council members fear that doing so would delegitimize them.

In the years of Ukrainian independence, Crimean Tatars have said they had forgotten what security police alarms or raids sounded like. They said with independent Ukraine they had the freedom to promote their language, culture and religion.

Dzhemilev, now living in exile in Kyiv, observed: “The Russian Federation is a totally alien country. We have always declared that we see the future of our country as part of Ukrainian territory.” Other Tatar leaders who tried to meet him at the security checkpoint at the border have been fined up to $220, a sum that is close to the average monthly income in Crimea.

After Moscow seized Crimea, Dzhemilev said Russians invited him to Moscow. “I talked to Putin for half an hour. He promised me they would help the Crimean Tatars. I told him, ‘You can assist us by taking away the military,’ ” he recalled.

International observers are keeping tabs on events in Crimea and have condemned Russian occupational authorities for their repressive treatment of the Tatar community.

“This is a population with a really tragic history that went through hell to get back to their historical homeland, were not successful in having their rights fully recognized by the Ukrainians, and are now coming under huge pressure from the Russians,” stated Nils Muiznieks, the Council of Europe’s commissioner for human rights, who compiled a report about the Crimea crisis that was released in October 2014.

Muiznieks explained that Russia’s security agency “has one playbook and it’s based on the North Caucasus, and they’re treating many Tatars as being potential jihadis.”

UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Zeid Ra'ad Al Hussein lamented last month the “worrying developments” in Crimea, where “multiple violations” of the rights of Crimean Tatars are being documented. He said earlier the premises of ATR, the only television channel broadcasting in the Crimean Tatar language, were raided by armed, masked men in unmarked military clothing, and the Deputy Head of the Crimean Tatar Mejlis, Ahtem Ciygoz, was detained, the OHCHR reported. Ciygoz faces up to 10 years in prison for creating mass disturbances.

Amnesty International said on the eve of the year since Crimea was seized by Russia, with journalists, activists and peaceful protestors facing increasing harassment and intimidation in Crimea, there is an urgent need for a strong international monitoring mission in Ukraine. It is calling for the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) to urgently establish a strong international monitoring mission in the country.

“Attempting to monitor the human rights situation in Crimea has become a near impossible task. Self-styled Crimean self-defense groups are harassing pro-Ukrainian protesters, journalists and human rights monitors with complete impunity,” said John Dalhuisen, Europe and Central Asia Director at Amnesty International.

In the eastern oblasts of Ukraine, similar self-defense groups, under Russian tutelage, evolved into mercenaries and terrorists, fighting side-by-side with Russian soldiers against Ukrainian armed forces.

Recently, two representatives of the OSCE were forced to cut their visit to Crimea short due to security concerns, Amnesty International wrote in its report. In a separate event, members of the organization were prevented from even entering the peninsula by unidentified military personnel.

On March 5, the UN Special Envoy to Crimea was also forced to cut his visit short. Only a few hours after arriving in Crimea, he was threatened by an aggressive crowd chanting pro-Russian slogans and forced by armed men to get back in his vehicle and return to the airport.

Amnesty International said Russian occupying authorities in Crimea have failed to investigate a series of abductions and torture of their critics since the violence that led to Russia’s mostly unrecognized annexation of the peninsula from Ukraine a year ago. The human rights NGO said Crimea’s Russian-supported leaders have cracked down on dissent, creating a climate of fear in the annexed Ukrainian region, with many of the regime's more vocal critics opting to leave.

It cites “violations of the rights to freedom of expression, assembly and association in Crimea [and] highlights human rights abuses by the de facto authorities, including the failure to investigate a series of abductions and torture of their critics, and their unrelenting campaign of intimidation against pro-Ukrainian media, campaigning organizations, Crimean Tatars and other individuals critical of the regime.”

The global human rights watchdog said it has documented the disappearances of three Crimean Tatars: Islyam Dzhepparov, 19, and Dzhevdet Islyamov, 23, were pushed into a van by four men in black uniform on September 29, 2014, and have not been seen since. Reshat Ametov, 39, was seized while attending a demonstration in March last year. His body was found later with signs of torture. Andriy Schekun, the leader of Ukrainian House, an organization promoting Ukrainian language and culture, was abducted by pro-Russian paramilitaries and held for 11 days in a secret location where he was electrocuted in March 2014. He was eventually handed over to the Ukrainian military.

Amnesty International said no one was held responsible in none of these cases.

The organization said the Russians and their puppets are also using intimidation and restrictive laws to silence the media and NGOs.

At a UN Security Council meeting on March 6, Ivan Šimonović, assistant secretary-general for human rights, noted that the situation in Crimea was deteriorating with systematic human rights violations affecting mostly Crimean Tatars and those who had opposed the March referendum.

At that meeting, Ambassador Raimonda Murmokaite, permanent representative of Lithuania, a leading supporter of Ukraine in its war with Russia, pointed out “There were disturbing reports of violations against the Tatar community, which had largely opposed the ‘sham’ referendum a year ago, and fundamental freedoms had been severely curtailed in Russian-annexed Crimea.”

Ambassador Yuriy Sergeyev, permanent representative of Ukraine, added then: “The human rights situation in Crimea was deteriorating, and the Council should act immediately to deal with those and other outrages.  Under no circumstances could the United Nations accept that Russia had turned Crimea into an isolated military camp and its residents into recluses.”

Beyond persecution, Russia has also begun to build a dangerous stockpile of nuclear and conventional weapons that has the potential of changing the balance of power in the Black Sea and Mediterranean Sea regions, and destabilizing global peace.

“We have seen a drastic buildup of military capabilities of the Russian armed forces in Crimea [which added to] already existing naval capabilities,” Maxim Shepovalenko, a senior research fellow at the Center for Analysis of Strategies and Technologies in Moscow, recently told NBC News.

Russia has reinforced ground forces and air defense on Crimea — roughly doubling its military manpower there — with some 25,000 to 30,000 soldiers.

According to state news agency TASS, Russia is planning to send Tu-22M3 bombers capable of carrying nuclear warheads to Crimea as part of its massive nationwide military drills. The plan repeats earlier claims by the Russian Foreign Ministry that Russia does not rule out placing nuclear weapons on the peninsula and conventional Russian forces in Crimea are set to increase, military observers say.

Additionally, a separate report said Backfire Tu-22M3 bombers and Tupolev Tu-95s will join Iskander mobile ballistic missile systems already believed to be on the peninsula.

Most of the world’s leaders have condemned Russia’s invasion and annexation of Crimea and support maintaining sanctions against Moscow until it returns Crimea to Ukraine. Unfortunately, contemporary history has shown that words do not dissuade Russia from war.

Jen Psaki, US State Department spokesperson, reaffirmed the US position, saying: “On this one year anniversary of the sham ‘referendum’ in Crimea, held in clear violation of Ukrainian law and the Ukrainian constitution, the United States reiterates its condemnation of a vote that was not voluntary, transparent, or democratic. We do not, nor will we, recognize Russia’s attempted annexation and call on President Putin to end his country’s occupation of Crimea.
“This week, as Russia attempts to validate its cynical and calculated ‘liberation’ of Crimea, we reaffirm that sanctions related to Crimea will remain in place as long as the occupation continues. The United States continues to support Ukraine’s sovereignty, territorial integrity, and right to self-determination.”

For the past 12 months, and despite Western sanctions, Crimea has been rapidly becoming a central plank of Putin’s political platform. State media has portrayed the annexation as an historic victory against an encroaching West intent on degrading Russia. In a documentary broadcast earlier this month, Putin revealed, sometimes with evident satisfaction and almost step by step, how Russian special forces had taken control of Crimea, rescuing its people, he said, from rampaging Ukrainian nationalists. Russia initially also used this ruse to launch the Russo-Ukraine War of 2014-15.

Nonetheless, Crimean Tatars continue with their resistance. In early March, troubled by the rising number of pro-Russian rallies, they began to stage demonstrations in Simferopol and elsewhere.

​​The resistance reached its peak with mass protests on International Women's Day, March 8, when as many as 15,000 protesters – mainly women and children – lined roadways throughout Crimea waving Ukrainian and Tatar flags and holding posters calling for peace.
“Many Crimeans came out, no matter their nationality,” said Andriy Shchekun, a Simferopol-based activist. “It was a consolidation, a demonstration of how all Crimeans felt. In principle it was the real majority, and we saw the real picture. We organized a major event without allocated money or political connections. It was a true civil protest against what was happening in Crimea.”
Many of the protesters extended their activities to include aiding besieged Ukrainian soldiers and fighting off members of the so-called self-defense forces of pro-Russian youths harassing activists and others.

Members of the Crimean intelligentsia were also active during the protests. Halyna Dzhikayeva, whose Karman art center was known for staging politically provocative works, said a majority of her audiences were openly opposed to the Russian invasion.
“We cultivated our audience to think,” she said. “Our performances weren’t light entertainment. They forced people to think critically about the things going on around them. So the people who went to the theater, who came to see our performances, were independent-minded.”

With tourists deterred from vacationing in Crimea after Russia militarized it, Moscow has had to subsidize Crimea’s floundering budget at the level of 85%, just like in the troubled territories of Chechnya and Ingushetia, Ukrainian online newspaper Ukrainska Pravda reported, with reference to Russian daily newspaper Nezavisimaya Gazeta. Russia has had to sign all of the invoices for the peninsula’s utilities.
World leaders have cast their support for Ukraine and Crimea, pledging not to reverse their position until Crimea is returned to Ukraine.

Canadian Foreign Affairs Minister Rob Nicholson marked the first anniversary of the referendum in Crimea this week by vowing Canada will never accept the outcome.

In his statement, Nicholson said Canada’s position on the issue remains firm. “Canada will never recognize the illegal annexation of Crimea,” he said.

Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper issued the following statement to mark illegal annexation of Crimea by Russia:

“A year ago this week, the so-called Crimean ‘referendum’ was held under the Putin regime’s influence to legitimize the illegal annexation of Crimea by Russia two days later.

“Whether it takes five months or 50 years, Canada will never recognize this annexation as being the genuine will of the Ukrainian people. We have instead maintained our call that the Putin regime cease the destabilization campaign it has orchestrated and fully withdraw from Crimea and eastern Ukraine.”

To mark the repulsive anniversary of Crimea’s enslavement, President Petro Poroshenko of Ukraine wrote in a column titled “Crimea Is Still Ukraine” in the March 19 edition of The Wall Street Journal. In which he wrote:

“I myself witnessed the illegal and shameful occupation, and never will I forget or excuse it. When I visited the Crimean capital of Simferopol to help negotiate a settlement one year ago, I saw many ‘little green men,’ who were in fact heavily armed professional soldiers. Although they were masked and disguised, with their uniforms and markings altered, it was clear that every command for the occupation had come from one source: the Kremlin…

“However, we cannot for a moment ignore the brutal violence currently being inflicted in eastern Ukraine, nor can we forget Crimea’s annexation…

“Crimea is not merely a Ukrainian issue. For arguably the first time since World War II, one country has unilaterally appropriated the territory of another, setting a dangerous precedent in the conduct of international relations…

“On March 27, 2014, 100 United Nations member states voted in favor of a resolution affirming support for the territorial integrity of Ukraine and recognition of Crimea as a part of Ukraine. We remember and appreciate this display of international solidarity in a time of need. And we believe that the Crimean people will regain their native land…

“One year later, Crimea still is Ukraine, and it is our joint responsibility with the rest of the world to undo the injustice de facto and de jure—to make the aggressor go. Sooner or later Crimea will return to where it belongs, and our joint duty is to make it sooner—out of respect of the rights of our citizens, to international law and for the sake of safeguarding global security.”

The United Kingdom also favors maintaining sanctions against Russia for occupying Crimea.  Adam Thomson, Britain’s permanent representative to NATO, wrote in The Wall Street Journal, “That is why remembering this anniversary matters. We must not accept Russia’s illegal annexation of Crimea as a new reality and still less as a new normal.

“Russia, tragically, has suffered strategic derailment through its adventure in Ukraine. But that does not make its behavior safe. There is a way out. Russia can still withdraw its troops from Crimea and eastern Ukraine, abide by its commitments under the Minsk agreements and let the Ukrainian people run their own country.

“But until this happens, our established position is firm: Crimea’s annexation is unacceptable, and we will continue to defend our values with sanctions that punish those responsible.”

Mustafa Dzhemilev arrived in New York City on Thursday, March 19, to attend an informal meeting of the UN Security Council about Crimea. At a press conference he urged the free world to maintain strong sanctions against the Kremlin to pressure the Russian aggressors to leave without using military force.

Dzhemilev warned that “if the war starts in Crimea, it will mean the extermination of the entire Crimean Tatar population in Crimea.”

Dzhemilev painted a grim picture of people in Crimea seeking to remain part of Ukraine being repressed, of more than 4,000 businesses closing down and being taken over by “so-called self-defense groups,” and of “very tense” inter-ethnic and inter-religious relations.

The Tatar leader bemoaned that Crimea used to be a popular tourist area but is now “being turned into a military base.”

The informal Security Council meeting was called by Ambassador Murmokaite of Lithuania. The gathering revealed who are friends of Ukraine and Crimea and who are enemies of human rights and global peace and stability. Russia, China, Venezuela and Angola, by their absence, demonstrated that they are from the dark side.

 “Russia is normally very quick to criticize Ukraine on alleged human rights violations, but completely ignores human rights violations happening under its own rule or under its proxy’s rule,” Murmokaite told reporters.

After 12 months of subjugating Crimea and the free world’s condemnation and sanctions, Russia is adamant about pursuing its colonial plans. Russia’s escalation of oppression and terror, militarization of the peaceful peninsula, and amassing a nuclear stockpile in a former nuclear-free zone demonstrates that it is the global enemy that must be defeated and not merely forced into a neutral corner.

The invasion and annexation of Crimea by Russia is a devastating precedent for the free world, which cannot remain unchanged.

#CrimeaIsUkraine

‘I Can’t Believe Russia Lied to Me’

On the night of August 20, 1968, some 200,000 Warsaw Pact troops and 5,000 tanks, led by Russia, then called Soviet Russia or the USSR, invaded Czechoslovakia to crush the “Prague Spring” – the Czecho-Slovak people’s short-lived period of liberalization, democracy and distancing itself from Moscow’s captivity. The Kremlin justified its invasion of Czecho-Slovakia with the recently proclaimed Brezhnev Doctrine, enunciated by General Secretary Leonid Brezhnev, which gave Moscow the red light to invade any captive nation that sought to deviate from the Soviet Russian prison of nations. Czecho-Slovaks protested the invasion with public demonstrations and at least one young hero self-immolated, but in the end they were no match for the Russian tanks. The historic, liberal reforms of First Secretary Alexander Dubcek were revoked and a so-called “normalization” and re-subjugation began under his successor Gustav Husak.

What was strange about this invasion was that none of the intelligence services, analysts, spies and satellites of USA and the other free world countries even caught a glimpse of Russia’s mass aggression – or suspected it.

Forty-six years later, on February 28, 2014, a few days after the closing ceremony of the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia, Russian troops invaded Ukraine by way of Crimea and ultimately staged fabricated elections and annexed the Ukrainian peninsula. The number troops and armor did not equal the army that invaded Czecho-Slovakia but still none of the intelligence services, analysts, spies and satellites of USA and the other free world countries even caught a glimpse of Russia’s latest aggression against a former captive nation – or suspected it.

The dangerous trend that I am alluding to is not Russia’s invasion of neighboring countries in the persistent imperial belief that once a Russian captive nation, always a Russian captive nation, and its imperial messianic vision of itself. The pattern that I’m referring to is the absence of any intelligence about Russia’s belligerent intentions that would have saved the captive nations from bloodshed and shielded free world leaders’ from foolish admissions that the West was caught totally off guard by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

How can that be? While, to quote Winston Churchill, Russia is a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma for many in the free world, there have been volumes of practical and anecdotal evidence of Moscow’s threatening activities and plans. Since being allowed by western powers to seize Eastern Europe at the end of World War II, Russia continued in the ensuing decades to demonstrate its penchant for building and preserving its empire. It quashed freedom uprisings in Poland, East Germany, Hungary and Czecho-Slovakia. National, human and religious activists in the USSR and East Europe waged peaceful and not-so-peaceful opposition against Russia while it arrested and incarcerated them in psychiatric asylums, prisons and concentration camps.

Shouldn’t this have sent a compelling signal to the free world leaders that something amiss is brewing in Russia’s captive nations and it is compelling the Kremlin to counterattack against peaceful civil activists? The West should have then applied multilateral pressure and sanctions on Moscow to cease and desist persecuting and oppressing them rather than open trade with the Russian dictatorship.

Leaders of the captive nations’ liberation movements have also publicly warned that Russia cannot be trusted and even if it undergoes political and social transformations – like from tsarism to communism to federal presidency – its imperial nature will not diminish.

Stepan Bandera, leader of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists, who was assassinated by a Russian agent on October 15, 1959, wrote in his Perspectives of a Ukrainian Revolution: “There is only one Russia – imperialist. It will be so until Russian imperialism will be totally obliterated and the Russian people will recover from it by understanding that Russia’s imperialism it the source of its greatest disaster – victims, anguish and decline. This is still a long way off.”

Bandera also said as if writing about today’s Russian war against Ukraine:

“If bolshevism is replaced tomorrow by another form of Russian imperialism, it will first of all turn against the independence of Ukraine, turn to enslaving it. This is clearly proven by state political thought and attitude of the Russian masses, all of Russian media, communist and anti-bolshevik alike. All of them are extremely hostile toward the idea of a ​​separate, sovereign state of Ukraine.”

“The idea of ​​dignity and respect for people, the free development of their own initiative, creative and worthy self-inclusion into a harmonious collective of national and social life is diametrically opposed to bolshevik tyranny, its enslavement and exploitation of people, its trampling of their dignity and ruining freedom. "

The free world cannot hide behind the excuse that it never heard of Bandera and the aspirations to freedom of the captive nations because the post-war intelligence services of the US, Britain and other countries solicited their knowledge, ideas and analyses. So what happened to the archives?

That may be history, but statements by today’s former captive nations’ leaders also warn against Russian threats and aggression. Lithuania’s President Dalia Grybauskaitė is a staunch support of lethal aid to Ukraine and is preparing her nation in case Russian armies cross its border. Poland, Latvia and Estonia are also increasing military training and expenditures.

Andrius Kubilius, former Prime Minister of Lithuania, was quoted as saying: “This is Putin’s war, which was initiated by him, which has been supported by him, which is being implemented by him, and which can only be stopped by him. Ukraine has shown clear signs that it no longer wants to support this post-imperial Russian entity, and Mr. Putin, along with the mainstream political class in Russia, is still living with a lot of nostalgia for the imperial past. Dismantling the Russian Empire has been a very painful and very difficult process. And the only way in which we can assist Russia in overcoming their psychologically painful situation is by helping Ukraine. The biggest mistake would be to allow ourselves to be threatened by statements about red lines.”

It is safe to say that if the free world leaders had paid attention to Bandera and the other liberation ideologues – past and present, the Russo-Ukraine War of 2014-15 would not have occurred or at least it would not have surprised, shocked and dismayed the US, Britain, Canada and the other democracies.

Thirteen months after Russia launched its war against Ukraine, western newspapers are filled with headlines that do not bode well for the competence of free world leaders. Here are a few that I have gleaned in the past three weeks:

Ukraine: UK and EU ‘badly misread’ Russia

Errors over Ukraine ‘catastrophic’: UK parliament report

Russia's Putin Took European States ‘By Surprise’ in Ukraine: Report

Britain ‘at mercy’ of Putin in a war against Russia, former defence chiefs warn

UK guilty of ‘catastrophic misreading’ of Ukraine crisis, Lords report claims

Russia ‘undermining’ global world order: US

Russian expansionism may pose existential threat, says NATO general

Russian tensions could escalate into all-out war, says NATO general

Ukraine: Kerry threatens further sanctions over ‘craven’ Russian actions

PARALYZED BY UKRAINE, DUMBFOUNDED BY RUSSIA

Kerry: Russia has lied about its activities in Ukraine

US furious over Russia’s ‘lies’ on Ukraine

And a few paragraphs from articles about what newspapers call the “Ukraine crisis.”

** “London (AFP) – Britain and the European Union are guilty of “sleepwalking” into a crisis in Ukraine, a scathing report from a British parliamentary committee said on Friday.”

** “LONDON — America’s European allies sleepwalked into the conflict with Russia in Ukraine and should now find ways to stop the relationship with Moscow from deteriorating further, according to a report by British lawmakers.”

** “Sir Michael Graydon, a former chief of the air staff, told The Times newspaper: “They have got us more or less at their mercy. We only have two bases where we have got Typhoons. One is in Scotland, one is in Lincolnshire. “The guys in Lincolnshire were having to go all the way down to Cornwall just to get anywhere near.”

** “The UK is guilty of sleepwalking into the crisis in Ukraine and has not been as active or visible as it should be, according to a damning report into the British and European approach to the crisis by the main House of Lords committee on foreign affairs.

“The report – the fullest evaluation of the Ukraine crisis to emerge from the British parliament – also finds that expertise within the Foreign Office towards Russia has diminished significantly, and according to the committee chairman, Lord Tugendhat, ‘led to a catastrophic misreading of the mood in the run-up to the crisis.’”

** “Washington (AFP) – In some of its sharpest criticism to date, Washington accused Moscow on Friday of ‘undermining’ the global order by supporting rebels in eastern Ukraine.

“The sluggish disintegration of a weak peace deal in Ukraine has come as nothing less than a blessing for President Obama. It has helped mask his administration's inability to determine the best response to the crisis, and to Russia.

“But this respite will not last. Given the events on the ground, Obama will soon have to decide whether to send weapons and trainers to the Ukrainian government and risk turning what has been largely a border skirmish into a major conflict by proxy with serious implications for the United States, Europe, and American interests worldwide.”

** “WASHINGTON (AP) — Secretary of State John Kerry said Tuesday that Russia has repeatedly lied to him about its activities in Ukraine where pro-Russian rebels are fighting national forces.

“‘Russia is engaged in a rather remarkable period of the most overt and extensive propaganda exercise that I’ve seen since the very height of the Cold War,’” Kerry told a U.S. Senate Appropriations subcommittee. ‘And they have been persisting in their misrepresentations — lies — whatever you want to call them about their activities there to my face, to the face of others on many different occasions.’”

John Kerry’s bizzare admission is perhaps the most detrimental.

These headlines and sentences prove in retrospect at least that the free world understands that it has been duped by Moscow. But what actions will it take to rectify the situation?

Russia is a formidable enemy by itself. It devotes a great deal of attention and rubles to its armed forces and flaunts its vision of global imperialism. However, when you combine its saber rattling with free world’s naïve incompetence, then the western democracies are just leaving the door open to their own demise.

Without meaning to aggravate their calamitous mistakes, if Ukraine loses its war with Russia – and by loses I mean anything except a complete and unconditional withdrawal of Russia from Ukraine – then this generation of world leaders will certainly be inscribed in history as the one that lost Ukraine on its watch.