Showing posts with label invasion. Show all posts
Showing posts with label invasion. Show all posts
Sunday, 24 August 2014
Monday, 3 March 2014
Obama: Russia is 'on the wrong side of history' in Ukraine
The world believes
Russia Ukraine
"The world is
largely united in recognizing that the steps Russia Ukraine
The U.S. President
stressed that Russia Ukraine
Obama called on
U.S. Congress to adopt an assistance package to the Ukrainian government as a
'first order of business.'
Sunday, 2 March 2014
Dictator Putin's Waffen SS - RUSSIAN AGGRESSION ON FOREIGN SOIL
The Crimean Prime Minister said Saturday that Russian troops are operating on the Ukrainian peninsula and made a personal appeal to Russian President Vladimir Putin for more assistance.
The Kremlin said in a subsequent statement that it would not ignore the request for help.
Sergei Aksyonov, who was appointed prime minister after a parliamentary vote Thursday, said that an agreement was in place with Russia’s Black Sea Fleet for Russian soldiers to perform guard duties at strategic locations.
“We have established cooperation with the Black Sea Fleet to protect vitally important sites,” Aksyonov said during a Cabinet meeting.
There have been widespread reports of significant Russian military activity, including the movement of tanks, troops and helicopters, across the Crimea in recent days. But Russia has insisted that all the movements are allowed within the framework of a 1997 agreement with Ukraine about the use of naval bases.
“I am turning to Russian President Vladimir Putin to request assistance to preserve peace and calm,” said Aksyonov, who is the leader of Ukraine’s Russian Unity Party.
Aksyonov also announced that a referendum on the status of Crimea within Ukraine will be brought forward by almost two months, to March 30, and said that local security forces including the police and the army - which are usually commanded from Kiev - will be brought under his control.
The developments in Crimea appear to bring closer a possible partition of the former Soviet nation where a new government is struggling to control the country after the ouster of President Viktor Yanukovych last week.
Putin has made no public comment on the current Ukrainian crisis since the opposition swept to power after months of street protests ended in a violent crackdown in which 82 people died.
Armed men in balaclavas have occupied key public buildings in Crimea in recent days and appeared to have taken control of the region’s two main airports. The Crimean parliament was seized Thursday by armed men who raised the Russian flag.
One of Ukraine’s largest telecommunications companies said in a statement Friday that telephone and internet links between Crimea and the rest of the country had been severed.
The incoming authorities in Kiev have described developments in Crimea as an invasion, and interim president Oleksandr Turchynov told reporters late Friday that Russia was seeking to provoke conflict.
Russia has recently moved about 6,000 additional troops into Crimea, Ukraine's defense minister said Saturday, according to report by Reuters news agency.
Crimea was transferred to the Ukrainian Republic by the Soviet leadership in 1954. Since the fall of Communism it has enjoyed a large degree of political autonomy within Ukraine, including its own prime minister.
About 60 percent of the population in Crimea identifies itself as ethnic Russian, with the remainder being Ukrainian or Crimean Tatar.
Pro-Russian groups and Tatars, who mostly support the new regime in Kiev, clashed outside the Crimean parliament Thursday during a confrontation in which at least two people died.
Saturday, 1 March 2014
MARCH 1st 2014 - 2000 GMT
UKRAINE ARMED FORCES
ON COMBAT ALERT
Ukraine armed forces on full combat alert
Ukraine put its armed forces on full combat alert and warned Russia that any military intervention in the country would lead to war.
After a more than three-hour meeting with security and defence chiefs, Acting President Oleksander Turchinov said there was no justification for what he called Russian aggression against his country.
Standing beside Turchinov, Prime Minister Arseny Yatseniuk said he had urged Russia to return its troops to base in the Crimea region during a phone call with Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev and called for talks.
"Military intervention would be the beginning of war and the end of any relations between Ukraine and Russia," Yatseniuk told reporters.
UPDATE AT 22.22 GMT
Two Russian anti-submarine warships have appeared off the Ukrainian coast near the Crimea port of Sevastopol, violating an agreement on the naval base there, Russian news agency Interfax reports quoting Ukrainian military source.
UPDATES:- Moscow Times
UPDATE AT 22.22 GMT
Report: Two Russian warships off the Ukrainian coast
UPDATES:- Moscow Times
22:15
Sevastopol City Council refuses to recognize Kyiv leadership
21:55
West has no right for armed intervention in Ukraine - Russian upper house head
21:43
21:20
Yanukovych slams Kyiv leaders' attempts to "force their ways on Crimea"
21:06
Russian legislator: 143,000 cross border from Ukraine since outbreak of violence
20:59
KREMLIN EXPRESSES HOPE TENSIONS OVER UKRAINE WILL STOP ESCALATING
20:57
PUTIN TO DECIDE WHETHER TO SEND TROOPS TO UKRAINE, RECALL AMBASSADOR FROM U.S. DEPENDING ON DEVELOPMENTS - SPOKESMAN
20:53
Putin himself to decide how many troops to deploy in Ukraine - lawmaker
20:34
Putin may not immediately exercise authority to use troops in Crimea - rep
20:24
Putin spokesman: "no decision" yet on parliament appeal to recall ambassador from U.S.
20:17
Russian upper house to ask for ambassador to be recalled from U.S.
20:10
PUTIN HAS NOT YET REACTED TO UPPER HOUSE APPEAL TO RECALL AMBASSADOR FROM U.S. - SPOKESMAN
20:08
MOSCOW URGES INTL PRESSURE ON KYIV TO NORMALIZE SITUATION IN UKRAINE
20:05
Russian upper house authorizes Putin to use troops in Ukraine
19:49
DECIDING HOW MANY TROOPS TO SEND TO CRIMEA PREROGATIVE OF PUTIN AS COMMANDER-IN-CHIEF - UPPER HOUSE MEMBER
19:46
RUSSIAN DECISION TO USE ARMED FORCES IN CRIMEA MAY TAKE TIME TO BE PUT INTO PRACTICE - SENIOR DIPLOMAT
19:44
RUSSIAN UPPER HOUSE TO APPEAL TO PUTIN TO RECALL AMBASSADOR FROM U.S.
19:41
RESOLUTION ALLOWING USE OF RUSSIAN ARMED FORCES IN UKRAINE IN EFFECT FROM MOMENT IT WAS PASSED - UPPER HOUSE CHIEF
19:40
RUSSIAN UPPER HOUSE GIVES GO-AHEAD TO USE OF RUSSIAN ARMED FORCES IN UKRAINE
19:38
LAWMAKER SAYS 143,000 HAVE CROSSED UKRAINE-RUSSIA BORDER SINCE UKRAINE CONFLICT STARTED
19:35
Russian legislator slams Obama for "direct threat" to Russia
19:15
Yanukovych asks Russian parliament to help Crimea - lawmaker
19:05
RUSSIAN LAWMAKER SAYS OBAMA HAS ISSUED DIRECT THREAT TO RUSSIA, URGES RECALLING RUSSIAN AMBASSADOR FROM U.S.
19:02
18:32
Russian Duma to "definitely" send observers to Crimea referendum - lawmaker
18:15
German foreign minister phones Moscow about Ukraine
18:13
Putin seeks parliamentary go-ahead for use of Russian armed forces in Crimea
17:56
PUTIN PUTS PROPOSAL BEFORE UPPER HOUSE OF PARLIAMENT FOR USE OF RUSSIAN ARMED FORCES IN UKRAINE UNTIL SITUATION NORMALIZES - KREMLIN
17:38
Protesters put Russian flag on Donetsk region admin HQ
17:20
Russia slams Western countries' attempts to "flirts" with Islamist rebels in Syria
Russian military regains its clout
Refitting Soviet-era warships, fielding new aircraft and tanks and seeking new overseas bases, the Russian military — which now has troops on alert amidst a crisis in Ukraine — is more potent than the force that briefly fought Georgia six years ago.
Moscow is seriously investing in building its clout. Since 2008, it has raised military spending by almost a third and drastically reformed both the armed forces and defense industry to tackle post-Cold War decay.
But Russian forces remain much weaker than at their Soviet peak and face huge problems ranging from corruption to a long-term shortage of recruits, not to mention the risk of insurgency if they set foot in Ukraine.
Moscow denies any direct link between the surprise military drills announced Wednesday and Ukraine, where largely pro-Western demonstrators ousted President Viktor Yanukovych, an ally of Russian leader Vladimir Putin, last weekend.
Nevertheless, the decision to put 150,000 troops on high alert along with jet fighters on Russia’s Western borders — where Ukraine lies — raised memories of Putin’s invasion of Georgia. Moscow’s expressions of concern for the safety of Russian citizens in Ukraine have also used similar language to statements that preceded the Georgian campaign.
In that five-day war, Russian troops evicted their Georgian counterparts from the disputed regions of South Ossetia and Abkhazia. But the outdated forces suffered losses at the hands of the sometimes more technically advanced, Western-equipped Georgians, prompting soul-searching and criticism in Moscow.
According to some accounts, three of the four Russian aircraft lost were downed by their own side.
The International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) in London estimates defense spending rose 31 percent between 2008 and 2013 to $68.2 billion. Russia is now firmly established as the world’s third-largest military spender, behind the U.S. and China, and the chaos under former President Boris Yeltsin, who stood down in 1999 to make way for Putin, is a thing of the past.
“There is a sense in the broader U.S. political discussion that Russia is still the basket case military of the Yeltsin era, but that is wrong,” said Elbridge Colby, a former Pentagon official and now fellow at the Center for a New American Security. “(It) is not the Red Army of the 1970s, but it has made considerable strides.”
While Russian officials say Moscow will not intervene in Ukraine, many Western analysts are skeptical about their assertions that the exercises are not linked to the crisis in the former Soviet republic. Russia’s saber-rattling, they say, is another sign of its military confidence.
“There is certainly an element of intimidation to it,” said Dmitry Gorenburg, Russia specialist at the U.S. government-funded Center for Naval Analyses. “They have put a great deal of effort into military reforms since Georgia, and some of it has worked. They probably do have a greater ability to intervene in Ukraine than they did then — it’s not that big a step up.”
While any actual invasion could initially succeed, he said Moscow might struggle in the face of a resultant insurgency. A more limited operation in majority Russian-speaking Crimea — already home to Russia’s Black Sea Fleet — could prove more achievable but is also seen as unlikely for now.
Russia says it is ready to work with the West on resolving the crisis but the interests of all Ukrainians must be taken into account. It accuses the new leaders in Kiev of violating a Western-backed peace deal and ignoring the interests of Russian-speakers.
The war games, scheduled to last from Friday until next week, are not the first of their kind. In September, the Zapad-13 exercise in Belarus saw 10,000 Russian troops deployed along the border with the Baltic states, former Soviet republics that now belong to the European Union. Another surprise exercise last July in Russia’s east involved 160,000 troops and was seen as a reminder that Moscow also remains nervous about its border with China.
Both exercises involved a level of activity that Russian forces would have been incapable of even five years ago, analysts say.
Russia is also asserting itself on the world stage. While its ability to send the army much beyond former Soviet borders seems limited, its warships have increased operations in the Arctic, Pacific, Baltic and Atlantic while returning to a near-permanent presence in the Indian Ocean and Mediterranean for the first time in years. Russian long-range bombers are again periodically probing NATO airspace.
On Wednesday, Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said Moscow is planning to expand its presence outside its borders with new military bases in a number of countries.
How viable these plans might be is unclear.
Since Georgia, Russia has abolished its cumbersome structure of undermanned divisions designed to fight on massive European fronts, replacing them with much more flexible smaller brigades and reducing the size of its officer corps by a third.
Its armaments industry was reorganized into a small number of largely state-owned firms, while Moscow promised that by 2020, 70 percent of its military equipment will be modernized. It has also partnered French manufacturers in building helicopter carriers, other European firms on ground vehicles and Israeli specialists on unmanned drones.
According to IISS, Russia now operates one aircraft carrier, five cruisers, 18 destroyers, nine frigates and 82 coastal warships as well as 64 submarines — 11 carrying ballistic missiles. Its air force is believed to have about 1,400 combat-capable aircraft.
IISS estimates Russia has 845,000 military personnel, with a largely theoretical reserve of 2 million with recent military service.
How much further the military will grow is also unclear. Corruption remains a serious problem. Demographics are also not going Russia’s way.
Still, “Moscow’s armed forces have already accomplished the organizational transition from mass mobilization army to modern combat force,” the German Institute for International and Security Affairs said in a January report. “Greater military muscle flexing must be expected.”
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