Thursday, April 24, saw a steep escalation of tensions between Moscow and Kiev after the Ukrainian army killed up to five pro-Russian militiamen in an attack on three checkpoints outside the eastern town of Slavyansk. President Vladimir Putin threatened “consequences.” He added that the legitimacy of the May 25 elections was in serious question. Defense Minister Gen. Sergey Shoigu ordered the Russian army to start drills at Rostov on Don near the Ukraine border.
debkafile’s military sources report that this order amounted to a state of alert, which required the troops to close their distance to the Ukraine border and take up prepared positions as bridgeheads for entering East Ukraine when the order is given.
Ukraine’s acting president demanded that Moscow pull its troops back from the border and stop “blackmail.”
In the past 48 hours, Russian officials have kept up an unprecedented stream of invective against the provisional government in Kiev and the Obama administration’s military, intelligence and financial intervention in Ukraine.
The opening shot was fired by Russia’s UN ambassador Vitaly Churkin, who Wednesday, April 23, blamed the US for the “pushing through the most radical scenario” in Kiev to save its $5 billion investment in regime change.
He was commenting on the statement by US Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland who told CNN Monday that the US had invested around $5 billion in supporting democracy in Ukraine since the fall of the Soviet Union.
Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov came next. He charged Washington with “running the show very much, very much.” As proof, Lavrov pointed to the timing of the Ukrainian government's re-launch of its security operation just after a two-day visit by US Vice President Joe Biden. The Ukraine army “had been ordered to shoot at people engaged in peaceful protests,” he said. Yet Kiev had failed to disarm its own extremists.
This was rounded off Thursday by Putin, who accused the Kiev “junta” of using the “military machine” to perpetrate a “very, very serious war crime against its own people” and promised “consequences.”
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The Kenyan's perfect distraction. Unlike the war on terror, which lasts forever, this one can be over with in minutes. Both can leave him in the seat of power. At least that's what he believes.
ReplyDeleteHe's biting off more than he can chew.
DeleteAntichrist Obama, THE poster boy for the term Despair; That sick sinking feeling you get when you realize that your leader, the person on whom your very life depends, doesn't have the slightest clue.
ReplyDeletedoesn't have the slightest clue.
DeleteAbsolutely.