"Russian politician proposes new divisions of Ukraine" Reuters

"In a letter sent to the governments of Poland, Romania and Hungary, Vladimir Zhirinovsky also suggested those countries hold referendums on incorporating the regions into their territory. Zhirinovsky, whose nationalist Liberal Democratic party largely backs President Vladimir Putin in the Russian parliament, sent the letter as Russia annexed the Crimea region of southern Ukraine last week. He is deputy speaker at the Duma and his party holds a minority in the parliament. But his ideas and language resonate with a large part of the Russian population and the Kremlin's increasingly pro-nationalist rhetoric. His letter, seen by Reuters, suggested Poland, Hungary and Romania, who are now in the European Union, might wish to take back regions which he said were in the past their territories."  Reuters

---------------------

So, basically, this political ally of the Russian president has invited Poland, Hungary and Romania to exercise supposed irredentist claims against the Ukrainian state created by the Soviet Union as a result of soviet victory in world War 2. 

The borders of the territories in eastern Europe have ben moving around for many centuries.  In many cases the present borders are of recent invention.  The notion that they are somehow engraved on stone tablets in some distant Olympian vault never to change again is laughable to anyone who knows any history at all. 

It will be interesting to see if this idea is attractive to the Polish, Hungarian and Romanian peoples as opposed to their governments.   pl 

http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/03/24/ukraine-crisis-partition-letter-idUSL5N0ML1LO20140324

Comments

[Thomas]

MRW

A hedge fund run by Nate Rothschild is heavily invested there and he has connections with the politicos of the UK through his ties to the Bullingdon Club.

Bailing Ukraine out in exchange for a 100 year factoring agreement on grain harvests is another avenue to explore as food security has become an issue in the business world.

[Thomas]

crf

The reason Crimea was in the Ukraine to begin with is due to Kruschev's mistress getting him drunk and applying the charms.

Letting the Ukrainians solve their own problems without outside interference would have prevented this crisis. But the 21sy century Jacobins aren't enjoying life if they are not make other people's lives miserable.

[Thomas]

Also liked this quote;

"However, some commentators say Russia has deliberately whipped up such fears, and that the influence of Right Sector in Ukrainian politics is exaggerated."

"Some Commentators" who could these unnamed people be?

[William R. Cumming]

While I am sympathetic to your views I believe the forces of international finance trump the corporations.

To some extent PL is correct that I am sympathetic to economic determinism!

FOLLOW THE MONEY!

[William R. Cumming]

Will! IMO German bankers own the Ukraine!

[William R. Cumming]

Thanks!

[Charles I]

watch this, don't get dizzy.

http://loiter.co/v/watch-as-1000years-of-european-boarders-change/

[MRW]

Really? Thanks, Thomas. Know what that hedge fund name is? You know, when Khodorkovsky was caught trying to sell Yukos Oil to Exxon via Cheney in 2003, he passed his shares off to Baron or Lord Jacob Rothschild in London for safe-keeping before he went to jail. Nate is Jacob's son. Now Khodorkovsky is in Berlin hailing the Ukrainian freedom fighters of Kiev and urging the breakup and subsequent joining of Ukraine to the EU. As I've mentioned on this board before, I'm sure there are western interests dying to get their mitts on the Dnieper-Donets Basin in eastern Ukraine. That field was brought in using Russia's abiotic oil theory, which does not assume that oil is a fossil fuel.

[Thomas]

MRW

Wiki calls it Vallares for mineral deposit investments. The Beaver earlier posted an article link on Nate which had another name for his personal hedge fund which mentioned his Ukrainian investments and Bullingdon membership.

It doesn't surprise me about Khodorkovsky.
It appears the current situation is revenge of Russian Looters from the West of the 90s. I saw on Bloomberg a while back were William Cohen was saying Russia should accept what is happening and allow our economic expertise back in to fix their unsustainable economy. I guess we are in the Oligarch Wars with a new form of entertainment soon to come, Rollerball.

[MRW]

Absolut.

[nick b]

Really? Thanks, Thomas. Know what that hedge fund name is?

JNR (UK) Ltd. Though I'm not sure it is technically a hedge fund. Previously there was Atticus Capital, but that was dissolved in 2009, I believe.

Gas is the real prize in Dneiper-Donets.

http://pubs.usgs.gov/fs/2011/3051/pdf/fs2011-3051.pdf

[different clue]

Trade creeps are to trade what peace creeps were to peace.

[Norbert M Salamon]

thanks for the link - somehow the map missed the 150 year sojourn od the Ottoman Empire in Budapest, up to and including the outskirts of Wien {Vienna] which was repelled by the help of Polish king's intervention.

[WP]

The resurrection myth is what Putin's recent speech is all about.

Kerensky failed because he could not invent "the" myth for the time. Lenin did. Kerensky also failed because he was less ruthless than the Bolsheviks; he did not murder Lenin.

Yatsenyuk will not last long either. Putin's myth resonates with too many Ukrainians who think fondly of the security and status of the former Soviet society.

Ukraine is poor and broke and Russian pensions are larger than Ukrainian ones. http://www.faz.net/aktuell/wirtschaft/wirtschaftspolitik/putins-wiedervereinigung-anschluss-der-krim-wird-fuer-russland-richtig-teuer-12859482.html

[Fred]

WP,

It is all a shame that Obama, in his domestic weakness, had to resort to the evil genie of external democracy building to prop up his power. Though the talking heads will talk about economics and national interests, this gambit is not really about economics or trade; it is about the exercise of the will of a nation personified by its leader. Now that Obama has tasted the apple, (Remember Egypt, Syria, Libya) he cannot quit until he has consummated his lust, lest he be deemed by his backers or himself as impuissant. As American history has shown so many times, Democratizing Ukraine is now a matter of personal survival to Obama. My thought is that Obama must act very quickly along the lines suggested by McCain, Nuland, Powers, Rice et.al or he will be humiliated at his home. We see the betrayals already:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/03/24/harry-reid-russia_n_5023060.html

From this perspective, the matter of American Exceptionalism is of prime importance to analyzing the current state of affairs in the United States. One should not discount the extent to which the ideology of American Exceptionalism controls events. Matters of ideology have caused many historical miscalculations. Our own Civil War would never have been fought without the predominance of the ideology of American Exceptionalism in the North. Objective minds back then easily predicted that the North had massively more industrial might, money, and population than did the Southern states and that the Confederacy had little chance to defeat the Union. Even elections will not stop the mythical idea.

My fellow Americans are you listening? Senator Harry Reid (see link above) says other members of the United States Senate are traitors aiding the South, I mean Putin. The election’s over, you lost, now obey the President’s party. Oh, the States in the Confederacy were members of the Union in 1860? That election mattered? Opps, sorry, got sidetracked there. Where was I? Yes, defending Democracy – in Ukraine, where elections matter (not valid in Crimea, or under the pre-February 2014 Ukrainian constitution. See American Exceptionalism, Yankee version, 1861-1865). Now back to the weakness: In mythical terms, resistance from internal opposition only steels the resolve of the true believers and justifies bolder action. (See American Exceptionalism, Yankee version 1865-1877 i.e Reconstruction)

Right now the East simply has no intellectual remedy for the American Exceptionalism myth. It has insufficient will to oppose it. (Just various units of the navy, army, a variety of Spetnatz and 500 ICBMs) Ideology trumps honor. Honor has no place in the affairs of men. The United States Government’s actions were a fundamental adherence to the American Exceptionalism Myth. No tacit understanding of the post-Soviet order agreed to between Washington and Gorbachev in the 1990s to reserve some middle-ground, semi-neutral territory between Russia and NATO-EU was going to stand in the way of what Must Be.

Now, Obama is the legend maker who is creating the linguistic code to support the spread of Democracy. Humanity has not changed. Obama is now a prisoner of his own social myth making. We are seeing change we can believe in, and principled allies we must defend:

http://news.yahoo.com/controversy-over-ukraines-tymoshenko-wipe-russians-leak-164225091.html

Now, rally to the flag and do what Obama says. Who needs rational thought and a view to actual national interests when we have a mythical ideology of our own exceptionalism?

Stupidity and incompetence often shape history. That is a fact we can all agree on. So is the destructive power of 500 ICBMs armed with nuclear weapons.

[william R. Cumming]

WP! Sir John Keegan in his book ON WAR identified honor as a key fundamental for onset of warfare.

Thanks for this insightful comment!

Will Germany and/or China be a factor in your opinion as to how this plays out or is it a bipolar cold war again[hopefully not hot]?

[william R. Cumming]

ALL:

Self-destruction seems to be a feature of Ukrainian politicians of all flavors IMO!

Is Putin patient in personality or practice?

[MRW]

Thanks Thomas and nick B,

Now I gotta' find out if Victoria Nuland has any shares in either one of whose funds. There must be some place where State Dept officials have to declare that.

How much cheaper would it be to pick up the resources in the Dneiper-Donets Basin as collateral for a loan from private banks that Ukraine subsequently can't repay. A lot cheaper than outright purchase at market price, or the agita of having to share profits with a government.

[William R. Cumming]

The federal case against BP is still pending!

[WP]

You clearly got my analysis. The competing myths are in play. It is all emotion now. That is why I fear to predict what this August will be like. All of this is why I agree with Col. Lang that we are looking down the end of a gun. Both sides are blind to the other.

Pray! We need some skilled myth-maker who can capture a vision of the 1000+ rocketing ICBMs for our common salvation before they are loosed.

[Charles I]

I missed it too, the damn thing is so small and so fast! An eye opener though, no matter what you miss. Being of Lithuanian descent, and childish, naturally I was impressed by the utmost extent of Lithuania.

[WP]

Tripartite. Greater Russia is exercising strong will to resurrect; the US and Europe, especially including Germany, in their hubris, erroneously see Russia as a bi-pole easily pressured to comply with Western myths; and China sits smiling like the Cheshire cat, invisible for now except for the smile.

There is no longer stasis. The world is at a critical tipping point. All are now at great risk from fools.

Every new newscast leaves me with less hope.

[David Habakkuk]

WP,

I have dealt with your reading of Putin’s speech in a response to your comment on the following thread.

One further point made by Dr Patrick Armstrong, to add to the remarks I quoted there. The speech is, quite unambiguously, defensive. As he puts it:

‘If I were to pick two sentences to sum it up, they would be these: “Our western partners, led by the United States of America, prefer not to be guided by international law in their practical policies, but by the rule of the gun. They have come to believe in their exclusivity and exceptionalism, that they can decide the destinies of the world, that only they can ever be right.” The second: “Are we ready to consistently defend our national interests, or will we forever give in, retreat to who knows where?”’

On second thoughts, I would recommend the cross-posted version of Dr Armstrong’s comments on the ‘Da Russophile’ website, as there is an interesting exchange between him and an intelligent supporter of the Maidan protestors, on the question of whether the revolutionary ‘genie’ can be put back in the bottle in Ukraine.

(http://darussophile.com/2014/03/russian-federation-sitrep-20-march-2014/ )

A key point is that what is driving Russian policy at this point is not dreams of bringing all ethnic Russians back into a Greater Russian ‘Reich’. It is a combination of fears about the results of failing to draw a line at this point.

Among these, in addition to the fear of an all-out to impose Ukrainian language and culture – such as it is – on Russophones, they will end up with a NATO naval base at Sevastopol, and the NED convinced that if it could bring off ‘regime change’ in Kiev it can follow its success up by playing the same trick in Moscow.

On this issue, I would refer you back to an exchange between Fareed Zakaria and Henry Kissinger back in February:

‘ZAKARIA: You know Putin well. You've met him more than any American. Do you think he is watching what is happening in Ukraine and thinking, the West and the United States is doing this essentially as a way of surrounding Russia?

‘KISSINGER: I think he thinks that this is a dress rehearsal for what we would like to do in Moscow.’

(See http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/1402/02/fzgps.01.html )

This is a rather important issue with which Putin deals in the speech, following the remarks Dr Armstrong quotes posing the alternatives of defending Russia’s interests or indefinite retreat:

‘Some Western politicians are already threatening us with not just sanctions but also the prospect of increasingly serious problems on the domestic front. I would like to know what it is they have in mind exactly: action by a fifth column, this disparate bunch of “national traitors” or are they hoping to put us in a worsening social and economic situation so as to provoke public discontent? We consider such statements irresponsible and clearly aggressive in tone, and we will respond to them accordingly. At the same time, we will never seek confrontation with our partners, whether in the East or the West, but on the contrary, will do everything we can to build civilised and good-neighbourly relations as one is supposed to in the modern world.’

Again, I really would recommend that you look closely at what Putin actually said in the speech, the full text of which is available at http://eng.kremlin.ru/news/6889.

[kao_hsien_chih]

And while Khodorovsky is calling for destruction of his own country in effect (after a career seemingly dedicated to that goal), he is (or, will soon be) hailed in the West as the hero of Russian democracy and the natural choice of the Russian people had it not been for electoral manipulations by Putin.... Oh, the irony.

[WP]

I have read and reread the speech many times now as well as many comments to it on other websites. See my comment on the more current thread.

BTW, the "This is the Emergency Alert System" message just beeped in my radio. At least in the midst of all of this we are aurally reminded of duck and cover drills from our youth. I do not cherish the feeling of that memory. Do not people ever learn?