Dear SteeleRedux,

You wrote: “The toll they had been enacting on ethnic Russians in Eastern Ukraine should in my opinion been recognised by the West and condemned. It wasn't..”

That was the point of my post starting this thread. Condemnation is selective. Russians were not condemned for what they were doing in Syria but were condemned for the invasion of Ukraine.

I have dismissed the wrongs done to ethnic Russians in Ukraine as I thought it was Russian propaganda justifying their invasion. I have been skeptical of their claims. I could be wrong.

Hey SteeleRedux,
I think its probably fair to say that we all tend to sway towards a bias of what we already believe to some degree.

I remember ttbn commenting at one point about how no matter what discussion we have here and no matter what arguments we all make to share our opinions and info, that none of us really ever change our positions too much, which is kind of interesting.

So that if you're skeptical of anything the smells like a conspiracy, you'll always tend to think with that bias,
Whereas if I tend to believe those things more than others, I'm always going to think of things from that kind of bias.

I do remember though following the whole White Helmets thing in Ukraine, and I tended to believe it, but I did have different sources.

I watched George Webb on youtube for quite some time and kept up with quite a lot of it, until his entire collection of videos were deleted.

That path I went down watching his videos opened my mind up to just how much stuff is really going on behind what people think.
Even now he's been to at least half a dozen countries in Western Europe in the past week, but I can only get snippets of info from his twitter and I don't have access to his paid subscription.
http://www.neighborhoodnewsstudio.com/

You also have to be honest as well, there isn't really any investigative journalism these days, it's all just reporters parroting the same info.
You have to ask the question why we don't see more opposing views?
It really makes you wonder if we're all just being fed what they want us to know.
We can only make judgements based of info were given, so it stands to reason that if one were to control that info, then they control what we think and believe.
A couple others:
http://www.mintpressnews.com/
http://www.brassballs.blog/

I found another potentially good looking source of info today. Gonzalo Lira
http://www.youtube.com/channel/UCPxpPT4b4vnDlX0sBGz3r4Q
Zelensky, Hunter Biden — and Their Sugar Daddy, Kolomoisky
http://youtu.be/fUPKZkqXfZI

"I have dismissed the wrongs done to ethnic Russians in Ukraine as I thought it was Russian propaganda justifying their invasion. I have been skeptical of their claims. I could be wrong."

I think there's definitely an element of ethnic hate going on here though.

I heard that Slavic people are very racist in their own way, if that's the right word, that they judge on a basis of how Slavic others are, and I watched a video today where a elderly Russian woman in Eastern Ukraine spoke about potentially being targetted just for having a common Russian surname.

- And there is definitely a hatred of Russians going on.
I think they hate the Russian speaking people, they seem to be quite serious about spoken language and wanting everything Ukrainian.

Dear davidf,

Perhaps reading some UN reports might provide balance.

For instance this one details some of the abuses: http://www.ohchr.org/sites/default/files/Documents/Countries/UA/Ukraine_14th_HRMMU_Report.pdf

Under the heading "Ukrainian law enforcement, armed and security forces", reads the following:

48. In the majority of cases documented by OHCHR, law enforcement employed threats of sexual violence against individuals detained under charges of terrorism, along with other forms of torture and ill-treatment during interrogation. Two of the documented cases took place in or around Avdiivka in April and May 2015. A male detainee who was subjected to torture and forced to confess to his involvement in the armed groups on camera, was subsequently threatened with sexual violence, told that he would be handcuffed and raped by a homosexual man. Two women from the same family, aged 18 and 41, were tortured and repeatedly threatened with sexual violence.

49. Other documented cases appear to be linked to the military presence in densely populated civilian areas, such as towns near the contact line, and general impunity. A man with a mental disability was subject to cruel treatment, rape and other forms of sexual violence by eight to 10 members of the ‘Azov’ and ‘Donbas’ battalions in August-September 2014. The victim’s health subsequently deteriorated and he was hospitalized in a psychiatric hospital.

“A resident of Mariupol was detained by three servicemen of the ‘Azov’ battalion on 28 January 2015 for supporting the ‘Donetsk people’s republic’. He was taken to the basement of Athletic School No. 61 in Mariupol, where he was held until 6 February 2015. He was continuously interrogated and tortured. He complained about being handcuffed to a metal rod and left hanging on it, he was reportedly tortured with electricity, gas mask and subjected to waterboarding and he was also beaten in his genitals. As a result he confessed about sharing information with the armed groups about the locations of the Government checkpoints. Only on 7 February, he was taken to the Mariupol SBU, where he was officially detained.”

Both sides are implicit in these abuses but the Azov and other Nazi groups feature strongly in these reports.

Dear Armchair Critic,

I understand the flow of information and spin can make it seem like nothing has substance, but by and large we are served by broadcasters like our ABC and the BBC which at least strive to get us decent and believable coverage.

I do note you have posted another 5 links. The offer to dissect one of them still stands if you wanted to put it forward.

One thing I found funny was an attempt by Lavrov to portray Zelensky as a Nazi by claiming Hitler had Jewish roots (as in ancestry).

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-61296682

Is this debate trying to elucidate the philosophical makeup of Ukrainians and so guess their future? Would such an approach have been useful in guessing the future of post ww2 Japan and West Germany?

I see that Gerasimov got hit with shrapnel near Izyum, then got evacuated asap. He was there to direct the special operation. Russia could have lost over 25,000 troops by some accounts, as well as about a third of its equipment directed to the invasion, and possibly 70% of its precision munitions. The Russian offensive is literally bogged down and they are getting clobbered by the assisted Ukrainian army, making them more and more vulnerable to a range of counteroffensives, and closer to collapse. Putin might be about to go under the knife, so that might be the end of him.