Since When did Ukrainians Become Entitled
to a Giant State?

As long as we are asking questions like this, who needs Russia or Russians? All that they are is a corrupt oil/materials syndicate which exports tons of cheap weapons, mainly to terrorists. Despite their problems at least the Ukrainians were trying to join the community of free nations and contribute to the world.

The Ukrainians were also trying to own Crimea although it belongs historically to the Tatars and is currently being in the possession of Russia, which is nine points of the law for a good reason. Ukraine is fine with starving and freezing the world to sustain their fight for Crimea. They leveraged our desire to help with their self-defense to position the world for WW3. Do they have any faint idea what other griefs the world is coping with? Every spare dime in the world has to go to Ukraine owning Crimea? the Donbas is unclear since we know the Russians were faking atrocities blamed on Kyiv. But can't somebody hold an actual referendum, if we all have to pay for the war about it?

Way back in the 90s there was a civil war in Rwanda. Millions of people died. The US didn't take sides. But, in the Russia vs Ukraine Quid Pro Joe has sent billions of bucks to the Ukraine and risked WWIII with Russia which has more nuclear weapons than a dog has fleas. Neither the Ukraine nor Rwanda have any strategic value to the US. So what's the difference? No money to be made in Rwanda but the Ukraine is a major souce of funds for the Bidet crime syndicate. The Big Jerk's cut is 10%. With that kind of money The Vegetable can get a solid gold throne with lackeys to raise and lower the lid. Both Russia and Ukraine have lots of good people. But their governments don't.

FTA " the Atlantic alliance claims to be purely defensive." sell ithat to Ghadaffi and Milosovich. #1 "who needs Russia or Russians?" that type of statement is why they remain paranoid.

Thanks, OP. Some historical perspective is always good.

It is interesting article but it overlooked one key element, Russia wants the whole thing not just a piece.

#1. Who are these “free nations” to which you refer? And what do you know about Russia?

History has always fascinated me. Trouble is, what matters most is how the world is carved up today, and who and how powerful are today's belligerents, not those prominent 369 years ago. Consider, for example, what the boundaries of the USA looked like in 1654...oh, that's right, it didn't exist. The few isolated European colonies in N.America were all claimed by Spain, France, and England, while indigenous tribes rightfully considered the entire continent to be their turf. Or ask Israel, which was nonexistent prior to 1948, if it has a right to exist...their answer will be rather one-sided...and they're not going to just go away.

There is nothing about 1654 that makes the geopolitical boundaries then extant in the region we know call Ukraine to be the "right answer." See prior comment.

It is worth noting that the Ukrainian government wanted this invasion. They believed that Russia was going to gradually attempt to absorb them, probably correctly, and that, if Russia was allowed to continue as it planned, Russia would succeed. On the other hand, while they expected the suffering to be great, they believed they could defeat an invasion, cementing themselves as an independent nation.

Well, when Russia entered into agreements and treaties with Ukraine after 1991, it was de facto acknowledging Ukraine as a legitimate state with existing borders. Does that count for anything? Or does that go away once the populace boots out a corrupt Russian lackey and signals a desire to align with Europe?

This article might as well have been written by the Kremlin, a pathetic excuse for Russian conquest. Apply the same "historical accuracy" to the US, and the US would barely be entitled to the original 13 colonies. The article conveniently leaves off that Ukraine has been mainly separate ethnically and linguistically for a very long time. "Paid in Russian blood?" You mean conquered? Since Catherine the Great conquered the territory in the 18th century, there have been laws banning Ukrainian culture and the Ukrainian language, which is linguistically closer to Polish than Russian. Once swallowed up by the USSR, Ukraine has been treated brutally. Recall the Holomodor in 1933, when, to punish the disobedient province, they went in and stole all their food, deliberately starving several millions of Ukrainians, while simultaneously transporting millions of Ukrainians to Siberia and migrating Russians to the region to forcibly "Russify" the area. Regardless, none of this historically revisionist history makes any difference. The treaty of 1991, which essentially traded Ukrainian nukes for territorial sovereignty, and of which the US, among others, agreed to be the guarantor, the same treaty that Putin verified as late as 2006, is the only thing that matters. In the last 30 years, Ukraine has developed a strong sense of Ukrainian identity. Instead of remaining a puppet state like Belorussia and tying itself to Russia, they looked to the West. In Ukraine, the inherited Kleptocracy, characteristic to all the former USSR territories, was being slowly reformed for an eventual admission into the EU. Invading Ukraine has nothing to do with Russia's "territorial security." A country with as many nukes as the rest of the world combined has no worries of invasion. This is Putin grabbing as much power as he can. The Great Leader is looking for his place in history.

Ukraine decided it would becom eindependent. One action was the idea that citizens in the Ukraine should not go to a church called the Russian Orthodox Church. The Ukraine has been encouraging people to throw any and all clergy of the Russian Orthodox Church out. When using that way of thinking, I notice that many attendees of the Roman Catholic Church in the United States are Italian. Thus all Roman Cathoic churches in the United States should not allow Italians.

is this about history? or about zell-out-$kyy killing his people--in his war for blackmail?

Since they tried to hide the CIA/DOD biolabs.

Sorry, this article is a amalgamation of BAD WIKI history. Ukraine under its may previous names back to , Kevian Rus (980-1024) and further, was one of the contenders for its place in the sun against Poland, Lithuania, Russia and the Ottomans. At times allied with the Crimean Tartars against Poland, other times allied with them against Russia, with a long history before the artificial 1654 as the author claims based on getting no deeper than wiki For a real history I recommend this one... The Gates of Europe by Serhil Plokei not this FAKER.

Trump urged Z to negotiate with Putin to work out their differences. Yeltsin had warned us Nato expansion would be an afront and a threat. Putin repeated and amplified Yeltsin's warnings that Nato, an economic as well as a mutual defense alliance, was viewed as a threat to Russia. We ignored them.

Two sommat minor clarification points: Crimea was depopulated almost entirely of it's Ottoman Tartar inhabitants, who were shipped enmasse to Siberia, it became not only Russians/Soviets only port that could operate in the winter, but also it's "Miami Beach", permanent luxury dachas of the Upper echelons of society of course, and even more collective vacation housing for the proletariat who could never be allowed to travel outside of Soviet Territory.. Ukraine was made Independent(on paper) so that Russia could have another reliable vote at the UN. Just as Crimea was handed over to Ukraine to guarantee another reliable russian vote in the Ukraine governing body. Russia will not, would not, could not cut Crimea free any more than the USA will/would/could allow Hawaii to become aligned with any other foreign power.

Who needs Russia?...sheesh, ya cannot pretend they do not exist. While the USA is approximately the same size in landmass as china, both are slightly smaller than Canada)..russia is nearly twice the size. Shall we pretend China or Canada doesn't exist? They are only smaller in population, China is 18% of the world population, the USA 4.25%...Russia only 1.85%, but their massive areas of mostly untapped natural resources is unmatched anywhere on the globe. What they lack is due to location...they have no seacoasts that are not icebound for much of the year. Canada has the same lack of usable seacoast issues, but not quite as badly, because river barges, train routes, and pipelines carry their exports out...though it is all via the USA, similarly Ukraine is Russia major outlet to the world..