• sodium_nitride [she/her, any]@hexbear.net
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    8
    ·
    15 days ago

    The Russians aren’t really attacking Ukraine because of nazis. That’s just Russian propaganda (doesn’t mean it doesn’t have elements of truth to it). The real reason is geopolitical, in that having NATO troops and military infrastructure on the russian-ukrainian border is really bad for Russian national security.

    Even as far back as the 1990s prominent figures in the west were predicting that having western troops or equipment in Ukraine would virtually guarantee war, and that the strategically sensible course of action would be to absorb Russia into the western sphere of influence by accounting for their security concerns instead of ignoring them.

    https://wikileaks.org/plusd/cables/08MOSCOW265_a.html

    In effect, the Russians saw the expansion of NATO as confirmation that the Cold War wasn’t really over. The tipping point for Russian intervention into Ukraine was the maidan coup, in which the newly installed government took hostile actions against Russian minorities living in Ukraine, especially in the donbass. Whether you believe that the donbass separatists were Russian puppets or not, they cannot be blamed for wanting to separate from what was and still is an objectively racist, neocolonised and neoliberal state.

    Not to mention, the eastern Ukrainians had voted for the guy kicked out in the maidan coup and were pissed.

    • huf [he/him]@hexbear.net
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      4
      ·
      15 days ago

      the maidan coup also threatened sevastopol, and there’s no fucking way in hell russia’s letting that port go