Arizona Governor Says He’d Rather Have a White Nationalist in State Legislature than a Democrat
William Vaillancourt – February 25, 2022
State of State Arizona – Credit: Ross D. Franklin/AP Images
Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey was questioned Thursday about his efforts to get Wendy Rogers elected to the state senate in 2020, and whether he has any regrets in light of how Rogers has been promoting white nationalist causes.
Arizona Mirror reporter Jeremy Duda asked the Republican governor his thoughts on Rogers during an event where Ducey announced a scholarship program for the state’s foster children.
“Are you still happy with that investment? Do you believe that was a good decision?” Duda asked, referring to the governor’s independent expenditures giving half a million dollars to Rogers’ campaign.
“What I need as a governor are governing majorities so that I can pass dollars into our social safety net so we can provide programs like this that will help children from all over our state… [and so] we can pass budgets that will put $8.6, $8.7 billion additional dollars into K-12 education,” Ducey claimed. “So that’s what I’ve wanted to do, is move my agenda forward. I’m proud of what we’ve been able to accomplish, and [Rogers] is still better than her opponent, Felicia French.”
When Duda asked him to elaborate on this last point, Ducey reiterated that Rogers “is better” than French, the Democrat whom she defeated in 2020.
Rogers is scheduled to speak Friday at the America First Political Action Conference (AFPAC), the Mirrorreported last week. AFPAC is an annual gathering of far-right figures organized by white nationalist Nick Fuentes, whom Rogers has praised in social media posts more than two dozen times, according toLeft Coast Right Watch, an extremist monitoring group. Rogers promoted the event on Telegram last week, the Daily Beastreported.
Rogers has intertwined herself with the Q-Anon crowd, has espoused racist “great replacement” theories, has called for Christian theocracy, and is a member of the paramilitary group the Oath Keepers. She is also a ‘Big Lie’ proponent, falsely claiming that the 2020 presidential election was fraudulent.
In the past, Ducey has sometimes distanced himself those on the fringes of his party, like when he ignored then-president Donald Trump’s demand that he not certify the results of Arizona’s 2020 presidential election. But on Thursday, rather than take the opportunity to speak out against Rogers, Ducey used children as an attempt to justify why he cares more about his party maintaining power than upholding principles. It seems like as long as Republicans hold a slim 16-14 edge in the Arizona state senate, Rogers will be welcome to continue her gross behavior without much, if any, criticism from the governor.
White House is ‘outraged’ over reports that staff at Chernobyl have been taken hostage by Russian forces
Kelsey Vlamis – February 24, 2022
Ukrainian servicemen take part in a joint tactical and special exercises in a ghost city of Pripyat, near Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant on February 4, 2022.Sergei Supinsky/AFP/Getty Images
Russian forces took over the Chernobyl nuclear plant in Ukraine on Thursday.
Press secretary Jen Psaki called reports the plant’s staff was taken hostage “incredibly alarming.”
It’s unclear how the Russian takeover will affect efforts to maintain radioactivity at the site.
Press secretary Jen Psaki said the White House is outraged over reports from Ukrainian officials that staff at the Chernobyl nuclear plant in Ukraine have been taken hostage by Russian troops.
Russian forces took over the remnants of Chernobyl earlier on Thursday during the country’s invasion of Ukraine. The move indicated Russia is likely to assault Ukraine’s capital city, Kyiv, which is located just south of Chernobyl, the site of one of the worst nuclear disasters in history.
“We’re outraged by credible reports that Russian soldiers are currently holding the staff of the Chernobyl facility hostage,” Psaki said during a press briefing on Thursday afternoon, adding “we condemn it and we request their release.”
Psaki said the situation at Chernobyl was not clear but that the hostage taking was “incredibly alarming and greatly concerning,” adding it could hurt efforts to maintain the facility, which is dangerously contaminated with radioactivity as a result of the 1986 nuclear disaster.
Earlier on Thursday, an adviser to the head of the plant said: “After a fierce battle, Ukrainian control over the Chernobyl site was lost. The condition of the former Chernobyl nuclear power plant, confinement, and nuclear waste storage facilities is unknown.”
Russia’s takeover sparked concerns that it would jeopardize the decades-long efforts to contain the nuclear disaster, including a billion-dollar investment in a containment dome in 2016. It’s unclear how the dome would hold up to combat damage, Insider’s Brent D. Griffiths reported.
War comes to Chernobyl, raising nuclear fears in Russia invasion of Ukraine
Alexander Nazaryan, Senior W.H. Correspondent – February 24, 2022
WASHINGTON — According to Ukrainian authorities, Russian forces have seized the Chernobyl nuclear reactor in northern Ukraine, where the world’s worst nuclear disaster took place in 1986 — and where vast reserves of dangerous nuclear waste remain entombed.
“After a fierce battle, Ukrainian control over the Chernobyl site was lost. The condition of the former Chernobyl nuclear power plant, confinement, and nuclear waste storage facilities is unknown,” an official at the plant said on Thursday afternoon, several hours after Russian forces moved across the Belarusian border, toward the plant.
Earlier in the day, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky warned on Twitter that Chernobyl was under threat: “Our defenders are giving their lives so that the tragedy of 1986 will not be repeated.” He described the move as “a declaration of war against the whole of Europe.”
When the reactor melted down in April 1986 during a test gone awry, a radioactive cloud covered much of the continent. Ukraine was then part of the Soviet Union.
The Chernobyl nuclear power plant in May 1986, a few weeks after the disaster. (Igor Kostin/Laski Diffusion/Getty Images)
The tightly protected Chernobyl Exclusion Zone sweeps in an almost 20-mile radius around the reactor. Today it includes ongoing safety operations, forests that have grown lush again, a few small settlements where villagers have refused to live and the town of Pripyat, abandoned by the plant’s employees and their families in the days after the explosion.
Reports indicate that Russian forces have entered the area around Chernobyl across the border with Belarus. It is not clear how extensive the fighting was to the reactor itself, which is part of a larger nuclear plant now in the process of being decommissioned.
Under the manufactured claim of needing to “demilitarize” and “de-Nazify” Ukraine, Russian President Vladimir Putin has launched an all-out assault on his much smaller and less powerful neighbor. He is believed to have ultimate designs on the seat of power in the capital, Kyiv.
The incursion raised fears that fighting near the reactor could dislodge harmful isotopes that were initially encased in a concrete sarcophagus by the Soviet Union and, more recently, were covered by a more modern protective dome whose cost has been estimated at $1.7 billion. Construction of the updated shelter was largely funded by Europe.
People look at the Object Shelter, also known as the sarcophagus, a temporary structure built in 1986 over the debris at Chernobyl. (Volodymyr Tarasov/Ukrinform/Barcroft Media via Getty Images)
A top Ukrainian official told the New York Times that Ukrainian military troops were “putting up fierce resistance,” but worried that continued fighting could stir up “radioactive dust [that] could cover the territory of Ukraine, Belarus and the countries of the European Union.”
The combination of incompetence and cruelty that led to the disaster — both vividly portrayed in a recent celebrated HBO miniseries that enraged Russian authorities — saw officials try to hide the extent of destruction, and is widely seen as having led to the collapse of the Soviet Union, whose image Putin has tried to rehabilitate.
The real reason Putin played a pussycat during the Trump presidency
Damon Linker, Senior correspondent – February 23, 2022
Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump. Illustrated | Getty Images, iStock
Republicans have long had a toughness fetish. Going back to the early days of the Cold War, its flip side has been the insinuation that Democrats are weaklings ready to sell out the country to its enemies, with the GOP eager to serve proudly and unapologetically as America’s lone defenders abroad.
No one should be surprised that the script has already been updated to account for recent distressing events on the border separating Russia and Ukraine.
Late last week, conservative talk-show host Hugh Hewitt observed in a tweet that “the tyrant Putin invaded Ukraine in 2014 and will do so again in 2022 but did not do so between 2017 and 2020.” Without mentioning his name, Hewitt implied Putin became a pussycat because of Donald Trump’s steadfast leadership as president.
But wait — wasn’t Trump Putin’s lapdog for the entirety of his presidency, famously refusing to say anything remotely critical about him and even siding with Putin’s denial of Russian interference in the 2016 election against evidence provided by America’s own intelligence services?
No doubt realizing the absurdity of the claim, National Review‘s Rich Lowry (and others) leapt in a few days later to add a layer of nuance to the assertion. It’s not that Trump was tougher than President Biden, but that he was more erratic: “The sheer unpredictably of Trump, his anger at being defied or disrespected, his willingness to take the occasional big risk (the Soleimani strike), all had to make Putin frightened or wary of him in a way that he simply isn’t of Joe Biden.”
There may be some truth in this revision of the thesis. Trump was indeed volatile, impulsive, and capricious. It’s certainly possible that Putin feared a move against Ukraine could spark a massive military response from Trump.
But it’s far more likely he hoped for something very different. As Jonathan Last pointedly suggested on Tuesday in his newsletter for The Bulwark, Trump expressed his desire on numerous occasions for the United States to withdraw from NATO altogether. He did so while campaigning for president in 2016. He did so as president. And apparently, he even made clear to advisers he hoped to make it a reality after he won re-election in 2020.
Since such a withdrawal is Putin’s fondest wish, it makes far greater sense to suppose his relative restraint during the Trump presidency was a function of a reasonable expectation he might get everything he wanted without having to fire a shot. Only now, with a less … unorthodox American president in charge, has war become Putin’s only means of advancing his more immediate aim of ensuring NATO moves no closer to Russian territory.
Putin didn’t play nice guy from 2017 to 2020 because he was afraid of Donald Trump. He did so because he knew he had nothing to fear from the fanboy in the Oval Office.
Russian state media is using Tucker Carlson, Mike Pompeo to bolster Putin’s moves in Ukraine
Catherine Garcia, Night editor – February 23, 2022
Mike Pompeo and Vladimir Putin. Alexander Nemenov/AFP via Getty Images
Russian state media personalities are lauding Russian President Vladimir Putin and his order to send troops to two separatist regions of eastern Ukraine, and using commentary from Fox News host Tucker Carlson and former U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo to further support his actions.
On Monday, Putin signed a decree recognizing two breakaway regions, the Donetsk People’s Republic and the Luhansk People’s Republic, as independent, and said he would send troops there on a “peacekeeping” mission. The regions are in an area known as the Donbas, and Moscow claims the troops will protect people being oppressed by the Ukrainian government. Russia has supported rebels in the Donbas since 2014, and it’s estimated that about 14,000 people have been killed in the fighting.
The Associated Pressreports that on Russian state television and radio, Putin’s move on Monday was, unsurprisingly, immediately met with lavish praise by anchors and pundits. On Russia 1, political talk show host Olga Skabeyeva delivered a message on Tuesday to residents of the separatist regions, saying, “You paid with your blood for these eight years of torment and anticipation. Russia will now be defending Donbas.”
Vladimir Solovyev, host of a morning show on the state-funded radio station Vesti.FM, declared that “we will ensure their safety. It is now dangerous to fight with them … because one will now have to fight with the Russian army.” On Channel One, a correspondent in Donetsk said local residents shared that they finally have “confidence in the future and that the years-long war will finally come to an end.”
To further bolster Putin, Russian state media is sharing supportive commentary from his fans on the American right. Julia Davis, a columnist at The Daily Beast and a Russian media analyst, tweeted several clips on Tuesday and Wednesday of Carlson and Pompeo now making the rounds on Russia state media — RT published Carlson’s latest defense of Putin with Russian subtitles, as well as an article titled, “Tucker Carlson wonders why U.S. elites hate Putin,” while Channel One aired an interview with Pompeo where he praised Putin as “very shrewd” and “very capable,” adding, “I have enormous respect for him.”
There is some pushback coming from independent Russian news outlets, like the website Holod. Its reporters started the hashtag “I’m not staying silent,” and asked people to “express their opinion about the war aloud — and also to remember that each of us has something connecting us to Ukraine.” There were several dozen responses, AP reports, with Russians panning Putin’s decision to send troops to eastern Ukraine.
New NOAA report finds sea level is rising fast. NC is especially at risk.
Ned Barnett – February 23, 2022
Charlotte Observer/JOHN D. SIMMONS
In North Carolina, the worries about climate change often focus on more frequent storms with heavier rainfall, but a new federal report points to an equally potent danger – the seeping effect of sea level rise.
The report released by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association (NOAA) as part of a multi-agency project shows that sea levels along U.S. coastlines will rise, on average, by as much as a foot over the next 30 years – equal to the rise measured over the last century.
Rick Luettich, a UNC marine science professor who heads the Center for Natural Hazards Resilience, said the projection for 2050 “isn’t radically different than it was 10 years ago,” but “there is a lot of clarity to these numbers now.”
That means sea level change isn’t a case of scientists speculating on what might happen given various scenarios. The change is here and accelerating.
“This new report says this is real now and it’s going to be significant much earlier than 2100,” said Luettich.
The most noticeable effect will be more coastal flooding, even without storms. NOAA said in a summary of the report’s findings: “Sea level rise will create a profound shift in coastal flooding over the next 30 years by causing tide and storm surge heights to increase and reach further inland. By 2050, ‘moderate’ (typically damaging) flooding is expected to occur, on average, more than 10 times as often as it does today, and can be intensified by local factors.”
Flooding related to sea level rise will be more extensive in North Carolina because of its low coastal plain. As seawater seeps further inland, it will render land unusable for agriculture, impair fresh water sources and disrupt the effectiveness of septic systems.
“Salt water intrusion is a major concern for the viability of coastal areas for agriculture and septic function is much less viable if the water table rises,” Luettich said. “That’s the hidden consequence.”
“If this report is accurate, the current challenges we have with ongoing sea level rise along the coast will grow exponentially more difficult to handle,” Miller said. “This is not simply an issue of where the sea meets the land. A foot rise in sea level in 30 years means parts of our barrier islands will be severely eroded or disappear, Pamlico Sound and other barrier island protected sounds and estuaries will be transformed into unprotected bays, and estuarine shorelines and salt marshes along our mainland areas will erode dramatically and move inland.”
Sea level rise is a global problem with a global cause: rising emissions of greenhouse gases. While little can be done about the next few decades, a drop in emissions could lessen the long-term swamping of the coasts. The NOAA report projects that under current conditions, sea level could rise by 2 feet by the end of this century. But if emissions are not checked, the increase could be as much as 7 feet.
Orrin Pilkey, a Duke expert on coastal geology and director emeritus of the Program for the Study of Developed Shorelines, has approached the threat of rising sea levels by calling for development to retreat from the beach and barrier islands. But that’s unlikely in North Carolina, given the large role of beach tourism and coastal real estate in the state’s economy. An alternative to retreating is stronger control over coastal development and more investment in infrastructure to limit flooding and protect freshwater supplies and wastewater systems.
Luettich said sea level change can be mitigated by lowering greenhouse gas emissions, but bringing that about involves an unknown that’s harder to predict. He said, “We understand the natural systems better than what people are going to do.“
Halting Nord Stream 2 leaves Russia with ‘a long-term vulnerability,’ Biden advisor says
February 23, 2022
Deputy National Security Advisor for International Economics under the Biden Administration Daleep Singh joins Yahoo Finance Live to discuss the Biden administration’s first tranche of sanctions against Russia, the Nord Stream 2 pipeline, and the financial impacts stemming from the Russia-Ukraine conflict.
Video Transcript
– Welcome back. You’re watching “Yahoo Finance Live.” And we continue to follow the potential economic fallout from Ukraine-Russia tensions. So let’s get more context on how the sanctions are working and what’s next.
I’m joined by Daleep Singh, Deputy National Security Advisor for International Economics under the Biden administration. Thank you for taking the time to join us. Now, we know the administration plans to impose sanctions on the company constructing the Nord Stream 2 pipeline between Russia and Germany following a similar move by Germany. What message does that send to Russia? And how damaging will that potentially be to Russia’s economy?
DALEEP SINGH: Good to be with you, Michele. Well, it means that we are serious about atrophying Russia’s power if he continues his aggression in Ukraine. You know, this was Putin’s prized natural gas pipeline that runs to Germany. He put $11 billion into this investment. It would have generated billions and billions of cash for Russia’s financial coffers.
And we’ve now, with the help of Germany, shut it down. And that means Europe is going to accelerate its diversification away from Russian energy. It also means that Russia is going to have a long-term vulnerability because it depends on oil and gas revenues to motor its growth. It’s 2/3 of Russia’s export revenues. It’s almost half of its budget revenues. So this is a serious blow to Putin. It’s just the beginning.
– And this certainly comes on top of the first tranche of sanctions that were already announced by the president targeting Russian banks and sovereign debt among others, still leaving room, though, to ramp up sanctions if needed. Now, how are you determining the effectiveness of the sanctions so far?
DALEEP SINGH: Yeah, well, first of all, we don’t judge the effect by one day. But if you look at the last three months when we started to signal exactly what kinds of costs we would impose, the effects are extremely serious. The Russian stock market is down almost 30% over that time period. The Russian currency has lost almost 15% of its value. And government borrowing rates in Russia have spiked well above 10%.
Now, over time– and looking back to 2014, this is not just an abstract expectation– what we’ll create is a negative feedback loop, a vicious feedback loop between capital outflows, a weaker currency, imported inflation, higher imported inflation, a hit to Russia’s purchasing power, lower investment, and lower growth. And the velocity of that negative feedback loop, it will be determined by Putin’s own choices, his escalation, not prescribed in advance by DC policymakers.
– So then as we look at this toolkit that the Biden administration has at its disposal, I want to talk about its use of the export administration regulations that do allow for the banning of foreign and domestic companies from exporting products to Russia. How do you see the administration potentially using this?
DALEEP SINGH: Yeah, this is an important tool in our toolkit. Much like financial sanctions, export controls deny something to Russia that it needs and that it can’t replace from anywhere else. In the case of export controls, we’re talking about critical technology inputs. In the case of financial sanctions, we’re talking about foreign capital. So when I say critical technology inputs, I’m talking about the foundational technologies of our time– artificial intelligence, semiconductors, quantum computing, robotics, hypersonic flight.
In almost each of those cases, these technologies are designed, they’re produced, by the US or one of our allies and partners. And it’s not surprising. The West and open societies tend to be where innovation, entrepreneurship, and risk-taking flourish.
If we shut down those critical technology inputs, then President Putin has very little ability to diversify his economy outside of oil and gas. He has very limited ability to modernize his economy. He said himself he has strategic ambition to develop an aerospace sector, a modern defense sector, a high-tech sector. He can’t do that without these technologies.
– And so how does that work in concert with some of the efforts also then and the initiatives coming from allies and partners in Europe?
DALEEP SINGH: Yeah, it can only work in tandem with our allies and partners in Europe, but also in Asia. So take semiconductors. We know almost all of the leading-edge semiconductor chips are produced in Taiwan and Korea. And what this rule allows us to do is to move in lockstep with our European partners as well as our Asian partners.
And so that’s what shuts out– that’s what shuts out Russia from the critical technologies that it needs. China has been mentioned as a substitute. But if you look at each of those technologies, and you consider how much could China actually substitute, not just for what the US supplies, but also Europe and Asia, it’s a very small percentage of the total.
– So then how much of this ramping up could we expect in the next tranche of sanctions?
DALEEP SINGH: That’s up to President Putin. You know, this was the beginning of an invasion. And this was the beginning of our response. What I can tell you is that the cost could ratchet much higher. Yesterday, the financial sanctions we imposed on banks, on Russian banks, they had about $80 billion dollars in assets. If we were to take these measures on the two largest banks in Russia, you’re looking at $750 billion in assets. It’s almost 10 times higher.
We’ve yet to unveil any of these export controls that I just described. The sanctions that we placed on Russian elites, we had a list of five of them that we imposed sanctions on yesterday. There’s a much longer list of people in Russia who benefited from kleptocracy and gained from corruption at the expense of the Russian people. And now, they’re going to have to share in the pain of these sanctions.
– Now, as is always the case with sanctions, obviously the possibility of blowback. And we did see President Biden acknowledging that sanctions and possible retaliatory sanctions from Russia could impact American consumers, who are already dealing with record-high inflation. Now, we have seen that the US is eyeing a release from oil reserves as prices rise on Ukraine issues. What can Americans expect in terms of energy prices in the short to long term? And how are the supply chains being managed to try and lessen the blow?
DALEEP SINGH: Yeah, well, if you look at the linkages between the Russian economy and the US economy, the direct trade linkages are fairly modest. Russia’s our 26th largest goods trading partner. The financial linkages as well, they’re more significant, but they’re also contained. And investors have had years and years to reduce their exposures to Russia. It’s really in the energy markets where Russia has systemic importance– second-largest producer of natural gas in the world, third-largest producer of crude oil.
Let me make a few points here, though. Number one, none of our measures are designed to reduce Russia’s ability to supply crude oil to global markets. Number two, there’s been no supply disruption thus far from Russia as it relates to oil. Number three, it would be a terrible mistake for Russia to weaponize its oil supply. As I mentioned before, it depends on oil and gas revenues for its exports and for the Russian government’s budget revenues.
And number four– and this is really important– think of the counterfactual if we mounted no response to unchecked Russian aggression in the heart of Europe. This could be the largest land invasion in Europe in the post-Cold War era.
Think of the uncertainties it would cause if that occurred without any response from the West, the chilling effect it would cause, the questions that will be asked about which country is next and which autocrat, which bully was going to exert– was going to try to exert a sphere of influence somewhere else. Those costs would be much higher. And those are not costs we’re willing to tolerate.
– And it certainly is a balancing act between having these sanctions to try and calm things down versus perhaps pushing too far and seeing retaliation get further and further. But we did see that when it came to the annexation of Crimea, there were also tough sanctions put in place. But the annex– and the annexation did still happen. How do you respond to concerns that either the sanctions don’t go far enough or that they won’t be enough to stop President Putin from claiming these regions of Donetsk and Luhansk?
DALEEP SINGH: Well, people need to understand is that we follow a set of guiding principles when we think about sanctions. We’re not cowboys applying arbitrary and capricious sanctions to the rest of the world. They have to be– they have to be powerful enough to demonstrate our resolve. That’s important. But number two, they have to be responsible to avoid unwanted spillovers to the global economy.
Number three, they have to be– we believe they have to be coordinated. So we design them to maximize the chance of moving in lockstep with our partners. Number four, they have to be sustainable. Sanctions work over the long term. And lastly, they have to be flexible. They have to preserve our option to escalate or de-escalate depending on Putin’s choices.
– Well, thank you so much for joining us today. Daleep Singh, the Deputy National Security Advisor for International Economics under the Biden administration, thank you for your update.
Arnold Schwarzenegger says he’s been 80% vegan the past 5 years and his ‘bad’ cholesterol is now so low his doctor thought he ‘might be a different person’
Gabby Landsverk – February 22, 2022
Arnold Schwarzenegger said he’d been mostly vegan for the past five years.
The bodybuilding champ said he ate about 80% plant-based food and it kept his cholesterol low.
He also said he had an occasional treat like a steak, which experts say can keep a diet sustainable.
The bodybuilding legend Arnold Schwarzenegger said he’d been eating a mostly plant-based diet for the past five years and it significantly lowered his cholesterol.
Schwarzenegger said in a recent edition of his email newsletter that about 80% of what he ate was vegan. He said he made an occasional exception for steak or Austrian wiener schnitzel — leaving room for treats in your diet can help avoid restriction and help you stick to a diet long term, experts previously told Insider.
“My bad cholesterol number is so low that my doctor thought I might be a different person,” Schwarzenegger said in the newsletter.
Certain animal-based foods like fatty cuts of meat, processed meats like bacon and hot dogs, and dairy products like cheese are linked to higher cholesterol levels.
The U.S. Finally Cuts the Crap and Calls It a Russian Invasion
Emil Filtenborg, Stefan Weichert – February 22, 2022
LEONID SHCHEGLOV
ZOLOTE, Ukraine—Every building in the neighborhood of Zolote-3 near the front line in Eastern Ukraine is marked by war. Many have broken windows and bullet holes in the walls; others have been completely destroyed by eight years of Russian artillery fire.
The school—which has just seven students left—has attached wooden boards to the lower parts of the windows to protect the children from fragments of war.
“We are afraid—when we are home, if we have to go to work and if we are going shopping. We are afraid all the time. They can hit us at any time,” says schoolteacher Sveta, 46. “But I cannot leave, I don’t know where to go. I just want this war to end.”
But the conflict isn’t going to end anytime soon. It’s just getting started. And finally, White House officials who have dawdled over using the “I-word” are catching up to their European counterparts and calling the latest round of Russian aggression what it, in fact, is: the start of an invasion.
“We think this is, yes, the beginning of an invasion, Russia’s latest invasion into Ukraine… an invasion is an invasion and that is what is underway.” John Finer, deputy national security adviser to the Biden administration, said in a CNN appearance on Tuesday.
And with good reason, as Russian troops and military vehicles have been pouring into Ukraine since Monday night, after President Vladimir Putin gave a rambling ahistorical speech about Moscow’s right to control Ukraine, a nation he sees as part of a larger Russian empire.
Putin’s military now stretches into the regions of Eastern Ukraine that were already under the control of pro-Kremlin rebels who seized power in parts of Donbas at the height of the last incursion, which began in 2014.
The grandiose speech Putin gave from the Kremlin on Monday raises fears that his ambitions do not end there.
His main spokesman Dmitry Peskov appeared to confirm on Tuesday that Russia would “recognize” the broader regions claimed by the rebel areas even though they are currently controlled by Ukraine, although he refused to clarify.
If the Russian military was ordered to enter those areas, that would almost certainly mean a direct military confrontation with the Ukrainian armed forces. And now, Putin has officially won approval from the Federation Council to use Russia’s Armed Forces abroad.
Valentina Matviyenko, the head of the upper house of parliament, announced on Tuesday that Putin had requested permission from lawmakers to deploy troops abroad. She said the decision was based on the fact that “these will be peacekeeping troops aimed at bringing peace to the Donbas.” She went on to claim the troops would “create normal living conditions for people and ensure security.”
The Defense Ministry also spoke out in favor of sending troops abroad, saying: “Russia will take all available measures to eliminate threats to peace in the Donbas, the situation is intensifying, we must take residents of Donbas under our protection.”
“The Kremlin has taken another step towards the revival of the Soviet Union,” said Ukraine’s defense minister, Oleksii Reznikov, on Tuesday.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, who appeared to spend much of the past weeks tamping down Western expectations of an imminent invasion, responded to the arrival of Russian troops on his country’s soil by calling for an emergency meeting of the United Nations Security Council. He spoke with President Joe Biden over the phone and, even before the latest Russian escalation, he told leaders including Vice President Kamala Harris that they needed to take concrete action before a full invasion, demanding a shift away “from a policy of appeasement” in a speech at the Munich security conference on Saturday.
The United States, the European Union and Britain were set to announce new sanctions on Russia on Tuesday in response to Putin’s decision to formally recognize the independence of Luhansk and Donetsk regions, which are under the control of pro-Kremlin stooges but on sovereign Ukrainian land.
There was a debate raging over whether to unleash a full package of sanctions now or wait to see if a full invasion of Ukraine follows. By then, some argue, it may be too late.
On the ground in Eastern Ukraine, the population continues to wait as the movement of these great tectonic plates is broadcast on their televisions.
“Of course, I heard about Putin’s speech but I don’t know what to think. Ukrainian experts say that he will attack, Americans say something and Russians say something. I don’t know what to think. I really don’t. It is a war of politics, not a war between people here,” Andriy, 38, who works in a mine in Toretsk near the front line, told The Daily Beast.
“I will not evacuate if Russia invades. I didn’t do that back in 2014. I was scared back then, as I am now, but I will not evacuate. I will continue to work, scared, of course, but continue to work.”
The fear has been ratcheting up since late last week, when the local population described the shelling as becoming more and more intense.
It has become familiar over seven years of sporadic shelling and ceasefire violations that include machine-gun fire and mortar attacks, but you can never truly become accustomed to the onslaught. The sound bounces off buildings and the landscape, making it hard to locate. It reflects. Every shell comes as a surprise and your body shakes a little and you feel the pressure or shock wave from the blast—even from far away. As it comes closer, your brain starts to panic somehow, to wonder where it happens next.
In Zolote-3, the population used to stand at more than a thousand, but the relentless pressure of an enormous, hostile neighbor has seen it dwindle to just a few hundred, mainly pensioners. At the entrance to the school, a drawing warns children not to pick up anything suspicious and to keep away from dangerous places.
“Call 101,” says a drawing outside the school, teaching kids to call the authorities if they see something like an undetonated bomb.Emil Filtenborg/The Daily Beast
The OSCE reported 1,500 ceasefire violations on Saturday alone, leaving the teachers increasingly concerned. “The situation now is terrible. There have been so many shootings in the last three days,” said Sveta, over the weekend. “I cannot even go to work. Children just sit at home. We cannot let them go out.”
The Daily Beast was stopped in the city by 60-year-old Larysa, who stands at her balcony in an apartment block, which she says is almost abandoned.
“We have shootings every hour. Shootings and shootings. I can hear it all the time,” she says, “We don’t need that here. We want peace. We want things to be normal.”
Her neighbors have left, mainly to the Ukrainian port city of Odessa, Larysa explains. Her children and grandchildren have also left, and she feels abandoned.
“We want peace, we want peace, we want peace,” she says.
Larysa has faith in the Ukrainian President to provide peace, but she fears all-out war will break out.Emil Filtenborg/The Daily Beast
The neighborhood of Zolote-3 is part of a larger area named Zolote, which is divided into five parts. Zolote-5 is under the control of the Russian-backed separatists, and Zolote-4 is split in two right on the front line. In Zolote-1 and Zolote-2, a few miles from the front line, the locals also complain about the increased number of ceasefire violations.
They can hear mortar attacks frequently and feel the waves from the explosions. Like Zolote-3, they have also suffered from war and economic decay. People in these parts of Zolote are dependent on the local coal mine for jobs.
Pavel, 52, who doesn’t want to provide his last name, recently retired from working in the mines. He fears that it will soon close and leave everyone without work.
“Before the war, we lived peacefully and calmly,” says Pavel, who served in the Soviet Army in his younger years and says he doesn’t have a negative view of Russia. “Back then, we were one country, one people, and now we are divided and we are only ruins.”
He says that what he experiences now is “brothers going against brothers” and that there isn’t anything worse than that. Such a war is “scary,” he says.
Russian troops are now stationed just a few miles from his home. A British Cabinet minister warned Tuesday: “The invasion of Ukraine has begun.”
Zelensky said Kyiv would not accept Russia’s de facto land grab in Donbas. “We are on our land, we are not afraid of anything and anyone, we don’t owe anything to anyone, and we will not give away anything to anyone,” he said in a televised address Tuesday morning.
The president added that Ukraine’s international borders will “remain as such” regardless of Russia’s “declarations and threats.”
Nina Vasilievna, 72, said the latest mortar attack on Zolote was so close to her that her balcony was trembling. She, however, said that she wasn’t afraid.
“There was no panic for me. My hope is in the Lord. He provides calm. People without God are, of course, in a panic. In fear. But my hope is in the Lord. If it were not for God, I would also be in a panic,” she told The Daily Beast.
“Children in Russia are also panicking. My daughter and my granddaughter say, ‘Come on Mom, come on. We’re going away’, but I’ve already been here for eight years. Even while Russia took the city [in 2014]. I will stay here,” she says.
A neutral Ukraine could shatter Putin’s claims on the former Soviet republic | Opinion
AJ Morris – February 22, 2022
In the early years of his ongoing 24-year run as the leader of the Russian Federation, Vladimir Putin once mused that, “Whoever does not miss the Soviet Union has no heart. Whoever does has no head.”
Whether this quip is an intentional play on a similar line by French statesman Francois Guizot in 1830 is unclear, but it serves to provide us with an irony-soaked window into Putin’s geopolitical worldview.
As Putin places his armed forces yet again on the borders of Ukraine and into the middle of the first crisis of 2022, things certainly feel like Cold War 2.0. One wonders, “Where is Putin’s head?”
Why Putin wants Ukraine in his fold
A glance around Russia’s periphery might help us understand.
Dave Granlund cartoon Putin Ukraine
The Eurasian Economic Union is not exactly a nightly topic on Western cable news. But since its formation in 2015, it has grown into the 10th largest economy in the world. The member states are all former members of the Soviet Union, anchored by three key players: Russia, Belarus, and Kazakhstan.
It may not have the heart of the Soviet Union, but Putin’s new bloc has all the same resources. What’s missing in this “RUBK” cube, as author Austin Bay calls it, is the “U.” Ukraine’s addition to the EEU would transform the EEU into a major world economic power. Ukraine has industry and agriculture the other pieces of the cube lack.
Unfortunately for Putin, the Ukrainian people remember the days of the Soviet Union very well. They remember the famine of 1932 and the millions of deaths that followed. They have made it clear since 2014 that they prefer not to invite the spiritual successor of the hammer and sickle back.
Putin needs Ukraine to complete his economic powerhouse. He seems prepared to take it by force and, as his predecessor Boris Yeltsin once put it, “sit on a throne of bayonets.” Ukraine seems to have few options.
Here’s what Ukraine can do
A NATO membership is one option. Joining the alliance comes with serious commitments for Ukraine, however, and would create a major point of direct geostrategic friction between Russia and the alliance.
Diplomacy is an art of give and take, of being heard but also hearing. Russia claims its military buildup is over concerns about Ukraine being included in NATO and about NATO aggression. Ukraine says it is concerned about (further) Russian invasion and violation of its sovereignty. Perhaps a neutral Ukraine is the answer.
Ukraine has traditionally been a bridge between East and West. Let it continue to be. If Switzerland and Austria can be neutral countries on the European stage, why not Ukraine?
A treaty that establishes a neutral Ukraine takes it out of contention for all parties and allows Ukraine to remain sovereign. It would also allow Putin to save face for his troop buildup while simultaneously removing the pretext he needs for military action. A neutral Ukraine doesn’t fit into Putin’s “RUBK” cube.
If Putin will not accept a treaty of neutrality and decides to take Ukraine or a part of it by force, make it abundantly clear that this means the absolute end of Russian economic ties to the continent. In addition to sanctions, perhaps full-on embargoes of Russian gas and oil should be considered as a deterrence measure. Give soft power the teeth it needs to work so that kinetic power doesn’t have to.
The punchline of Yeltsin’s quote about a throne of bayonets is that “you can’t sit on it for long.” There is still time to keep from finding out.
AJ Morris, a Jackson, Tennessee native. is a captain in the United States Army. His opinions are strictly his own and do not reflect the opinions of the Department of Defense.
