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Send us a textThis conversation delves into the complexities of the Ukraine-Russia war, focusing on the Maidan Massacre as a pivotal event that escalated the conflict. Professor Dr. Ivan Katchanovski discusses the historical roots of political violence in Ukraine, the division between pro-Russian and pro-Western sentiments, and the role of Western governments in the overthrow of Yanukovych. The discussion highlights the importance of understanding the origins of the conflict for potential resolution and the devastating consequences that have ensued. In this conversation, Ivan Katchanovski discusses the complex geopolitical situation surrounding Ukraine, its relationship with the West, and the ongoing conflict with Russia. He emphasizes the role of media misrepresentation, the human cost of the war, and the failures of international diplomacy. Katchanovski argues that Ukraine has become a client state of the West, and he critiques the decisions made by Ukrainian leadership, particularly Zelensky, in the context of the war. He highlights the significant casualties and the lack of transparency regarding the true impact of the conflict on Ukrainian society. In this conversation, Ivan Katchanovski discusses the ongoing conflict between Ukraine and Russia, focusing on the hidden casualties of war, the rhetoric of European leaders, the role of propaganda, predictions for the war's outcome, the potential for a realistic peace deal, and the influence of the Trump administration on conflict resolution. Katchanovski emphasizes the misrepresentation of casualties by Ukrainian officials, the increasing militarization of the European Union, and the necessity for a peace deal that acknowledges Russian demands to minimize the negative consequences for Ukraine and the West.===Go and fund Dr. Katchanovski's work.Russia-Ukraine War & Its Origin: https://gofund.me/173df0edThe Maidan Massacre in Ukraine: https://gofund.me/334b0e98===Books:The Maidan Massacre in Ukraine: The Mass Killing that Changed the World https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-031-67121-0Social Media:X: https://x.com/I_KatchanovskiAcademia: https://uottawa.academia.edu/IvanKatchanovski===Make Your Life a Masterpiece! Enroll NOW: programs.the-ykm.com/collectionstheykm.comthe-ykm.comwhyknowledgematters.comprograms.the-ykm.comtheykm.comthe-ykm.comwhyknowledgematters.com#whyknowledgematters #podcast #theykm #livelearnlove #educationthe ykm: That's WhyKnowledgeMattersSupport the show

This week we talk about Euromaidan, minerals deals, and propaganda.We also discuss European security, NATO, and the western-led world order.Recommended Book: Storm Front by Jim ButcherTranscriptIn February of 2014, pro-Russian protests racked parts of southeastern Ukraine and Russian soldiers, their uniforms and weapons stripped of flags and other identifying markers, occupied another part of Ukraine called Crimea.This was seemingly in response to Ukraine's overthrow of its pro-Russian president, Viktor Yanukovych, who was toppled as part of the Euromaidan protests, which were themselves a response to Yanukovych deciding to aim for closer ties with Russia, rather than signing an association agreement with the EU, which would have committed Ukraine to several EU-oriented reforms, related to corruption, among other things, while also giving Ukrainians many new rights, including visa-free movement and access to the European Investment Bank, beginning a few years later, in 2017.This sudden pivot away from the EU and toward Russia didn't go down well with the Ukrainian public, which had repeatedly shown it wanted to lean toward the west, and the Euromaidan protests were focused on weeding out government corruption; the existing government was accused of being all sorts of corrupt, and had also been accused of human rights abuses and allowing Russian oligarchs undo influence at the highest rungs of power; Yanukovych was in Russia's pocket, basically, and his overthrow made Russia worry that they would lose control of their neighbor.So Russia moved in to take part of Ukraine, basically uncontested, both internally and externally—a lot of other governments made upset noises about this, but Russia gave itself cover by removing their flags from their personnel, and that gave them the ability to paint everything that happened as a natural uprising from within Ukraine, the people wanting freedom from their Ukrainian oppressors, and Russia was just supporting this cry to overthrow oppressive tyrants, because they're very nice and love freedom.For the next eight years, the Ukrainian government fought separatist forces, funded and reinforced by the Russian government, in the southeastern portion of their country, while Russia expanded their infrastructure in Crimea, which again, they stole from Ukraine early on, and where they previously leased vital naval facilities from Ukraine; and those facilities are assumed to be a big part of why all this went down the way it did, as without said naval facilities, they wouldn't have a naval presence in the Black Sea.Then, in February of 2022, after a multi-month buildup of troops and military hardware along their shared border, which they provided all sorts of excuses for, and which many commentators and governments around the world excused as just a bunch of saber-rattling, nothing to worry about, Russia launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine, initially aiming for a blitzkrieg-like assault that was meant to take Ukraine's capital city, Kyiv, and decapitate the country's government within just days, at which point they could replace the government with someone who's working for them, another puppet they controlled.As of the day I'm recording this, in early March of 2025, the war is still ongoing, though. And in the years since it began, it's estimated that more than a million people have been killed or injured, while entire cities across Ukraine have been leveled and tens of thousands of Ukrainian refugees have fled Russia's forces as they've raped and pillaged and murdered their way across the Ukrainian countryside, those refugees leaving for destinations around the world, but creating a refugee crisis in nearby European nations like Poland and Germany, in particular.There's been a lot of back and forth in this conflict, Russia initially thought to have a massive upper hand, probably winning within days, as intended, but then Ukraine held fast, Russia redeployed its troops and armor, Ukraine got some remarkable counter-attacks in, and then Russia started to reset its economy to allow for a more drawn-out conflict.As of early 2025, Russia is once against considered to have the upper-hand, and though Ukraine has been holding the line even in the most under-assault regions in the eastern portion of its territory, and has in recent weeks managed to take some Russian-held territory back, Russia's comparably larger number of troops, its recent resupply of soldiers from North Korea, its larger economy and number of supply chains, and its relationships with entities like China and Iran, in addition to North Korea, all of which have been supplying it with things it needs to keep the war effort going, at length, have all conspired to put Ukraine on the back foot.Additionally, Ukraine is struggling, after this many years of total war, to refill empty boots and make do with whatever their allies can and will offer them, in terms of money, weapons, but also the basics, like food and fuel. They've been able to shore-up some limited aspects of their economy, and have innovated like crazy when it comes to things like drones and other fundamentals of asymmetric, defensive warfare, but right now at least, the larger forces swirling around in the geopolitical realm are making life difficult for Ukraine, and for those who are still supporting them.And that's what I'd like to talk about today; the continuing conflict in Ukraine, but especially what's happening on the sidelines, beyond the battle itself—and how those sideline happenings might lead to some fundamental changes in how Europe is organized, and the makeup of the modern world order.—At this point I've done probably half a dozen or more episodes on this conflict; it's long-lasting, it's big, it's important locally, but also globally, and it's been informing both geopolitical and economic outcomes since day one.Today I'd like to talk about some recent happenings, most of them from the past few months, that could prove impactful on the eventual outcome of this conflict, and might even determine when that end of fighting arrives.And at the center of these happenings is recently reelected US President Trump, who has always had a, let's call it unusual, public appreciation for Russian President Putin, and the strongman image he and other global authoritarians wield, while at the same time not being a big fan of Ukrainian President Zelensky—perhaps in part because Trump called Zelensky back in 2019 to try to get him to come up with evidence supporting a debunked conspiracy theory about his opponent, Joe Biden's administration, related to alleged impropriety in US-Ukrainian relations.Zelensky could find no such evidence, and when he told Trump there was nothing to be found, Trump blocked payments on $400 million worth of military aid for Ukraine, holding it hostage until Zelensky came up with what he wanted. This became a big scandal only after the fact, and before it could be made public or became known by congress via a whistleblower complaint, Trump released the money. This led to a formal impeachment inquiry into Trump later that year, which led to his impeachment for abusing his power and obstructing Congress—but he was then acquitted by the Republican-led Senate.This, it's thought, may have colored Trump's behavior toward Zelensky when the two men sat down, alongside several other US officials, including US Vice President JD Vance, to discuss a potential mineral deal between the US and Ukraine, which was based on an earlier deal that the Ukrainian government dismissed.The original deal basically required that Ukraine exploit its mineral wealth and put half of the money it makes from those minerals into a fund that would be used to pay the US back for the military assistance it's provided so far, to the tune of $500 billion; which is quite a lot more than the $175 billion or so the US has spent on this conflict since Russia invaded, only $128 billion of which has directly aided the Ukrainian government, as opposed to funding US activities associated with the war, or supporting other affected countries thereabouts.So originally the US asked for more than double what's been provided so far, in return, paid for by Ukraine's mineral wealth, which includes a lot of the types of rare earth minerals that are vital for common modern technologies, like computers, batteries, and solar panels.That didn't fly, mostly because it didn't contain a security guarantee for Ukraine—the US saying it would protect them if necessary, basically, in exchange for this huge sum of money—so the new deal asked for $500 billion be placed in a fund, and that fund would be jointly controlled by the US and Ukraine, the funds used to rebuild the country after the war.50% of all revenues from Ukrainian natural resources newly exploited after the war, so not from existing mines and ports and such, would be put into this fund. Like the first time around, this deal didn't include a security agreement from the US, but the general idea was that this fund would incentivize new investment in the area, and because Ukraine has a lot of unexploited mineral wealth, this could give the US a new source for these sorts of valuable raw materials that are currently mostly controlled by China, but which the US government is attempting to claim more of, now that it's realized it's way behind on locking down sources of these really important things.At the meeting where this second deal was meant to be signed, though, Zelensky flying to the US to sit down with Trump to make it happen, the President and Vice President more or less verbally attacked Zelensky, criticizing him for not being more overtly grateful, and telling him he was wrong when he said that Russia started the war by invading Ukraine.It was all pretty bizarre, and even folks in Trump's own party seemed pretty puzzled by the whole thing, some of them calling it embarrassing, as Trump and Vance were basically parroting Putin's propaganda that no one actually believes because they ignore easily verifiable facts.In any event, this led to a lot of fallout between the US and Ukrainian governments, with Trump suggesting he would lean more heavily on Ukraine to get them to accept peace on Russia's terms, because the Ukrainians couldn't see reason and accept his version of reality, essentially.Trump has also suggested that he's been talking a lot with Putin, and that he believes Putin wants peace, and it's time to end the war. Putin, for his part, has not seemed inclined to give up anything in order to achieve peace, and Russian attacks on Ukraine have increased in scale since Trump came into office, and even more so after talks about a supposed peace agreement began.All of which has had implications on the ground.In Ukraine, Ukrainian soldiers have had to operate with fewer resources, as Trump cut off additional funding and supply shipments, post-meeting. He recently ordered that the US not share intelligence with them, too, and they cut off the sharing of satellite imagery, which Ukraine has used to great effect to strike Russian targets from a distance.This has also had implications across Europe, though, as while Ukraine is being invaded now, there are concerns that if Putin gets away with taking part or all of Ukraine, he'll go for other previous Soviet assets, next, maybe starting with the Baltic nations—Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania—and then tearing off chunks of Poland, Finland, or other neighbors that were previously part of the Soviet Union, like eastern Germany.The European Union, despite a fair bit of warning about Trump's stance on the issue, and the possibility that he would return to office, has been seemingly dumbstruck by Trump's sudden pivot away from supporting Ukraine, and away from NATO more broadly, toward a stance that favors Russia, instead. European governments have been scrambling to come up with an aid package that will replace some of what the US would have given, and have started sharing more intelligence, as well, including satellite imagery.It won't be easy, though, as the US versions of these things, from monetary resources to eyes in the sky vastly outshine what even the combination of British, French, and German assets can offer—at least at this stage. And the US has traditionally handled the lion's share of spending and building in these areas, shouldering the majority of NATO spending, because, well, it could, and that was a major premise of the post-WWII, western-led world order. The US said it would protect global capitalist democracies with its military might and nukes, if necessary, and European nations have been generally happy with this setup as it has generally allowed European governments to spend less money on their militaries and more on other stuff.That state of affairs seems to have ended, or at the very least become too unreliable to bet on, though, so EU nations are attempting to fill in the gaps left by the suddenly less-reliable-seeming US government, not just for Ukraine, but for themselves, as well.Poland's president recently announced that he wants to develop nuclear weapons and wants every adult male to undergo military training, so the country can field an army 500,000-strong.The French president has said he wants to extend his country's nuclear umbrella—guaranteed deterrence, basically, using nuclear weapons—to the whole of the EU. France has far fewer nukes than the US and Russia, but this captures a sense of the moment in the Union, where a bunch of currently underfunded militaries are realizing they might not be able to rely on the US in a pinch. And while they collectively have a lot more people and resources than Russia, Russia is fully mobilized and has shown itself to be willing to attack sovereign nations, whenever it pleases, caring a lot less for the human lives it spends, in the process, than is typical in western-style democracies.Even short of full-scale, out of nowhere invasions, Russia could pose a threat to European governments via asymmetrical routes. It's been seemingly approving all sorts of espionage operations meant to increase immigration arrivals in European nations where immigration is already a hot-button issue, nudging politics to the far-right, and it's allegedly been attacking infrastructure, in terms of hacking and just blowing stuff up, in order to sow discord and fear.As I mentioned earlier, too, part of Germany was previously held by the Soviet Union, and that same part of the country has recently voted heavily in favor of the country's furthest-right party, which wants stronger ties with Russia. So while conventional military issues are at the forefront of discussion, right now, Russia's long history of asymmetric warfare is also getting a fair bit of attention, as it could conceivably use these groups as a casus belli to attack, carving off pieces of its European neighbors and slowly incorporating them into its sphere of influence, similar to what it did in Ukraine, beginning in 2014; if eastern Germany supports Russia, it could fund and in other ways support uprising efforts in these regions, creating chaos and potentially even breaking off separatist states that would pull those regions into Russia's orbit.It's a tumultuous moment in this part of the world, then, in part because of the conflict that's still ongoing—a much larger and more powerful nation having invaded its smaller, less-powerful neighbor. But it's also tumultuous because of the implications of that conflict, especially if Russia comes out on top. If they win, there would seem to be a far greater chance of their deciding to keep the ball rolling, replicating a model that worked (without significant long-term consequences) across more neighboring nations.And if they can do that before Europe reinforces itself—assuming that's what the EU does, as it can be difficult to get a bunch of people with a bunch of at times competing interests to agree on anything, and even more so when said agreement involves both money and potentially sending civilians into harm's way—if Russia can get there before a new, restructured and reinforced Europe emerges, we could see another, similar conflict soon, and this one could be even more successful than the last, if Russia tweaks its formula to make it more effective, and European governments succumb to war weariness, exhausted by the war in Ukraine, in the meantime.Show Noteshttps://www.cfr.org/article/how-much-us-aid-going-ukrainehttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trump%E2%80%93Ukraine_scandalhttps://www.csis.org/analysis/breaking-down-us-ukraine-minerals-dealhttps://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/08/world/europe/ukraine-russia-north-korea-kursk.htmlhttps://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2025/03/08/zelensky-trump-fallout-ukraine/https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/04/world/europe/ukraine-us-trump-military-support.htmlhttps://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/06/us/politics/ukraine-zelensky-trump-russia.htmlhttps://apnews.com/article/russia-ukraine-war-dobropillya-us-intelligence-3d0bad105a93933e9cdaca5cf31fcf74https://mwi.westpoint.edu/no-substitute-for-victory-how-to-negotiate-from-a-position-of-strength-to-end-the-russo-ukraine-war/https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/eu-leaders-cautiously-welcome-macrons-nuclear-umbrella-offer-2025-03-06/https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/07/world/europe/bulgarians-guilty-spying-russia-uk.htmlhttps://www.politico.com/news/2025/03/08/europe-scrambles-to-aid-ukraine-after-us-intelligence-cutoff-00219678https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c9wpy9x890wohttps://www.cbsnews.com/news/keith-kellogg-ukraine-intelligence-sharing-pause/https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/ce8yz5dk82wohttps://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/07/world/us-ukraine-satellite-imagery.htmlhttps://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c05m907r39qohttps://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/07/us/politics/trump-russia-sanctions-tariffs.htmlhttps://www.csis.org/analysis/ukraines-future-vision-and-current-capabilities-waging-ai-enabled-autonomous-warfarehttps://www.politico.eu/article/donald-tusk-plan-train-poland-men-military-service-russiahttps://www.euronews.com/my-europe/2025/03/08/poland-says-it-plans-to-give-every-adult-male-military-traininghttps://www.nytimes.com/2025/02/22/world/europe/ukraine-trump-minerals.htmlhttps://apnews.com/article/ten-days-that-upended-us-support-for-ukraine-8930c01a15910a7ad8a7f7c7fac9ba3ahttps://www.wsj.com/world/white-house-and-ukraine-close-in-on-deal-for-mineral-rights-e924c672https://ca.finance.yahoo.com/news/ukraine-us-still-ironing-parts-191805611.htmlhttps://www.reuters.com/business/us-could-cut-ukraines-access-starlink-internet-services-over-minerals-say-2025-02-22/https://www.nytimes.com/2025/02/25/world/europe/ukraine-minerals-deal.htmlhttps://www.cnn.com/2025/02/26/europe/ukraine-us-mineral-resources-deal-explained-intl-latam/index.htmlhttps://www.spglobal.com/commodity-insights/en/news-research/latest-news/electric-power/122624-eu-moving-to-develop-infrastructure-for-nuclear-energy-expansion-officialshttps://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-03-07/european-stocks-see-most-inflows-in-decade-amid-defense-splurgehttps://www.nytimes.com/2025/02/10/business/ai-summit-paris.htmlhttps://apnews.com/article/germany-ukraine-debt-brake-economy-military-spending-74be8e96d8515ddddd53a99a69957651https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2025/03/03/world/europe/ukraine-russia-war-drones-deaths.html?unlocked_article_code=1.2U4.b15Z.1EA4tDb_37Bqhttps://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/10/world/europe/ukraine-russia-eastern-front-line.htmlhttps://www.iiss.org/online-analysis/military-balance/2025/02/combat-losses-and-manpower-challenges-underscore-the-importance-of-mass-in-ukraine/https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign-assessment-march-7-2025https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euromaidanhttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Union%E2%80%93Ukraine_Association_Agreementhttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russo-Ukrainian_Warhttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_the_Russian_invasion_of_Ukraine_(1_January_2025_%E2%80%93_present) This is a public episode. 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Given the shameful American sacrifice of Ukraine, there will be few timelier movies than Anna Kryvenko's upcoming “This House is Undamaged”,. It will be an Orwellian documentary examining the Russian destruction of Mariupol, the Ukrainian city devastated by Putin's invasion in 2022. Krivenko, a Fellow at the Artist in Residence program, Institute for Advanced Studies at CEU, explains how Russian authorities are rapidly rebuilding and selling properties there while erasing Ukrainian history and creating the big lie of Mariupol as a historically Russian city. Kryvenko, originally from Kyiv, also discusses the parallels between Putin's and Trump's lies about Ukraine, summarizing their fundamental misrepresentation of the truth as a "carnival of hypocrisy."Here are the five KEEN ON takeaways from our conversation with Kryvenko:* The Russians are engaged in a systematic erasure of Mariupol's Ukrainian identity, not just through physical reconstruction but through an aggressive propaganda campaign that claims the city was "always Russian." This reconstruction effort began shortly after the city's destruction in 2022.* Pre-war Mariupol was not characterized by deep Russian-Ukrainian divisions as Russian propaganda claims. According to Kryvenko, language differences weren't a source of conflict before political forces deliberately weaponized them.* The rebuilding of Mariupol has a dark commercial aspect - Russians are selling apartments in reconstructed buildings, sometimes in properties where the original Ukrainian owners were killed, and marketing them as vacation properties while ignoring the city's tragic recent history.* There's a humanitarian crisis unfolding as some Ukrainians are being forced to return to occupied Mariupol because they have nowhere else to live, with Kryvenko citing statistics that around 150,000 people returned to occupied territories by the end of 2024.* The filmmaker is using a unique methodology of gathering evidence through social media content, vlogs, and propaganda materials to document both the physical transformation of the city and the narrative being constructed around it, rather than traditional documentary filming techniques.Transcript of Anna Kryvenko InterviewAndrew Keen: Hello, everybody. As the situation in Ukraine becomes more absurd, it seems as if the lies of Donald Trump and the lies of Vladimir Putin are becoming increasingly similar. Trump has been talking about Zelensky and Ukraine, what is described as a barrage of lies. As CNN reports, Trump falsely called Zelensky a dictator. It's becoming more and more absurd. It's almost as if the whole script was written by some Central European or East Central European absurdist. Meanwhile, the Russians continue to lie as well. There was an interesting piece recently in the Wall Street Journal about Russia wanting to erase Ukraine's future and its past. My guest today, Anna Kryvenko, is a filmmaker. She's the director of an important new movie in the process of being made called "This House Is Undamaged." She's a visual fellow at the Central European University, and she's joining us from Budapest today. Congratulations on "This House is Undamaged." Before we talk specifically about the film, do you agree with my observations that there seems to be an increasingly eerie synergy between the lies coming out of Washington, D.C. and Moscow, between Trump and Putin?Anna Kryvenko: I think the situation is becoming more crazy and absurd. That's a better word to use in this situation. For me, all of this looks like some carnival of hypocrisy. It's unbelievable that someone can use the word "dictator" in comparison with Vladimir Putin or speaking about this 4% of the people who support Zelensky when he says it's only four persons. It looks completely absurd. And this information comes from Moscow, not from actual Ukrainian statistics.Andrew Keen: The phrase you use "carnival of hypocrisy" I think is a good description. I might even use that in the title of this conversation. It's almost as if Trump in particular is parodying himself, but he seems so separated from reality that it seems as if he's actually being serious, at least from my position in California. How does it look from your perspective in Budapest? You're originally from Ukraine, so obviously you have a particular interest in this situation.Anna Kryvenko: I don't even know what to think because it's changing so fast into absurd situations. Every day when I open the news, I'm speaking with people and it looks like some kind of farce. You're expecting that the next day someone will tell you that this is a joke or something, but it's not. It's really hard to believe that this is reality now, but unfortunately it is.Andrew Keen: Kundera wrote his famous novel "The Joke" as a parody of the previous authoritarian regime in Central Europe. Your new movie, "This House is Undamaged" - I know you are an artist in residence at the Institute for Advanced Study at Central European University - is very much in that vein. Tell us about the project.Anna Kryvenko: We're in work in progress. I was doing research in the archives and internet archives. This documentary film will explore the transformation of Mariupol, a Ukrainian city that was destroyed by the Russian invasion in 2022. I will use only archives and found footage materials from people who are in Mariupol now, or who were in Mariupol at the time of invasion, who were actually trying to film what's going on. Sometimes I'll also use propaganda images from Russia, from Russian authorities. In May 2022, Mariupol, after intense fighting, was almost completely destroyed.Andrew Keen: Tell us the story of Mariupol, this town on the old border of Russia and Ukraine. It's in the southeast of Ukraine.Anna Kryvenko: It's on the shore of the Azov Sea. It's part of Donetsk region. It was always an industrial city, most known for the Azovstal factory. In 2022, after incredible brutality of Russian war against Ukraine, this strategically important city was almost completely destroyed in May 2022 and was occupied by Russian government. About 90% of buildings were destroyed or demolished in some way.Andrew Keen: The Russians have essentially leveled the town, perhaps in the same way as the Israelis have essentially destroyed Gaza.Anna Kryvenko: Exactly. For a lot of people, we have this image of destroyed Mariupol until today. But after these terrible events, the Russians started this big campaign to rebuild the city. Of course, we know it was done just to erase all the scars of war, to erase it from the city's history. They started the reconstruction. Some people who stayed in Mariupol thought they would have new housing since they had no place to live. But business is business - Russian authorities started to sell these apartments to Russian citizens.Andrew Keen: I'm surprised Trump hasn't got involved. Given his real estate background and his cozy relationship with Putin, maybe Trump real estate will start selling real estate in Mariupol.Anna Kryvenko: I was thinking the same thing this last week. It was looking like such an absurd situation with Mariupol. But now we are in this business mode again with Ukraine and all the minerals. It's only the economical part of war they look at.Andrew Keen: He probably would come up with some argument why he really owns Mariupol.Anna Kryvenko: Yes.Andrew Keen: Coming back to the Wall Street Journal piece about Russia wanting to erase Ukraine's future and its past - you're originally from Kyiv. Is it the old East Central European business of destroying history and creating a new narrative that somehow conforms to how you want history to have been made?Anna Kryvenko: I was really shocked at how fast this idea of Russian Mariupol is repeating after two years in Russian media, official and semi-professional blogs, YouTube, and so forth. As a person working with this type of material, watching videos every day to find what I need, I'm listening to these people doing propaganda from Mariupol, saying "we are citizens of the city and it's always been Russian." They're repeating this all the time. Even when I'm hearing this - of course it was always a Ukrainian city, it's completely absurd, it's 100% disinformation. But when you're hearing this repeated in different contexts all the time, you start to think about it.Andrew Keen: It's the same tactics as Trump. If you keep saying something, however absurd it sounds or is, if you keep saying it enough times, some people at least start believing it. You're not a historian or political scientist, but Mariupol is in the part of Ukraine which had a significant population of Russian-speaking people. Some of the people that you're filming and featuring in your movie - are they Russians who have moved into Mariupol from some other part of Russia, or are they people originally from Mariupol who are somehow embracing their new Russian overlords?Anna Kryvenko: The people I'm watching on social media, most of them say they're from Mariupol. But you can find journalistic articles showing they're actually paid by the Russian government. It's paid propaganda and they're repeating the same narrative. It's important that they're always repeating "we were born in Mariupol" and "we want the city to be Russian." But of course, you can see it's from the same propaganda book as 2014 with Crimea. They're repeating the same narrative from Soviet times - they just changed "Soviet Union" to "Russia" and "the West" to "European Union."Andrew Keen: You grew up in Kyiv, so you're familiar with all these current and historical controversies. What's your take on Mariupol before 2020, before it was flattened by the Russians? Was it a town where Russian-speaking and Ukrainian people were neighbors and friends? Were there always deep divisions between the Russian and Ukrainian speaking populations there?Anna Kryvenko: It's hard to explain because you need to dig deeper to explain the Russian-speaking and Ukrainian-speaking parts of Ukraine. But it was never a problem before Yanukovych became prime minister and then president. It was his strategy to create this polarization of Ukraine - that the western part wants to be part of the European Union and the eastern part wants to be part of Russia because of language, and they cannot live together. But it's not true. For me as a person from Kyiv, from the center of the country, with friends from different parts of Ukraine, it was never a problem. I'm from a Russian-speaking family and have many friends from Ukrainian-speaking families. It was never a question. We were in a kind of symbiotic connection. All schools were in Ukrainian, universities in Ukrainian. We were bilingual. It was not a problem to communicate.Some of this division came from Yanukovych's connections to Putin and his propaganda. It was important for them to say "we are Russian-speaking people, and because we are Russian-speaking, we want to be part of Russia." But I have friends from Mariupol, and after 2014, when war in eastern Ukraine started and Mariupol was bombed a few times, it became a really good city to live in. There were many cultural activities. I know friends who were originally from Mariupol, studied in Kyiv in theater or visual art, and went back to Mariupol because it was a good place for their art practice. Ukraine is still a bit centralized, with most activity in Kyiv, Kharkiv, Lviv, and the big cities, but Mariupol wasn't a city with internal conflict. It's weird that so fast after 2022, people started saying it was always problematic in wanting to be part of Russia. It was never like that.Andrew Keen: It's as if I lived for a year in Bosnia before the civil war, and it was almost as if ethnicity was invented by the nationalist Serbian regime. It seems as if the Putin regime is doing or has done the same thing in the eastern part of Ukraine.Anna Kryvenko: Yes.Andrew Keen: You talk to lots of friends still and you're from Kyiv originally, and obviously your professional life remains focused on the situation. In late February 2025, what's your sense of how Ukrainians are feeling given what Trump is now saying?Anna Kryvenko: I think a lot of people in Ukraine or Ukrainians abroad are feeling lonely, that they don't have support. Again we are in this situation where you have big deals about Ukraine without Ukraine. You feel like nothing, just an empty space on a map with minerals or sea access. We're just sitting there waiting while they're agreeing on deals. That's the negative layer. But it's important for all Ukrainians to be together and speak about the situation. After Trump's words about the 4% support for Zelensky, there were statistics from last year showing 57-55% support for Zelensky. Today, after these few days, new statistics show 65% support.Andrew Keen: Zelensky started his political career as a satirical comedian, and it's as if he's participating in his own comedy - as if he's almost paid Trump to promote him. What about the broader take on the US? Obviously Trump isn't all America, but he was just elected a couple of months ago. Are your Ukrainian friends and associates, as well as many people at the Central European University in Budapest, taking this as a message from America itself, or are people able to separate Trump and America?Anna Kryvenko: This is a hard question because we always know that you have a president or representative figure, but that's not the whole state. I spoke with someone from our university who was in Pennsylvania before the election, and he said all the people were pro-Trump. The logic was really simple - "he's good" and "he will stop this war" - though people sometimes don't even know which war or which country. They're just repeating the same talking points.Andrew Keen: It's sort of Orwellian in the sense that it's just war and it doesn't really matter who's involved - he's just going to stop it.Anna Kryvenko: It reminded me of how everyone was repeating about Lukashenko from Belarus that "he's a good manager" and can manage things, and that's why he's still president - not that he's a dictator killing his opponents. They use this to explain why he's good and people choose him. Now with Trump, they say "he's a good businessman," but we can see how this business works. Today, someone from Trump's administration said Zelensky needs to stop being arrogant because Trump is in a bad mood. In what world are we living where this is used as an argument?Andrew Keen: Coming back to real estate, he probably sees Mariupol as a nice strip on the Black Sea, like Gaza, which he sees as a valuable strip on the Mediterranean for real estate development. I found an interesting piece online about the Russian invasion, "When Buildings Can Talk: The Real Face of Civilian Infrastructure Ruined by Russian Invaders." In a way, your project "This House is Undamaged" is your way of making buildings talk. Is that fair?Anna Kryvenko: I think it's the best description you can use.Andrew Keen: Perhaps you might explain how and why.Anna Kryvenko: This name "This House is Undamaged" might or might not be the final name. For me, it's important because after the first months when it started to be a Russian city, some people were trying to sell apartments just to have some money. The reconstruction started a bit later. They were using video websites like Craigslist. It immediately became Russian, part of Russian territory. People from different Russian regions who saw this opportunity were trying to buy something because prices were so cheap. People needed money to buy a ticket and go to other cities or to relatives. In every advertisement, there was this phrase "this house has no damages" or "this house is undamaged." You had to put it there even if it wasn't true - you could see pictures where one building had a hole, but they were still saying "this house is undamaged."Andrew Keen: It's just again coming back to the carnival of hypocrisy or the carnival of absurd hypocrisy - you see these completely destroyed homes, and then you have the signs from the Russians saying this house is undamaged.Anna Kryvenko: It was also interesting why some people from Russia want to buy apartments in Mariupol, in these reconstructed buildings with weird pro-Russian murals - it's like Stalinism. They don't even know where Mariupol is - they think it's somewhere near Crimea, but it's not the Black Sea, it's the Azov Sea, an industrial region. It's not the best place to live. But they think it will be some kind of resort. They're living somewhere in Russia and think they can buy a cheap apartment and use it as a resort for a few months. This is absurd because the city was completely destroyed. You still have mass graves. Sometimes they're selling apartments where they can't even find the owner because the whole family is dead.On Google Maps, someone made an alternative version where you can see all the buildings that were destroyed, because officially you can't find this information anywhere. People were putting crosses where they knew someone died in a building - entire families. And after this, people are buying their apartments. For me, this is unbearable. You can do research about what you're doing, but people are lazy and don't want to do this work.Andrew Keen: It comes back to the Journal piece about Russia literally erasing not just Ukraine's past but also its future, creating a culture of amnesia. It's chilling on so many levels. But it's the old game - it's happened before in that part of the world and no doubt will happen again. As a filmmaker, what particular kind of political or aesthetic responsibility do you have? People have been writing - I mentioned Kundera, Russian writers, Gogol - satires of this kind of absurd political power for centuries. But as a filmmaker, what kind of responsibility do you have? How does your form help you make this argument of essentially restoring the past, of telling the truth?Anna Kryvenko: A lot of filmmakers in Ukraine, with the start of invasion, just brought cameras and started making films. The first goal wasn't to make a film but to document the crimes. My case is different - not only because my family's in Ukraine and I have many friends there and lived there until my twenties. For the last ten years, since the Maidan events in 2013-2014, I started working with archive and found footage material. This is my methodology. For me, it's not important to go somewhere and document. It's more interesting to use media deconstruction from propaganda sources, maybe from Ukrainian sources also because it's a question of ideology.One of my favorite materials now is people doing vlogs - just with their camera or mobile phone going from Russia to Crimea or back. You only have two ways to go there because airports aren't working, so you go through the Kerch-Crimea bridge. Now because of Mariupol's strategic location, you can go through there, so you have two different roads. People from different Russian cities sometimes film their road and say "what is this, is it destroyed?" This is the average Russian person, and you can hear the propaganda they're repeating or what they're really thinking. For me, it's important to show these different points of view from people who were there or are there now. I don't have the opportunity as a Ukrainian citizen to go there. Through this method, in the near future when I finish this film, we can have testimonies from the inside. We don't need to wait for the war to end because we don't know how or when it ends. It's important to show it to people who maybe don't know anything about what's going on in Mariupol.Andrew Keen: Given the abundance of video on the internet, on platforms like YouTube, how do you distinguish between propaganda and truth yourself in terms of taking some of these segments to make your film? It could be conceivable that some of the more absurd videos are put out by Ukrainians to promote their own positions and undermine the Russians. Have you found that? Is there a propaganda war on YouTube and other platforms between Ukrainian and Russian nationalists? And as a filmmaker who's trying to archive the struggle in an honest way, how do you deal with that?Anna Kryvenko: Of course, there are many people, and Mariupol is the best example because the Russian government is paying people to repeat pro-Russian ideology. Sometimes you can see just an average person from Mariupol going with a camera and shooting something without speaking - this is just documentation. Sometimes you have Russian people there for some days just saying something. And of course, you get different segments of real propaganda from some ministry in Russia with drone material and big music. I'm always trying to question myself: What am I looking at? Who is speaking? On technical aspects, why is this like this? It helps me to be holistic.Of course, I'm from Ukraine, and sometimes this is the most uncomfortable - you can hear actual people from Mariupol saying something you don't want to hear because it's not your point of view on the war. But these are people really from the city giving some kind of realistic point of view on the situation. It's sad, but there were statistics at the end of 2024 that about 150,000 people were returning to occupied territories, not only to Mariupol but all occupied territories. Maybe 40% were coming back to register their property and then returning to Ukrainian territory, but many people are returning to Mariupol because they don't have anywhere to live in Ukraine. It's not hundreds but thousands of people. As Ukrainians, we're not comfortable with this because we're all in different situations. But if something's not comfortable for my point of view, it doesn't mean it's bad or good.Andrew Keen: It's an important project. I know your artist residency at the Central European University is finishing at the end of February. You're going to focus on finishing the movie. When do you think it will be ready and what are your ambitions for the finished movie? Will you put it online, in theaters? What's your ideal?Anna Kryvenko: If everything goes well, we can finish it in a year and a half because it will be a long process of editing and working with rights. We only started working on it six months ago, and it's starting to go faster. Documentary making is a long process because of funding and everything. Even though I don't need to go somewhere physically, it's still a long process with a lot of waiting. First, we're thinking about festivals, maybe a theater release, maybe we'll have some broadcasters because it's an important topic to show to a wider audience. After a year, we'll see.Andrew Keen: If "Buildings Can Talk" is the subtitle of this upcoming movie "This House is Undamaged," it's a really important project about Mariupol. Thank you for being on the show. I'm going to have to get you back when the movie is done because I can't wait to see it.Anna Kryvenko: Thank you so much. Thank you.Keen On America is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.Anna Kryvenko (1986, Ukraine) is a video and fine art photography artist based in Prague and Kyiv. She is a Fellow at the Artist in Residence program, Institute for Advanced Studies at Central European University. She graduated from the Centre for Audio-Visual Studies at the Film and TV School of the Academy of Performing Arts (FAMU, Prague). Her films and performances were screened at Dok Leipzig, ZagrebDox, Visions du Reel Nyon, Fluidum Festival, Jihlava Documentary Film Festival, etc. With her found-footage film Silently Like a Comet, she won the prize for the Best Experimental Act at FAMUFEST, Prague (CZ), and a few others. Her film Listen to the Horizon won the prize for the Best Czech Experimental Documentary, Jihlava IDFF (CZ). Her first feature documentary film My Unknown Soldier won the Last Stop Trieste 2018 Postproduction Award, Special Mention at Zagreb Dox, the Special Prize of the Jury at IDFF CRONOGRAF, and the Andrej Stankovič Prize. Her newest short film Easier Than You Think won the Jury Award of the Other Vision Competition 2022 (PAF, Czech Republic).Named as one of the "100 most connected men" by GQ magazine, Andrew Keen is amongst the world's best known broadcasters and commentators. In addition to presenting the daily KEEN ON show, he is the host of the long-running How To Fix Democracy interview series. He is also the author of four prescient books about digital technology: CULT OF THE AMATEUR, DIGITAL VERTIGO, THE INTERNET IS NOT THE ANSWER and HOW TO FIX THE FUTURE. Andrew lives in San Francisco, is married to Cassandra Knight, Google's VP of Litigation & Discovery, and has two grown children. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit keenon.substack.com/subscribe

America's Nuke War with Russia   (audio) David Eells 10/23/24   Pastor Phillip Barnett - Azovmena 1 Prophecy   https://youtu.be/ip4xEGh-u5M?si=50v6E8B-WtybEHpb  Recorded 4/27/2022 in Tulsa, OK at Lewis Ave Church of God of Prophecy   Transcription: Pastor Phillip Barnett begins saying, I would always keep a pad of paper and pen on my nightstand so I could write down any thought, or Word from the Lord. On this particular night I had this dream and it was amazing with a lot of scenes and it was very long. I knew it was from God, but I laid back down and fell asleep without writing it down and when I woke up I could not remember anything. I fasted and prayed for 2 weeks what the dream was about and I left it with the Lord. Then on January 18, 2007, I went to bed and I dreamed the dream all over. In the dream I knew what the next scene would be because I had seen it in the dream before. I realized while dreaming that God was giving me the dream again that I had 10 years ago that I had forgotten!   In this dream I saw 8 large rocket-shaped mountains and the tops had a nuclear warhead. They were in crescent shape and they were frozen. (Saved for a later time.) Over the next few days, God revealed to me what these rockets were and that there would be a war between the United States and a reformed Soviet Union, including Russia, Belarus, and eastern Ukraine. (Where the Russians are at the time of this attack.) Those rockets would be American nuclear missiles that would destroy eastern Ukraine; the first one would hit Kiev and then it would circle around to Sumy, Harkoff, and all the cities to the bottom of Odessa. All of eastern Ukraine would be destroyed.  (Warheads peeling off a multiple warhead ICBM missile. Did the (DS) Deep State steal the launch codes for these missiles?) I was in central Ukraine and a few days later, I'm thinking about how there's no mountain like what I saw in central Ukraine. I'm on a bus and so I asked somebody on the bus, “What is the name of this mountain?” A woman said what sounded like an Italian word, like ‘Azolemna' or something which sounded like it had a lot of vowels. I tried to repeat what I thought I heard and she said again, “Azov Mena”.   Later as I was on the floor praying to the Lord about the name of this mountain, God said write it down. So I wrote down the letters of the name: A, Z, O, V, and then, M, E, N, A. I connected AZOV to the Azov Sea and then I connected “Mena” to the interpretation of the handwriting on the wall in Dan 5:26 This is the interpretation of the thing: MENE; God hath numbered thy kingdom, and brought it to an end; I then heard the Holy Spirit say, “From the Azov Sea to the Belarus border, from the Dnieper River over to the Russian border (Kiev is on this river), all of eastern Ukraine will be destroyed by these 8 American nuclear missiles.”  (All the evidence of human trafficking and labs creating biological weapons the DS wants destroyed and of course depopulation.) God revealed in the dream that Russia would invade Ukraine, there would be a holocaust against the Jews, (Two signs before the nukes go off; Russia did invade Ukraine and the nations are attacking Israel now.) and He urged people to flee, especially from the heavily populated Donbass area with approximately 11 million people. God spoke to me for five hours during the night and gave me four visions. The day after I had the dream, which was exactly the same as the first one 10 years prior except I was much closer to the 8 nuclear missiles that were going to be launched…   That night I was praying and the Lord spoke something to my heart and I went to write it down and I had a vision. I saw that all eastern Ukraine from the Azov Sea up to the Belarus border, and from the Dnieper River to Russia was black; it had been burned black by nuclear bombs that had fallen in that area.   The Lord gave me 4 visions this same night and after each vision, I asked the meaning of the vision and the Lord would give me the meaning. This went on for four hours. Then the Lord told me to go into the kitchen and when I went into the kitchen, I looked out the window and see several clouds in the sky, each in the shape of cars, buses, and trucks, and they were moving in two distinct lines from downtown Kiev towards southwestern Ukraine. I saw one huge cloud in the shape of a large bus over downtown Kiev. The wind had blown these clouds to the southwest.   God then spoke to me, saying, “There will be two evacuations from Kiev. The first one will take place when the Russian army is about to occupy Kiev and the second one will come when the nuclear war between the reformed Soviet Union and the United States takes place.” About 3 ½ - 4 weeks after this war started. There were hundreds of thousands of cars in deadlock trying to get out of Kiev. I saw this on TV and realized the next part of the prophecy would come next.  (The third sign comes to pass.) This paragraph is a summary (Pastor Barnett recounts going all over preaching his prophecy about Russia invading Ukraine and the reactions it received. He had preached this prophecy at various churches in Ukraine where he was invited. He received many death threats on social media. Many people thought he was crazy and did not believe him and thought it all was impossible. He continued to preach his prophecy. The end of 2013 comes around and a revolution begins in Kiev and then early war begins. The then-President Yanukovych of Ukraine made a public plea on Russian television for Russian troops to invade Ukraine. Yanukovych's request came before the ongoing war between Russia and Ukraine, which had already resulted in thousands of deaths. He shares how the governor of the Donbas region in Ukraine had made a plea on Russian national television for President Putin to intervene and "destroy the fascists," who are ruining this country and killing children.)   My family and I left Ukraine after God had given me 17 dreams urging us to return home in the United States. The fighting began in Donbass after President Yanukovych had requested the Russians to come in and take Ukraine. Donbass is where all the mineral resources in the industry and the metal industry's at in Ukraine. This is what the Azovmena Prophesy in 2007 said would happen. These things began in 2014, 7 years later.   A man contacted me from Ohio who had watched the Azovmena Prophecy in 2007 and he was living in Kiev at the time, and the Holy Spirit spoke to him that this is true; this war is going to happen. Russia is going to invade Ukraine. He told me he moved to Levi in western Ukraine and then thought that wasn't far enough away, and he needed to move to America. So they're now in Ohio because he believed the prophecy. Another family who heard the prophecy and believed it, moved their family to California and they escaped the invasion of Russia. Many thousands of people who heard this prophecy including many Jews were saved because they moved before Russia invaded.   Amo 3:7 Surely the Lord Jehovah will do nothing, except he reveal his secret unto his servants the prophets.   God told me that I could not leave anything out of this prophecy and I can't add anything to it. He said, “If you preach it just the way I gave it to you, I will give you more.” He told me that I need to share these prophecies, not just in Ukraine but to many other countries.   So next I'm going to share now about the nuclear war that is coming to America. What states and cities that will be destroyed and what states and cities that will not be destroyed. (He doesn't share “cities not destroyed” in this video.)   In Azovmena 1 Prophecy, God put me on a building in Mobile, Alabama. As I'm on this building, I see (in vision) Russian ICBM missiles coming across Canada to America. I could see from the Rocky Mountains all the way to the East Coast. From where I was standing, I couldn't see Florida and I couldn't see anything on the west side of the Rocky Mountains.   The first ICBM to hit America destroyed Chicago. The next one hit Milwaukee WI, but it was way up in the air; it didn't come down lower in the air, but was way up in the atmosphere, where it blew up over Milwaukee.  (This would destroy Milwaukee and EMP a large portion of the country.) The next one I see hits Cleveland OH, then St. Louise, MO, Memphis, TN, Nashville, TN and New Orleans, LA, then Little Rock, AR, Denver, CO, and Albuquerque, NM.  10 warheads Later on God gave me a dream and in it, I saw two sets of flights of Russian bombers and they weren't the big giant bombers, they were medium range bombers that would have to fly off of an aircraft carrier and be refueled in the air. One flight had four planes, and the other flight had two planes. They all had nuclear cruise missiles, and they dropped the missiles. (I believe the Lord told me in His mercy this part would not happen.)  Here's what I understood of what I saw in the dream. Three nuclear bombs will hit New York City and two will hit Washington D.C. One will hit Baltimore, MD and one will hit Boston, MA (He misspoke “Maryland” in the video, but correction is made to Boston is on screen.) Now that's seven nuclear missiles, but six planes that I saw. So evidently, one of the bombs to hit NYC, will be an ICBM because I only saw six of these planes with nuclear cruise missiles to hit cities in the northeast. Cincinnati… (He gets off track here and doesn't come back to these missiles in this video. Possibly because the Lord said these bombers will not fly in His mercy.)   (He shares how he faced opposition and death threats for sharing this prophecy, particularly from people in Russia. Then he goes on to preach the tribulation begins … He states how the Bible is no longer U.S.'s foundation and the Obama administration has made law that men can marry men and a women can marry women. He states that 62 million babies have been murdered…and America will pay the cost in blood. (As it did to Sodom and Gomorrah and it is beginning with the DS's weather warfare. Abraham bargained with God and an angel took Lot and family out of Sodom before the cities were destroyed. [Come out of the big sin cities.] So I asked God would He delete this judgment and only got that He would lessen it because of His mercy. Since I have seen extreme mercy from God on the world lately, I jumped right to the end of the bargaining and asked if one missile from U.S. and one missile from Russia would be enough and He said “Yes”. I was surprised but God said He wanted to show His mercy again. Keep in mind that the U.S. ICBM's have 5 warheads and the Russian ICBM's have 10 warheads. But God will be in control as His Word says.) …       Russian Nuclear Exchange with U.S.   Garrett Crawford- 4/29/22  (David's notes in red) I dreamed that everyone was stocking up on food at a grocery store late at night. (Insiders are warning to have at least 3 to 6 months of food stored up. As far as believers go, we know that God shall supply our every need according to His riches in Glory.) I saw many people rushing at the last minute to get prepared. There was a general sense of uncertainty in the air. Many who had been expecting an event to happen were already prepared. (And it may be that these will have to help those around them and miracles will happen.)   For some reason Sylvester Stallone was in the dream and he was getting prepared too, but he had lost heart and his courage had left him. He was not mentally or spiritually prepared. (Sylvester plays the part of a strong warrior, so to speak, but it appears even they will lose heart through the things coming.)   I told him he could stay with me as I had been preparing for this for some time. (The most important way to prepare is spiritually, for the Word says, “Righteousness delivereth from death.”)   As we were leaving the store, I noticed many people's cars had been stolen from the parking lot while they were buying supplies. People came out to find their cars were gone, they were in disbelief. Sylvester and I thought that my car had been stolen too but we eventually found it. (Having their cars stolen out of the parking lot represents that rest and peace will be taken from the vessels of many. Also in the natural the DS would do this to put people at their mercy which is nil.)   We were somewhere talking and he could not understand why I was happy and not scared. He felt he had so much more to live for on this Earth and he was upset that it was all being taken from him. (Many lives will be turned upside down in order to get their attention and cause them to seek the Lord once He has destroyed all their worldly idols.)   I, on the other hand, had no love for the world and the things in it, I could literally feel nothing because this Earth had no hold on me. I felt freer than any man alive. (John 12:25 He that loveth his life loseth it; and he that hateth his life in this world shall keep it unto life eternal.)   Around this time, I had a flashback to the beginning of the day. It was light outside and the sun was out. I was walking through the parking lot of the grocery store and the Word of Lord came to me saying, “At this time the wise will shine brighter than the sun and will instruct many.” (The wise will be anointed with the wisdom of Jesus and will instruct many in the way of righteousness.)   The next thing I knew, the scene changed and I was at my dad's house in Bethel. (Representing the Father's “House of Bread”. Those feeding on the Bread from Heaven, Jesus Christ, the Word of the Lord, will be in the rest.)   I was all alone with my dogs and cat. (The elect among all the factious dogs and the rebellious cats to God and His Word will return to the Father's house.)   I remember watching the war in Ukraine taking place over my dad's house, like an open vision, but it was something tangible that I was actually experiencing. (Like the death angel that passed over the houses of the Israelites, this “war” and its fall-out will pass over the elect of God.)   I saw that America had been assisting Ukraine. I even saw America launching attacks to aid Ukraine, but there was a grave mistake made and an American missile had been launched accidentally and it hit a Russian target. (Notice, “one missile” as I was told although I did not remember this dream. Will this be accidental or on purpose? The DS has been provoking the nuclear option and would love to escalate this conflict to continue to deflect away from the declass of all their evil crimes that are coming to light and to depopulate and to try to derail the elections so that they can hold on to power. Also it was admitted that the U.S. helped the Ukrainians sink the Russian flagship Moskva and it was an American missile. No one would admit this unless they wanted the Russians to retaliate against the U.S. as the DS does. Moskva led the naval assault during the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, from February 2022 until her sinking on 14 April 2022.)   This so called, ‘accidental' Missile strike caused the whole world to stop. Everyone wondered what Russia would do, but no one expected that Russia would retaliate against America. (Putin has come out publicly and warned that any attack on Russia by NATO or U.S. and Western forces during this Ukraine conflict would be reciprocated, presumably against the DS, since he knows they are the real enemy.)   Then I watched what appeared to be a large missile silo open and a projectile came out and was fired at America. (Notice one missile) The missile hit America inside her borders and everyone was in a state of shock. No one actually believed Russia would retaliate but they did and with fierce wrath. (Putin and Russia have been fighting the DS and they would know this missile is coming from them. They would pick their targets accordingly. Get out of blue cities and states.)   The weapon they used made 7 waves of fire blast throughout America like fiery shockwaves. The sound of the weapon was like a siren. Every blast was accompanied by the most ominous siren sound; seven blasts and seven sirens. (This is a multiple warhead missile. Also, could seven blasts announce the approach of the seven trumpet judgments of the Tribulation as in the first dream?)   After the last blast I looked outside and America was on fire. It was just 1 missile launch from each side and after Russia struck with their missile they did not continue. (A measured response to stop the war.) It was like an eye for an eye. I felt in the dream that America was playing a dangerous game with Russia that backfired. (Even though the military has moved interceptor missiles to the coast in the night, they evidently didn't intercept this. The Russian ICBM missiles have 10 warheads that spread out to different cities and are considered by many to be unstoppable due to its evasive maneuvers. The U.S. ICBM's have 5 warheads so it's not an equal response but God who “works all things after the counsel of His own will” can easily change this unbalance.)   Everyone in America was in complete disbelief. I heard a man say, “I can't believe they did it, I can't believe they actually attacked us!”. After the blasts I surveyed the damage and my dad's house was still standing. Both my dogs were in the house with me and survived. I opened the front door (Jesus) and my cat was there. (Many of the rebellious who are God's elect will return to the Father's House of Bread.) He had survived the carnage even though he had been outside of the house. Then I woke up.   Let's pray and ask mercy of the Lord on this.   Here is the war that begins the seven year tribulation, which two of these dreams speak of. Rev 6:3 And when he opened the second seal, I heard the second living creature saying, Come. 4 And another horse came forth, a red horse: and to him that sat thereon it was given to take peace from the earth, and that they should slay one another: and there was given unto him a great sword.       An Angry Bear Awakens   Excerpt from Dumitru Duduman's Prophecies   April 1997   I knelt by my bed to pray, as I do every night before going to sleep. After finishing my prayer, I opened my eyes, but I was no longer in my room. Instead, I found myself in a forest. I looked around, and to my right I saw a man dressed in white who pointed his finger and said, “See and remember”. It took me a while to find what he was pointing at. It was a small bear who seemed half dead lying on the ground.   As I continued to watch this bear, it began to breathe deeper. With every passing minute it seemed to revive itself, and, as I watched, it also became angrier. It then began to grow. Soon it was larger than the forest floor, and as it grew larger, it continued to become angrier. It then began to paw the ground, so that when its paw would hit the ground, the earth would shudder. The bear continued to devastate all that stood in its path until it came upon some men with sticks trying to fend it off. (Don't pay any attention to the lies, the Russians have won this war in Ukraine but the DS needs a bigger war that hurts the US and Russia, their two worst enemies. The Russians have taken down the Nazi's, the bio-labs, the tunnels and dungeons with the captive children, and the evidence of DS crimes, etc.) By this time the bear had grown so large that it simply crushed the men underfoot and continued its rampage.   I was stunned by what I saw and asked the man standing beside me, “What does this mean?” “At first they thought the great bear was dead,” the man said. (If you listen to MSM's silliness.) “As it will begin to stir once again, they will consider it harmless. Suddenly, it will grow strong once more with purpose and violence. (They have made tremendous advances in weaponry.) God will blind the eyes of those that continue to trample on the sacrifice of Christ's blood, until the day the bear will strike swiftly. This day will catch them unprepared, and it will be just as you saw”.   The man then said, “Tell my people the days are numbered and the sentence has been passed. If they will seek My face and walk in righteousness before Me, I will open their eyes that they may see the danger approach. If they only look to the approaching danger, they, too, will be caught up and trampled underfoot. Only in righteousness will they find safety”.   Suddenly, I was once again by myself in my room, on my knees, with sweat covering my face.       Five Major U.S. Cities Nuked   Richard Swanson   Author of the book Spare Your People     In 1971, I saw, in a dream, limited nuclear war in America. (Or one missile with multiple warheads) I beheld two or three short successive orange-colored flashes of light off in the distance towards the north. These flashes, which produced a strobe-light effect, literally lit up the nighttime sky.   As they occurred I could briefly see the outline of some mountains from beyond which the flashes came. The next morning - in the dream - as I was walking through a field of swamp grass, I heard a news report over a transistor radio which was attached to a corner pole of a lean-to. The news report said: “Washington, D.C., New York City, Chicago, Denver and San Francisco have been struck by thermonuclear warheads”. (Five DS strongholds the Russians would target. In 1971 the Russians likely had mostly 5 warheads per ICBM. They have been updating these to 10 warheads. But they could use a five warhead missile which would even the odds and bring peace.)   By the time the broadcast said “Denver” I was in the Spirit. I was standing beside Jesus. I then realized it was Jesus Who was giving the news report, and what I was hearing over the transistor radio was the Word of God. As He spoke, His words could be heard throughout eternity.   As Jesus said “Denver,” He pointed there, and as He did, the Holy Spirit showed me, though it was not quite dawn, exactly where Denver was. It was still night in San Francisco, yet the Holy Spirit showed me where that city was too. I then looked back toward the East Coast. The sun had already risen there and through some cirrocumulus clouds, I could see the Florida area. I suddenly realized I was up in the heavens looking down.   I also knew that during this limited nuclear attack I would be in Florida, very close to the Alabama border. (Phillip Barnett was in AL too) Several years later I discovered that this part of Florida is indeed swampland, just as in the dream.       Bride Protected as the Wicked are Nuked   Bill Steenland - 4/23/22 (David's notes in red)   I dreamed I was in my kitchen preparing dinner. (Representing the preparation of the spiritual food to feed God's elect.) I was suddenly translated to a place in the mountains. (This represents the choosing of the Bride by bringing Her to Mt. Zion which is a place of safety from the Beast?) Although I was incredibly surprised about the miracle, I knew why the Lord had done it. I had a horrible feeling and immediately started searching the skies. I said to myself, “Oh my God! This is it and it must have started!”   There was a light orange flash way, way off in the distance. (The people to be judged will be spiritually far from Zion and the presence of God.) I saw the top of a mushroom cloud. The Lord was letting me know nuclear weapons were going off in a distance that I couldn't physically see. (Back when this dream was given: I asked if we should pray this down by faith and got a “NO.” When I forwarded this dream to Eve, she cast lots asking the Lord if we can pray this down? And she received 3 Tails for “NO”. ... Has God planned to chasten the U.S. in spite of their silly thousand years of peace on a wicked nation?)   Back when this dream was given: I asked, “Is this the DS cities being destroyed?” And got “Yes”.) As in a nuclear attack there will be desolation, waste, and astonishment as the Lord said in Eze 35:2 Son of man, set thy face against mount Seir and prophesy against it, (The leadership of the Edomites who are Esau's seed who persecuted and betrayed their own brother, Israel.),   3 and say unto it, Thus saith the Lord Jehovah: Behold, I am against thee, O mount Seir, and I will stretch out my hand against thee, and I will make thee a desolation and an astonishment. 4 I will lay thy cities [or congregations] waste, and thou shalt be desolate; and thou shalt know that I am Jehovah.)   Little mushroom clouds appeared in the background and stuck in the sky as if it was some computer program that pinned the location of the blasts in the distance. As I moved around the symbols would stay in their places. There were many, many of these nukes going off.   I continued to walk up this hill to an abandoned house with no windows or doors. It was made of concrete and looked like the place the Lord was sending me to hide. (Representing the refuge that God has prepared for His people to be hidden in the Rock. Their freedom to come and go is unhindered by doors.)   The house had a bunch of silver everywhere. (The Lord will supply for the financial and physical needs of His people in the times ahead. Some say ultimately silver will be more valuable than gold.) I thought I could barter using them, so I started to break them apart and put them in a backpack. It struck me odd that whoever was there previously didn't see the value in the silver. (Because escaping is overwhelmingly more important. And silver will only later skyrocket.)   Then I looked out of the little concrete building and there was a massive food processing plant nearby. I remember almost laughing because the Lord had put me right next to a food processing plant. I thought, “Oh wow! That's that! Thank you God!” (Food and money will be plentiful among the Bride as the Lord spoke. Isa 61:5-8 And strangers shall stand and feed your flocks, and foreigners shall be your plowmen and your vine-dressers. 6 But ye shall be named the priests of Jehovah; men shall call you the ministers of our God: ye shall eat the wealth of the nations, and in their glory shall ye boast yourselves.   7 Instead of your shame ye shall have double; and instead of dishonor they shall rejoice in their portion: therefore in their land they shall possess double; everlasting joy shall be unto them. 8 For I, Jehovah, love justice, I hate robbery [the factions in Church and state have stolen from their brethren] with iniquity; and I will give them their recompense in truth (God will re-pay), and I will make an everlasting covenant with them.)  Back when this dream was given: I asked, “Will this devastation come after the redistribution of wealth planned in the GCR ?” And received a “Yes.” Eve asked for a confirming word for this and received, Psa.81:5 (in context 5-7) He appointed it in Joseph for a testimony, When he went out over the land of Egypt, Where I heard a language that I knew not. 6 I removed his shoulder from the burden: His hands were freed from the basket. 7 Thou calledst in trouble, and I delivered thee; I answered thee in the secret place of thunder; I proved thee at the waters of Meribah. Selah   As the dream changed I was still in the house but was talking to a woman dressed in camouflage. (The Bride is hidden in the “secret place of the Most High.”) She was explaining to me where we were in the mountains. She told me the state, the mountain range, and the roadway. I can't remember what it was but I knew it was somewhat iconic, well known and popular for mountain travel. There was a Native American word she told me and I remember thinking, “I need to look that up and find the meaning.” but I cannot remember the name. I knew more people were coming; some of them good and some of them bad. (Many will come and be saved in the revival.) Then I woke up.   Eve asked for a word by faith at random for Bill's dream and received: Eze.21:28-32 And thou, son of man, prophesy, and say, Thus saith the Lord Jehovah concerning the children of Ammon (A faction who turned against the people of God like the DS has.), and concerning their reproach; and say thou, A sword, a sword is drawn, for the slaughter it is furbished, to cause it to devour, that it may be as lightning; (I asked is this representing a swift taking down of those who factioned against their own countryman? And got “Yes.” This could be so-called Americans against Americans the Alliance against the DS as is happening now.)   29 while they see for thee false visions, while they divine lies unto thee, to lay thee upon the necks of the wicked that are deadly wounded, whose day is come in the time of the iniquity of the end. 30 Cause it to return into its sheath. In the place where thou wast created, in the land of thy birth, will I judge thee. 31 And I will pour out mine indignation upon thee; I will blow upon thee with the fire of my wrath; and I will deliver thee into the hand of brutish men, skillful to destroy. 32 Thou shalt be for fuel to the fire; thy blood shall be in the midst of the land; thou shalt be no more remembered: for I, Jehovah, have spoken it.   (I believe the fake nuclear war will turn into a real nuclear war by the DS hands. The world knows that President Trump's base are Christians and they do not differentiate Christians from New Agers, who have lied to them about “peace and safety” because they do not believe in the book of Revelation. This will set the stage for the “sudden destruction”. And in the second 3 1/2 years of the Tribulation, the world Beast will make war against the Christians in Rev 13.)       From The Edge Hyssop Chronicles   Larry W. Taylor - Sept. 21, 2002   I saw an Eagle standing proud and tall and the Eagle was turning to fight some enemy that was before it. (The DS) The proud Eagle, all dressed for battle, turned and faced the enemy before it and just as the Eagle started forward toward the enemy; I saw a knife being thrust into the back of the proud and surprised Eagle. (The DS Judas' start a limited nuclear war with Russia?) As the Eagle staggered from the knife wound to its back, I saw (nuclear) arrows come from the enemy it had been facing and hit the Eagle. (The DS caused the retaliation against the U.S.) The vision faded at this point , so I did not see the result of the attack on the Eagle.       MISSILES OF OCTOBER! Sept. 7, 2002 Thought I would relate a dream to you I had in the early 1980s. I had been in prayer for about a week and on the last day of my prayer fast, I became very sleepy. So sleepy, that I couldn't keep my head up. I struggled against sleep as I was trying to hear the Lord. I lay back on the bed for a minute, but as soon as my head hit the bed I was asleep. I immediately had a dream.   In the dream I saw a long line of missile silos. I had the knowledge in the dream that these were missiles no one ever thought would be fired! I could not tell who the missiles belonged to. As the dream progressed, I saw the missiles begin to fire and lift out of their silos. I noted that not all the missiles were fired, but only a certain number were fired. I saw the missiles fired, go up into the sky and reach a peak; then start to arch and fall back towards the earth, towards its target. I did not see who or what the target was but as the missiles began to fall towards their targets, I heard in my dream what sounded like a loud audible voice, "THESE ARE THE MISSILES OF OCTOBER!"   This voice woke me up fully awake and I sat up with a start! I still remember in vivid detail the dream of the Missiles and the voice that declared they were of October. (No year was given)  (If the DS was going to fire at the Russians to make a war, wouldn't they do it before the election to stop it? Since they are too far behind to get away with cheating this time?) 1 THESSALONIANS 5:3 For when they shall say peace and safety, then sudden destruction cometh upon them, as travail upon a woman with child; and they shall not escape.   2 CHRONICLES 20:20  Believe in the LORD, your God, so shall ye be established; believe his prophets so shall ye prosper.   AMOS 3:7 Surely the Lord God will do nothing, but He revealeth His secret unto his servants, the prophets.   (Note: I shared this with President Trump and General Smith.)

In late July 2013, Vladimir Putin visited Kiev. There he celebrated the 1,025th anniversary of Christianity coming to the Kievan Rus. There he and Ukrainian President Victor Yanukovych stood shoulder to shoulder and celebrated the unity of Russia and Ukraine. At that moment–my guest Michael Kimmage writes– Putin and Yanukovych, Russia and Ukraine, seemed to be “twin protagonists of the same story.” Seven months later things were very different indeed. This was because of what my guest Michael Kimmage describes as a series of collisions which resulted in the war that began in 2014, and which accelerated in 2022. The first collision was between Russia and Ukraine; the second between Russia and Europe; and the third between Russia and the United States. Michael Kimmage is Professor of History at the Catholic University of America where is chair of the department. From 2014 to 2016, he served on the Secretary's Policy Planning Staff at the US Department of State, where he held the Russia/Ukraine portfolio. He was last on Historically Thinking in Episode 165 to discuss his book The Abandonment of the West: The History of an Idea in American Foreign Policy. His most recent book is Collisions: The Origins of the War in Ukraine and the New Global Instability, and it is the subject of our conversation today.   For Further Investigation The list of Historically Thinking conversations either directly connection or tangentially related to this conversation with Michael Kimmage is vast. Here are just a few... Episode 211: The (Quiet) Russian Revolution Episode 212: The Perennial Russian Pivot to Asia Episode 284: The Greatest Russian General, in War and Peace Episode 345: The Ecology of Nations

In Kyiv, the war against Russia's invasion plays out not only through airstrikes and drones, but also through culture. Well before his full-scale invasion, President Putin was clear in his ahistorical belief that Ukraine is a made-up country, rightfully part of greater Russia. Our first guest, Victoria Nuland, was in Kyiv during the Maidan protests in 2013-14, meeting with pro-democracy protesters as well as then-President Yanukovych. This was the first of many such visits since then. It was just last month that the current Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs was in Kyiv for talks and she joins Christiane from Washington to discuss U.S. support for Ukraine.  Also on today's show: Sergey Markov, Director, Institute of Political Studies in Moscow / Former MP, United Russia; Oleksiy Goncharenko, Member of the Ukrainian Parliament; Gita Gopinath, First Deputy Managing Director, IMF  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

On the tenth episode of the Ukraine's Story series, we will delve into the events of the Revolution of Dignity (or Euromaidan), which unfolded in late 2013 and early 2014. It was a series of mass protests and demonstrations in Ukraine's capital, Kyiv. Sparked by President Yanukovych's decision to suspend an association agreement with the European Union in favour of closer ties with Russia, the movement evolved into a broader call for democratic reforms, an end to government corruption and closer ties with Europe and the West. The protesters, known as Euromaidan activists, endured harsh winter conditions as they occupied Kyiv's Independence Square. The movement culminated in February 2014 with the ousting of President Yanukovych, marking a pivotal moment in Ukraine's modern history. Ukraine was at a crossroads, torn between closer ties with the West and maintaining historical ties with Russia, reflecting the nation's internal struggle in defining its geopolitical identity and future direction.You can find bonus content such as videos and extended versions of episodes over at The History Buff Patreon (it's free - for now!). You can also follow The History Buff on Instagram, TikTok and Youtube.Artwork by Leila Mead. Check out her website and follow her on Instagram.Music: As History Unfolds by Christoffer Moe Ditlevsen. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

February 20th 2024 Yuriy recounts of the intense and tragic events during the beginning of the Ukrainian revolution, where unarmed protestors faced violent suppression by authorities, leading to the start of the Russo-Ukrainian war. He tells the story of courageous and resilient Ukrainians who fought for independence against corrupt regimes and foreign interference. You can email Yuriy, ask him questions or simply send him a message of support: fightingtherussianbeast@gmail.com    You can help Yuriy and his family by donating to his GoFundMe: https://www.gofundme.com/f/help-yuriys-family   Yuriy's Podbean Patron sign-up to give once or regularly: https://patron.podbean.com/yuriy   Buy Yuriy a coffee here: https://bmc.link/yuriymat  ----more---- TRANSCRIPT: (Podbean app users can enjoy closed captions)    It is February 20  From the metallic pole, bullets ricochet with a soft musical ring. You managed to hear a "ding" on a high note and the quiet whistle of a bullet rapidly losing speed after hitting the steel. This sound is deceptively pleasant, almost calming. It was from this sound exactly 10 years ago when the war began. I remember this day very well, February 20th, 2014. For several months a huge tent camp had been set up in the center of Kyiv- unafraid of winter colds and other inconveniences, thousands of people stood gut there demanding the resignation of the thieving pro-Russian President, Victor Yanukovych.   The riot police he sent kidnapped and killed the most active protestors since the first weeks of revolution, set ambushes and raid on the revolutionaries for weeks. But it was on February 20 that were authorities decided on an armed assault on the camp. Snipers settled on the rooftops, riflemen and riot police with shotguns occupied the streets around with square, with the protestors. The police force advanced, broke several barricades, burned tents, but then something incredible happened- tired freezing people with sticks and stones drove the regime's dogs away. They retreated, hiding behind the backs of conscript soldiers whom they used as a living shield and shot at unarmed people. Blood flowed down the hills of Kyiv. Terrified police officers sprayed the crowd with wallet of bullets.  At some point, a man next to me fell like a thrown sack. A bullet hit him in the head and went through. He didn't even have time to scream. They loaded him onto makeshift stretchers, made of boards, and tried to carry him out of the firing zone. But the police hit the leg of one of walls carrying the corpse. He fell, but didn't scream or cry, just cursed those who had caused this bloody turmoil. And although it was Ukrainian Riot police shooting at the protestors brought to Kyiv from all over the country, it was the first battle of Russo-Ukrainian war. And here's why. Protests in Ukraine began after Yanukovych refused to sign the long awaited agreement on cooperation with the European Union. He refused because Putin really did not want that, who approved and vetoed all important decisions over Ukrainian government. Having nominally gained independence from Moscow in 1991, in 2014 Ukraine had to reckon with what Russian rulers would want.  And people got tired of it. We were tired of Yanukovych corrupt rule, tired of Russian managers sitting in all major enterprises and even government departments, Ukrainians were tired of being a colony and decided to truly become independent, so we went against the government. The riot police shooting at them, were not only defending Yanukovych, they were defending the order under which Russians could dictate their terms to Ukraine.  And when this order fell along with Yanukovych fleeing to Russia with tracks of gold, the Russians started an open war. They entered Crimea, then the Donbas and in 2022 decided to finish off Ukraine once and for all.  But Ukraine stood then, when people had nothing but faith in themselves and pieces of broken cobble stones. It'll stand now when instead of cobble stones, Ukrainians have guns in their hands. 

Congress is probably going to send approximately $50 billion more, most of that for weapons, to continue the war in Ukraine. In November, high ranking officials from the State Department testified about how the Biden administration intends to use our money and why. In this episode, hear the highlights of their testimony and decide for yourself if you think their goals are worth sacrificing more American money and Ukrainian lives. Please Support Congressional Dish – Quick Links Contribute monthly or a lump sum via Support Congressional Dish via (donations per episode) Send Zelle payments to: Donation@congressionaldish.com Send Venmo payments to: @Jennifer-Briney Send Cash App payments to: $CongressionalDish or Donation@congressionaldish.com Use your bank's online bill pay function to mail contributions to: Please make checks payable to Congressional Dish Thank you for supporting truly independent media! Background Sources Recommended Congressional Dish Episodes WTF is the World Trade System? Naomi Klein. Picador: 2008. Nicole Narea. October 13, 2023. Vox. Offshore Technology. Ukraine: How We Got Here Branko Marcetic. February 7, 2022. Jacobin. Stanley Reed and Andrew E. Kramer. November 5, 2013. The New York Times. Marieke Ploegmakers. February 5, 2012. All About Feed. Arseniy Yatsenyuk Official Website. Retrieved on December 16, 2023. Wikipedia: The Free Encyclopedia. The Ukraine War, by the Map Defence Intelligence, UK Ministry of Defense. December 15, 2023. GlobalSecurity.org. Visual Journalism Team. November 16, 2023. BBC News. Josh Holder. September 28, 2023. The New York Times. @war_mapper. December 31, 2022. GlobalSecurity.org. U.S. Support for Ukraine Karoun Demirjian. December 6, 2023. The New York Times. The IMF in Ukraine Oleksandra Betliy. May 5, 2023. Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. March 31, 2023. International Monetary Fund. Estelle Nilsson-Julien and Ilaria Federico. March 5, 2023. Euronews. December 21, 2022. International Monetary Fund. Diplomacy Connor Echols. December 1, 2023. Responsible Statecraft. Seymour Hersh. December 1, 2023. Seymour Hersh on Substack. Olena Roshchina. November 24, 2023. Ukrainska Pravda. The Toll of War Jonathan Landay. December 12, 2023. Reuters. John Mazerolle. December 8, 2023. CBC News. Inae Oh. November 8, 2023. Mother Jones. Oleg Sukhov. September 28, 2023. The Kyiv Independent. Israel-Palestine Ian Black. Narrated by Michael Page. Tantor Audio: 2018. Darryl Cooper. The Martyrmade Podcast. Audio Sources November 8, 2023 Senate Foreign Relations Committee Witnesses: , Assistant Secretary of State, European and Eurasian Affairs , Assistant Secretary of State, Energy Resources , Assistant Administrator, Europe and Eurasia, United States Agency for International Development (USAID) Clips 1:55 Sen. Ben Cardin (D-MD): The supplemental funding will strengthen governance and anti-corruption systems. It will improve the resilience of our economies and our energy supply. It will support efforts to come out of the other side of this. We're ready for Ukraine to join EU and also NATO. But this investment in Ukraine goes far beyond its borders. By degrading Russia's military capabilities, we're also degrading the capabilities of those who Russia works with, like Iran, Hamas, and Hezbollah. 10:30 Sen. Ben Cardin (D-MD): First Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs James O'Brien. Assistant Secretary O'Brien assumed his role just last month after serving as sanctions coordinator at the State Department. He is a former career employee of the department receiving numerous performance awards and serve to previous US administration's as Special Presidential Envoy for hostages and for the Balkans. 11:00 Sen. Ben Cardin (D-MD): The next will be Assistant Secretary for Energy Resources, Jeffrey R. Pyatt. No stranger to this committee, career diplomat Assistant Secretary Pyatt has been in his current role since September 2022. He served as US Ambassador to Greece and Ukraine. He has held numerous leadership positions through out the department and has won numerous awards. 11:25 Sen. Ben Cardin (D-MD): And our third witness is Assistant Administrator Erin McKee, who serves as the Assistant Administrator in the Bureau of Europe and Eurasia at USAID. Prior to this position, she was the US Ambassador to Papua New Guinea and to the Solomon Islands. Prior to her Ambassador appointments, as a member of the Senior Foreign Service she served in numerous leadership roles throughout USAID and the embassies abroad. Before her US government career she developed private sector experience including throughout the former Soviet Union. 14:40 James O'Brien: This is around the Black Sea and Crimea. Ukraine has, through its own ingenuity and with weapons that have been provided, loosened Russia's grip. Russia tried to blockade the ability of Ukraine to export, but now Ukraine is starting to export more grain, more metals. And this is enabling it to pay for more of its war itself. So just a few numbers as we go through this. Ukraine is hoping to get about 8 million tons of grain and metals out through the Black Sea over the course of the next year. If it does that, it will provide about $5-6 billion more for its tax base than it has now. That helps to make up the shortfall that our supplemental will cover for the meantime. But it also then provides the employment for millions of its citizens to work within Ukraine. Now, that is a path to victory where we help Ukraine by providing assistance to have its energy grid strengthened, air defense over its employment centers, and the export routed needs so that it is able to fight this fight over the long term and to hold Russia off thereafter. 15:50 James O'Brien: The military assistance in the supplemental is about $45 billion. That goes to acquire American equipment that Ukraine will then use to pay for American service people to support Ukraine and to pay other countries to acquire American equipment after they provide equipment to Ukraine. 16:05 James O'Brien: The direct budget support that we provide to Ukraine enables Ukraine to put all of its tax dollars to support the war. Ukraine pays for about 60% of the costs of this war right now. The direct budget support pays for hundreds of thousands of educators, first responders, firefighters, and health care professionals to work within Ukraine. 16:55 James O'Brien: The next question is, who's with us? We have more than 40 countries. They provide much more assistance to Ukraine than we do. It's about $91 billion to our $70 billion so far. They've hosted 4.5 million Ukrainian refugees at a cost of around $18 billion. They are proposing another $50 billion in assistance just from the European Union. 17:30 James O'Brien: Right now, Ukrainians are willing to do this job because it's in their territory. If we abandon them, then somebody else is going to have to do this job later and it's likely to be us. So I'd rather confront Russia and its destabilizing attitudes right here, right now, and we can finish the job with the supplemental that we've proposed for your consideration. 18:45 Geoffrey R. Pyatt: For Ukraine, this coming winter promises to be even more challenging than the last. Ukraine's generation capacity has degraded about 50% since the start of the war. Ukrainian energy workers have labored day and night, often under fire, to repair, restore, and harden grid and generation facilities, often by cannibalizing parts from elsewhere. But most spare parts by now have been consumed, and Russia has recently resumed its bombardment of power plants and refineries, including just this morning in eastern Ukraine. 20:50 Geoffrey R. Pyatt: The World Bank has estimated that after last winter, Ukraine needed at least $411 billion to rebuild its infrastructure. That was eight months ago. Every day that number grows. Electricity grid damage alone amounted to $10 billion in 2022. Ukraine's economic future depends on investment by the private sector, and energy is key to unlocking that industrial recovery. 21:25 Geoffrey R. Pyatt: American energy companies like Halliburton, GE, and EQT have been active partners in this effort, providing vital equipment to Ukraine and actively exploring future commercial opportunities. We're working together to build a better future for and with Ukraine -- modern, cleaner, and with a more decentralized power sector that is fully integrated with Europe, even serving as a power exporter to the rest of the European Union. 22:10 Geoffrey R. Pyatt: After the full scale invasion, US LNG producers stepped up to surge supplies to Europe, as our allies turned away from Russia as an energy source. Since 2022, US exporters have supplied the EU with approximately 90 million tons of LNG -- three times as much as the next largest supplier. Last year, 70% of US LNG exports went to Europe. Europe's shift away from Russian energy has happened much faster than predicted, and marks a permanent shift in the International Energy map. 25:30 Erin McKee: In response to the immediate crisis, USAID has provided nearly $2 billion in humanitarian assistance to Ukraine since February of 2022. The generosity of the American people has supplied emergency health care, agriculture and energy support to Ukraine's most vulnerable populations. And thanks to the Congressional appropriations, USAID disbursed reliable, sustained direct budget support to the Ukrainian government, along with unprecedented levels of oversight. This enabled first responders, health care workers, teachers and others to continue their vital work and sustain Ukraine's economy and institutions while they defend their country's freedom and sovereignty. 26:10 Erin McKee: To respond to Russia's weaponization of hunger, USAID launched the Agriculture Resilience Initiative to keep farmers afloat. USAID also works very closely with the private sector to improve Ukraine's energy security and transform Ukraine's energy sector into a modern engine of growth. Side by side with our agriculture and energy efforts is USAID's support to small and medium enterprises, helping Ukraine increase jobs and generate revenue. 26:45 Erin McKee: At this time, there is no funding left for direct budget support. Without further appropriations, the government of Ukraine would need to use emergency measures such as printing money or not paying critical salaries, which could lead to hyperinflation and severely damage the war effort. USAID has also exhausted all of its supplemental humanitarian assistance funds. Additional funding is critical in the face of what remains an enormous need. If Congress does not approve supplemental funding, our partner organizations in Ukraine would have to either reduce the number of people getting this humanitarian assistance by up to 75% or suspend our humanitarian programs entirely. 27:30 Erin McKee: USAID also looks to the future to building resilient infrastructure and institutions that will support Ukraine's path towards European Union integration. For decades, USAID has buttressed Ukraine's progress towards transparent, inclusive and accountable governance. The United States continues to help Ukraine carry out judicial reform, institutionalized transparent financial systems, and respond to the people of Ukraine's zero tolerance for corruption. 33:15 Erin McKee: They have not skipped a beat in advancing the reform agenda. The EU report just came out this morning and both Ukraine and Moldova, and a variety of other countries, received support for continuing and opening chapters of recession talks. That's because our support to strengthening and deepening the institutions fighting corruption in Ukraine have received the top priority from the President. They had to pass and meet conditionality that we put on our direct budget support and did so without blinking. So while they're fighting a war and fighting for their survival, they are 100% dedicated to ensuring that the political economy model that they inherited during the Soviet Union is dismantled, which reflects the will of the Ukrainian people. 34:35 Geoffrey R. Pyatt: And one of the real success stories amid the tragedy of this war is that Europe has turned decisively away from its dependence, up until 2022, on Russian gas in particular. I see that as a permanent change in the landscape. It's reflected in the billions of dollars that European countries have invested in regasification facilities. It's reflected in the contracts that are being signed with American LNG producers. And it's also reflected in Europe's renewed and doubled commitment to accelerating the pace of its energy transition. So ironically, Putin's weaponization of his energy resource has induced Europe to break its vulnerability there and I think that is a permanent change in the landscape. That is also a positive benefit for American energy producers in our leadership on the energy transition. 35:55 Sen. James Risch (R-ID): I want to talk about the nuclear reactors we have in the United States, of which there are 95, give or take a few. Would you tell the committee, please, where does the fuel come from to operate these nuclear facilities? Geoffrey R. Pyatt: So, Ranking Member, about 20% of the fuel that operates our nuclear fleet here in the United States still comes from Russia. The President has included in his latest supplemental request for about $2.2 billion to help rebuild the nuclear enrichment capacity that we need here in the United States to end that dependency. And the administration has also stated its support for a ban on the import of Russian nuclear fuel. 43:30 Erin McKee: Right now Ukraine is able to spend all of their national budget in the fight. They are paying their soldiers salaries, they are dedicated to defeating Putin on the front lines. That means they don't have any resources to take care of their people and govern, which is as vital to keep up the unity of purpose and the resilience that we've seen from the Ukrainian people, because they're all in, both on the civilian and the military side. So the types of services that would be suspended are first responders who rush into the building and save lives, medical care to make sure that inoculations stay up so that the Ukrainian population stays healthy, particularly children's routine immunizations. We heard reports of polio outbreaks and some other concerns during the early days of the mass emigration of folks fleeing the conflict. We also are supporting teachers and continuing education so that they don't lose a generation as a result of Putin's attacks on civilians and civilian infrastructure so that the kids can stay in school, and that those families — Sen. Chris Coons (D-DE): Am I correct that the direct budget support requested gradually goes down over the next year, as the economy becomes more vibrant and we assess Ukraine is able to generate more revenue? Erin McKee: Correct. The direct budget support and their fiscal stability is also vital for the IMF program and other donors stepping in. Our leadership in this space -- and yes, we were first -- unlocked the other support that we've seen mobilized from the EU and other donors, as well as boosting the confidence in the multilaterals to be able to contribute to Ukraine's economic stability, which is as vital as winning the war. If their economy collapses, Putin will have won. 47:55 Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY): As Harvard's Graham Allison points out, if Putin is forced to choose between humiliating defeat on the one hand and escalating the level of destruction, there's every reason to believe he chooses the latter. There's a great deal of evidence that the war in Ukraine has come to a stalemate. Even Ukraine's Commander in Chief of the armed services has admitted as much. In Graham Allison's view, the Ukraine war has escalated far enough to see how bad things would become if we end up in a world where nuclear weapons are used. Allison believes that where we are now, both for Putin's Russia and for the Biden-led US and the Western alliance, it's time to search for an off ramp for all the parties. What is being done at the State Department to search for an off ramp. James O'Brien: Thank you, Senator. A few points. I mean, I can speak to the foreign policy implications. My belief is if we don't stand with Ukraine now, we'll be spending much more on defense in the future. Much of this supplemental goes to reinvest in the United States, so far from rot and ruin, we're actually shoring up the foundations in our energy sector as Assistant Secretary Pyatt — Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY): So your argument is that war and funding war around the world is good for our armaments industry. James O'Brien: I'm saying this supplemental is good for our economy — Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY): For the armaments industry. So really, it's a justification of war. To me, that's sort of reprehensible -- and this is coming from my side as well -- the idea that "Oh, glory be, the war's really not that bad. Broken windows are not that bad, because we pay people to fix them. Broken countries are not so bad, because hey, look, the armaments industry is gonna get billions of dollars out of this." I think that's a terrible argument. I wish y'all would go back to your freedom arguments or something. But the idea that you're going to enrich the armaments manufacturers, I think is reprehensible. James O'Brien: Well, Senator, I'm not making the argument war is good. I'm making the argument, in this case, war is necessary. Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY): And that we can make a little profit on the side. It's not so bad since the armaments guys who make a lot of profit on this, right. James O'Brien: Senator, I think you're proposing a kind of false choice that Ieither have to say that or say nothing. What I'm saying is that our economy rests on a foundation of innovation. And in the supplemental, we're investing in our energy sector — Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY): But the money is borrowed. We're borrowing the money. We don't have it. We don't have a pot of money. So what you're arguing is, in essence, that we borrow the money from China, we send it to Ukraine, Ukraine, sends it back to buy arms from us, and that's a win-win. How do we win when we're borrowing money to pay people. See this is this false sort of argument that "oh, look, we'll create five jobs for every dollar we spend," but we're borrowing the money. It doesn't make any sense. It's coming from somewhere where it would be a productive use, into the use of basically fomenting a war and continuing on a war. James O'Brien: No, that's not the choice in front of us, Senator. And I'm sorry that you feel that that's the way you want to frame it. The choice in front of us is do we invest in the capacities that allow this war to be won? Those include capacities in energy, in defense, in IT, and they include — Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY): Let's get away from funding the armaments people. You know, I'm not for that. But the original question is, what are you doing to develop an off ramp? You know, when I listen to your presentations, it sounds like the Department of War, I don't hear the Department of diplomacy in front of me. Where are the diplomats? Is anybody talking about negotiation? Do you really believe that Ukraine is gonna push Russia out of out of Ukraine, they're gonna push them out of Crimea, push them out of the East, and that Zelenskyy's is position, "we will not negotiate till they're gone from Ukraine," is viable? And that there's not going to have to be some negotiation beforehand? If you believe that, though, the meat grinder continues and Ukraine will be in utter destruction and tens of thousands more people will die if there is no negotiation. You would think that as a superpower, we would be involved somewhat with encouraging negotiation. But I've heard nothing from you, and nothing from anyone in your administration, frankly, that talks about negotiating. James O'Brien: Well, Senator, then I hope you would sit down and talk with me about what we're doing in this regard. Here, I'll give you a little sense of it. All wars end with a negotiation. We've made clear we'll do that with Ukraine, not over Ukraine's head. It takes two parties to negotiate the end of a war. President Putin is not serious about negotiating the end of the war. He has said he wants to wait and see what happens in November 2024. We're preparing for that eventuality so we can have a negotiation that will actually stick as opposed to the track record of broken agreements that President Putin has made with a whole range of his neighbors up until now. So that's successful diplomacy, not mere diplomacy. Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY): There are actually some who say we're back to about where we started as far as negotiating and tens of thousands of people have died on both sides, and we haven't been successful. But I still hear only war and I don't hear diplomacy. James O'Brien: No but I think what we're looking at is successful diplomacy. I just spent last weekend with 66 countries talking about the basis of a successful peace in Ukraine. Russia didn't show up. That, again, is the problem. You don't have a willing partner on the other side, so simply saying that there must be talks is -- you're asking for a monologue, not diplomacy. 55:00 Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-OR): You know, I'm really struck by the parallel to the journey of Chamberlain to Munich to say, "Okay, Hitler, you can take a third of Czechoslovakia" and then he declared peace in our time, under the assumption that somehow this would not whet Hitler's appetite. Did Chamberlain's strategy work? James O'Brien: No. Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-OR): Will this strategy now, of us bailing on Ukraine to appease Putin, work? James O'Brien: No, it'll invite more aggression. 1:01:40 Sen. Pete Ricketts (R-NE): Do you think we should condition US aid to prevent US tax dollars from supporting PRC-owned or controlled entities from providing the reconstruction? James O'Brien: Senator, we do. That's why it's so important to have the supplemental so that we remain in the game and can set the conditions that make it impossible for opaque, illegitimate contractors like the Chinese to enter. And I know my colleagues can speak at some length about how in energy, telecomms, and other sectors we do exactly that. But if we're not there, then we can't we can't provide the guarantees you want. 1:05:35 James O'Brien: There are about $2.2 billion to go to both the energy supply and to the economic activity that's needed for Ukraine to begin to repair its access to the outside world. That's also important to us. When Russia invaded Ukraine, grain prices went up six times in many places around the world, because Ukraine is an incredibly important part of the global grain trade. The work that AID does to help Ukrainian farmers get their products to market, in the supplemental, the $100 million that is for demining will help farmers get their product to market. All of that directly benefits the markets in which our consumers are a part. So if we do all that, if we can get them to about pre-war export levels, that's an extra $6 billion a year in tax revenue just from the exports, as well as what the industries pay and what happens around the society. Now, Secretary Pritzker, and she should come and testify this herself, she's doing an outstanding job at building a strategy that lets us focus our efforts in key places, so that Ukraine's economy will begin to work and contribute to the global economy, even while this war is going on. All of that works together to make sure that Ukraine can succeed and has the leverage needed when we get to a negotiation, as Senator Paul wants. 1:13:55 Geoffrey R. Pyatt: So I would point out that the greatest threat to the energy grid today are the Shahed drones, which Russia is now beginning to industrialize the production of those. We can talk about that in a classified setting, but there is a direct Iran-Russia nexus in the attacks on Ukraine's energy system. 1:24:10 Geoffrey R. Pyatt: We are working as hard as we can to accelerate that trend. We do that through two mechanisms. One is by accelerating our energy transition, both here in the United States, but also globally, as the Biden administration has done through the Inflation Reduction Act to reduce the dependence on fossil fuels. But the other aspect of this is what we are doing systematically to reduce Russia's future energy revenue. Just last week, for instance, we leveled new sanctions against a project in the in the Arctic, Arctic LNG 2, which is Novatek's flagship LNG project, which Novatek set in motion with the aspiration of developing Russia as the largest LNG exporter in the world. Our objective is to kill that project, and we're doing that through our sanctions, working with our partners in the G7 and beyond. 1:26:00 James O'Brien: Russia is losing its lucrative markets. That's what got it rich enough to afford this war. It's losing out in the sectors of innovation that are going to drive economic development in the future. So we look at this and say, "Does it put pressure on Putin to get to the table?" Well, yes, it does. It's going to take a little time. He started the war with 640 billion in a rainy day fund. By the start of this year, despite record profits last year, he was down around 580, we immobilized 300 of that, and he spent down further from there. So that gives them a year, two years maybe, of run room on that rainy day fund that all came from selling oil and gas. So that's gone. The second thing is that we don't see Russia able to play in the sectors that are going to drive innovation and economic growth in the future. The areas of quantum mechanics, artificial intelligence, the energy transition, including the new nuclear technologies that are coming on board, and Senator Risch, your work on this I really appreciate, because Russia entangled countries in these long term networks of corruption, with generation-long Rosatom contracts. We're now competing for those again, and taking those sectors away from Russia. That changes the long term prospect from what it was. The result of all this is we anticipate that Russia's GDP is going to be at least 20% smaller by 2030 than it would be if Putin had not started this war. So it's a long term strategic loss for him, and it creates a great opportunity for us in a number of important sectors. 1:35:30 Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL): I understand, and this is not critical. I agree that we can't allow borders to be changed unilaterally and we have to stand with our allies. I'm not diminishing any of those things. But those arguments are too vague. They make sense here, but I'm just telling you they're too vague. This notion that we need to do whatever it takes for however long it takes, is also misguided. Not because that's not necessarily what we need to do, but because that's not going to be enough for people who are asking these questions. I would just say if you had an opportunity, any of you three, or all you three to talk to someone, say someone that came up to me a week ago and said, "Why are we still putting all this money in Ukraine. I hate Putin, I hate what he's done, but we've got all these other things domestically and in other parts of the world that are more important, including China, and now what's happening in the Middle East. How are we going to be spending $60 billion every six months? For how long? Given the debt that we already have?" What would you say to them? And how would you explain to them that this fits into their national interest in that perspective I've just outlined? James O'Brien: That's really well framed, Senator, so I'll do my best here. I think the first thing I'd say is you got to shore up your own base. If we're going to confront China over the next decades, it's 1.4 billion people, that's looking to write the rules that the world economy will run on. We go at them with a coalition of 50-odd countries, Europe is about 600-700 million of that, we're 350 million. With that already, we're set to compete really effectively. Ukraine, though, is a challenge by Putin trying to fray that foundation. So we have to shore that up if we're going to have the heft to compete with China over time. The battle over Ukraine also allows us to reinvigorate our own industrial base, we're creating new energy technologies and putting them in place around the world. We're building new defense technologies, the work that's being done in IT, all of that's included in this supplemental, and that's going to make us better able to defend Taiwan, to work in the South China Sea, than we have otherwise. The final point I'd make is, this is the wrong time to walk away because Ukraine's winning. It's already taken back half the territory Putin seized since February 2022. It opened up the Black Sea grain lanes that Putin tried to shut down in July, did that mostly with its own creativity around a whole set of interesting drones and other technologies that are going to contribute to our security as Ukraine gets closer to NATO. So those are all reasons you don't walk away when you're partway through the job. 1:41:10 Geoffrey R. Pyatt: Ukraine is not a charity case. In economic and development terms, it's an opportunity. Developing that opportunity depends on restoring a level of peace. But as we look to the future, you're going to have a Europe which has decoupled from Russian energy supplies, which means that there's a hole of about 130 BCM per year in energy supply that Europe is going to have to fill. Over the short term, some of that is American LNG, but that's a very expensive option. Ukraine has fantastic resources on wind, on solar, on biomass. It has Europe's second largest civil nuclear industry. It has developed and has demonstrated an extraordinary technological acuity. Just look at how clever Ukrainian soldiers have been in the application of drone technology. These are all the skill sets that Ukraine will need to prosper as a member of the European Union. My colleague, Assistant Administrator McKee, referred to the statement which European President Vanderlaan delivered today welcoming the significant progress that Ukraine has made on its reforms, and her and the Commission's determination to move ahead with Ukraine's accession to the European Union. And I would say as somebody who served as an American ambassador in the EU for six years, what Ukraine represents is a demographically young population, a population which is fantastically committed to the values of the European Union. Ukraine is the only place in the world where people have fought and died under the flag of the EU for the values that are represented in the European constitutions. So I think these are the investments in the leadership that Secretary Pritzker is providing to help our companies and companies around the world begin to make plans for the day after and to work with Ukrainians to keep pushing forward the reforms, which are fundamental to creating the environment where American energy companies, renewable energy companies can come into Ukraine, where we can use Ukraine to help to fill the huge challenges that our global supply chain faces. In the Soviet Union, Ukraine was the center of Soviet metallurgy, the center of Soviet petrochemicals industries, all of those latent skills are still there. You talked about nuclear, Ukraine has a company in Kharkiv, Turboatom, which is one of the few facilities in all of Europe that has the industrial capacity to produce the large steel enclosures that are part of building modern nuclear reactors. So I applaud your focus on this and I know I speak for all three of us and how systematically we're focused on trying to lay the foundation for that better future that the Ukrainian people so richly deserve. 1:53:55 James O'Brien: Ukraine has won back 50% of the territory Russia took since February of 2022. The second piece that's important: Putin is playing a waiting game, like many Muscovite rulers before him. So it's difficult to get a decisive battle. So what we need is what's in the supplemental that has the ability to fight this fight over some time, and we do see real success. So in the Black Sea, Russia attempted to stop Ukraine from exporting. In July, exports were down 2-2.5 million tons; they're already more than doubled, and expect to see them go up substantially more. That's because of what Ukraine has done with its technology and its new weapons systems, more of which would be provided by the supplemental. February 4, 2014 On Demand News on YouTube Speakers: Victoria Nuland, Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs, 2013-2017 Geoffrey Pyatt, United States Ambassador to Ukraine, 2013-2016 Clips Victoria Nuland: Good. So I don't think Klitsch [Vitali Klitschko] should go into the government. I don't think it's necessary, I don't think it's a good idea. Geoffrey Pyatt: Yeah, I mean I guess, in terms of him not going into the government, just sort of letting him stay out and do his political homework and stuff. I'm just thinking in terms of, sort of, the process moving ahead, we want to keep the moderate Democrats together. The problem is going to be Tyahnybok and his guys and I'm sure that's part of what Yanukovych is calculating on all this. Victoria Nuland: I think Yatz [Arseniy Yatsenyuk] is the guy with the economic experience, the governing experience. He's the guy. What he needs is Klitsch [Vitali Klitschko] And Tyahnybok On the outside, he needs to be talking to them four times a week. You know, I just think Klitsch [Vitali Klitschko] Going in he's going to be at that level working for Yatsenyuk it's just not gonna work. Geoffrey Pyatt: We want to get someone out here with an international personality to come out here and help to midwife this thing. And then the other issue is some kind of outreach to Yanukovych. We'll probably regroup on that tomorrow as we see how things fall into place. Victoria Nuland: So on that piece, Jeff, I wrote the note, Sullivan's come back to me saying “you need Biden,” and I said probably tomorrow for an attaboy and get the deets to stick, Biden's willing. Geoffrey Pyatt: Great. December 19, 2013 The Atlantic Council Speaker: John McCain, U.S. Senator from Arizona, 1987-2018 Clips 16:45 Sen. John McCain: If Ukraine's political crisis persists or deepens, which is a real possibility, we must support creative Ukrainian efforts to resolve it. Senator Murphy and I heard a few such ideas last weekend—from holding early elections, as the opposition is now demanding, to the institution of a technocratic government with a mandate to make the difficult reforms required for Ukraine's long-term economic health and sustainable development. Decisions such as these are for Ukrainians to make—no one else—and if they request our assistance, we should provide it where possible. Finally, we must encourage the European Union and the IMF to keep their doors open to Ukraine. Ultimately, the support of both institutions is indispensable for Ukraine's future. And eventually, a Ukrainian President, either this one or a future one, will be prepared to accept the fundamental choice facing the country, which is this: While there are real short-term costs to the political and economic reforms required for IMF assistance and EU integration, and while President Putin will likely add to these costs by retaliating against Ukraine's economy, the long-term benefits for Ukraine in taking these tough steps are far greater and almost limitless. This decision cannot be borne by one person alone in Ukraine. Nor should it be. It must be shared—both the risks and the rewards—by all Ukrainians, especially the opposition and business elite. It must also be shared by the EU, the IMF and the United States. All of us in the West should be prepared to help Ukraine, financially and otherwise, to overcome the short-term pain that reforms will require and Russia may inflict. April 20, 1994 Southern Center for International Studies Speaker: Arthur Dunkel, Director-General of the World Trade Organization, 1980-1993 Clips 26:55 Arthur Dunkel: If I look back at the last 25 years, what did we have? We had two worlds: The so-called Market Economy world and the centrally planned world; the centrally planned world disappeared. One of the main challenges of the Uruguay round has been to create a world wide system. I think we have to think of that. Secondly, why a world wide system? Because, basically, I consider that if governments cooperate in trade policy field, you reduce the risks of tension – political tension and even worse than that." Music by Editing Production Assistance

In this episode we're in Kyiv, the capital of Ukraine, and the nearby suburb, Irpin. Join us as we delve into the untold stories of human resilience, the symbolism of abandoned cars. We also dive into the time before the war, when we visit the residence of the former pro-Russian president, Victor Yanukovych. His massive wealth and lavish lifestyle, starkly contrasts the ongoing struggles of the Ukrainian people, and his opulent estate stands as a testament to the depth of corruption under his regime and its detrimental impact on the nation. Yanukovych's deposed leadership has ignited frustration and outrage among Ukrainians, illuminating the urgent need for transparency and accountability in governance. When the people of Ukraine finally found out about this lavishness and scale of the estate, it was viewed as a symbol of corruption and excess. And that sparked the Euromaidan Revolution. It's time to uncover the true impact of corruption and understand the true path to reconstruction. Blogpost: https://theradiovagabond.com/289-ukraine  Timestamped summary of this episode: 00:00 - Introduction  00:37 - War Remnants in Kiev  02:19 - Facts About Kiev  05:02 - Personal Perspective on the War  09:06 - Visit to Yanukovych's Former Residence  18:07 - Background on Ukraine's pro-Western stance  19:46 - Evolution of the protests  22:23 - Violent crackdown and Yanukovych's downfall  24:48 - Zelensky's leadership and challenges  35:44 - Armed Forces Push Russians Out  36:36 - Rebuilding Residential Buildings  37:09 - Abandoned and Destroyed Cars 

In this episode we're in Kyiv, the capital of Ukraine, and the nearby suburb, Irpin. Join us as we delve into the untold stories of human resilience, the symbolism of abandoned cars. We also dive into the time before the war, when we visit the residence of the former pro-Russian president, Victor Yanukovych. His massive wealth and lavish lifestyle, starkly contrasts the ongoing struggles of the Ukrainian people, and his opulent estate stands as a testament to the depth of corruption under his regime and its detrimental impact on the nation. Yanukovych's deposed leadership has ignited frustration and outrage among Ukrainians, illuminating the urgent need for transparency and accountability in governance. When the people of Ukraine finally found out about this lavishness and scale of the estate, it was viewed as a symbol of corruption and excess. And that sparked the Euromaidan Revolution. It's time to uncover the true impact of corruption and understand the true path to reconstruction. Blogpost: https://radiovagabond.com/338-ukraine  

This week's episode is dedicated to the environmental disaster in East Palestine, Ohio and its political causes and ramifications. As you have heard – or possibly have not heard, since there was an attempt to bury this story early on – on February 3, a massive derailment of a freight train containing hazardous chemicals led to the release of toxic chemicals in the Ohio town of East Palestine, in the surrounding region in Ohio and Pennsylvania, and perhaps even further afield. We do not know, because state and federal officials have refused to give forthright information about this preventable disaster. Our hearts go out to the people of the region and to the country as a whole, for we are all held hostage to this plutocracy and the broken political system it props up.   We discuss the Trump administration's destruction of railroad regulations and the Biden administrations' refusal to reinstate them – which led to Biden union-busting in December as railroad workers begged futilely for sick days and safer conditions. Many workers warned of this precise disaster. The American people can see what's happening – left, right, and center – and unfortunately, with few exceptions, officials on the left, right, and center are keeping the truth about the extent of the disaster from the public. We discuss the ramifications of gutted local media, social media networks that hide information with algorithms, and cable networks that look the other way. We also review the decades of corporate greed and horrific labor policies that led to the Chernobyl of Ohio.   On a related note, we discuss the appointment of Jeffrey Zients, an investment banker with a history of Medicare and Medicaid fraud, as Biden's new chief of staff. The appointment of Zients, who was responsible to a large extent for Biden's disastrous covid policies in 2020 and 2021, could not have come at a worse time. Zients joins a team of eugenicist advisors who believe that one's worth is solely determined by how much you contribute to the economy – and who believe that if you are elderly or disabled, your life lacks utility to the point of worthlessness. (We wish we were exaggerating, but they say this openly.) This is a terrifying time to be surrounded by, as the Ukrainians say, “oligarchs who see the people as the shit they grow their money in”. We are REFUSING to be ruled by them and believe the first step is to speak truth to power and document the crimes.   Our bonus episode, available to Patreon subscribers at the Truth-Teller level or higher, is on UFOs! You know, those objects in the sky that the US government is giving us the play-by-play on while they dodge the tragedy in Ohio. We discuss China spy balloons, Project Blue Beam, and much more! We then do our weekly Q&A, answering questions sent in by our Patreon subscribers at the Democracy Defender level or higher. Topics include Erik Prince, threats to poll workers, why the Democrats choose snark over serious prosecution, and much more. Gaslit Nation is a 100% independent podcast – our Patreon subscribers keep us going! Your support allows us to continue taking on these topics and we appreciate your support and our community of listeners!   Show Notes:   Zoom screening of Mr. Jones on February 25 followed by Q&A with Andrea. Sign up for the event by going to the website: TINY.CC/mrjones. Admission is FREE Suggested donation to the Kyiv Independent - as we need to support "media AND democracy" in Ukraine (and here in the US).   Opening clip: https://twitter.com/DrEricDing/status/1625155991724605440   Closing Clip: https://twitter.com/DrEricDing/status/1625277554910273537   The Freight Rail Labor Dispute Was Never About ‘Sick Days' (vice.com)   Rail Companies Blocked Safety Rules Before Ohio Derailment (levernews.com)   Zeke Emanuel on Twitter: https://t.co/c1yEfz2dMG   The Corporate Past of Jeffrey Zients - The American Prospect   Ohio woman finds chickens dead, questions chemical release from train https://www.wdtn.com/news/ohio/ohio-woman-finds-chickens-dead-questions-chemical-release-from-train/   Animals are sick and dying after Ohio train derailment https://www.wtrf.com/ohio/animals-are-sick-and-dying-after-ohio-train-derailment/?utm_source=t.co&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=socialflow   Elon Musk: We're Curbing Starlink's Use in Ukraine to Prevent WWIII https://www.pcmag.com/news/elon-musk-were-curbing-starlinks-use-in-ukraine-to-prevent-wwiii?taid=63ea57b105dea00001f6d1c9&utm_campaign=trueAnthem%3A+Manual&utm_medium=trueAnthem&utm_source=facebook   Tad Devine and Yanukovych work in Ukraine:  https://twitter.com/rachelweinerwp/status/1022594989702959104   ‘Sadness in the whole forest': family of Cop City activist killed by police seeks answers https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/feb/12/cop-city-manuel-paez-teran-family-mourns   Eric Feigl-Ding thread on the Norfolk Southern chemical explosion:  https://twitter.com/DrEricDing/status/1625155991724605440   American life expectancy is now at its lowest in nearly two decades https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2022/12/22/1144864971/american-life-expectancy-is-now-at-its-lowest-in-nearly-two-decades

Scott talks with Ted Snider about former German Chancellor Angela Merkel's recent claim that the Minsk agreements were never meant to bring peace to the Donbas. Merkel said that instead, they were implemented to give Ukraine time to build up its military. Some are doubting whether Merkel's comments are true, but Snider explains why this is a big deal whether she's lying or not. Scott and Snider explore the dynamic around the Minsk agreements and examine the crucial years between the 2014 ousting of Yanukovych and the 2022 invasion. They also touch on where things stand today and on whether the best window for negotiation has already passed.  Discussed on the show: “Did Europe Lie to Russia About Peace?” (Antiwar.com) “The U.S. Approach to Ukraine's Border War Isn't Working. Here's What Biden Should Do Instead” (Politico) “Did the West Miss Its Window?” (Antiwar.com) “CIA director holds secret meeting with Zelensky on Russia's next steps” (Washington Post) Ted Snider has a graduate degree in philosophy and writes on analyzing patterns in U.S. foreign policy and history. He is a regular writer for Truthout, MondoWeiss and antiwar.com. This episode of the Scott Horton Show is sponsored by: Tom Woods' Liberty Classroom; ExpandDesigns.com/Scott. Get Scott's interviews before anyone else! Subscribe to the Substack. Shop Libertarian Institute merch or donate to the show through Patreon, PayPal or Bitcoin: 1DZBZNJrxUhQhEzgDh7k8JXHXRjY Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

 Download Episode. Scott talks with Ted Snider about former German Chancellor Angela Merkel's recent claim that the Minsk agreements were never meant to bring peace to the Donbas. Merkel said that instead, they were implemented to give Ukraine time to build up its military. Some are doubting whether Merkel's comments are true, but Snider explains why this is a big deal whether she's lying or not. Scott and Snider explore the dynamic around the Minsk agreements and examine the crucial years between the 2014 ousting of Yanukovych and the 2022 invasion. They also touch on where things stand today and on whether the best window for negotiation has already passed.  Discussed on the show: “Did Europe Lie to Russia About Peace?” (Antiwar.com) “The U.S. Approach to Ukraine's Border War Isn't Working. Here's What Biden Should Do Instead” (Politico) “Did the West Miss Its Window?” (Antiwar.com) “CIA director holds secret meeting with Zelensky on Russia's next steps” (Washington Post) Ted Snider has a graduate degree in philosophy and writes on analyzing patterns in U.S. foreign policy and history. He is a regular writer for Truthout, MondoWeiss and antiwar.com. This episode of the Scott Horton Show is sponsored by: Tom Woods' Liberty Classroom; ExpandDesigns.com/Scott. Get Scott's interviews before anyone else! Subscribe to the Substack. Shop Libertarian Institute merch or donate to the show through Patreon, PayPal or Bitcoin: 1DZBZNJrxUhQhEzgDh7k8JXHXRjY

This is an unusual issue of the newsletter, and it's about an unusual conversation I taped yesterday. Normally I don't send out an issue of NZN for each podcast I post, but I think this is a particularly important conversation—and also a complicated conversation, one that can benefit from a preface. The conversation will go public next week and is available to paid NZN subscribers, like you, now—via this issue of the newsletter (video below, audio above) but also via the Nonzero feed on your podcast app (assuming you've set up the special paid subscriber version of that feed in your podcast app; if you haven't, just click “Listen on” in the upper right corner of this post and follow the instructions).The conversation is with Ivan Katchanovski, a political scientist who grew up in Ukraine, came to the US to do graduate work, and now teaches in Canada, at the University of Ottawa. He is frustrated with the way western media is covering the war in Ukraine and with the way western media depicts Ukraine more broadly—including the decade of turmoil that preceded the war.One thing that impresses me about Katchanovski is his capacity for cognitive empathy. He grew up in western Ukraine, speaking Ukrainian, but he is attentive to perspectives in the eastern part of the country, where many people grew up speaking Russian and no few of them are considered “ethnically Russian”. In fact, he has done research on the attitudes of eastern Ukrainians—which leads to one of his frustrations with western coverage of Ukraine. The standard western narrative about the path toward conflict in Ukraine depicts the pivotal events of 2014 roughly like this: Peaceful protests against the policies of a pro-Russian president, Viktor Yanukovych, morphed into revolution—the “Maidan Revolution” or “Revolution of Dignity”—and after the president stepped down Putin responded by seizing Crimea and supporting separatists in the Donbas. This is more or less accurate in so far as it goes. But Katchanovski would like to add a couple of things, the second of which would constitute a radical amendment to the standard narrative: 1. The Maidan revolution made the ground in eastern and southern Ukraine much more fertile for Russian intervention. The overthrow of a democratically elected president who had strong support in the Donbas and Crimea made many people in those areas more supportive of some kind of separation from the rest of Ukraine—more supportive of Russia's annexation of Crimea and more supportive of the separatist movement in the Donbas that Putin would within months be aggressively aiding. (Katchanovski suggests that if the various Obama administration officials who were happy about the overthrow of Yanukovych had done their homework, they would have anticipated this effect on public opinion and perhaps been more ambivalent about regime change.) 2. The “Maidan massacre”—which is depicted in the standard narrative as the murder of dozens of protesters by riot police, and which put massive international pressure on Yanukovych to step down — wasn't what it seemed. Katchanovski, after extensive research on how the revolution unfolded, has concluded that the massacre wasn't in fact perpetrated by police, but rather by far right militants who supported the protests (but whom most of the protesters didn't support, as most of the protesters weren't far right). He says the snipers who killed the protesters were in buildings controlled by far right groups, not by the government.In other words, Katchanovski contends that the killing of the protesters was a “false flag” operation—conducted in the hope that the Yanukovych regime would be blamed and would then be removed from power. Which is what happened.I'm not conversant enough in the evidence to say whether Katchanovski is right, but one thing I can say is that he's assembled a lot of evidence. You can find some of his writings on the subject here and here, and relevant videos he's assembled here. (He says his most recent paper on the subject was accepted by an academic journal but then rejected, a change of heart he suspects reflects political pressure.) I can also say that Katchanovski struck me as sincere and credible. But see what you think. I should add that he has a strong accent, speaks fairly fast, and is not averse to the occasional tangent. But I think if you stick with the conversation until the end, your perspective on the war in Ukraine, and your understanding of Ukraine itself, will be significantly broadened. 00:00 Ivan's Ukrainian upbringing and academic background5:08 Where did pro-Russian sentiment in eastern Ukraine come from? 16:19 Why Ivan worried Ukraine's 2014 revolution would lead to civil war 33:09 Did Europe impede resolution of Russia-Ukraine tensions? 49:25 What western media gets wrong about the Maidan revolution 59:49 Was the Maidan massacre a false flag operation? 1:15:29 The state of Ukrainian democracy after the Maidan revolution 1:33:07 The political forces that impeded Zelensky's peace plan Robert Wright (Bloggingheads.tv, The Evolution of God, Nonzero, Why Buddhism Is True) and Ivan Katchanovski (The University of Ottawa, Historical Dictionary of Ukraine). Recorded January 18, 2023. Comments on BhTV: http://bloggingheads.tv/videos/65579 Twitter: https://twitter.com/NonzeroPods Facebook: https://facebook.com/bloggingheads/ Podcasts: https://bloggingheads.tv/subscribe This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit nonzero.substack.com/subscribe

Time Magazine declares Ukrainian president Zelensky as its 2022 "Person of the Year". #ukraine #zelensky #russia LINKS✏️ Dave Smith & Joe Rogan discuss reasons for Ukraine war: https://bit.ly/3P8CZJq✏️ The "Snipers' Massacre" on the Maidan in Ukraine Ivan Katchanovski: https://bit.ly/3VWu2VRIn-depth study of reasons for 2014 coup in Ukraine (US-backed).✏️ Audio recording revealing US' role in 2014 coup: https://bit.ly/3FwVmVi✏️ How and why the U.S. Government Perpetrated the 2014 Coup in Ukraine: https://bit.ly/3PbWRLW✏️  Wikispooks info re: Maidan Massacre: https://bit.ly/3VFU4gk✏️  John Mearsheimer giving reasons for Ukraine war: https://bit.ly/3FhQyls

See the YouTube video here: (1) Vyacheslav Likhachev - YouTube Vyacheslav Likhachev is a historian, journalist, political scientist, and social activist. He holds a Ph.D. in History from the Moscow Lomonosov University, and graduated from the Jewish University in Moscow, Russia. As Research Fellow, he worked at Jewish University in Jerusalem, Central European University in Budapest, and Warsaw University, Poland. Taught at Jewish University in Moscow, Moscow State University, International Solomon University (Kyiv, Ukraine), and at Kyiv-Mohyla Academy (Ukraine). Head of the "Analytics" Program (Eurasian Jewish Congress, EJC), and of the National Minorities Rights Monitoring Group. Since 2008, Chief Editor of the official EJC website. His research interests include ethnopolitical conflict studies, xenophobia on the post-Soviet space, ideology and activity of far-right groups in Russia and Ukraine, political extremism, theories of nation and nationalism, history of anti-semitism, activity of Jewish communities on post-Soviet space, and inter-confessional relations. https://krytyka.com/en/authors/vyacheslav-likhachev Former head of the Monitoring Group for the Rights of National Minorities,Former Research Analyst at ZMINA. Center for Human Rights, Former Project manager at the Congress of National Communities of Ukraine, Former Fellow at United Nations Human Rights, Former Area Coordinator at Vostok – SOS, Former Guide at Yad Vashem: World Holocaust Center, Jerusalem, Former Founder at The Chernivtsi Museum of the History and Culture of Bukovinian Jews, Former Teacher at the Institute of Asian and African Countries, Former Teacher at Jewish University in Moscow, Former Editor in Chief at Jews of Euro-Asia magazine, Worked at the Union of Councils for Soviet Jews, Former General Counsel, member at Euro-Asian Jewish Congress. Euromaidan SOS: honest answers to the most common questions about AZOV in the West Euromaidan SOS: honest answers to the most common questions about AZOV in the West - Центр Громадянських Свобод (ccl.org.ua) The Far Right in the Conflict between Russia and Ukraine. The Far Right in the Conflict between Russia and Ukraine (ifri.org) Right-wing extremism in Ukraine: the phenomenon of ”Svoboda” brocshura_block.indd (jewseurasia.org) The “Right Sector” and Others: National Radicals and the Ukrainian Political Crisis of Late 2013 – Early 2104 https://www.academia.edu/27715875/The_Right_Sector_and_Others_National_Radicals_and_the_Ukrainian_Political_Crisis_of_Late_2013_Early_2104?fbclid=IwAR0uMb7h39-N5364jfrK-IXrEtIQPlHgul3Coq7AtQi_KHrfWJ35-zQw0S8  In this video/audio Introductions Ukrainian Nationalists vs Modern Ukraine (Nation building, OUN, formation of modern Ukraine.) Weakening of the far right in Ukraine.  Propaganda directed at Ukraine (Maidan to Russian invasion) Yanukovych's rule and loss of electoral support for the far right.  Far right street crime and violence. Impact of Russian invasion on the Ukrainian far right. Azov Battalion.  q7rPOBIbzSTXzvbjWsRG

ORN Martin Armstrong show notes 10/25/22 US sanctions over Russia are a nail in our coffin. Including other countries in our sanctions violated international law. Undermining rule of law. NATO wanted Russia to join NATO in 1991. Story about failed Gorbachev coup, Yeltsin in interim, and Putin come to power. Documents show Clinton part of getting Putin in and communist takeover. People behind Putin are far worse. The communists are still there. Putin criticized by Russian hardliners for being too nostalgic about Ukraine, the root of Russia. He didn't want to destroy it. Ukraine not a nation before 1991. Area east of Dnieper River was always Russian empire. Yeltsin forced out of power over fraudulent transaction at Bank of New York in July 1999. He picked Putin to succeed. Biden administration is controlling Zelensky. Zelensky told not to negotiate. Said Ukraine would rearm with nuclear weapons. It's a war for climate change. 55% of Russian economy is fossil fuels. West wants to cut off ability of Russia to sell fossil fuels. US wanted to invade Syria because Syria wanted to run a pipeline. US invasion of Iraq is old story of projections that US will take out the dictator and the people will cheer and support the US. Invading countries take out the power grid first. Putin only now is taking out the Ukrainian power grid. Hardliners want Putin out. US blew up the Nordstream pipeline. A drone was discovered, Sweden not saying whose it was. The problem is having standing armies. US second amendment was supposed to enable a militia. They have to always demonize Russia. Every prior leader has always sought world peace. Only the opposite now. Not one leader is talking peace. They just want war. They need war because the financial system is collapsing. They plan to default on debts and start over again. Kissinger is very smart. Every president since Nixon has invited him to the White House except Biden. US history of false flags. They never tell the truth about anything. Removing Russia from SWIFT gave China the go ahead to initiate their CIPS financial system. Neocons on both sides, Republican and Democrat. Ukrainian Nazis horrified even the German Nazis. Deep-rooted hatred between Russia and Ukraine. Even the IMF refused to give Ukraine money until they cleaned up their corruption. Major area for laundering money. Minsk agreement that NATO would stay out of Ukraine. Donbass supposed to vote and form their own republic then. US started the civil war in Ukraine in 2014. US wanted Yanukovych out, forced protests and new election. Attacks on Donbass started then. November 7 is US election but also a critical time for the Ukrainian war. Will there be a false flag before the election? US, UK, France, Turkey warned by Russia that Ukraine will set off a dirty bomb. Armstrong's SOCRATES computer and its successful predictions. Japan has 2nd largest sovereign debt. Will fall before the US does. Uncertainty created about their financial system, so capital comes to the US. EU money also coming to the US now, because of liquidity crisis. FED creates money when it takes in debt. Yellen is shortening the yield curve. Biden is increasing expenditures dramatically. Bank needs a balance sheet to buy debt. Debt increasing so fast that banks can't buy debt. Yellen will buy 30 year bonds from the market and then issue short term debt as a swap. Is making the Treasury more susceptible to interest rate changes. Phase 1 was repo crisis. US wouldn't sell to European banks. The first crack in confidence. Now in Phase 2. Crack in confidence in government debt itself. Phase 3 is a complete collapse. They go into war to get out of this. Armstrong's new book, The Seizure of Russia.

Guests featured in this episode: Mykola Gnatovskyy, a renowned Ukrainian legal scholar who was recently elected to serve as judge at the European Court of Human Rights. Before taking up this very prestigious nine-year appointment at the ECHR, Mykola was a professor at the Institute of International Relations, Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv. He also advised the Ukrainian Minister for Foreign Affairs on international criminal justice, and was a member of the International Expert Board on Crimes Committed during Armed Conflict at the Office of the Prosecutor General of Ukraine.From 2015 until 2021, Mykola served three consecutive terms as President of the European Committee for the Prevention of Torture and Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment.In March of this 2022, he was one of the original signatories, together with Ukraine's Minister of Foreign Affairs and the former British Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, calling for the establishment of a special tribunal to investigate Russia for the crime of aggression against Ukraine. GLOSSARY:What is the International Criminal Court?(01:58 or p.1 in the transcript)International Criminal Court (ICC): permanent judicial body established by the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court (1998) to investigate, prosecute, and try individuals accused of genocide, war crimes, and crimes against humanity and to impose prison sentences upon individuals who are found guilty of such crimes. On July 1, 2002, after the requisite number of countries (60) ratified the agreement, the court began sittings. It is headquartered in the Netherlands at The Hague: source What is the War in Ukraine?(04:32 or p.2 in the transcript)In early November 2021 Russia began building up military forces along the borders of Ukraine, for the second time in a year. Over 100,000 Russian military personnel and assets were deployed in Crimea and in the Voronezh, Kursk and Bryansk regions of western Russia. Further Russian forces were deployed to Belarus for a series of exercises close to the Ukrainian border and Russian naval assets from the Baltic and Northern fleets deployed for exercises in the Black Sea. Tensions escalated following a US intelligence assessment in December 2021, which suggested that Russia could be planning an invasion of Ukraine in early 2022. On 24 February 2022 Russia launched military action in Ukraine, with forces crossing into the country from Belarus in the north, Russia in the east and Crimea in the south. Russia's actions came just days after President Putin officially recognized the self-declared independence of the Donetsk People's Republic (DPR) and Luhansk People's Republic (LPR), the regions of eastern Ukraine that are under the control of Russian-backed separatist forces, and deployed “peacekeeping” forces to the region: source What is the massacre in Eastern Anatolia?(07:18 or p.2 in the transcript)Massacre in Eastern Anatolia, also known as Armenian Genocide: campaign of deportation and mass killing conducted against the Armenian subjects of the Ottoman Empire by the Young Turk government during World War I (1914–18). Armenians charge that the campaign was a deliberate attempt to destroy the Armenian people and, thus, an act of genocide. The Turkish government has resisted calls to recognize it as such, contending that, although atrocities took place, there was no official policy of extermination implemented against the Armenian people as a group: source What is the Wagner Group?(17:02 or p.5 in the transcript)Wagner Group: a network of businesses and groups of mercenaries that have been linked by overlaps in ownership and logistics networks. Entities making up the network have been described in sanctions designations by the U.S. Treasury as being involved in a wide range of activities, including working to suppress pro-democracy protests, spreading disinformation, mining for gold and diamonds, and engaging in paramilitary activity. The group, such as it is, first appeared in Ukraine in 2014, where it assisted the Russian military in the annexation of Crimea. Since then, paramilitaries and businesses have branched out to Syria—where they have fought in support of embattled President Bashar al-Assad while securing a foothold in the country's energy sector—as well as to Libya, Sudan, Madagascar, Mozambique, and the Central African Republic: source What is the occupation of Crimea and Eastern Ukraine?(31:38 or p. 8 in the transcript)The Crisis in Crimea and Eastern Ukraine: on 22 February 2014, President Yanukovych disappeared from Ukraine and a new government was installed by the Ukrainian parliament. Later that month unidentified military figures, widely thought in the West to be Russian personnel (this was later confirmed), surrounded the airports in Crimea, a majority-Russian peninsula in Ukraine and the Crimean autonomous assembly was taken over by pro-Russian forces. In March 2014 a declaration of independence was issued by the assembly and a subsequent referendum on union with Russia was held. Since then, Russia has maintained its control over Crimea and supported pro-Russian separatist forces who also took control of parts of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions of eastern Ukraine (the Donbas) in 2014. Fighting between Russian-supported separatists and Ukrainian government forces has continued in the Donbas for the last eight years despite the negotiation of the Minsk Agreements in 2014/2015 which called for a ceasefire, the withdrawal of all foreign armed groups and constitutional reform recognizing the special status of Donetsk and Luhansk: source  Democracy in Question? is brought to you by:• Central European University: CEU• The Albert Hirschman Centre on Democracy in Geneva: AHCD• The Podcast Company: Novel Follow us on social media!• Central European University: @CEU• Albert Hirschman Centre on Democracy in Geneva: @AHDCentreSubscribe to the show. If you enjoyed what you listened to, you can support us by leaving a review and sharing our podcast in your networks! 

In Part 2 of our series on Ukraine, we pick up with the history of Ukraine starting with the aftermath of the Maidan Coup in 2014. The post-coup government in Ukraine with hand-picked Prime Minister Yatsenyuk cozied up to the EU, IMF, and US and enacted a law targeting the Russian language. These actions led to widescale protests in predominantly Russian speaking areas of Ukraine. We explain how the story we hear in the western media has been mostly propaganda and that Crimea was not invaded by Russia, but voted by general ballot to join Russia. The same is true of the independent republics of Donetsk and Luhansk who held general referendums to breakaway from Ukraine after the coup government launched a bloody civil war targeting these regions in the Donbass. And while Ukrainian neo-Nazi battalions carried out this war in the Donbass, then Vice-President Joe Biden was working closely with Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko to impose IMF structural adjustment programs on Ukraine. These programs were a direct war on the working class and only served to enrich corporate interests. One of these corporations, oil and gas company Burisma, appointed Hunter Biden to their board after Joe Biden visited Ukraine. The Poroshenko/Biden friendship is one rife with corruption. The current proxy war in Ukraine was set up by the Maidan coup, orchestrated by Jake Sullivan, Victoria Nuland, and Joe Biden under an Obama presidency. The actions of Joe Biden under the Obama administration make it clear that this was set up to be continued under Hillary after 2016, though the strategy changed when Hillary was defeated. Russiagate was created to prepare the public for this war against Russia. The media-military-industrial-complex is complicit in creating this tragedy, which could have been avoided if the US had just left Ukraine alone. Related Materials 2010 Ukrainian presidential election -To give you an idea of the historical political divide in Ukraine, here is an article on the electoral split during the 2010 national election between Yanukovych and Tymoshenko. Yanukovych was democratically elected, even though he was heavily opposed by NATO and the West. This map shows how the Eastern regions of Ukraine, including the Donbass, Crimea, and Odessa (where a majority speak and identify as Russian) went heavily for Yanukovich while the more Western, EU-affiliated regions of Ukraine voted for Tymoshenko. The IMF connection with the Ukraine crisis - Details on how the IMF uses loans to impose neoliberal austerity measures Revealing Ukraine: Documentary by Oliver Stone - An important documentary on the aftermath of the Maidan, featuring Oliver Stone interviewing Ukrainian opposition leader Viktor Medvedchuk Time Documentary: Inside A White Supremacist Militia in Ukraine Joe Biden Delivers Remarks to Ukrainian Parliament- Dec. 2015 - Joe Biden addresses Ukrainian parliament Former Ukraine president returns to Kyiv to face treason charges - Former Ukrainian President Poroshenko charged with treason over his corrupt actions as president ‘This is a war of propaganda': John Pilger on Ukraine and Assange | Talking Post with Yonden Lhatoo

Ukraine Plus Other Wars OngoingThe Jack Blood Show 360 4-14-2022 Ruslan Haiduk and Kevin Booth How do Ukrainians feel about Russians? from our young friend Ruslan Haiduk The world asks Ukrainians to stop hating Russians. They say that Russians are victims of their government. They have been receiving too much propaganda and don't know where the truth is. However, Ukrainians ignore that and still hate Russians. What about me? Do I hate Russians? - I don't know. Read the following statements and decide on your own. Before the war, I had a lot of friends in Russia, close friends. They knew me very well. They knew that I had a wonderful life in Ukraine, I traveled, I studied, I worked, and I was happy. When the war started my friends were worried about me. They phoned and said: “Don't worry we are going to save you. Putin will save Ukraine.” I responded: “We don't need to be saved”. They said that I didn't know the truth, I'd been lied to that I had a beautiful life. When I tried to explain that Russia invaded us, they didn't believe any of my words. When I said that missiles attacked buildings in my city and Russian tanks shot people, they said that it was fake information provided by the Ukrainian government. When I said that I could see everything with my eyes, they said that I just didn't understand the situation. It was hard to hear those words from people I considered to be my friends. Expecting support I received humiliation. That's a short story about how I lost all my Russian friends. That's a story about how even my Russian relatives who visited Ukraine and saw it as a beautiful developing country didn't believe my words. Russians say it's not their war. They are “little” people and can't help it. In 2014 thousands of Ukrainians protested against the Ukrainian government and President Yanukovych. People with sticks and stones fought police with guns. One hundred people died, but we won and changed our government. It was Maidan 2014. Russia is the biggest country in the world with 144 million people, no one would defeat them if they united. But instead, more Russians gathered in Mc Donald's on its last working day than in protests against the war. As I said before, freedom is a choice of people. Russians are slaves of their government and they don't want to change it. Moreover, they want other countries to live the same way. Everyone who says that Russians can't receive the true information is wrong. Most of them know the truth. They are just too weak to admit that they are wrong. They feel that they are totally screwed but they can't accept that it was their country that invaded Ukraine and killed thousands of innocent people. That's why they prefer believing in lies which makes their country a hero. Imagine, 140 countries, hundreds of celebrities, politicians, and almost everyone in the world says that Russia is the occupant. There are a billion proofs. Russians have the same access to the internet as each of us but they don't want to believe it. It is their choice, not the effect of Russian propaganda. Through weeks of the war, Russians started understanding that the world considers them enemies. So Russians try to convince everyone that the war is not their fault and sanctions harm “innocent” people. Well, it's not Putin who kills thousands of Ukrainians. It's 200 000 Russian soldiers who are on Ukrainian land, who have families which let it happen. Moreover, without support from Russians who shout out the power of their fascist sign ”Z”, Putin wouldn't be able to commit that crime in Ukraine for a whole month. This war is the responsibility of every adult Russian who keeps saying: “It's not my war”, “We are little people”, “I am beyond politics”, and “Let the leaders of countries decide”. At first, I also didn't understand why sanctions have to harm Russians. But now it's clear. Without sanctions, they won't change their actions. They have to see that their government commits a crime. Russians proved that the words of celebrities and world leaders are nothing to them. Destroying the Russian economy and showing people what their life will be if they don't take action, will make people start thinking. And one more time: If Russians unite and fight their government, this war will end. Finally, the last thing I want to share with you. One of my Russian friends is a part of the Russian army. He is 18. He started military service in November 2021. Three months before the war had started. I try to keep in touch with him to know more about the situation. He told me that on the 23rd of February the Russian government sent him on training to Crimea, but indeed they sent him to the war. They also gave them documents to sign which they didn't even read. Before starting to defend Russian soldiers you should know that as soon as they entered Ukraine they knew exactly what they were doing. My friend said that they saw innocent people who begged them to leave their land, but still they just blindly obeyed orders. “Destroy that house, bomb a hospital, shoot a car”, they did anything. Good soldiers? No, just cowards. They keep killing people because they are afraid of going to prison for ignoring orders. But my friend is different. I'll tell you why. He had an opportunity to go home because he hadn't finished his military service and it was illegal for him to be in the war. But he decided to stay because the Russian government paid him 300$ a month. That's the price of life for Russian soldiers. I still keep in touch with my friend. However, he's not my friend anymore. Today he phoned me and said that he was alright hiding in occupied villages. As soon as I know that he is heading to attack Ukrainian cities, I'll ask about his location and inform the Ukrainian army. I know that our army will destroy those troops and it will be my fault. You can call me a traitor but I know that I will save the lives of other innocent people and especially children whose deaths hit me the most. Do I hate Russians? - maybe I don't. But I won't be able to forgive them. I won't forgive my Russian friends and relatives who didn't believe my words. I won't forgive Russians for every death of a Ukrainian child which happened because they supported their government or kept silent. I won't forgive my friend who chose money instead of peace. I won't forgive Russians for their words that it was their government, not them. I won't forgive them for every sleepless night I spent worrying about my father and Ukrainian people who hid in shelters. I won't forgive.KEVIN BOOTH:Sacred Cow Productions is a production company founded by filmmaker and author Kevin Booth and the late comedian Bill Hicks. https://sacredcowproductions.com/Shadows of Sofia - Trailer https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H7pXUwkk6wsAmerican Drug War: The Last White Hope https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1033467/?ref_=ttmi_ttThere is only one Jack Blood!Jack Blood News: https://www.facebook.com/JackBloodNews/E-Mail and Paypal jackblood@hotmail.comOCHELLI LINKS:If You Appreciate what Ochelli.com Radio Does: https://ochelli.com/donate/Ochelli Effect - Uncle - Age of Transitions - T-shirts and MORE: https://theageoftransitions.com/category/support-the-podcasts/

Tune back in for part two of Justin's interview with former diplomat and former non-commission officer in the United States Marine Corps, Shane Partlow. In this installment, Shane gets into the nitty gritty of Ukraine's 2014 Maidan Revolution, following the Euromaidan protests against former president Viktor Yanukovych. He discusses efforts to stay hidden at protests and rallies as well as what happened when the Yanukovych regime suddenly fell and Russian troops made an opportunistic play to invade Crimea.Connect with Shane:Twitter: @Shane_PartlowCheck out the book Shane read from, Christopher Smith's Ukraine's Revolt, Russia's Revenge, here.https://www.amazon.com/Ukraines-Revolt-Russias-Revenge-Revolution/dp/0815739249Connect with Spycraft 101:IG: @spycraft101Patreon: Spycraft 101Buy the book: here on AmazonDownload the free eBook: The Clandestine Operative's Sidearm of Choice: here.https://spycraft101-400d7.gr8.com/Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/spycraft101)

Vào tháng 11 năm 2013, Tổng thống Yanukovych đã từ chối ký một hiệp định liên kết với EU, mặc dù đã được ký tắt trước đó một năm. Các cuộc biểu tình của nhiều bộ phận dân chúng đã dẫn đến sự thay đổi chính phủ với hậu quả là Nga đã sáp nhập Crimea bất chấp luật pháp quốc tế, ngấm ngầm ủng hộ lực lượng ly khai thân Nga ở phía Đông Ukraine. Xem thêm.

Taras Kuzio - Russian Nationalism and the Russian-Ukrainian War (Europa Country Perspectives) Kindle version 27 gennaio 2022 https://amzn.to/3KaM1Ct Sottotitoli in italiano (traduzione automatica) Intervista con il Professor Taras Kuzio, esperto di politica, criminalità e sicurezza in Russia, Ucraina ed Eurasia. Nel 2010 ha previsto l'annessione della Crimea alla fine del mandato di Yanukovych. Taras Kuzio è Research Fellow, Henry Jackson Society, Professor Political Science, Kyiv Mohyla Academy. Sostieni Liberi Oltre le Illusioni diventando socio: vai su www.liberioltreleillusioni.it nella sezione "ASSOCIATI" e diventa socio. Ti aspettiamo ----------------------------

We continue on our journey with PART 3 of my Ukraine Series... extrapolating on Oliver Stone's Ukraine on Fire Documentary. In this episode... I dive into the perspectives of President Viktor Yanukovych and one of the deadliest revolutions in history... The Maidan Revolution!   Many don't know much about the Maidan Revolution... or the specific events that led up to it... Yanukovych was handed a wounded economy from predecessor Viktor Yushchenko... important trade agreements and negotiations were needed to patch up the mess and get Ukraine back on track. However, negotiations weren't in favor for Ukraine through the lens of Mr. Yanukovych... leading to a pause in negotiations with the European Union. This led to the uproar of specific populations of Ukraine... the Western-Central Ukrainians and Neo-Nazi extremist organizations. Again... geographical divides existed... Eastern-Southern Ukrainians support Russia and saw the EU-NATO alliance more so as a threat rather than protection... These populations weren't protesting due to this pause in negotiations by Mr. Yanukovych.   I have discovered and quoted independent journalist + author Chris Kasper de Ploeg and his book Ukraine in the Crossfire quite often to support everything I state and cite in this episode involving the events leading to and during the euromaidan protests... I am also quoting and summarizing from key individuals interviewed from the Oliver Stone Documentary as well... I am simply summarizing and explaining to the best of my ability... not justifying or condoning. So don't flip out! If errors exist and important info is left out... feel free to send me some feedback which is always more than welcome.    The Recipe for Revolution runs deep... Revolving around MONEY... THE MEDIA... and SPECIFIC TECHNIQUES. Oliver Stone highlights that we have seen these repeatable steps and tactics in many other places around the world throughout history. We touch base on this recipe ten-fold in regards to the Maidan Revolution in this episode... and we will revisit this recipe in future episodes when we travel to other parts of the world involving almost identical revolutions.   The plot keeps thickening.    Enjoy. Or not.   Yours Truly. --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/unveiledpatriot/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/unveiledpatriot/support

Sweathead Facebook group member Philipp Paster lives in Kyiv, Ukraine. Much of his family is there, too. But everyone lives in different apartments. On Friday, March 11, Philipp (formerly a brand strategist at TBWA Ukraine) spoke with me about what it's been like to be living in Kyiv during the Russian invasion. I only watched the documentary “Winter On Fire”, which looks at the toppling of one of Ukraine's leaders Yanukovych, after speaking with Philipp. Watching it before speaking with Philipp would have given me better questions. Like many of us, I'm only just starting to wrap my head around the history of Kyiv and Ukraine. Still, many thanks to Philipp for sharing his thoughts with us. I'll post another interview with three Ukrainians later this week. **

What will Putin do when his back is to the wall? Will he use battlefield Nukes? Worse? We must stop war to protect the Ukrainian people. Nationalist Zelensky rejects Putin's ultimatums as former Ukrainian leader Yanukovych calls for Zelensky to overcome his pride and stop war at any cost. Savage makes an appeal for peace in conversation with CIA analyst Fred Fleitz. Is Russia prepared to seize all of Ukraine? Is Zelensky acting in the best interest of his people? Then Savage shares a recent YouTube video praying that cries for peace would ripple around the world. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Richard Hanania, President of the Center for the Study of Partisanship and Ideology and a Research Fellow at Defense Priorities, discusses the current Russian war in Ukraine and the intertwined western cultural war deeply embedded within this conflict’s narrative. Noting how the “white conservative Christians bad” forms the ideological core of neoliberal views of this conflict, Hanania explains how wokery has crept into current media and political discourses which show support through emotional readings of the current war in Ukraine without any concern for the humanitarian impact of neoliberal calls to punish Russia. Hanania describes the generational differences of older generations who suffer from Cold War nostalgia lending to their hostile views of Russia while giving detailing the links between television’s influence on the representation of the current conflict. Covering the business model of major media like CNN and MSNBC and the American foreign policy establishment and its policies, Hanania covers the current media bias from the right’s militaristic bent and the left’s focus on identity politics while outlining the dangers in how many intake media. Hanania presents the background of US involvement in Ukraine historically to include its involvement in the protests against Yanukovych and its form of “democracy promotion” which fundamentally amounts to regime change while also accounting for the historical role of NATO in the run-up to this conflict and the post-Soviet situation in relationship to US foreign policy. Get full access to Savage Minds at savageminds.substack.com/subscribe

Nearly a 3 hour podcast, filled to the brimUkraine v. Russia Pt 2*correction: Yanukovych is president of Ukraine, not Russia.  During Adam's explanationVeterans Burn Pit Bill vote - Boebert votes NOSex storiesSvetlana ThumburgFuck, Marry, KillHell Let Loose talkJust click the fuckin button and listen.Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bbath)

On 12 March 2014 a historic 10-minute video was uploaded to youtube that acquired over a million hits since then, and that presented and truthfully explained a compendium of video-clips which had been uploaded to the Web during the 2014 overthrow and replacement of Ukraine's democratically elected President, Viktor Yanukovych, who had been called to the White House right after his 2010 electoral win and was asked by Obama to help to push his country toward joining NATO (though all of the opinion polls that had been taken of the Ukrainian public showed that the vast majority of Ukrainians viewed NATO to be their enemy, no friend of Ukraine). Yanukovych said no, and the Obama Administration (with the help of Google corporation) began by no later than 2011 to organize their coup to take down and replace Yanukovych so as to get Ukraine into NATO in order for America to become able to place its missiles only a five-minute striking-distance away from Moscow, for a retaliation-prohibiting blitz nuclear first-strike attack. During 2003-2009, only around 20% of Ukrainians wanted NATO membership, while around 55% opposed it. In 2010, Gallup found that whereas 17% of Ukrainians considered NATO to mean “protection of your country,” 40% said it's “a threat to your country.” Ukrainians predominantly saw NATO as an enemy, not a friend. But after Obama's February 2014 Ukrainian coup, “Ukraine's NATO membership would get 53.4% of the votes, one third of Ukrainians (33.6%) would oppose it.” The 2014 coup in Ukraine was about two things: getting Ukraine into NATO, and seizing Russia's biggest naval base, which ever since 1783 has been in Crimea, which (Crimea) the Soviet dictator had transferred to Ukraine in 1954 while still continuing Crimea as the Soviet Union's biggest naval base. Obama, already by no later than June 2013, was planning to grab that naval base and turn it into yet another U.S. naval base. http://globalreportage.org/2022/03/07/evidence-that-ukraine-has-been-run-by-neo-nazis-since-february-2014/ --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/global-reportage/support

We get a Religion 101 for Ukraine with Associated Press reporter Peter Smith.

In the face of invading Russian forces, a young democratic nation’s resistance has galvanized world attention and support. We take a closer look at the religious context behind the conflict

As Russian President Vladamir Putin ordered Russian troops to the border with Ukraine, he sought to reframe the way the world sees Ukraine. Religion was at the heart of that effort.

Instead of leaving Ukraine for the United States when the conflict erupted, Pastor Benjamin Morrison explained this is home and his calling is to minister and support those in need.

On Sunday, February 27th, 2022, Father Hitchens was overwhelmed to see the wider community's solidarity with the Ukrainian people.

James Meek talks to Tom about the events leading up to Russia's invasion of Ukraine, from the fall of Yanukovych to the wars in the Donbas and Nagorno-Karabakh, and considers what may happen next.Read more by James Meek here: https://lrb.me/jamesmeekpodSubscribe to the LRB from just £1 per issue: https://mylrb.co.uk/podcast20bTitle music by Kieran Brunt / Produced by Anthony Wilks See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Bark of neem tree may protect against coronavirus variants   University of Colorado and the Indian Institute of Science Education and Research, February 28, 2022   Extract from the bark of the neem tree may help treat and reduce the spread of coronavirus, according to a new study led by scientists at the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus and the Indian Institute of Science Education and Research Kolkata. The study, reported recently in the journal Virology, shows that components of neem bark may target a wide range of viral proteins, suggesting its potential as an antiviral agent against emerging variants of coronaviruses (including SARS-CoV-2). "The goal of this research is to develop a neem-based medication that can reduce the risk of serious illness when someone is infected with coronaviruses," said study co-author Maria Nagel, MD, research professor in the department of neurology and ophthalmology at the University of Colorado School of Medicine on the CU Anschutz Medical Campus.   (NEXT)   Black Seed Oil Puts Deadly Asthma Meds To Shame   University College London, February 26, 2022    A new study published in the journal Phytotherapeutic Research reveals that a powerful little black seed known as nigella sativa-- once referred to as ‘the remedy for everything but death' -- may provide a powerful alternative to pharmaceutical medicine in the treatment of asthma. The new study  was a placebo-controlled RCT performed on 80 asthmatics, with 40 patients in each treatment and placebo groups. NSO capsules were administered 500 mg twice daily for 4 weeks. The placebo group received an equal dose of olive oil.   (NEXT)   Healthy gut microbiome improves success of cancer treatment   King's College London, February 28, 2022   The largest study to date has confirmed the link between the gut microbiome and the response to cancer immunotherapy therapy for melanoma. The study is published today in Nature Medicine and co-ordinated by King's College London, CIBIO Department of the University of Trento and European Institute of Oncology in Italy, University of Groningen in the Netherlands and funded by the Seerave Foundation. Dr. Karla Lee, clinical researcher at King's College London said that "preliminary studies on a limited number of patients have suggested that the gut microbiome, as an immune system regulator, plays a role in the response of each patient to cancer immunotherapy, and particularly in the case of melanoma. This new study could have a major impact on oncology and medicine in general."   (NEXT)   Physical fitness linked to lower risk of Alzheimer's disease   Washington VA Medical Center, February 28, 2022   People who are more physically fit are less likely to develop Alzheimer's disease than people who are less physically fit, according to a preliminary study released today. “One exciting finding of this study is that as people's fitness improved, their risk of Alzheimer's disease decreased—it was not an all-or-nothing proposition,” said study author Edward Zamrini, MD, of the Washington VA Medical Center in Washington, D.C.. “So people can work toward making incremental changes and improvements in their physical fitness and hopefully that will be associated with a related decrease in their risk of Alzheimer's years later.” The study involved 649,605 military veterans in the Veterans Health Administration database with an average age of 61 who were followed for an average of nine years. They did not have Alzheimer's disease at the start of the study. The group with the lowest level of fitness developed Alzheimer's at a rate of 9.5 cases per 1,000 person-years, compared to 6.4 cases per 1,000 person-years for the most fit group.   (OTHER NEWS)   The Mess that Nuland Made   Victoria Nuland engineered Ukraine's “regime change” in early 2014 without weighing the likely chaos and consequences, wrote Robert Parry on July 13, 2015. The Mess that Nuland Made   Robert Parry.   Special to Consortium News   As the Ukrainian army squares off against ultra-right and neo-Nazi militias in the west and violence against ethnic Russians continues in the east, the obvious folly of the Obama administration's Ukraine policy has come into focus even for many who tried to ignore the facts, or what you might call “the mess that Victoria Nuland made.” Assistant Secretary of State for European Affairs “Toria” Nuland was the “mastermind” behind the Feb. 22, 2014 “regime change” in Ukraine, plotting the overthrow of the democratically elected government of President Viktor Yanukovych while convincing the ever-gullible U.S. mainstream media that the coup wasn't really a coup but a victory for “democracy.” To sell this latest neocon-driven “regime change” to the American people, the ugliness of the coup-makers had to be systematically airbrushed, particularly the key role of neo-Nazis and other ultra-nationalists from the Right Sektor. For the U.S.-organized propaganda campaign to work, the coup-makers had to wear white hats, not brown shirts. So, for nearly a year and a half, the West's mainstream media, especially The New York Times and The Washington Post, twisted their reporting into all kinds of contortions to avoid telling their readers that the new regime in Kiev was permeated by and dependent on neo-Nazi fighters and Ukrainian ultra-nationalists who wanted a pure-blood Ukraine, without ethnic Russians. Any mention of that sordid reality was deemed “Russian propaganda” and anyone who spoke this inconvenient truth was a “stooge of Moscow.” It wasn't until July 7 that the Times admitted the importance of the neo-Nazis and other ultra-nationalists in waging war against ethnic Russian rebels in the east. The Times also reported that these far-right forces had been joined by Islamic militants. Some of those jihadists have been called “brothers” of the hyper-brutal Islamic State. Though the Times sought to spin this remarkable military alliance neo-Nazi militias and Islamic jihadists as a positive, the reality had to be jarring for readers who had bought into the Western propaganda about noble “pro-democracy” forces resisting evil “Russian aggression.” Perhaps the Times sensed that it could no longer keep the lid on the troubling truth in Ukraine. For weeks, the Right Sektor militias and the neo-Nazi Azov battalion have been warning the civilian government in Kiev that they might turn on it and create a new order more to their liking. Clashes in the West Then, on Saturday, violent clashes broke out in the western Ukrainian town of Mukachevo, allegedly over the control of cigarette-smuggling routes. Right Sektor paramilitaries sprayed police officers with bullets from a belt-fed machine gun, and police backed by Ukrainian government troops returned fire. Several deaths and multiple injuries were reported. Tensions escalated on Monday with President Petro Poroshenko ordering national security forces to disarm “armed cells” of political movements. Meanwhile, the Right Sektor dispatched reinforcements to the area while other militiamen converged on the capital of Kiev. While President Poroshenko and Right Sektor leader Dmitry Yarosh may succeed in tamping down this latest flare-up of hostilities, they may be only postponing the inevitable: a conflict between the U.S.-backed authorities in Kiev and the neo-Nazis and other right-wing fighters who spearheaded last year's coup and have been at the front lines of the fighting against ethnic Russian rebels in the east. The Ukrainian right-wing extremists feel they have carried the heaviest burden in the war against the ethnic Russians and resent the politicians living in the relative safety and comfort of Kiev. In March, Poroshenko also fired thuggish oligarch Igor Kolomoisky as governor of the southeastern province of Dnipropetrovsk Oblast. Kolomoisky had been the primary benefactor of the Right Sektor militias. So, as has become apparent across Europe and even in Washington, the Ukraine crisis is spinning out of control, making the State Department's preferred narrative of the conflict that it's all Russian President Vladimir Putin's fault harder and harder to sell. How Ukraine is supposed to pull itself out of what looks like a death spiral a possible two-front war in the east and the west along with a crashing economy is hard to comprehend. The European Union, confronting budgetary crises over Greece and other EU members, has little money or patience for Ukraine, its neo-Nazis and its socio-political chaos. America's neocons at The Washington Post and elsewhere still rant about the need for the Obama administration to sink more billions upon billions of dollars into post-coup Ukraine because it “shares our values.” But that argument, too, is collapsing as Americans see the heart of a racist nationalism beating inside Ukraine's new order. Another Neocon ‘Regime Change' Much of what has happened, of course, was predictable and indeed was predicted, but neocon Nuland couldn't resist the temptation to pull off a “regime change” that she could call her own. Her husband (and arch-neocon) Robert Kagan had co-founded the Project for the New American Century in 1998 around a demand for “regime change” in Iraq, a project that was accomplished in 2003 with President George W. Bush's invasion. As with Nuland in Ukraine, Kagan and his fellow neocons thought they could engineer an easy invasion of Iraq, oust Saddam Hussein and install some hand-picked client in Iraq, Ahmed Chalabi was to be “the guy.” But they failed to take into account the harsh realities of Iraq, such as the fissures between Sunnis and Shiites, exposed by the U.S.-led invasion and occupation. In Ukraine, Nuland and her neocon and liberal-interventionist friends saw the chance to poke Putin in the eye by encouraging violent protests to overthrow Russia-friendly President Yanukovych and put in place a new regime hostile to Moscow. Carl Gershman, the neocon president of the U.S.-taxpayer-funded National Endowment for Democracy, explained the plan in a Post op-ed on Sept. 26, 2013. Gershman called Ukraine “the biggest prize” and an important interim step toward toppling Putin, who “may find himself on the losing end not just in the near abroad but within Russia itself.” For her part, Nuland passed out cookies to anti-Yanukovych demonstrators at the Maidan square, reminded Ukrainian business leaders that the U.S. had invested $5 billion in their “European aspirations,” declared “fuck the EU” for its less aggressive approach, and discussed with U.S. Ambassador Geoffrey Pyatt who the new leaders of Ukraine should be. “Yats is the guy,” she said, referring to Arseniy Yatsenyuk. Nuland saw her big chance on Feb. 20, 2014, when a mysterious sniper apparently firing from a building controlled by the Right Sektor shot and killed both police and protesters, escalating the crisis. On Feb. 21, in a desperate bid to avert more violence, Yanukovych agreed to a European-guaranteed plan in which he accepted reduced powers and called for early elections so he could be voted out of office. But that wasn't enough for the anti-Yanukovych forces who led by Right Sektor and neo-Nazi militias overran government buildings on Feb. 22, forcing Yanukovych and many of his officials to flee for their lives. With armed thugs patrolling the corridors of power, the final path to “regime change” was clear. Instead of trying to salvage the Feb. 21 agreement, Nuland and European officials arranged for an unconstitutional procedure to strip Yanukovych of the presidency and declared the new regime “legitimate.” Nuland's “guy” Yatsenyuk became prime minister. While Nuland and her neocon cohorts celebrated, their “regime change” prompted an obvious reaction from Putin, who recognized the strategic threat that this hostile new regime posed to the historic Russian naval base at Sevastopol in Crimea. On Feb. 23, he began to take steps to protect those Russian interests. Ethnic Hatreds What the coup also did was revive long pent-up antagonisms between the ethnic Ukrainians in the west, including elements that had supported Adolf Hitler's invasion of the Soviet Union during World War Two, and ethnic Russians in the south and east who feared the anti-Russian sentiments emanating from Kiev. First, in Crimea and then in the so-called Donbas region, these ethnic Russians, who had been Yanukovych's political base, resisted what they viewed as the illegitimate overthrow of their elected president. Both areas held referenda seeking separation from Ukraine, a move that Russia accepted in Crimea but resisted with the Donbas. However, when the Kiev regime announced an “anti-terrorism operation” against the Donbas and dispatched neo-Nazi and other extremist militias to be the tip of the spear, Moscow began quietly assisting the embattled ethnic Russian rebels, a move that Nuland, the Obama administration and the mainstream news media called “Russian aggression.” Amid the Western hysteria over Russia's supposedly “imperial designs” and the thorough demonizing of Putin, President Barack Obama essentially authorized a new Cold War against Russia, reflected now in new U.S. strategic planning that could cost the U.S. taxpayers trillions of dollars and risk a possible nuclear confrontation. Yet, despite the extraordinary costs and dangers, Nuland failed to appreciate the practical on-the-ground realities, much as her husband and other neocons did in Iraq. While Nuland got her hand-picked client Yatsenyuk installed and he did oversee a U.S.-demanded “neo-liberal” economic plan slashing pensions, heating assistance and other social programs the chaos that her “regime change” unleashed transformed Ukraine into a financial black hole. With few prospects for a clear-cut victory over the ethnic Russian resistance in the east and with the neo-Nazi/Islamist militias increasingly restless over the stalemate the chances to restore any meaningful sense of order in the country appear remote. Unemployment is soaring and the government is essentially bankrupt. The last best hope for some stability may have been the Minsk-2 agreement in February 2015, calling for a federalized system to give the Donbas more autonomy, but Nuland's Prime Minister Yatsenyuk sabotaged the deal in March by inserting a poison pill that essentially demanded that the ethnic Russian rebels first surrender. Now, the Ukraine chaos threatens to spiral even further out of control with the neo-Nazis and other right-wing militias supplied with a bounty of weapons to kill ethnic Russians in the east turning on the political leadership in Kiev. In other words, the neocons have struck again, dreaming up a “regime change” scheme that ignored practical realities, such as ethnic and religious fissures. Then, as the blood flowed and the suffering worsened, the neocons just sought out someone else to blame. Thus, it seems unlikely that Nuland, regarded by some in Washington as the new “star” in U.S. foreign policy, will be fired for her dangerous incompetence, just as most neocons who authored the Iraq disaster remain “respected” experts employed by major think tanks, given prized space on op-ed pages, and consulted at the highest levels of the U.S. government.  

Throughout the winter of 2013/14 protesters built barricades and camped out in the centre of Kyiv demanding change. The focus was the Maidan, Kyiv's central Square of Independence. The demonstrators wanted the government of Viktor Yanukovych to move politically towards the EU and away from Russia, but when he refused to sign an agreement with the EU tensions spilled over. In February government forces, and snipers, shot dead 103 protesters and injured many others. Shortly afterwards President Yanukovych fled Ukraine and went to Russia. Elvira Bulat was a businesswoman from Crimea when the protests began. She tells Rebecca Kesby why she packed up her business, to spend that snowy winter in the barricades of the Maidan, and why she still believes Ukraine belongs in Europe. Photo: Kyiv, Ukraine - December 9th 2013. Anti-government protesters stand guard at one of the barricades defending Maidan Square against police. Credit: Etienne De Malglaive/Getty Images.

The situation on the Russia – Ukraine border is becoming more serious by the day. There are now 130,000 Russian troops on the border, but what's it really all about? In this new episode of Twenty Minute Topic, Marcus Stead and Greg Lance-Watkins try to make sense of the situation. The history, politics and demography of Ukraine is complex and bloody. We're being told by the mainstream media that Russian president Vladimir Putin could be about to invade Ukraine. President Putin is many things – a bully, a tyrant and an egotist, but there is very little evidence that he is mad. There is a lot more to this story than the simple cliches we're seeing banded about on our TV news bulletins. Neither President Putin nor President Zelensky of Ukraine say an invasion is coming, so why are there so many Russian troops on the border? An understanding of Ukraine's history and population is vital when assessing the current situation. A significant minority of the Ukrainian population are Russian-speaking and identify culturally with Russia, particularly in the area around Donetsk. During the collapse of the USSR, Russia surrendered a great deal of land in Europe and Asia, mostly without violence, and it consented to the reunification of Germany. Documents in the George Washington University show that at the time, agreements were made that NATO would not expand towards the Russian border in return. George Kennan, the greatest anti-Soviet diplomat of the immediate post-Cold War era, warned against the expansion of NATO towards Russia's borders. He said: “The expansion of NATO right up to the Russian borders is the greatest mistake of the post-Cold War period.” Yegor Gaidar, the former Prime Minister of Russia, liked in the West because of his economic reforms., contacted Canada's ambassador, Chris Westdal, in Moscow in 2004, to say he had come ‘to beg, to plead' to advise Ottawa against further NATO expansion which would, he warned, ‘bring out the worst of Russian instincts'. In 2014, President Yanukovych, who refused to sign a political association or free trade agreement with the EU, was overthrown by a mob which included Nazi sympathisers and hardline football hooligans, with the support of the EU and the USA. At the time of the revolution, President Yanukovych was just one year away from facing re-election at the ballot box. The government that came next was much more friendly towards the EU, and an agreement followed. The Minsk II agreement, signed by the leaders of Ukraine, Russia, France and Germany in 2015, was intended to pave the way for a federal, peaceful Ukraine, allowing for enhanced rights for the significant section of the population that speaks Russian and identifies with Russia culturally. Not a single provision of the Minsk II agreement has been fully implemented. History teaches us that it is far easier to begin a conflict than it is to end it. Should NATO or any Western countries be involving themselves in a complex and dangerous conflict few people outside the region understand? The podcast is available on the Talk Podcasts website, iTunes, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, SoundCloud, Spotify and the iTunes app.

Russia's Foreign Ministry on Sunday rejected a British claim that the Kremlin is seeking to replace Ukraine's government with a pro-Moscow administration, and that former Ukrainian lawmaker Yevheniy Murayev is a potential candidate.Britain's Foreign Office on Saturday also named several other Ukrainian politicians it said had links with Russian intelligence services, along with Murayev who is the leader of a small party that has no seats in parliament.Those politicians include Mykola Azarov, a former prime minister under Viktor Yanukovych, the Ukrainian president ousted in a 2014 uprising, and Yanukovych's former chief of staff, Andriy Kluyev."Some of these have contact with Russian intelligence officers currently involved in the planning for an attack on Ukraine," the Foreign Office said.Murayev told The Associated Press via Skype that the British claim "looks ridiculous and funny" and that he has been denied entry to Russia since 2018 on the grounds of being a threat to Russian security. He said that sanction was imposed in the wake of a conflict with Viktor Medvedchuk, Ukraine's most prominent pro-Russia politician and a friend of Russian President Vladimir Putin.Murayev's Nashi party — whose name echoes the former Russian youth movement that supported Putin — is regarded as sympathetic to Russia, but Murayev on Sunday pushed back on characterizing it as pro-Russia."The time of pro-Western and pro-Russian politicians in Ukraine is gone forever," he said in a Facebook post."Everything that does not support the pro-Western path of development of Ukraine is automatically pro-Russian," Murayev told The AP.He also said he supports Ukraine having neutral status and believes that "striving for NATO is tantamount to continuing the war." Ukrainian forces and Russia-backed separatists have been fighting in the country's east since 2014, a conflict that has killed more than 14,000.Ukrainian political analyst Volodymyr Fesenko described Murayev as a significant figure in Ukraine's pro-Russia camp, but added: "Murayev is a second-place player. I don't think Murayev has direct connections in the Kremlin."The U.K. government made the claim based on an intelligence assessment, without providing evidence to back it up. It comes amid high tensions between Moscow and the West over Russia's designs on Ukraine and each side's increasing accusations that the other is planning provocations."The disinformation spread by the British Foreign Office is more evidence that it is the NATO countries, led by the Anglo-Saxons, who are escalating tensions around Ukraine," Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said on the Telegram messaging app Sunday. "We call on the British Foreign Office to stop provocative activities, stop spreading nonsense."British Foreign Secretary Liz Truss said the information "shines a light on the extent of Russian activity designed to subvert Ukraine, and is an insight into Kremlin thinking."Truss urged Russia to "deescalate, end its campaigns of aggression and disinformation, and pursue a path of diplomacy," and reiterated Britain's view that "any Russian military incursion into Ukraine would be a massive strategic mistake with severe costs."Britain has sent anti-tank weapons to Ukraine as part of efforts to bolster the country's defenses against a potential Russian attack.Mark Galeotti, who has written extensively on Russian security services, said: "I can't help but be skeptical" about the British claim."This is one of those situations where it is hard to know whether what we're facing is a genuine threat, a misunderstanding of the inevitable overtures that were being made to various Ukrainian figures by Russians or 'strategic communication' — which is what we call propaganda these days when we're doing it," Galeotti, who is honorary professor of Slavonic and East European Studies at University College, London,...See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

On this week's Global Research News Hour, we focus on the growing friction between the United States and Russia over the fate of Ukraine with three great guests; In our first half hour, commentator and columnist Scott Ritter expresses his thoughts about NATO's inability to thwart the Russians and opens up a possible face saver for all forces involved. In our second half hour, commentator Paul Craig Roberts opens up about the West's involvement in the popular movement that overthrew President Yanukovych and about the choice by Crimeans to actually rejoin the Russian Federation. Finally in our second half hour, we will hear from a journalist, activist and observer actually living in Kiev named Dmitriy Kovalevich about the racist groups that sprung up after the Maidan and how all politics, journalism and policing in Ukraine has been affected for the worse.

Photo:  "The full text of Yanukovych's address to Putin on the introduction of troops in Ukraine has appeared." #Ukraine: Moscow waiting. @Felix_Light @CBSNews @MoscowTimes https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2022/01/19/biden-says-invading-ukraine-would-be-disaster-for-russia-a76091.  

Since the beginning of December, news outlets around the world have been covering a possible Russian invasion of Ukraine. In this episode, get the full back story on the civil war that has been raging in Ukraine since 2014, learn what role our government has played in the conflict, and hear Victoria Nuland - one of the highest ranking officials in the Biden administration's State Department - testify to the Senate Foreign Affairs Committee about the Biden administration's plans if Russia decides to use its military to invade Ukraine. Please Support Congressional Dish – Quick Links Contribute monthly or a lump sum via PayPal Support Congressional Dish via Patreon (donations per episode) Send Zelle payments to: Donation@congressionaldish.com Send Venmo payments to: @Jennifer-Briney Send Cash App payments to: $CongressionalDish or Donation@congressionaldish.com Use your bank's online bill pay function to mail contributions to: 5753 Hwy 85 North, Number 4576, Crestview, FL 32536. Please make checks payable to Congressional Dish Thank you for supporting truly independent media! Background Sources Recommended Congressional Dish Episodes CD231: Lights Out: What Happened in Texas? CD229: Target Belarus CD206: Impeachment: The Evidence CD186: National Endowment for Democracy CD167: Combating Russia (NDAA 2018) LIVE CD156: Sanctions – Russia, North Korea & Iran CD068: Ukraine Aid Bill CD067: What Do We Want In Ukraine? CD024: Let's Gut the STOCK Act Articles, Documents, and Websites Conflicted Congress. Insider. TurkStream. “Project: The Turkstream Pipeline.” Western Balkans Investment Framework. “Ionian-Adriatic Pipeline (IAP) Project Financing.” Amber Infrastructure Group. “About Us: Our People.” Three Seas. “Three Seas Story.” Three Seas. “Priority Projects.” State Property Fund of Ukraine. “Large Privatization.” State Property Fund of Ukraine. “How to buy.” State Property Fund of Ukraine. “Ukrainian Government Assets for Sale.” Stephanie. December 14, 2021. “Kiev mayor Klitschko warns of Russian invasion.” News in 24. Kenny Stancil. December 13, 2021. “Groups Move to Uncover Why Biden Held Huge Drilling Sale That DOJ Said Was Not Required.” Common Dreams. The Kremlin. December 7, 2021. “Meeting with US President Joseph Biden.” Maxine Joselow and Alexandra Ellerbeck. December 6, 2021. “Biden is approving more oil and gas drilling permits on public lands than Trump, analysis finds.” The Washington Post. Medea Benjamin and Nicolas J. S. Davies. November 23, 2021. “The US-Russia Confrontation Over Ukraine.” Consortium News. International Monetary Fund (IMF). November 22, 2021. “IMF Executive Board Completes First Review Under Stand-By Arrangement for Ukraine, Approves Extension of the Arrangement, Press Release No. 21/342.” Nathan Rott. November 17, 2021. “The Biden administration sold oil and gas leases days after the climate summit.” NPR. Anatol Lieven. November 15, 2021. “Ukraine: The Most Dangerous Problem in the World.” The Nation. John Vandiver and Alison Bath. November 12, 2021. “US Actions in Ukraine Backfiring as Risk of Russian Invasion Grows, Analysts Say.” Military.com Andrew E. Kramer. November 3, 2021. “Weapons Tracing Study Implicates Russia in Ukraine Conflict.” The New York Times. Anton Troianovski and Julian E. Barnes. November 2, 2021. “U.S.-Russia Engagement Deepens as C.I.A. Head Travels to Moscow.” The New York Times. Anton Troianovski and David E. Sanger. October 31, 2021. “Rivals on World Stage, Russia and U.S. Quietly Seek Areas of Accord.” The New York Times. David E. Sanger. October 25, 2021. “Ignoring Sanctions, Russia Renews Broad Cybersurveillance Operation.” The New York Times. Artin DerSimonian. October 19, 2021. “Ice breaking? Russia waives ban on Victoria Nuland.” Responsible Statecraft. Andrew E. Kramer. October 18, 2021. “Russia Breaks Diplomatic Ties With NATO.” The New York Times. Mark Episkopos. October 16, 2021. “Victoria Nuland's Mission to Moscow.” The National Interest. Reuters. September 10, 2021. “Russia and Belarus launch 'hot phase' of huge war games.” Antony Blinken. August 20, 2021. “Imposition of Sanctions in Connection with Nord Stream 2.” U.S. Department of State.](https://www.state.gov/imposition-of-sanctions-in-connection-with-nord-stream-2/) Paul Belkin and Hibbah Kaileh. July 1, 2021. “In Focus: The European Deterrence Initiative: A Budgetary Overview, IF10946.” Congressional Research Service. Henrik B. L. Larsen. June 8, 2021. “Why NATO Should Not Offer Ukraine and Georgia Membership Action Plans. War on the Rocks. NATO. April 26, 2021. “Boosting NATO's presence in the east and southeast.” David E. Sanger and Andrew E. Kramer. April 15, 2021. “U.S. Imposes Stiff Sanctions on Russia, Blaming It for Major Hacking Operation.” The New York Times. The White House. April 15, 2021. “FACT SHEET: Imposing Costs for Harmful Foreign Activities by the Russian Government.” The White House. April 15, 2021. “Executive Order on Blocking Property with Respect to Specified Harmful Foreign Activities of the Government of the Russian Federation.” Reutuers. April 13, 2021. “NATO, not Russia, will decide if Ukraine joins, Stoltenberg says.” Vladimir Isachenkov. April 9, 2021. “Kremlin says it fears full-scale fighting in Ukraine's east.” AP News. Civil.ge. January 20, 2021. “Secretary-designate Blinken Says NATO Door Shall Remain Open to Georgia.” Hans M. Kristensen and Matt Korda. January 12, 2021. “Nuclear Notebook: United States nuclear weapons, 2021.” The Bulletin. Andrew Feinberg. January 9, 2021. “Two years after his infamous phone call with Trump, Zelensky comes to Washington.” The Independent. David E. Sanger, Nicole Perlroth and Julian E. Barnes. January 2, 2021. “As Understanding of Russian Hacking Grows, So Does Alarm.” The New York Times. David E. Sanger, Nicole Perlroth and Eric Schmitt. December 14, 2020. “Scope of Russian Hacking Becomes Clear: Multiple U.S. Agencies Were Hit”. The New York Times. Mark Episkopos. November 11, 2020. “Ukraine's Power Play on Minsk.” The National Interest. Government Accountability Office. October 21, 2020. “Crude Oil Markets: Effects of the Repeal of the Crude Oil Export Ban, GAO-21-118.” Anthony B. Cavender, Thomas A. Campbell, Dan LeFort, Paul S. Marston. December 23, 2015. “U.S. Repeals Longstanding Ban on Export of Crude Oil.” Pillsbury Law. Robert Parry. July 15, 2015. “The Ukraine Mess That Nuland Made.” Truthout. Robert Parry. March 19, 2015. “Ukraine's Poison Pill for Peace Talks.” Consortium News. “Full text of the Minsk agreement” February 12, 2015. Financial Times. NATO. May 8, 2014. “Article 23.” Bucharest Summit Declaration Seumas Milne. April 30, 2014. “It's not Russia that's pushed Ukraine to the brink of war.” The Guardian. David Morrison. Updated May 9, 2014. “How William Hague Deceived the House of Commons on Ukraine.” HuffPost. US Energy Information Administration. March 15, 2014. “16% of Natural Gas Consumed in Europe Flows Through Ukraine.” Energy Central. Robert Parry. February 27, 2014. “Cheering a ‘Democratic' Coup in Ukraine.” Common Dreams. “Ukraine crisis: Transcript of leaked Nuland-Pyatt call.” February 7, 2014. BBC News. Adam Taylor. December 16, 2013. “John McCain Went To Ukraine And Stood On Stage With A Man Accused Of Being An Anti-Semitic Neo-Nazi.” Insider. Brian Whelan. December 16, 2013. “Far-right group at heart of Ukraine protests meet US senator.” Channel 4 News. Guardian staff and agencies. December 15, 2013. “John McCain tells Ukraine protesters: 'We are here to support your just cause.'” The Guardian. International Monetary Fund (IMF). October 31, 2013. “Statement by IMF Mission to Ukraine, Press Release No. 13/419.” Carl Gershman. September 26, 2013. “Former Soviet States Stand Up to Russia. Will the U.S.?” The Washington Post. Amanda Winkler. November 14, 2011. “'60 Minutes' Exposes Congressional Insider Trading.” The Christian Post. Images USAID and Ukraine Privatization Fund Bills S.1605 - National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2022 Sponsor: Sen. Scott, Rick [R-FL] Audio Sources President Biden White House Departure December 8, 2021 President Biden briefly stopped and spoke with reporters as he departed the White House for an event in Kansas City, Missouri. He began by addressing the Omicron variant, saying that the Pfizer vaccine is showing encouraging results against the COVID-19 variant. When asked about Russian President Putin and Ukraine, President Biden said if Putin were to invade Ukraine, there “will be severe consequences.” He went on to say that putting U.S. troops on the ground in Ukraine is currently “not in the cards.” close Report Video Issue Clips Biden: We hope by Friday, we're going to be able to say and announce to you that we're having meetings at a higher level, not just with us, but with at least four of our major NATO allies and Russia to discuss the future of Russia's concerns relative to NATO writ large. And whether or not we can work out any accommodations as it relates to bringing down the temperature along the eastern front. Biden: We have a moral obligation and a legal obligation to our NATO allies if they were to attack under Article Five, it's a sacred obligation. That obligation does not extend to NATO, I mean to Ukraine, but it would depend upon what the rest of the NATO countries were willing to do as well. But the idea of the United States is going to unilaterally use force to confront Russia invading Ukraine is not in the cards right now. Biden: Meeting with Putin. I was very straightforward. There were no minced words. It was polite, but I made it very clear, if in fact, he invades Ukraine, there will be severe consequences, severe consequences. Economic consequences, like none he's ever seen or ever had been seen in terms of ease and flows. He knows his immediate response was he understood that and I indicated I knew he would respond. But beyond that, if in fact, we would probably also be required to reinforce our presence in NATO countries to reassure particularly those on the Eastern Front. In addition to that, I made it clear that we would provide the defensive capability to the Ukrainians as well. Hearing on U.S. Policy Toward Russia Senate Committee on Foreign Relations December 7, 2021 Victoria Nuland, the undersecretary of state for political affairs, testified at a Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing on U.S. policy toward Russia. She addressed President Biden's earlier call with Russian President Vladimir Putin and said that Russia would suffer severe consequences if it attacked Ukraine. Other topics included the use of sanctions if Russia invades Ukraine, the cooperation of NATO and U.S. allies, Russia's use of energy during conflict, and the Nord Stream 2 Pipeline 00:20 Sen. Bob Menendez (D-NJ): As we meet here today Russia is engaged in one of the most significant troop buildups that we have seen along Ukraine's border. To nyone paying attention, this looks like more than posturing, more than attention seeking. The Kremlin's actions clearly pose a real threat of war. 00:40 Sen. Bob Menendez (D-NJ): I want to be crystal clear to those listening to this hearing in Moscow, Kiev and other capitals around the world. A Russian invasion will trigger devastating economic sanctions the likes of which we have never seen before. 00:59 Sen. Bob Menendez (D-NJ): I proposed a suite of options last month in an amendment to the NDA. The Russian banking sector would be wiped out, sovereign debt would be blocked, Russia would be removed from the Swift payment system, sectoral sanctions would cripple the Russian economy. Putin himself as well as his inner circle would lose access to bank accounts in the West. Russia would effectively be cut off and isolated from the international economic system. Let me be clear, these are not run of the mill sanctions. What is being discussed is at the maximum end of the spectrum, or as I have called it the mother of all sanctions, and I hope that we can come together in a bipartisan way to find a legislative path forward soon, so that we can achieve that. 1:51 Sen. Bob Menendez (D-NJ): If Putin invades Ukraine the implications will be devastating for the Russian economy but also for the Russian people. 2:24 Sen. Bob Menendez (D-NJ): But is the Kremlin really ready to face a bloody, persistent and drawn out insurgency? How many body bags is Putin willing to accept? 6:03 Sen James Risch (R-ID): This is a clearly clearly bipartisan matter. 7:40 Victoria Nuland: First, let me review what we are seeing. Over the past six weeks, Russia has stepped up planning for potential further military action in Ukraine, positioning close to 100,000 troops around Ukraine's eastern and northern borders and from the south via the Crimean peninsula. Russian plans and positioning of assets also include the means to destabilize Ukraine from within, and an aggressive information operation and an attempt to undermine Ukrainian stability and social cohesion and to pin the blame for any potential escalation on Kiev, and on NATO nations including the United States. Russia's military and intelligence services are continuing to develop the capability to act decisively in Ukraine when ordered to do so, potentially in early 2022. The intended force, if fully mobilized, would be twice the size of what we saw last spring, including approximately 100 battalion tactical groups, or nearly all of Russia's ready ground forces based west of the Urals. We don't know whether President Putin has made a decision to attack Ukraine or to overthrow its government. But we do know he's building the capacity to do so. 10:42 Victoria Nuland: Since 2014 The United States has provided Ukraine with $2.4 billion in security assistance including $450 million this year alone 12:00 Victoria Nuland: Diplomacy remains the best route to settle the conflict in Donbas and address any other problems or grievances. The Minsk agreements offer the best basis for negotiations and the US is prepared to support a revived effort if the parties welcome that. 15:16 Victoria Nuland: You might have seen a press conference today that commission Chairwoman van der Laan gave in Brussels in which she made absolutely clear that the EU would also join in very consequential economic measures of the kind that they have not employed before. 23:26 Victoria Nuland: It's also important, I think, for President Putin to understand as the President conveyed to him today, that this will be different than it was in 2014. If he goes in you will recall then that our sanctions escalated somewhat gradually as he didn't stop moving. This time the intent is to make clear that the initial sanctions in response to any further aggressive moves in Ukraine will be extremely significant and isolating for Russia and for Russian business and for the Russian people. 24:51 Victoria Nuland: As you know, energy is the cash cow that enables these kinds of military deployments. So Putin needs the energy to flow as as much as the consumers need it. But more broadly, we have been counseling Europe for almost a decade now to reduce its dependence on Russian energy, including our opposition to Nord Stream 2 and our opposition to Nord Stream 1 and our opposition to to TurkStream and TurkStream 2 and to have come to find alternative sources of hydrocarbons but also to continue their efforts to go green and end their dependencies. 30:55 Sen. Todd Young (R-IN): President Putin and Foreign Minister Lavrov have repeatedly indicated that they seek to deny any potential path to NATO membership for Ukraine and other Eastern European countries. Does the administration view this demand is a valid issue for negotiation? Victoria Nuland: No we do not and President Biden made that point crystal clear to President Putin today that the issue of who joins NATO is an issue for NATO to decide it's an issue for applicant countries to decide that no other outside power will or may have a veto or a vote in those decisions. 32:22 Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH): Senator Portman and I offered an amendment to this year's NDAA in that vein to increase military assistance and raise the amount of assistance that could go to lethal weapons. 33:21 Victoria Nuland: But we will not be shy about coming to you as we as we need support and the bipartisan spirit here is really gratifying. 34:08 Victoria Nuland: At the NATO ministerial last week, there was a commitment among allies that we needed more advice and more options from our NATO military authorities with regard to the consequences of any move by Russia deeper into Ukraine and what that would mean for the eastern edge of the alliance and what it would mean about our need to be more forward deployed in the east. 34:44 Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH): Belarus now that it is seems to be totally within Russia's control also presents another front for the potential for Russia to invade Ukraine. Can you speak to whether we view what's happening in Belarus in that way? I know that Ukrainians view it that way because we heard that when we were in Halifax for the international security forum and met with some Ukrainian officials. Victoria Nuland: Well, as as you know, Senator, the situation in Belarus is just tragic and really concerning in many, many ways, which is why the administration along with the European Union in a multilateral way increased sanctions just last week, including blocking the sale to us or to Europe of one of the great sources of Lukashenko has money potash, etc, and sanction some dozens more Belarusians responsible for the violence and intimidation there and particularly now for the weaponization of migrants pushing you know, accepting them from third countries and then pushing them against the EU's border in a very cynical and dangerous way. But I think you're talking about the potential as Lukashenko becomes more and more dependent on the Kremlin and gives up more and more of Belarus is sovereignty, something that he told his people he would never do that Russia could actually use Belarusian territory to march on Ukraine and or mask, its forces as Belarusian forces. All of those -- Those are both things that that we are watching, and it was particularly concerning to see President Lukashenko would make a change in his own posture with regard to Crimea. He had long declined to recognize Russia Russia's claim on Crimea, but he changed tack a week ago which is concerning. 39:08 Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI): If there's one thing that Vladimir Putin aught to understand is how unified we are. I mean, there are many things that divide us politically in this country. But when it comes to pushing back on Russian aggression, supporting countries like Ukraine that are trying to develop their freedom, free themselves from their legacy of corruption from their former involvement with the Soviet Union, we are very strongly united. 39:56 Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI): What we impose on them and how and how harmful it would be to Russia, you know, unfortunately to Russian people. 40:36 Victoria Nuland: What we're talking about would amount to essentially isolating Russia completely from the global financial system with all of the fallout that that would entail for Russian business, for the Russian people, for their ability to, to work and travel and trade. 41:41 Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI): I can't think of a more powerful way to punish Russian aggression than by rolling back what progress has been made, and if at all possible, prevent the Nord Stream 2 from ever being completed. Is that something that is being discussed with allies is that something's being contemplated? Victoria Nuland: Absolutely. And as if, as you recall from the July U.S.-German statement that was very much in that statement that if that any moves, Russian aggression against Ukraine would have a direct impact on the pipeline, and that is our expectation and the conversation that we're having. Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI): So again, direct impact is one thing, but I'm literally talking about rolling back the pipeline. Loosely define that but I mean, taking action that will prevent it from ever becoming operational. Victoria Nuland: I think if President Putin moves on Ukraine, our expectation is that the pipeline will be suspended. Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI): Well, I certainly hope that the Senate Foreign Relations Committee would take up legislation to go beyond just suspending it but from ending it permanently. 44:28 Victoria Nuland: I think we can, and I know this is close to your heart as well, need to do better in our Global Engagement Center and in the way we speak to audiences around the world and particularly on these kinds of subjects. 55:04 Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT): But something different has happened in that country since what has been referred to as the Revolution of Dignity. I got the chance to be there on the Maidan during the midst of that revolution with you and Senator McCain. 58:56 Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT): The Three Seas Initiative is a really important initiative linking essentially the ring of countries that are either former republics or satellite states of the Soviet Union together. They're begging for US participation in their projects necessary to make them more energy independent of Russia. Isn't this an opportunity for the United States to step up and take some of these customers away from Russia's gas station? Victoria Nuland: Absolutely, as we have been doing with our support for more LNG terminals around Europe for many years, as we are doing now in our support for, you know, green alternatives, not just in the United States, but in Europe as well. And many, many US companies are involved with that. But that particular belt of three C's countries is absolutely crucial, as you've said. 1:11:19 Sen. Rob Portman (R-OH): I visited to Maidan in 2014. The tires were still smoldering and the Revolution of Dignity changed everything. You know, Ukraine decided to turn to us and to the West, and to freedom and democracy. And it was a momentous decision. They chose to stand with us. And now it's our turn to stand with them. And we've done that over the years. I mean, if you look at what happened with regard to the Ukraine security assistance initiative, which I co authored. Over the past six years, the United States has transferred defense articles, conducted training with Ukrainian military. We have been very engaged. 1:12:05 Sen. Rob Portman (R-OH): This week we have the NDAA likely to be voted on and likely it will include an increase in that lethal defensive funding. 1:12:14 Sen. Rob Portman (R-OH): What defensive weapons has Ukraine ask for and what is the State Department willing to provide them under an expedited process? 1:18:44 Sen. Tim Kaine (D-VA): My concern is this: if the United States and the West's response to a military invasion is sanctions, but no military response, obviously, we're providing military aid to Ukraine. And we've been generous in that way. But if we are not willing to help a Ukrainian military, that's 50,000 people matched up against Russia, I would think that China would conclude, boy, the West sure, I'm going to come to the aid of Taiwan, if we were to do something on Taiwan. Because China would conclude, we're much more militarily powerful than Russia is. And the status questions about Taiwan and sovereignty are a little bit murkier than those about Ukraine. And there's no NATO in the Indo Pacific, we have allies in the Indo Pacific but we don't have a NATO with a charter, with a self defense article. I think China would determine, if the West responds to a military invasion went as far as sanctions but no further, that the United States and other nations would be extremely unlikely to use military force to counter a military invasion of Taiwan. And I think Taiwan would likely conclude the same thing. So I'm very concerned about that. And I wonder, is that a fair concern that I have about how the Chinese and the Taiwanese would view the West's unwillingness to provide more significant military support to stop an invasion by Russia? Is my concern a fair one? Or is my concern overwrought? Victoria Nuland: Senator, in this setting, I would simply say that this is a moment of testing. And I believe that both autocrats around the world and our friends around the world will watch extremely carefully what we do, and it will have implications for generations. Sen. Tim Kaine (D-VA): And those and those implications could go far beyond Ukraine. Victoria Nuland: They could go well beyond Europe. Yes. 1:22:00 Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL): Then I would imagine that he's already been publicly messaging what his asks are. The first is that we would pull back NATO forces from anywhere near their western border. The second is to completely rule out the admission probably not just of Ukraine, but Georgia as a member of NATO. And the third is to stop arming Ukraine. Of those three conditions that he's publicly messaged already, would the United States agreed to any of those three? Victoria Nuland: All of those would be unacceptable. 1:41:11 Victoria Nuland: And in fact you could argue that in the Donbas he did take control of some 40% of Ukraine's coal reserves which were a major energy input 1:42:04 Sen. Bob Menendez (D-NJ): I hope the one thing that anyone in the world who is watching this hearing today takes away is that even on some of the most contentious issues of the day, on this one, there is overwhelming, broad, bipartisan support for Ukraine there is overwhelming bipartisan support for its territorial integrity, there is overwhelming bipartisan support for swift and robust action. And after conversations with some of the members of the committee, I look to galvanize that in some tangible way legislatively as we wait for the days ahead as to what may or may not happen. Ukrainian President Zelensky Meeting with Secretary Austin at the Pentagon August 31, 2021 Secretary Lloyd Austin: As you know sir, President Biden has approved a new $60 million security assistance package including Javelin anti-armor systems and more to enable Ukraine to better defend itself against Russian aggression. Secretary Lloyd Austin: Now this department is committed to strengthening our Strategic Defense Partnership. The US Ukraine strategic defense framework that Minister Tehran and I will sign today enhances our cooperation and advances our shared priorities, such as ensuring that our bilateral security cooperation continues to help Ukraine countering Russian aggression and implementing defense and defense industry reforms in support of Ukraine's NATO membership aspirations, and deepening our cooperation in such areas as Black Sea security, cyber defense and intel sharing. Russian President Putin Annual Call-In Program June 30, 2021 Russian President Vladimir Putin held his annual call-in question and answer session with citizens from around the country. During this 70-minute portion, he answered questions on relations with Ukraine, the European Union, and the United States, reiterating that whatever sanctions are imposed against Russia, his country's economy will prevail. Clips Putin: I have already said that it is impossible and it makes no sense to try to restore the Soviet Union by a number of reasons and looking at the demographic processes in a number of former Soviet republic, so it's unreasonable effort to do because we can face a lot of social problems that will be possible to resolve and some issues like the ethnic groups, in various regions, but what should we do about Russia itself without the geopolitical realities and about our internal development? Putin: Why is Ukraine not on the list of countries who are Russia's adversaries? Another question: are you going to meet with Zelensky? Well, why Ukriane is not on the list of adversaries? That's because I do not think that the Ukrainian people are our adversaries. I said it many times and I will say it again. The Ukrainians and Russians, that's one people, one nation. Putin: What I'm worried about is a fundamental thing. They are trying to open up military bases near or inside Ukraine. Making the territory of Ukraine, the territory that's close on the border with Russia a military platform for other countries is a threat to the security of Russia. And this is what worries us. This is what we have to think about. Discussion: Foreign Affairs Issue Launch with Former Vice President Joe Biden Council on Foreign Affairs January 23, 2018 Clips 00:06:15 Joe Biden: They cannot compete against a unified West. I think that is Putin's judgment. And so everything he can do to dismantle the post-World War II liberal world order, including NATO and the EU, I think, is viewed as in their immediate self-interest. 00:24:15 Haass: In the piece, the two of you say that there's no truth that the United States—unlike what Putin seems to believe or say, that the U.S. is seeking regime change in Russia. So the question I have is, should we be? And if not, if we shouldn't be seeking regime change, what should we be seeking in the way of political change inside Russia? What's an appropriate agenda for the United States vis-à-vis Russia, internally? 00:24:30 Biden: I'll give you one concrete example. I was—not I, but it just happened to be that was the assignment I got. I got all the good ones. And so I got Ukraine. And I remember going over, convincing our team, our leaders to—convincing that we should be providing for loan guarantees. And I went over, I guess, the 12th, 13th time to Kiev. And I was supposed to announce that there was another billion-dollar loan guarantee. And I had gotten a commitment from Poroshenko and from Yatsenyuk that they would take action against the state prosecutor. And they didn't. So they said they had—they were walking out to a press conference. I said, nah, I'm not going to—or, we're not going to give you the billion dollars. They said, you have no authority. You're not the president. The president said—I said, call him. (Laughter.) I said, I'm telling you, you're not getting the billion dollars. I said, you're not getting the billion. I'm going to be leaving here in, I think it was about six hours. I looked at them and said: I'm leaving in six hours. If the prosecutor is not fired, you're not getting the money. Well, son of a bitch. (Laughter.) He got fired. And they put in place someone who was solid at the time. Confirmation Hearing: Defense Secretary Confirmation Hearing Senate Armed Services Committee January 12, 2017 00:20:15 Sen. McCain: For seven decades, the United States has played a unique role in the world. We've not only put America first, but we've done so by maintaining and advancing a world order that has expanded security, prosperity, and freedom. This has required our alliances, our trade, our diplomacy, our values, but most of all, our military for when would-be aggressors aspire to threaten world order. It's the global striking power of America's armed forces that must deter or thwart their ambitions. Too many Americans, too many Americans seem to have forgotten this in recent years. Too many have forgotten that our world order is not self-sustaining. Too many have forgotten that while the threats we face may not have purely military solutions, they all have military dimensions. In short, too many have forgotten that hard power matters—having it, threatening it, leveraging it for diplomacy, and, at times, using it. Fairly or not, there is a perception around the world that America is weak and distracted, and that has only emboldened our adversaries to challenge the current world order. Daily Briefing: Nuland Tape Press Conference February 6, 2014. Jen Psaki, State Department Spokesperson 0:19 Reporter: Can you say whether you—if this call is a recording of an authentic conversation between Assistant Secretary Nuland and Ambassador Pyatt? Jen Psaki: Well, I'm not going to confirm or outline details. I understand there are a lot of reports out there, and there's a recording out there, but I'm not going to confirm a private diplomatic conversation. Reporter: So you are not saying that you believe this is a—you think this is not authentic? You think this is a— Psaki: It's not an accusation I'm making. I'm just not going to confirm the specifics of it. Reporter: Well, you can't even say whether there was a—that this call—you believe that this call, you believe that this recording is a recording of a real telephone call? Psaki: I didn't say it was inauthentic. I think we can leave it at that. Reporter: Okay, so, you're allowing the fact that it is authentic. Psaki: Yes. Reporter: “Yes,” okay. Psaki: Do you have a question about it? Phone Conversation: Nuland-Pyatt Leaked Phone Conversation February 4, 2014 Nuland: Good. So I don't think Klitsch [Vitali Klitschko] should go into the government. I don't think it's necessary, I don't think it's a good idea. Pyatt: Yeah, I mean I guess, in terms of him not going into the government, just sort of letting him stay out and do his political homework and stuff. I'm just thinking in terms of, sort of, the process moving ahead, we want to keep the moderate Democrats together. The problem is going to be Tyahnybok and his guys and I'm sure that's part of what Yanukovych is calculating on all this. Nuland: I think Yatz [Arseniy Yatsenyuk] is the guy with the economic experience, the governing experience. He's the guy. What he needs is Klitsch [Vitali Klitschko] And Tyahnybok On the outside, he needs to be talking to them four times a week. You know, I just think Klitsch [Vitali Klitschko] Going in he's going to be at that level working for Yatsenyuk it's just not gonna work. Pyatt: We want to get someone out here with and international personality to come out here and help to midwife this thing. And then the other issue is some kind of outreach to Yanukovych. We'll probably regroup on that tomorrow as we see how things fall into place. Nuland: So on that piece, Jeff, I wrote the note, Sullivan's come back to me saying “you need Biden,” and I said probably tomorrow for an attaboy and get the deeds to stick, Biden's willing. Pyatt Great. Press Conference: Senator John McCain on Ukraine at the Atlantic Council C-SPAN December 19, 2013. 00:16:45 McCain: If Ukraine's political crisis persists or deepens, which is a real possibility, we must support creative Ukrainian efforts to resolve it. Senator Murphy and I heard a few such ideas last weekend—from holding early elections, as the opposition is now demanding, to the institution of a technocratic government with a mandate to make the difficult reforms required for Ukraine's long-term economic health and sustainable development. Decisions such as these are for Ukrainians to make—no one else—and if they request our assistance, we should provide it where possible. Finally, we must encourage the European Union and the IMF to keep their doors open to Ukraine. Ultimately, the support of both institutions is indispensable for Ukraine's future. And eventually, a Ukrainian President, either this one or a future one, will be prepared to accept the fundamental choice facing the country, which is this: While there are real short-term costs to the political and economic reforms required for IMF assistance and EU integration, and while President Putin will likely add to these costs by retaliating against Ukraine's economy, the long-term benefits for Ukraine in taking these tough steps are far greater and almost limitless. This decision cannot be borne by one person alone in Ukraine. Nor should it be. It must be shared—both the risks and the rewards—by all Ukrainians, especially the opposition and business elite. It must also be shared by the EU, the IMF and the United States. All of us in the West should be prepared to help Ukraine, financially and otherwise, to overcome the short-term pain that reforms will require and Russia may inflict. Discussion: Beyond NAFTA and GATT C-SPAN April 20, 1994 Arthur Dunkel, Director General of the UN 26:00:00 Dunkel: If I look back at the last 25 years, what did we have? We had two worlds: The so-called Market Economy world and the centrally planned world; the centrally planned world disappeared. One of the main challenges of the Uruguay round has been to create a world wide system. I think we have to think of that. Secondly, why a world wide system? Because, basically, I consider that if governments cooperate in trade policy field, you reduce the risks of tension – political tension and even worse than that.” Cover Art Design by Only Child Imaginations Music Presented in This Episode Intro & Exit: Tired of Being Lied To by David Ippolito (found on Music Alley by mevio)

After the Euromaidan in Ukraine, on the one hand, the overthrow of the authoritarian and corrupt regime of Yanukovych opened the door to liberal transformations in the political and economic spheres. On the other hand, the removal of the pro-Russian government and Moscow's war on Ukraine in response has prompted initiatives to strengthen Ukraine's national orientation. Liberalism or nationalism: what is closer to Ukrainians? Let's check with VoxUkraine what's the latest on this topic?

In 2020, Oxford University Press published a second edition of Serhy Yekelchyk's Ukraine: What Everyone Needs to Know (Oxford UP, 2020). This series is based on the reference format that allows to concisely present the most essential information on both generic and most recent acute issues. One will find in this addition answers to the questions pertaining to Kyivan Rus, the Cossacks, as well as the notorious Pereiaslav Treaty of 1654. In addition to this information, the book contains chapters that concisely describe both the Orange Revolution and the Euromaidan. These chapters are followed by inquiries into Russia's occupation of the Crimea and the Donbas war which is supported by the Kremlin. Yekelchyk emphasizes that the Euromaidan was, on the one hand, the Ukrainians' response to the corrupt regime which was being normalized by Yanukovych and his supporters; on the other hand, it was also a response to the turn to Russia, which Yanukovych promoted and supported: “Popular dissatisfaction with the corrupt regime had been mounting for years, but the sudden diplomatic turn from Europe to Russia was simply the last straw” (93). For the Ukrainians, “Europe” represented democratic values which were systematically violated by Russia: “‘Europe' served as a popular shorthand slogan implying democracy, rule of law, and economic opportunity—all the things ordinary citizens found lacking in Yanukovych's Ukraine” (93). Russia's aggression against Ukraine is viewed by Yekelchyk as part of Putin's ambitions to restore the mightiness of Russia—in terms of global positioning—within the traditions of both the Russian Empire and the Soviet Union. Yekelchyk's book also contains brief inquiries into the most recent developments around the Russo-Ukrainian conflict on the international level: the evaluation of the presidency of Petro Poroshenko and his decisions during the years of the most active conflict; the investigation of the shooting down of the Malaysia Airlines passenger flight; the international sanctions against Russia; the recent controversy about the Steinmeier Formula. There are sections which address the alleged meddling of the Ukrainian authorities in the 2016 presidential election in the US and the current presidency of Volodymyr Zelensky. With Ukraine: What Everyone Needs to Know, Serhy Yekelchyk shares his outstanding expertise that helps understand the complex overlaps and developments that shape the historical and political environment in contemporary Ukraine. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In 2020, Oxford University Press published a second edition of Serhy Yekelchyk’s Ukraine: What Everyone Needs to Know (Oxford UP, 2020). This series is based on the reference format that allows to concisely present the most essential information on both generic and most recent acute issues. One will find in this addition answers to the questions pertaining to Kyivan Rus, the Cossacks, as well as the notorious Pereiaslav Treaty of 1654. In addition to this information, the book contains chapters that concisely describe both the Orange Revolution and the Euromaidan. These chapters are followed by inquiries into Russia’s occupation of the Crimea and the Donbas war which is supported by the Kremlin. Yekelchyk emphasizes that the Euromaidan was, on the one hand, the Ukrainians’ response to the corrupt regime which was being normalized by Yanukovych and his supporters; on the other hand, it was also a response to the turn to Russia, which Yanukovych promoted and supported: “Popular dissatisfaction with the corrupt regime had been mounting for years, but the sudden diplomatic turn from Europe to Russia was simply the last straw” (93). For the Ukrainians, “Europe” represented democratic values which were systematically violated by Russia: “‘Europe’ served as a popular shorthand slogan implying democracy, rule of law, and economic opportunity—all the things ordinary citizens found lacking in Yanukovych’s Ukraine” (93). Russia’s aggression against Ukraine is viewed by Yekelchyk as part of Putin’s ambitions to restore the mightiness of Russia—in terms of global positioning—within the traditions of both the Russian Empire and the Soviet Union. Yekelchyk’s book also contains brief inquiries into the most recent developments around the Russo-Ukrainian conflict on the international level: the evaluation of the presidency of Petro Poroshenko and his decisions during the years of the most active conflict; the investigation of the shooting down of the Malaysia Airlines passenger flight; the international sanctions against Russia; the recent controversy about the Steinmeier Formula. There are sections which address the alleged meddling of the Ukrainian authorities in the 2016 presidential election in the US and the current presidency of Volodymyr Zelensky. With Ukraine: What Everyone Needs to Know, Serhy Yekelchyk shares his outstanding expertise that helps understand the complex overlaps and developments that shape the historical and political environment in contemporary Ukraine. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In 2020, Oxford University Press published a second edition of Serhy Yekelchyk’s Ukraine: What Everyone Needs to Know (Oxford UP, 2020). This series is based on the reference format that allows to concisely present the most essential information on both generic and most recent acute issues. One will find in this addition answers to the questions pertaining to Kyivan Rus, the Cossacks, as well as the notorious Pereiaslav Treaty of 1654. In addition to this information, the book contains chapters that concisely describe both the Orange Revolution and the Euromaidan. These chapters are followed by inquiries into Russia’s occupation of the Crimea and the Donbas war which is supported by the Kremlin. Yekelchyk emphasizes that the Euromaidan was, on the one hand, the Ukrainians’ response to the corrupt regime which was being normalized by Yanukovych and his supporters; on the other hand, it was also a response to the turn to Russia, which Yanukovych promoted and supported: “Popular dissatisfaction with the corrupt regime had been mounting for years, but the sudden diplomatic turn from Europe to Russia was simply the last straw” (93). For the Ukrainians, “Europe” represented democratic values which were systematically violated by Russia: “‘Europe’ served as a popular shorthand slogan implying democracy, rule of law, and economic opportunity—all the things ordinary citizens found lacking in Yanukovych’s Ukraine” (93). Russia’s aggression against Ukraine is viewed by Yekelchyk as part of Putin’s ambitions to restore the mightiness of Russia—in terms of global positioning—within the traditions of both the Russian Empire and the Soviet Union. Yekelchyk’s book also contains brief inquiries into the most recent developments around the Russo-Ukrainian conflict on the international level: the evaluation of the presidency of Petro Poroshenko and his decisions during the years of the most active conflict; the investigation of the shooting down of the Malaysia Airlines passenger flight; the international sanctions against Russia; the recent controversy about the Steinmeier Formula. There are sections which address the alleged meddling of the Ukrainian authorities in the 2016 presidential election in the US and the current presidency of Volodymyr Zelensky. With Ukraine: What Everyone Needs to Know, Serhy Yekelchyk shares his outstanding expertise that helps understand the complex overlaps and developments that shape the historical and political environment in contemporary Ukraine. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In 2020, Oxford University Press published a second edition of Serhy Yekelchyk’s Ukraine: What Everyone Needs to Know (Oxford UP, 2020). This series is based on the reference format that allows to concisely present the most essential information on both generic and most recent acute issues. One will find in this addition answers to the questions pertaining to Kyivan Rus, the Cossacks, as well as the notorious Pereiaslav Treaty of 1654. In addition to this information, the book contains chapters that concisely describe both the Orange Revolution and the Euromaidan. These chapters are followed by inquiries into Russia’s occupation of the Crimea and the Donbas war which is supported by the Kremlin. Yekelchyk emphasizes that the Euromaidan was, on the one hand, the Ukrainians’ response to the corrupt regime which was being normalized by Yanukovych and his supporters; on the other hand, it was also a response to the turn to Russia, which Yanukovych promoted and supported: “Popular dissatisfaction with the corrupt regime had been mounting for years, but the sudden diplomatic turn from Europe to Russia was simply the last straw” (93). For the Ukrainians, “Europe” represented democratic values which were systematically violated by Russia: “‘Europe’ served as a popular shorthand slogan implying democracy, rule of law, and economic opportunity—all the things ordinary citizens found lacking in Yanukovych’s Ukraine” (93). Russia’s aggression against Ukraine is viewed by Yekelchyk as part of Putin’s ambitions to restore the mightiness of Russia—in terms of global positioning—within the traditions of both the Russian Empire and the Soviet Union. Yekelchyk’s book also contains brief inquiries into the most recent developments around the Russo-Ukrainian conflict on the international level: the evaluation of the presidency of Petro Poroshenko and his decisions during the years of the most active conflict; the investigation of the shooting down of the Malaysia Airlines passenger flight; the international sanctions against Russia; the recent controversy about the Steinmeier Formula. There are sections which address the alleged meddling of the Ukrainian authorities in the 2016 presidential election in the US and the current presidency of Volodymyr Zelensky. With Ukraine: What Everyone Needs to Know, Serhy Yekelchyk shares his outstanding expertise that helps understand the complex overlaps and developments that shape the historical and political environment in contemporary Ukraine. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In 2020, Oxford University Press published a second edition of Serhy Yekelchyk's Ukraine: What Everyone Needs to Know (Oxford UP, 2020). This series is based on the reference format that allows to concisely present the most essential information on both generic and most recent acute issues. One will find in this addition answers to the questions pertaining to Kyivan Rus, the Cossacks, as well as the notorious Pereiaslav Treaty of 1654. In addition to this information, the book contains chapters that concisely describe both the Orange Revolution and the Euromaidan. These chapters are followed by inquiries into Russia's occupation of the Crimea and the Donbas war which is supported by the Kremlin. Yekelchyk emphasizes that the Euromaidan was, on the one hand, the Ukrainians' response to the corrupt regime which was being normalized by Yanukovych and his supporters; on the other hand, it was also a response to the turn to Russia, which Yanukovych promoted and supported: “Popular dissatisfaction with the corrupt regime had been mounting for years, but the sudden diplomatic turn from Europe to Russia was simply the last straw” (93). For the Ukrainians, “Europe” represented democratic values which were systematically violated by Russia: “‘Europe' served as a popular shorthand slogan implying democracy, rule of law, and economic opportunity—all the things ordinary citizens found lacking in Yanukovych's Ukraine” (93). Russia's aggression against Ukraine is viewed by Yekelchyk as part of Putin's ambitions to restore the mightiness of Russia—in terms of global positioning—within the traditions of both the Russian Empire and the Soviet Union. Yekelchyk's book also contains brief inquiries into the most recent developments around the Russo-Ukrainian conflict on the international level: the evaluation of the presidency of Petro Poroshenko and his decisions during the years of the most active conflict; the investigation of the shooting down of the Malaysia Airlines passenger flight; the international sanctions against Russia; the recent controversy about the Steinmeier Formula. There are sections which address the alleged meddling of the Ukrainian authorities in the 2016 presidential election in the US and the current presidency of Volodymyr Zelensky. With Ukraine: What Everyone Needs to Know, Serhy Yekelchyk shares his outstanding expertise that helps understand the complex overlaps and developments that shape the historical and political environment in contemporary Ukraine.

In 2020, Oxford University Press published a second edition of Serhy Yekelchyk’s Ukraine: What Everyone Needs to Know (Oxford UP, 2020). This series is based on the reference format that allows to concisely present the most essential information on both generic and most recent acute issues. One will find in this addition answers to the questions pertaining to Kyivan Rus, the Cossacks, as well as the notorious Pereiaslav Treaty of 1654. In addition to this information, the book contains chapters that concisely describe both the Orange Revolution and the Euromaidan. These chapters are followed by inquiries into Russia’s occupation of the Crimea and the Donbas war which is supported by the Kremlin. Yekelchyk emphasizes that the Euromaidan was, on the one hand, the Ukrainians’ response to the corrupt regime which was being normalized by Yanukovych and his supporters; on the other hand, it was also a response to the turn to Russia, which Yanukovych promoted and supported: “Popular dissatisfaction with the corrupt regime had been mounting for years, but the sudden diplomatic turn from Europe to Russia was simply the last straw” (93). For the Ukrainians, “Europe” represented democratic values which were systematically violated by Russia: “‘Europe’ served as a popular shorthand slogan implying democracy, rule of law, and economic opportunity—all the things ordinary citizens found lacking in Yanukovych’s Ukraine” (93). Russia’s aggression against Ukraine is viewed by Yekelchyk as part of Putin’s ambitions to restore the mightiness of Russia—in terms of global positioning—within the traditions of both the Russian Empire and the Soviet Union. Yekelchyk’s book also contains brief inquiries into the most recent developments around the Russo-Ukrainian conflict on the international level: the evaluation of the presidency of Petro Poroshenko and his decisions during the years of the most active conflict; the investigation of the shooting down of the Malaysia Airlines passenger flight; the international sanctions against Russia; the recent controversy about the Steinmeier Formula. There are sections which address the alleged meddling of the Ukrainian authorities in the 2016 presidential election in the US and the current presidency of Volodymyr Zelensky. With Ukraine: What Everyone Needs to Know, Serhy Yekelchyk shares his outstanding expertise that helps understand the complex overlaps and developments that shape the historical and political environment in contemporary Ukraine. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In 2020, Oxford University Press published a second edition of Serhy Yekelchyk's Ukraine: What Everyone Needs to Know (Oxford UP, 2020). This series is based on the reference format that allows to concisely present the most essential information on both generic and most recent acute issues. One will find in this addition answers to the questions pertaining to Kyivan Rus, the Cossacks, as well as the notorious Pereiaslav Treaty of 1654. In addition to this information, the book contains chapters that concisely describe both the Orange Revolution and the Euromaidan. These chapters are followed by inquiries into Russia's occupation of the Crimea and the Donbas war which is supported by the Kremlin. Yekelchyk emphasizes that the Euromaidan was, on the one hand, the Ukrainians' response to the corrupt regime which was being normalized by Yanukovych and his supporters; on the other hand, it was also a response to the turn to Russia, which Yanukovych promoted and supported: “Popular dissatisfaction with the corrupt regime had been mounting for years, but the sudden diplomatic turn from Europe to Russia was simply the last straw” (93). For the Ukrainians, “Europe” represented democratic values which were systematically violated by Russia: “‘Europe' served as a popular shorthand slogan implying democracy, rule of law, and economic opportunity—all the things ordinary citizens found lacking in Yanukovych's Ukraine” (93). Russia's aggression against Ukraine is viewed by Yekelchyk as part of Putin's ambitions to restore the mightiness of Russia—in terms of global positioning—within the traditions of both the Russian Empire and the Soviet Union. Yekelchyk's book also contains brief inquiries into the most recent developments around the Russo-Ukrainian conflict on the international level: the evaluation of the presidency of Petro Poroshenko and his decisions during the years of the most active conflict; the investigation of the shooting down of the Malaysia Airlines passenger flight; the international sanctions against Russia; the recent controversy about the Steinmeier Formula. There are sections which address the alleged meddling of the Ukrainian authorities in the 2016 presidential election in the US and the current presidency of Volodymyr Zelensky. With Ukraine: What Everyone Needs to Know, Serhy Yekelchyk shares his outstanding expertise that helps understand the complex overlaps and developments that shape the historical and political environment in contemporary Ukraine. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Is this the end of Europe's Last Dictator? In this episode, Matt spoke with Aliaksandr aka Ales Herasimenka, a researcher at the University of Westminster and previous guest on the show about the ongoing presidential elections in Belarus, where embattled president Alexander Lukashenko faces the most organized opposition in the history of his 26 years as president. A new generation has rallied around the 37-year-old English teacher Svetlana Tikhanovskaya, who promises to usher in a new era of democracy to Belarus. The final day of voting is Sunday, August 9th, after which no one is exactly sure what to expect following an election campaign that has already broken all the norms. "Is this the end of Europe's Last Dictator?" - a lovely title to the most recent podcast episode by a great team at The...Posted by Ales Herasimenka on Friday, August 7, 2020 NOTE: This episode was recorded on August 5th, 2020 via Zoom. CREDITS Co-Producer: Matthew Orr (Connect: facebook.com/orrrmatthew) Co-Producer: Tom Rehnquist (Connect: @RehnquistTom) Associate Producer: Lera Toropin Associate Producer: Cullan Bendig Associate Producer: Samantha Farmer Associate Producer: Milena D-K Assistant Producer/Social Media Manager: Kathryn Yegorov-Crate Recording, Editing, and Sound Design: Michelle Daniel Music Producer: Charlie Harper (Connect: facebook.com/charlie.harper.1485 Instagram: @charlieharpermusic) www.charlieharpermusic.com (Main Theme by Charlie Harper and additional Background music by Charlie Harper, John Bartmann, and Blue Dot Sessions) Tikhanovskaya sound bites from BBC World News coverage. Executive Producer & Creator: Michelle Daniel (Connect: facebook.com/mdanielgeraci Instagram: @michelledaniel86) www.msdaniel.com DISCLAIMER: The views expressed on this episode do not necessarily reflect those of the show or the University of Texas at Austin. Special Guest: Aliaksandr Herasimenka.

101 – Ukraine – Russia Annexes Crimea  Crimea Invaded - Poroshenko Sets Up Shop Topics - Ukraine – A history lesson 866-988-8311 info@republickeeper.com Ukraine 2/4/2014 – Tuesday NULAND – PYATT CALL LEAKS 2/6/2014 - Thursday 'This is what you cook for Ukraine?' State Dept Psaki grilled over leaked tape 2/7/2014 – Friday – Fiona Hill Feb 22nd - Following the violence the Ukrainian parliament on 22 February voted to remove Yanukovych from power (on the grounds that his whereabouts were unknown and he thus could not fulfil his duties), and to free Yulia Tymoshenko from prison. The same day Yanukovych supporter Volodymyr Rybakresigned as speaker of the Parliament, and was replaced by Tymoshenko loyalist Oleksandr Turchynov, who was subsequently installed as interim President.[59] Yanukovych had fled Kiev, and subsequently gave a press conference in the Russian city of Rostov-on-Don.[60] Feb 28 2014 – Friday – Russian Troops invade Crimea – CNN Report – Features Chuck Hagel (Diplomatic Focus) March 2nd – Russian forces official enter March 5th – Hagel de=escalate 3/6 – Obama Speech – sanctions 3/13 – MRE’s no weapons – wsj 3/16 – Referendum in Crimea – the EU and the US called it illegal 3/17 – President Obama Speaks 4/21-22 Biden Goes to Ukraine 4/28 – Hunter gets a job 4/30 – British MP – It’s not Russia that pushed. 5/25 – Porishenko Elected 6/6 – Biden there for inauguration 10/2014 – Burisma signs USAID deal – Signed by Andrii Kicha – just arrested for the $6m bribe. 11/20-2/2014 – Biden Trip Biden made his third trip of a busy year in the week after elections. It was part of what officials said was an effort to encourage political leaders to rapidly form a new government and press on with anti-corruption reforms. "You must be getting tired of seeing me as often as you do," said Biden, before congratulating Poroshenko on peaceful elections and condemning continuing Russian aggression. "America does not and will not recognize Russian occupation and attempted annexation of Crimea," he said. "We do not, will not, and insist others do not accept this illegal annexation." December 7-8/2015 – Biden there with $1Billion in loan guarantees Amos Hochstein in tow https://justthenews.com/accountability/russia-and-ukraine-scandals/joe-bidens-ukraine-adviser-secretly-aided-kremlin Jan 16-17, 2017 - At the time, White House officials said the trip was to reinforce U.S. backing for Ukraine while the world prepared for the inauguration of President Trump, who was expected to bring a pro-Russia stance to office days later.   “The vice president's trip to Ukraine will underscore US support — and highlight his personal involvement in providing support — for Ukrainian independence, democratic development, prosperity and security,” the White House said. The vice-president’s keen interest in Ukraine, his frequent trips and phone calls to Poroshenko, attracted questions ahead of that trip. “And so when he is tasked by the president to focus on an area, he goes out of way to make sure that he has a close personal relationship with the leaders involved,” said the official. Support request Pray Subscribe & Share Donate

100 – Ukraine Welcome Topics - Ukraine – A history lesson 866-988-8311 info@republickeeper.com Ukraine Ukraine was once Keivan Rus and it was the most powerful state in Europe Why is the location so strategic and the opportunity for corruption so great. There has always been struggle over Ukraine. To control it or to maintain control even when briefly independent. Odessa in the South is like Portland Or. In the West - Kiev is like Everett WA or call North Seattle, Vancouver Canada is the northern border. In the Midwest – Fargo is Odessa, Northern border is Winnipeg East Coasters – Odessa is Montreal, Quebec City is Kiev and then go north for a couple of hundred km to Belarus Gained independence in 1991 Officially Neutral – 1994 – Partnered with NATO In 2004 they had the “Orange Revolution” Yanukovych then PM, was declared winner of the Presidential elections. The elections were rigged, as determined by their supreme court The opposition guy was poisoned with dioxin, probably by Russia. So we stirred the pot – From Wikipedia “Activists of the Orange Revolution were funded and trained in tactics of political organisation and nonviolent resistance by Western pollsters[clarification needed] and professional consultants[who?] who were partly funded by Western government and non-government agencies but received most of their funding from domestic sources.[nb 1][155] According to The Guardian, the foreign donors included the U.S. State Department and USAID along with the National Democratic Institute for International Affairs, the International Republican Institute, the NGO Freedom House and George Soros's Open Society Institute.[156]” Yanokovych kicked out be re-elected in 2010 Monopolies are dangerous but they existed in a number of arenas, media, energy, rail, etc. After In 2013 Yanukovich decided to suspend the Ukraine-European Union Association Agreement and seek closer economic ties with Russia, a several-months-long wave of demonstrations and protests known as the Euromaidan began, which later escalated into the 2014 Ukrainian revolution that led to the overthrow of Yanukovych and the establishment of a new government. These events formed the background for the annexation of Crimea by Russia in March 2014, and the War in Donbass in April 2014. Just recently - June 24th, 2020 Yanukovych was charged with treason along with his defense minister for using the military on behalf of Russia instead of Ukraine. It’s the same folks who trained these guys who trained the PKK and the KPG we were talking about, they pulled down the statue of Lenin. 12/9 - Monday - LENIN CLIP 12/11 – Wednesday - UKRAINE POLICE PULL OUT 12/11- Nuland - Food 12/13/2013 Friday – Nuland While Ukrainian riot police have reportedly left Kiev's Independence Square, one of the United States' top diplomats says she has told President Viktor Yanukovych that "what happened last night, what has been happening in security terms here, is absolutely impermissible in a European state, in a democratic state." Nuland was in Kiev on Wednesday. She reported that she "spent more than two hours with President Yanukovych. It was a tough conversation, but it was a realistic one. I made it absolutely clear to him that what happened last night, what has been happening in security terms here, is absolutely impermissible in a European state, in a democratic state." But, Nuland added, "we also made clear that we believe there is a way out for Ukraine, that it is still possible to save Ukraine's European future and that is what we want to see the president lead. But that is going to require immediate security steps and getting back into a conversation with Europe and with the International Monetary Fund, and bringing justice and dignity to the people of Ukraine. I have no doubt after our meeting that President Yanukovych knows what he needs to do. The whole world is watching. We want to see a better future for Ukraine." https://www.publicradiotulsa.org/post/world-watching-us-diplomat-tells-ukraine 12/16/2013 – Monday – Senator McCain Audio 12/25/2013 - Anti-government journalist Tetyana Chornovol beaten up in Ukraine 1/15/2014 – Wednesday NULAND Nuland – European Future Nuland – Integrity of the process Sometime in Q1 – Victor Pinchuks company hires Norm Coleman, former MN senator at Hogan & Hartson for $230 – it was the 1st lobbyist in a decade. Continues through now, same firm, different lobbyist. Coleman – was a lib. Bit part of anti war movement, sit ins, etc, 1993 - I am a lifelong Democrat. Some accuse me of being the fiscal conservative in this race—I plead guilty! I'm not afraid to be tight with your tax dollars. Yet, my fiscal conservatism does not mean I am any less progressive in my Democratic ideals. From Bobby Kennedy to George McGovern to Warren Spannaus to Hubert Humphrey to Walter Mondale—my commitment to the great values of our party has remained solid. In 1996 he chaired Paul Wellstone’s re-election campaign. Pivoted to the RNC in Dec 1996. In 2010 he was considered for RNC Chairman. In 2011 he joins the firm and So FF and here’s Normy, now lobbyist for them and Saudi Arabia,   1/24 Friday Protest Riots Spread across Ukraine 1/28/2014 -Tuesday - Parliament votes to annul protest law and President Yanukovych accepts resignation of PM and cabinet 1/29/2014 – Wednesday - Parliament passes amnesty law for detained protesters, under the condition occupied buildings are vacated 2/4/2014 – Tuesday NULAND – PYATT CALL LEAKS 2/6/2014 - Thursday 'This is what you cook for Ukraine?' State Dept Psaki grilled over leaked tape 2/7/2014 – Friday – Fiona Hill Feb 28 2014 – Friday – Russian Troops invade Crimea – CNN Report – Features Chuck Hagel Support request Pray Subscribe & Share Donate

The latest news about the war between Russia and Ukraine...For the first time since the last days of the Yanukovych era, Ukraine has taken a step towards tyranny. On April 10, masked operatives from Ukraine’s State Bureau of Investigations swooped on the home of anti-corruption activist, civic leader, and former parliamentarian Tetyana Chornovol (https://atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/ukrainealert/zelenskyy-puts-ukraines-maidan-revolution-on-trial/)… - Дещо про війну в Україні із Росією, що дедалі більше стає забутою у світі, та посягання на завоювання Революції Гідності...

In 2010, Ukraine had one of its most important elections of the modern age, and it featured a pair of American professionals on opposite sides. Fighting for the Party of Regions was future Trump Campaign Advisor Paul Manafort, and fighting for the Motherland Party was our guest today, Jeff Link. Jeff would take the lessons he learned on the American Campaigns of Senator Tom Harkin and President Barack Obama, as well as his work in Aruba, Kenya and Ghana, and use them to try to keep Prime Minister Tymoshenko from being sent to prison.

This week we have more on the Biden business in the Ukraine including some background on the Euromaidan uprising, the role of energy supply in the regime change and Russia's annexation of Crimea, and the role of the United States (via USAID) in the overthrow of Yanukovych. As evidence for the latter, we play the […] The post BFTN 53 – Regime Change In Ukraine appeared first on The BS Filter.

Donald Trump. Ukraine. Joe Biden. A phone call. Election Interference. Impeachment! What the hell is going on? In this episode, an irritated Jen gives you the backstory that you need to know about the impeachment drama, including what the steps to impeachment are. Prepare yourself: Everyone devoted to the Republican or Democratic parties will be pissed off by this episode. Please Support Congressional Dish – Quick Links Click here to contribute monthly or a lump sum via PayPal Click here to support Congressional Dish for each episode via Patreon Send Zelle payments to: Donation@congressionaldish.com Send Venmo payments to: @Jennifer-Briney Send Cash App payments to: $CongressionalDish or Donation@congressionaldish.com Use your bank's online bill pay function to mail contributions to: 5753 Hwy 85 North, Number 4576, Crestview, FL 32536 Please make checks payable to Congressional Dish Thank you for supporting truly independent media! Recommended Congressional Dish Episodes CD167: Combating Russia NDAA CD102: The World Trade Organization: COOL? CD067: What do We Want in Ukraine CD068: Ukraine Aid Bill CD190: A Coup for Capitalism CD176: Target Venezuela Regime Change in Progress Articles/Documents Article: Pelosi, Trump may reach trade deal despite impeachment by Niv Elis, The Hill, October 3, 2019 Article: This 2016 letter proves that GOP attacks on Biden over Ukraine are nonsense by Alex Ward, Vox, October 3, 2019 Article: Civilian Deaths in U.S. Wars Are Skyrocketing Under Trump. It May Not Be Impeachable, but It’s a Crime. by Murtaza Hussain, The Intercept, October 2, 2019 Article: Hunter Biden, the black sheep who might accidentally bring down Trump, explained by Matthew Yglesias, Vox, October 1, 2019 Article: Shoot Migrants’ Legs, Build Alligator Moat: Behind Trump’s Ideas for Border by Michael D. Shear and Julie Hirschfeld Davis, The New York Times, October 1, 2019 Article: Impeachment inquiry erupts into battle between executive, legislative branches By Karen DeYoung, Josh Dawsey, Karoun Demirjian and John Hudson, The Washington Post, October 1, 2019 Article: McConnell says if House impeaches Trump, Senate rules would force him to start a trial by Seung Min Kim, The Washington Post, September 30, 2019 Article: Trump claim on stalled aid for Ukraine draws new scrutiny by Robert Burns, Lolita Baldor, and Andrew Taylor, The Associated Press, MilitaryTimes, September 30, 2019 Article: Hunter Biden: The Most Comprehensive Timeline by Jim Geraghty, National Review, September 30, 2019 Article: The gas tycoon and the vice president’s son: The story of Hunter Biden’s foray into Ukraine by Paul Sonne, Michael Kranish and Matt Viser, The Washington Post, September 28, 2019 Article: The gas tycoon and the vice president’s son: The story of Hunter Biden’s foray into Ukraine by Paul Sonne, Michael Kranish and Matt Viser, The Washington Post, September 28, 2019 Article: Piety and Power by Tom LoBianco, The New York Times, September 27, 2019 Article: White House Knew of Whistle-Blower’s Allegations Soon After Trump’s Call With Ukraine Leader by Julian E. Barnes, Michael S. Schmidt, Adam Goldman and Katie Benner, The New York Times, September 26, 2019 Article: Democrats, Please Don’t Mess This Up. Impeach Trump for All His Crimes, Not Just for Ukraine. by Mehdi Hasan, The Intercept, September 26, 2019 Document: S. 2583 [Report No. 116-126], September 26, 2019, Pg 144 Article: Here’s what you need to know about the US aid package to Ukraine that Trump delayed by Joe Gould and Howard Altman, Defense News, September 25, 2019 Article: Read the record of Trump’s controversial call to Ukraine’s president Zelensky by Ephrat Livni, Quartz, September 25, 2019 Article: How the Impeachment Process Works by Charlie Savage, The New York Times, September 24, 2019 Article: Trump ordered hold on military aid days before calling Ukrainian president, officials say By Karoun Demirjian, Josh Dawsey, Ellen Nakashima and Carol D. Leonnig, The Washington Post, September 23, 2019 Article: Ukraine military aid extension passes US House after White House delay by Joe Gould, Defense News, September 19, 2019 Article: US State Department clears Ukraine security assistance funding. Is the Pentagon next? by Aaron Mehta, Defense News, September 12, 2019 Document: S. 2474: Defense Appropriations Act, September 12, 2019, Pg 305 Document: DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE APPROPRIATIONS BILL, 2020, September 12, 2019, Pg 148 Letter: For Chairman Burr and Chairman Schiff August 12, 2019 Article: Will Hunter Biden Jeopardize His Father’s Campaign? by Adam Entous, The New Yorker, July 1, 2019 Article: What Powers Does a Formal Impeachment Inquiry Give the House? by Molly E. Reynolds, Margaret Taylor, Lawfare, May 21, 2019 Article: U.S. ambassador to Ukraine is recalled after becoming a political target by Josh Rogin, The Washington Post, May 7, 2019 Article: Timeline in Ukraine Probe Casts Doubt on Giuliani’s Biden Claim by Stephanie Baker and Daryna Krasnolutska, Bloomberg, May 7, 2019 Article: How does impeachment work? Here is the step-by-step process by Debbie Lord, Cox Media Group National Content Desk, AJC, April 22, 2019 Article: Trump’s feud with Jerry Nadler rooted in decades-old New York real estate project by Rachael Bade and Josh Dawsey, The Washington Post, April 8, 2019 Article: Joe Biden's 2020 Ukrainian nightmare: A closed probe is revived by John Solomon, The Hill, April 1, 2019 Article: Senior Ukrainian official says he's opened probe into US election interference The Hill, March 20, 2019 Article: Top Ukrainian justice official says US ambassador gave him a do not prosecute list The Hill, March 20, 2019 Document: 2019 Funding Report, February 13, 2019 Article: The Danger of President Pence by Jane Mayer, The New Yorker, October 16, 2017 Article: Joe Biden, His Son and the Case Against a Ukrainian Oligarch by James Risen, The New York Times, December 8, 2015 Additional Resources Document: H.R. Full Committee Print, Department of State Appropriations Document: DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE APPROPRIATIONS BILL, 2020, Pg 100 Prepared Remarks: Prepared Remarks by Senator John McCain on America’s Role in Europe’s East, Atlantic Council, December 19, 2013 Sound Clip Sources Interview with Mitch McConnell:, CNBC, September 30, 2019 Speakers: Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell Transcript: Sen. Mitch McConnell (KY): Yeah, it's a, it's a Senate rule related to impeachment that would take 67 votes to change. So I would have no choice but to take it up. How long you're on it is a whole different matter, but I would have no choice but to take it up. President Trump Meeting with Ukrainian President, C-SPAN, 74th U.N. General Assembly at United Nations headquarters in New York City, September 25, 2019 Speakers: Donald J. Trump President Zelensky Transcript: 1:45 Volodymyr Zelensky: It’s a great pleasure to me to be here, and it’s better to be on TV than by phone. 3:30 Volodymyr Zelensky: My priority to stop the war on Donbass and to get back our territories, –- thank you for your support in this case, thank you very much. 6:40 Volodymyr Zelensky: And to know when, I want world to know that now we have the new team, the new parliament, the new government. So now we – about 74 laws, new laws, which help for our new reforms, land reform, -- law about concessions, that we – general – and we launched the – secretary, and anti-corruption court. As we came, we launched the anti-corruption court, it began to work on the 5th of September. It was, you know, it was, after five days we had the new – So we are ready, we want to show that we just come, and if somebody, if you, you want to help us, so just let’s do business cases. We have many investment cases, we’re ready. 12:00 Reporter: Do you believe that the emaiIs from Hillary Clinton, do you believe that they are in Ukraine? Do you think this whole -- President Trump: I think they could be. You mean the 30,000 that she deleted? Reporter: Yes. President Trump: Yeah, I think they could very well, boy that was a nice question. I like, that's why, because frankly, I think that one of the great crimes committed is Hillary Clinton deleted 33,000 emails after Congress sends her a subpoena. Think of that. You can't even do that in a civil case. You can't get rid of evidence like that. She deleted 33,000 emails after, not before, after receiving the subpoena from the U.S. Congress. 16:00 Translator for Volodymyr Zelensky: During the investigation, actually, I want to underscore that Ukraine is an independent country. We have a new –- in Ukraine, a hired, professional man with a western education and history, to investigate any case he considers and deems -- Speaker Pelosi Announcement of Impeachment Inquiry, C-SPAN, September 24, 2019 Speakers: Nancy Pelosi 0:40 Speaker Nancy Pelosi (CA): Shortly thereafter, press reports began to break of a phone call by the President of the United States calling upon a foreign power to intervene in his election. 4:30 Speaker Nancy Pelosi (CA): And this week, the President has admitted to asking the President of Ukraine to take actions which would benefit him politically. The action of the Trump, the actions of the Trump presidency revealed dishonorable fact of the President's betrayal of his oath of office, betrayal of our national security, and betrayal of the integrity of our elections. Therefore, today, I'm announcing the House of Representatives moving forward with an official impeachment inquiry. I'm directing our six committees to proceed with their investigations under that umbrella of impeachment inquiry. The president must be held accountable. No one is above the law. House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerry Nadler (D-NY) talks with CNN's Erin Burnett, CNN, August 8, 2019 Speakers: Chairman Jerry Nadler (D-NY) Transcript: Rep. Jerrold Nadler (NY): This is formal impeachment proceedings. We are investigating all the evidence, we are gathering the evidence, and we will at the conclusion of this, hopefully by the end of the year, vote to, vote articles of impeachment to the House floor, or we won't. That's a decision that we'll have to make, but that, but that's exactly the process we're in right now. Council of Foreign Relations: Foreign Affairs Issue Launch with Former Vice President Joe Biden, Tuesday, January 23, 2018 Speakers: Joseph R. Biden, Jr. Michael R. Carpenter Presider, Richard N. Haass Transcript: 6:00* Joe Biden: I think there's a basic decision that they cannot compete against a unified West. And I think that is Putin's judgment. And so everything he can do to dismantle the post world war two liberal world order, including NATO and the EU, I think is viewed as they're in their immediate self-interest. 52:00 Joe Biden: I’ll give you one concrete example. I was—not I, it just happened to be that was the assignment I got. I got all the good ones. And so I got Ukraine. And I remember going over, convincing our team and our leaders, that we should be providing for loan guarantees. And I went over, I guess, the 12th, 13th time to Kiev. I was supposed to announce that there was another billion-dollar loan guarantee. And I had gotten a commitment from Poroshenko and from Yatsenyuk that they would take action against the state prosecutor, and they didn’t. So they said they were walking out to a press conference. I said, nah, I’m not going to—or, we’re not going to give you the billion dollars. They said, you have no authority. You’re not the president. The president said—I said, call him. (Laughter.) I said, I’m telling you, you’re not getting the billion dollars. I said, you’re not getting the billion. I’m going to be leaving here in, I think it was about six hours. I looked at them and said: I’m leaving in six hours. If the prosecutor is not fired, you’re not getting the money. Well, son of a bitch. (Laughter) He got fired. And they put in place someone who was solid at the time. 54:00 Joe Biden: But always worked in Kiev because, as I said, look, it's simple proposition. If in fact you do not continue to show progress in terms of corruption, we are not going to be able to hold the rest of Europe on these sanctions and Russia is not going to roll across the inner line here and take over the rest of the country with their tanks. What they're going to do is they're going to take your economy down. You're going to be absolutely buried and you're going to be done, and that's when it all goes to hell. 56:00 Joe Biden: It's a very difficult spot to be in now, when foreign leaders call me, and they do, because I never, ever, ever would say anything negative to a foreign leader, and I mean this sincerely, about a sitting president, no matter how fundamentally I disagree with them. And it is not my role, not my role to make foreign policy. But the questions across the board range from, what the hell is going on, Joe, to what advice do you have for me? And my advice always is to, I give them names of individuals in the administration who I think to be knowledgeable and, and, and, and, and committed, and I say, you should talk to so and so. You should, and what I do, and every one of those times, I first call the vice president and tell him I received the call, tell him, and ask him whether he has any objection to my returning the call. And then what is the administration's position, if any, they want me to communicate to that country. Interview, ABC News, March 30, 2015 Speakers: Mike Pence George Stephanopoulos 8:00 George Stephanopoulos: One fix that people have talked about is simply adding sexual orientation as a protected class under the state civil rights laws. Will you push for that? Mike Pence: I will not push for that. That's not on my agenda. And that's not been an objective of the people of the state of Indiana. Transcript of leaked Nuland-Pyatt call, BBC News, February 7, 2014 Speakers: Victoria Nuland Geoffrey Pyatt Watch on YouTube Victoria Nuland: Good. So, I don’t think Klitsch should go into the government. I don’t think it’s necessary, I don’t think it’s a good idea. Geoffrey Pyatt: Yeah, I mean, I guess. In terms of him not going into the government, just let him sort of stay out and do his political homework and stuff. I’m just thinking in terms of sort of the process moving ahead, we want to keep the moderate Democrats together. The problem is going to be Tyahnybok and his guys, and I’m sure that’s part of what Yanukovych is calculating on all of this. I kind of— Victoria Nuland: I think Yats is the guy who’s got the economic experience, the governing experience. What he needs is Klitsch and Tyahnybok on the outside. He needs to be talking to them four times a week, you know? I just think Klitsch going in—he’s going to be at that level working for Yatsenyuk; it’s just not going to work. Victoria Nuland: So, on that piece, Geoff, when I wrote the note, Sullivan’s come back to me VFR, saying, you need Biden, and I said, probably tomorrow for an “atta-boy” and to get the deets to stick. Geoffrey Pyatt: Okay. Victoria Nuland: So, Biden’s willing. Geoffrey Pyatt: Okay, great. Thanks. Senator John McCain on Ukraine, C-SPAN, Atlantic Council of the U.S., December 13, 2013 Speakers: John S. McCain III Watch on YouTube Transcript: 16:45 Sen. John McCain: Finally, we must encourage the European Union and the IMF to keep their doors open to Ukraine. Ultimately, the support of both institutions is indispensible for Ukraine's future. And eventually, a Ukrainian President, either this one or a future one, will be prepared to accept the fundamental choice facing the country, which is this: While there are real short-term costs to the political and economic reforms required for IMF assistance and EU integration, and while President Putin will likely add to these costs by retaliating against Ukraine's economy, the long-term benefits for Ukraine in taking these tough steps are far greater and almost limitless. This decision cannot be borne by one person alone in Ukraine. Nor should it be. It must be shared—both the risks and the rewards—by all Ukrainians, especially the opposition and business elite. It must also be shared by the EU, the IMF and the United States. All of us in the West should be prepared to help Ukraine, financially and otherwise, to overcome the short-term pain that reforms will require and Russia may inflict. Cover Art Design by Only Child Imaginations Music Presented in This Episode Intro & Exit: Tired of Being Lied To by David Ippolito (found on Music Alley by mevio)  

Harley Schlanger, eMail for Blog harleysch@gmail.com, LaRouchePUB.com, Deep State Coup Against Trump, Collapse of British Bankers World Empire, NOT IMPEACHMENT, BUT A COUP, DEMS ATTACK ON TRUMP IS A DISGUSTING DEFENSE OF COLLAPSING IMPERIAL ORDER, Attorney General William Barr into the origin of the whole fabricated Russiagate fiasco, failure of the investigation by special counsel Robert Mueller to find evidence of Russian meddling, threat of the popping of the “everything bubble” with the collapse of a staggering volume of unsustainable debt,Dr Bill Deagle MD AAEM ACAM A4M, NutriMedical Report Show, www.NutriMedical.com, www.ClayandIRON.com, www.Deagle-Network.com, NOT IMPEACHMENT, BUT A COUP:DEMS ATTACK ON TRUMP IS A DISGUSTING DEFENSE OF COLLAPSING IMPERIAL ORDERby: Harley SchlangerOct. 4 — As the Democratic Party leaders in the U.S. House of Representatives are racing to impeach Donald Trump, the President tweeted on October 1, “As I learn more and more each day, I am coming to the conclusion that what is taking place is not an impeachment, it is a coup.” With the exception of Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who had repeatedly spoken out against moving for impeachment, those Democrats who have begun impeachment proceedings, such as Representatives Adam Schiff and Jerrold Nadler, have been demanding the removal of Trump from office since virtually the day of his inauguration. With the announcement of a “whistle blower’s” complaint that Trump abused his position to demand that Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky aid in digging up “dirt” on his opponent in 2020, Joe Biden, Pelosi suddenly shifted her position on September 24, and the race for impeachment was on.What led to this sudden rush to judgement against Trump?There are three significant reasons for the flight-forward lunacy coming from the anti-Trump crowd:1. The investigation launched by Attorney General William Barr into the origin of the whole fabricated Russiagate fiasco, which was first announced by President Trump on May 24, is moving into a decisive phase. In that announcement, Trump said he tasked Barr with the job of conducting a broad probe, saying he hopes he looks into the role of the United Kingdom, Australia and Ukraine, at a minimum. Along with the soon-to-be-revealed findings of Justice Department Inspector General Horowitz on fraud committed by Obama administration intelligence officials in obtaining FISA warrants to spy on the Trump campaign, Barr and U.S. Attorney John Durham are honing in on the networks which launched the attack against Trump. They are investigating what role was played by foreign governments in the operations against the Trump campaign in 2016, and then in the regime change coup against him after his election. What they will likely prove is that Russiagate was a continuation of British imperial geopolitical manipulations to insure that there could be no improvement in U.S.-Russian relations, with Ukraine serving as a key battleground to disrupt Trump’s efforts to develop cooperative relations with Russia. The February 2014 regime change coup against a democratically-elected government in Ukraine was run by British and U.S. intelligence operatives, working with “left-wing” Soros’ -funded networks and “right-wing” neocons, who backed violent Nazi militia networks involved in the Maidan Square uprising. The point man for the Obama administration in handling Ukraine was Vice President Joe Biden.2. The failure of the investigation by special counsel Robert Mueller to find evidence of Russian meddling, Trump collusion with Russia, and obstruction of justice by the President, freed him to move forward with his intent to improve relations with Russia. The firing of the Director of National Intelligence Coats and National Security Adviser Bolton, both of whom are committed war hawks who had been acting within the administration against Trump’s desires to put an end to the regime change wars of the last two decades, demonstrated that he was now taking control of his administration, especially its foreign policy. This has been a fear of the imperial geopoliticians from the beginning of his presidency, and it was reaffirmed by his discussions at the Osaka G20 summit with Putin, Xi, India’s Modi, and then his trip to meet with North Korean President Kim following the summit, that he was committed to follow through with his intent to pull the U.S. out of the provocative strategic geometry of his predecessors, Bush and Obama. The potential for a realignment organized by Trump, outside the Old Paradigm defined by geopolitics, represents an existential threat to the Trans-Atlantic elites who have used divide-and-conquer schemes and endless regional wars to enforce their designs.3. The onrush of a financial crisis, which combines the threat of the popping of the “everything bubble” with the collapse of a staggering volume of unsustainable debt, has been met by the global financial elites and their central bank operatives by a return to short-term bailouts, and a concerted push for creating a new Green financial bubble. The recent threats by Bank of England Governor Mark Carney, at the U.N. Climate Summit, that those banks and firms which do not accept a Green financial dictatorship will be cut off from credit by central banks, is a key feature of this agenda. Trump’s repeated denunciations of the Federal Reserve policy, combined with his open rejection of the fraud of “man-made climate change”, has heightened the panic of these financial circles that he may respond to the collapse with economic nationalist measures, which reflect the influence of American economist and statesman Lyndon LaRouche. Those behind Russiagate come from the same circles as those who ran the persecution of LaRouche, including William Weld, who is running against Trump, and Robert Mueller, who took over from Weld the running of the Get LaRouche task force.WHY UKRAINE?The excuse for launching the latest impeachment frenzy is the release of a “whistle blower’s” report on a call made by Trump to Ukraine’s new President Zelensky, on July 25. Trump acknowledges that in that conversation, he asked for Zelensky’s aid in investigating leads into the role of Ukrainian networks in setting Russiagate into motion, as well as the involvement of Joe Biden, when he was Vice President, in shutting down an investigation into charges of corruption involving his son, Hunter, who was a board member of a Ukrainian energy company, Burisma. Trump attorney, Rudy Giuliani, who has been looking into a variety of leads involving Ukraine, stated that he began the investigation because he believed “there was a lot of evidence” that the Democratic National Committee (DNC) and the Clinton campaign — which were involved in launching the initial charges against the Trump campaign in the summer of 2016 — “had a close connection to Ukrainian officials.”Among matters under investigation, in addition to the charges of Biden’s personal role in shutting down an investigation into his son’s role at Burisma, by threatening to cancel aid to Ukraine if the prosecutor in that case was not fired immediately, was the surfacing of a “black book”, which was allegedly a ledger of payments to Trump’s former campaign manager Paul Manafort from the Yanukovych government. While this ledger was never produced as evidence, its purported existence was used by Mueller in the conviction of Manafort for money laundering. Manafort’s conviction was the first big success for Mueller. Giuliani said that Manafort’s attorney told him that the “black book” did not exist! In addition to Giuliani’s probe, Senators Grassley and Johnson wrote a letter to Barr saying they will investigate the Ukrainian government’s role on behalf of the Clinton campaign in framing Manafort. “Such allegations of corruption deserve due scrutiny,” they wrote in the letter.While the wealth of details about the leads from Ukraine is beyond the scope of this article, there are several points which must be made (1.). One involves the dirty role played by lead impeachment operative Rep. Schiff, who knew of the charges against Trump before the whistle blower filed his complaint. The whistle blower, who has been identified by the {New York Times} as a CIA official, approached a House Intelligence Committee aide to brief him, before filing his complaint. The aide then reported to Schiff, the Committee chair, raising the question of whether or not Schiff played a role in drafting what was contained in the complaint.Secondly, there is the question raised by Trump of looking into whether CrowdStrike, the firm which claimed it had proof of Russian hacking of the DNC server, which it was supposed to be protecting, had moved that server to Ukraine. There are many reports of Ukrainian hackers having left digital finger prints all over elements of Russiagate, working with networks in the NSA and CIA. The CrowdStrike claim of Russian “hacking” was never proven — in fact, the server was never given to the FBI to investigate, and the only forensic investigation into the charges of Russian hacking, by former NSA Technical Director Bill Binney and associates, demonstrated that the Clinton/DNC files were not hacked, but captured through a download, i.e., were taken as a result of an “inside” job.Third is the simple fact that the Putin-hating networks involved in the Ukraine coup overlap those trying to frame Trump in Russiagate. These include “ex”-MI6 operative Christopher Steele, of the notorious “pee-pee” dossier, funded by the Clinton campaign and the DNC, who worked with State Department official Jonathan Winer, in filing dozens of reports on Ukraine in the period of the 2014 coup; the Soros networks, which provided funds for both the Ukrainian uprising and the anti-Trump insurgency; a variety of anti-Trump neocons; and CIA and U.S. intel operatives, in collusion with Russophobes and Trump regime change plotters John Brennan, the former CIA Director, and James Clapper, the Director of National Intelligence. There are reports that both Brennan and Clapper are terrified by the Durham investigation. Brennan has not only been a leading instigator in demanding impeachment, but responded to the latest whistle blower report by calling for more whistle blowers to come forward. In contrast, when he was CIA chief, he took the lead in demanding prosecution of those who blew the whistle on his dirty ops, including torture and illegal spying on Americans.THE TARGET IS RUSSIAAs reported above, the real reason for the attacks on Trump is his commitment to break with the imperial geopolitical strategic arrangement which has dominated the post-Cold War world. He not only campaigned by saying he wished the U.S. to be “friends” with Russia and China, but acted on that from the beginning of his presidency. This is the causus belli for the financial and intelligence establishment, sometimes identified as the “Military Industrial Complex”, or the shadow government. Their goal is not merely sustaining military build-up, and fighting endless wars, but to protect a globalist financial regime of looting and genocidal austerity, not only against the underdeveloped sector, but increasingly against the populations of the Trans-Atlantic region. This global regime is threatened by the collapse of its failed economic policies, but also by the emergence of a alternative, “New Paradigm”, centered around China’s Belt-and-Road Initiative. This New Paradigm is gaining support from many nations, due to its commitment to offer an alternative to the disastrous policies of the IMF and World Bank, through providing credit and technologies for the building of an economy based on advancing a new platform of infrastructure, and using real science to improve the energy-flux density needed for a new era of manufacturing and agriculture.This New Paradigm is very much influenced by the life work in science and economics of Lyndon LaRouche. The possibility that Trump could move against the Old Paradigm, and join with Russia, China and India — as LaRouche proposed prior to the crash of 2008 — represents a real threat to the existing system.The destructive failure of the present system is what provoked the global insurgency against that establishment, typified not only by Trump’s victory in 2016, but by Brexit, the ongoing fight in Italy and Austria, etc. — voters in many nations are rejecting the globalists, and electing leaders who refuse to submit to the post-Cold War geometry. The counter-attack against this insurgency has ranged from falsified prosecutorial efforts and “sting operations”, such as those run by MI6 and the CIA/FBI in Russiagate with operatives such as Josef Mifsud — whose role is under investigation by Barr and Durham, in cooperation with Italy — to false flags, such as the attempt to start a war with Iran, and “Color Revolution” regime change operations, as in Hong Kong.When the prosecutorial House of Cards known as the Mueller report collapsed, panic necessitated a new assault against Trump. While those pushing impeachment, such as Schiff and Nadler are deadly serious in their commitment to disrupt efforts to achieve peaceful cooperation between the U.S. with Russia and China, the present escalation is galvanizing an effort to defeat the putschists, as their latest efforts are increasingly being exposed. The {Washington Times}, for example, in an article titled “John Durham probe goes worldwide to examine spies and their Trump targets,” lays out the deeper strategic implications, which previously had rarely been reported outside of LaRouche publications. The article quotes a former Pentagon spokesman and Trump campaign national security adviser, J.D. Gordon, who said, “The Trump-Russia collusion narrative was a clear attempt to subvert democracy by destroying a presidency and as many people in the president’s orbit as possible….Since the shady origins crisscross the globe from the U.K. to Italy to Ukraine to Australia and beyond, it’s only logical for Barr and Durham to pursue all credible leads and hold those accountable for any crimes they may have committed. Unless those responsible for the abuse of power that created Trump–Russia mass hysteria are punished, that sort of nefarious behavior will become the new normal in our media and politics.”Thus, the real question facing those living in the Trans-Atlantic region, is whether they will step forward to lead the fight against the regime changers and their coup, in defense of the election of Donald Trump and the Constitution, or submit meekly to the genocidalists and allow them cause the likely destruction of life on the planet.END1.) The details known thus far, including an in-depth look at the role of Joe Biden, are available in a report produced by larouchepac, https://larouchepac.com/20190927/concerning-coup-against-trump-some-plain-facts. Keep an eye on the LaRouchePAC site, as it is the “source of record” on the coup, and how to defeat it.Audio Player For information regarding your data privacy, visit Acast.com/privacy See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Today, we take a little trip to a place called “Moneyland”. Moneyland is a virtual place – but it is also very real. In fact, it is the third richest “country” in the world. Moneyland is the title of the Times of London's Business Book of the Year, written by our guest Oliver Bullough. Oliver is an award-winning investigative journalist. He previously wrote two non-fiction books on Russia's history and politics. The book's full title is Moneyland: Why Thieves and Crooks Rule the World and How to Take it Back. It is where many of the world's mega rich, particularly kleptocrats in a variety of countries characterised by high levels of corruption, hide and spend their stolen wealth. As you will hear from Oliver, Moneyland is a lawless, stateless place. It is also one that the West's own institutions have helped to create, and in the process undermine the foundations of Western stability. We cover that and more in this enthralling conversation, including: What Moneyland is and how it got created; How Moneyland works – how kleptocrats can steal, hid and spend their ill-gotten wealth (and do things like buy passports); Tax havens and how they work; The role of the West in creating Moneyland, and how Moneyland is undermining democracy; What we can do to fight back against Moneyland Show notes: Moneyland: Why Thieves and Crooks Rule the World and How to Take it Back Oliver on Twitter A Kleptocracy Tour of London with Oliver Kleptocracy Tours Viktor Yanukovych Francis Fukuyama Walid al-Juffali The Eurobond Gabriel Zucman's The Hidden Wealth of Nations Civil Society Groups:             Global Witness             Transparency International             Corruption Watch             FACT Coalition             The Hudson Institute's Kleptocracy Initiative             Sherpa _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ Get your free audio book and 30 day free trial at Audible: US listeners: get your free trial and audio book at Audible UK listeners: get your free trial and audio book at Audible _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ __ _ _ _ _ _ _ Like what you heard? Subscribe and/or leave a rating and review on iTunes: http://apple.co/1PjLmK Subscribe on Stitcher: http://www.stitcher.com/podcast/all-things-risk/the-all-things-risk-podcast Subscribe on Soundcloud: https://soundcloud.com/ben-cattaneo Follow the podcast on Twitter: https://twitter.com/RiskThings Drop us a note: allthingsrisk@gmail.com

  The National Endowment for Democracy is a private foundation - that receives millions of our tax dollars - that pays groups to work to change the governments of other countries. In this episode, hear highlights from a hearing during which the president of this creepy organization and the presidents of two organizations that it funds - which are controlled entirely by members of the Republican and Democratic parties - will give you some insight into what kind of work they are doing manipulating information and interfering in elections in other countries around the world. Please Support Congressional Dish – Quick Links Click here to contribute monthly or a lump sum via PayPal Click here to support Congressional Dish for each episode via Patreon Send Zelle payments to: Donation@congressionaldish.com Send Venmo payments to: @Jennifer-Briney Send Cash App payments to: $CongressionalDish or Donation@congressionaldish.com Use your bank's online bill pay function to mail contributions to: 5753 Hwy 85 North, Number 4576, Crestview, FL 32536 Please make checks payable to Congressional Dish Thank you for supporting truly independent media! Recommended Congressional Dish Episodes CD175: State of War CD172: The Illegal Bombing of Syria CD167: Combating Russia NDAA 2018 LIVE CD117: Authorization for Limitless War CD113: CISA is Law CD102: The World Trade Organization: COOL? Main Hearing Hearing: Democracy Promotion in a Challenging World, Senate Foreign Affairs Committee, June 14, 2018. Full Hearing Transcript Watch on YouTube Witnesses: Carl Gershman: National Endowment for Democracy: President Daniel Twining: International Republican Institute: President Kenneth Wollack: National Democratic Institute: President Timestamps & Transcripts 15:35 Representative Edward Royce (CA): At home, we must maintain the decades-old bipartisan consensus that democracy is a core element of U.S. foreign policy. That is why it’s important to have the National Endowment for Democracy, the International Republican Institute, and the National Democratic Institute here today, and that’s why it’s important that Congress continues to adequately fund these institutions.   24:30 Representative Edward Royce (CA): I’m pleased to welcome our distinguished guests here on the panel, including Mr. Carl Gershman, who has served as president of the National Endowment for Democracy since its founding in 1984. He’s a long-time friend of this committee. He’s respected worldwide for his work, especially in his efforts to help peaceably end the Cold War and transition countries from behind the Iron Curtain to democracy, and he’s done this through nongovernmental action. Before his time at NED, he was the senior counselor to the United States representative to the United Nations, where he worked on international human rights issues.   25:21 Representative Edward Royce (CA): Mr. Daniel Twining is the president of the International Republican Institute, and previously he served as the counselor and director of the Asia Program at the German Marshall Fund of the United States. He also worked here in Congress. He worked here as a foreign policy advisor to Senator John McCain.   25:45 Representative Edward Royce (CA): And we have Mr. Kenneth Wollack. He is president of the National Democratic Institute, and he has co-edited the Middle East Policy Survey and written regularly on foreign affairs for the Los Angeles Times.   27:26 Carl Gershman: I’d call your attention, for example, to some recent events, among them the remarkable democratic transition in Gambia; the fall of the corrupt Zuma government in South Africa; the stunning victory of democracy in Malaysia, and the freeing of opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim; the equally stunning triumph of democracy in Armenia; and the successful local elections in Tunisia that are, in my view, a decisive step forward in the Arab world’s first democracy. These are just a few of the examples that I could give of recent democratic advances. There is Slovakia, interesting developments in Ethiopia. Even in a country like Uzbekistan, we can see some glimmerings of some opening.   31:07 Carl Gershman: Other examples include the support that NED has given in Ukraine to the Anti-Corruption Action Center that has tirelessly led the campaign for the establishment of an independent anti-corruption court. And I’m pleased to report that just last week the Ukrainian parliament at long last approved legislation to create such a court.   37:25 Daniel Twining: In Europe, the Kremlin is deploying a sophisticated information-warfare campaign to undermine democratic institutions, erode citizen trust in democracy, and wedge apart the transatlantic alliance. This form of warfare is particularly insidious—this political warfare—because it uses core features of democracy against us—exploiting our free media, manipulating false information, undermining confidence in electoral systems. IRI’s Beacon Project is engaged in a big line of work to leverage our relationships for European political parties and civil-societies groups to track Russian misinformation, including in many local languages, and then to coordinate political responses to that.   31:46 Carl Gershman: The last example is the nonpartisan training conducted by four NGOs in Tunisia of new candidates who participated in last month’s local elections. Of the 235 individuals who were trained, 112 won seats, and 25 were at the heads of their electoral lists.   41:46 Kenneth Wollack: Authoritarian regimes are using digital tools to advance their interests, including electoral espionage and the dissemination of disinformation, to skew electoral outcomes, disrupt democratic discourse, discredit democratic institutions, and fuel ethnic and social divisions. NDI has responded by providing cybersecurity support; assisting efforts of civic, media, and political groups to detect, expose, and combat this information; and conducting new types of public-opinion research to identify populations that are most susceptible to Russian disinformation and develop messages that can build resilience. In cooperation with IRI and NED, NDI is helping to launch a new effort with democracy groups, civil-society organizations, civic-tech partners, political parties, and a global network of four million citizen election monitors to interact more regularly with the technology companies.   44:23 Kenneth Wollack: Ukrainians can point to concrete achievements in recent years. These include the emergence of new political parties that have national reach and are focused on citizens they represent rather than on oligarchs who would finance them. Brought together by NDI in partnership with the European Parliament, party factions in the Rada are overcoming deep fragmentation to agree on procedures that will make it easier to build consensus around reforms. In NDI programs alone, more than 45,000 citizens have engaged directly in the national reform process and reaching more than 1.3 million citizens through the media.   45:05 Kenneth Wollack: Another story of democratic resilience is unfolding in Syria. In northern Syria, citizen groups are prioritizing community needs, and local administrative councils are responding by providing critical services. Fifty NDI governance advisors are working each day in 34 locations to advise citizen groups and administrative councils, and bringing them together to solve problems.   49:19 Carl Gershman: But you’ve got to build a defense against it, and a lot of the groups that we helped stop fake news Ukraine and other groups like that are being able to identify fake information. We have a dialogue—a very ongoing dialogue—with the Internet companies to take down a lot of incitement, a lot of fake news. We’re connecting our grantees with the Internet companies. We have groups like Bellingcat, which is an investigative journalist group. They use open-source information. But they’ve identified the Russian general who provided the missile that shot down the Malaysian airliner.   51:30 Kenneth Wollack: But this a daily fight on the ground. Representative Edward Royce (CA): A social media fight? Wollack: Yes. To give you one example, the Democratic Party of Serbia, two weeks before the local elections, the Russians—presumably the Russians—had hacked their Facebook page, put horrible content on it. The hackers then contacted Facebook, told them to look at the site. Facebook immediately took down the Facebook page. Now, the party didn’t know who to contact. They had no contact with Facebook. They were able to contact us. Our office in Silicon Valley managed to reach the Facebook executives. They immediately took it down.   54:04 Representative Eliot Engel (NY): The budget proposal for fiscal year 2019 requested a $67 million for NED, which is a 60 percent cut from the amount which is $170 million that Congress has appropriated yearly since FY ’16.   54:59 Carl Gershman: I mean, there are, obviously, two fundamental problems with the OMB budget request for fiscal 2019: the amount and separating us from the four institutes. And both of these are devastating. I don’t even want to get into now what we would have to cut. They’re devastating—utterly devastating. It would virtually kill the whole program.   58:22 Daniel Twining: But in Malaysia, IRI’s been working with the opposition there since 2002. Malaysia was essentially a one-party majoritarian state. The ruling party had ruled since 1957. It had gerrymandered all the districts, given itself every advantage. But in this last election a month ago, the opposition won for the first time in 60-something years, and that was an example of playing the long game, right? We, the United States, supported a democratic opposition that is now in charge of this very strategic country right there on the front lines of the South China Sea, right there on the front lines of the Islamic world’s intersection with the rest of Asia, and that’s good for America.   1:09:12 Representative Gregory Meeks (NY): And Mr. Gershman, I’m a former board member at NED, so I’ve seen firsthand the work that you and your dedication and the bipartisan board of NED collectively working together to try to make sure that we have a better world for all of us.   1:12:20 Kenneth Wollack: Our engagement is not to spread falsehoods. It’s not to create fake news. It’s not to try to disrupt the process. It’s not to try to spur conflict in countries. What we’re trying to do is promote the principles, values, processes, and institutions that are enshrined in an intergovernmental organization. And our work is to try to help people engage in the political process.   1:16:34 Representative Dana Rohrabacher (CA):... did we or did we not involve ourselves heavily to undermine the democratically elected government of Yanukovych in Ukraine? And what did it bring us? It brought us turmoil and conflict—that if we’d have waited and let that government be elected, because of its flaws unelected, we would not be in this situation today where the world is more likely to go into conflict because of that. I don’t believe the Russians would’ve invaded Ukraine had we not arrogantly involved ourselves to overthrow that democratically elected government in Ukraine.   1:18:39 Representative Dana Rohrabacher (CA): So, I’ve had my say. I know I’m making everybody mad at me, but I had to say it.   1:25:59 Representative Brad Sherman (CA): And I want to turn our attention to Yerevan and Armenia. NED has allocated $1.3 million last year. Now we’ve seen a real move toward democracy. Are you going to do more, given the fluid situation there? Carl Gershman: Thank you very much for that question, Mr. Sherman. Yes. The answer is yes. Our board, which meets later this week, is making Armenia what we call a country eligible for contingency funds, which are funds set aside for new situations and, obviously, what’s happened in Armenia is very, very new. And we—I think there are several priorities that have to be addressed. There are going to be quick elections that have been called in Armenia, and those elections have to have integrity to them to give legitimacy to the current Pashinyan government. There is a parliament that oversees this, and government officials are really new to the governing game. The system has been controlled by a centralized authority for a number of years and so a lot of training is going to have to be necessary for some of the new government officials. And then, finally, there’s going to be a big information war, the kind of issue raised by Congressman Royce, and it is very essential in this period—and this is what the groups that we help are doing—is to get people reliable and independent information so they don’t make the judgments based upon the disinformation that is going to be promoted by the forces that have just been removed from power.   1:49:40 Representative Karen Bass (CA): Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chair. And I want to welcome my colleagues from NED and IRI and NDI. And I’m a member of the NED board, for my colleagues that are here on the committee, and I have to say the work that NED does around the world is really tremendous.   2:07:52 Representative Ted Poe (TX): Globally, what do you personally see is the number-one entity that is a threat to democracy worldwide? Is it China? Is it Russia? Is it North Korea? Is it ISIS? Is it Iran? Pick one. Pick the one you think is the threat. Carl Gershman: China. Rep. Poe: China. Gershman: China. Rep. Poe: Mr. Twining. Daniel Twining: China. Rep. Poe: Mr. Wollack. Kenneth Wollack: Russia. Rep. Poe: Russia. Russia and China.   2:35:00 Carl Gershman And I think it should not be forgotten: NED was created as an independent institution so that even when you have problems, whatever the problems are with the executive branch, our work continues consistently. And I think that was a brilliant idea, and it’s in the National Endowment for Democracy Act adopted by the Congress by Dante Fascell in 1983, and I think it was brilliant to give the NED that kind of independence so that we can go forward, regardless of what the policies of the executive branch are at any particular time.   2:47:46 Carl Gershman: I take pride in the fact that when we make grants to groups abroad, I take pride that it’s with American taxpayer money. We try to protect that money. We try to make sure that every single dollar is spent well. But I take pride in the fact that that’s a demonstration of the support coming from the American people. Sound Clip Sources News Interview: The Rules-Based International Order Created by the U.S. is Being Torn Apart by the U.S., CNN, June 10, 2018. 2:30 Sen. Diane Feinstein I mean we have helped support this whole Democratic Atlantic community and more or less forged it into a single entity. And I’ve been very proud of that as an American. Speech: Madeleine K. Albright Gives Keynote Remarks at 2018 Albright Luncheon, National Democratic Institute, YouTube, May 10, 2018. 10:50 Madeline Albright We are employing every tool at our disposal from the use of focus groups to the collection of more accurate data, to connections made through social media, to the design of election observer missions, to the drafting of model laws, to partnerships with regional bodies and the United Nations, to the mobilization of public opinion from around the equator and from pole to pole. Discussion: Foreign Affairs Issue Launch with Former Vice President Joe Biden, Council on Foreign Affairs, January 23, 2018. Speakers: Joe Biden Richard Haass - President of the Council on Foreign Relations Joe Biden: I’ll give you one concrete example. I was—not I, but it just happened to be that was the assignment I got. I got all the good ones. And so I got Ukraine. And I remember going over, convincing our team, our leaders to—convincing that we should be providing for loan guarantees. And I went over, I guess, the 12th, 13th time to Kiev. And I was supposed to announce that there was another billion-dollar loan guarantee. And I had gotten a commitment from Poroshenko and from Yatsenyuk that they would take action against the state prosecutor. And they didn’t. So they said they had—they were walking out to a press conference. I said, nah, I’m not going to—or, we’re not going to give you the billion dollars. They said, you have no authority. You’re not the president. The president said—I said, call him. (Laughter.) I said, I’m telling you, you’re not getting the billion dollars. I said, you’re not getting the billion. I’m going to be leaving here in, I think it was about six hours. I looked at them and said: I’m leaving in six hours. If the prosecutor is not fired, you’re not getting the money. Well, son of a bitch. (Laughter.) He got fired. And they put in place someone who was solid at the time. Hearing: Facebook, Google and Twitter Executives on Russian Election Interference, House Select Intelligence Committee, C-SPAN, November 1, 2017. Witnesses: Kent Walker Google Senior Vice President & General Counsel Colin Stretch Facebook Vice President & General Counsel Sean Edgett Twitter Acting General Counsel 59:39 Rep. Terri Sewell (D-AL): I submit to you that your efforts have to be more than just about finding malicious and deceptive activity, that you have a responsibility—all of you have a responsibility—to make sure that we are not adding to the problem by not being as rigorous and as aggressive as we can in terms of vetting the content and in terms of making sure that we are being really dynamic in doing that.   1:57:39 Rep. Jackie Speier (D-CA): RT, Russia Today, on your platform, has 2.2 million subscribers. Fox News, on your platform, has 740,000 subscribers. CNN has 2.3 million subscribers. The Intelligence Community assessment that was made public in January spoke about RT, and it said, “RT conducts strategic messaging for Russian government. It seeks to influence politics and fuel discontent in the United States.” So my question to you is, why have you not shut down RT on YouTube? Hearing: Facebook, Google and Twitter Executives on Russian Disinformation , Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime and Terrorism, October 31, 2017. Witnesses Colin Stretch - Facebook Vice President and General Counsel  Sean Edgett - Twitter Acting General Counsel  Richard Salgado - Google Law Enforcement & Information Security Director 38:25 Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (RI): And I gather that all of your companies have moved beyond any notion that your job is only to provide a platform and whatever goes across it is not your affair. Colin Stretch: Senator, our commitment to addressing this problem is unwavering. We take this very seriously and are committed to investing as necessary to prevent this from happening again. Absolutely. Whitehouse: Mr. Edgett? Sean Edgett: Absolutely agree with Mr. Stretch, and this type of activity just creates not only a bad user experience but distrust for the platform, so we are committed to working every single day to get better at solving this problem. Whitehouse: Mr. Salgado? Richard Salgado: That’s the same for Google. We take this very seriously. We’ve made changes, and we will continue to get better. Whitehouse: And ultimately, you are American companies, and threats to American election security and threats to American peace and order are things that concern you greatly, correct? Stretch: That is certainly correct. Edgett: Agree. Salgado: That’s right.   Hearing: Subcommittee Hearing - The Collapse of the Rule of Law in Venezuela, Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, July 19, 2017. Witness Luis Almagro Secretary General of the Organization of American States 07:15 Senator Marco Rubio: I also know this, and I do not speak for the president, but I’ve certainly spoken to the president, and I will only reiterate what he has already said, and I’ve been saying this now for a number of days: it is my—I have 100% confidence that if democracy is destroyed once and for all in Venezuela on the 30th in terms of the Maduro regime, the president of the U.S. is prepared to act unilaterally in a significant and swift way. And that is not a threat; that is the reporting of the truth. Confirmation Hearing: Defense Secretary Nominee General James Mattis Says Russia is Trying to Break NATO, US Senate, C-SPAN, January 12, 2017. John McCain: For seven decades, the United States has played a unique role in the world. We’ve not only put America first, but we’ve done so by maintaining and advancing a world order that has expanded security, prosperity, and freedom. This has required our alliances, our trade, our diplomacy, our values, but most of all, our military for when would-be aggressors aspire to threaten world order. Hearing: U.S. Strategy Against ISIS, Senate Armed Services Committee, C-SPAN, December 9, 2015. 2:28:14 Sen. Lindsey Graham Here’s what I’ve done. I make an offer to our president that I believe this war is going to go on for a long time after his presidency; I believe that they’re going to go wherever they can on the planet and that we should stop them wherever necessary; and when it comes to means, we should not limit this commander in chief or any other commander in chief when it comes to means. Speech: Gov. Howard Dean - DemTools 2.0 Launch, NDI's DemTools Launch Event, December 9, 2015. 9:55 Howard Dean I’m incredibly proud to be a member of the board of NDI, which is an incredibly sophisticated organization that does not shrink from bringing democracy to any corner of the Earth, including some we’re not allowed in. We get there anyway. Speech: Sen. Tom Cotton Says US Should Shoot Down Russian Planes Over Syria, YouTube, October 1, 2015. Conference: Is the United States at a Crossroads? Domestic and Global Dimensions, Wilson Center, May 15, 2015. 15:35 Jane Harmon Ukraine. You and I were there together. Madeline lead the delegation - of course she did - for the National Democratic Institute, which she chairs and the International Republican Institute was also there during the first Ukraine election in May of last year. And among other things we met with the presidential candidates including Poroshenko and Tymoshenko and we tooled around in Kiev and I also went to Odessa to see how the voting was going. Speech: Senator Dan Sullivan's Maiden Floor Speech, US Senate, C-SPAN, January 27, 2015. 9:05 Sen. Dan Sullivan If the executive branch continues to dither on America’s economic future, Congress can and should act to expe- dite such projects. That is what we are doing with Keystone, and that is what I will be pressing the Congress to do for Alaska’s and America’s next great en- ergy infrastructure project—the Alas- ka LNG project—which will create thousands of jobs and provide clean and affordable energy to Americans and our allies for decades. Speech: Vice President Joe Biden Opens 2014 NDI Democracy Award Dinner, National Democratic Institute, December 11, 2014. 32:40 Vice President Joe Biden That’s why in Ukraine, working alongside groups like NDI, with your leadership, we’re providing to the Ukrainians, as we had to the Iraqi’s, personnel from each of our departments teaching them how to literally, as I said, write a budget, expertise from our Justice Department, teaching them the tools that are available to ensure that the court systems are free and transparent. We’re helping Ukrainian officials develop laws and regulations that will establish anti-corruption institutions within the government, enable authorities to combat corruption more effectively. Our militaries are working together to improve Ukrainian capacity to provide it’s own defense and a military system that meets the standards of democracies, while providing security assistance to counter Russian aggression. Speech: Thomas A. Daschle's Speech to NDI's 30th Anniversary Dinner, National Democratic Institute, December 16, 2013. 1:30 Tom Daschle Like many of you, - by the mission of NDI. The realization that we have had one focus now for 3 decades. And that focus is very simply to empower people to be able to govern themselves more effectively. That’s what we try to do. Speech: Mitt Romney Foreign Policy Speech, Virginia Military Institute, C-SPAN, October 8, 2012. 17:25 Mitt Romney Fortunately, we had leaders of courage and vision, both Republicans and Democrats, who knew that America had to support friends who shared our values, and prevent today’s crises from becoming tomorrow’s conflicts. Statesmen like Marshall rallied our nation to rise to its responsibilities as the leader of the free world. We helped our friends to build and sustain free societies and free markets. We defended our friends, and ourselves, from our common enemies. We led. We led. News Interview: CIA Admits Orchestrating Syrian Coup of March 1949, BBC Interview, 1967. Additional Reading Article: Who will fix Facebook? by Matt Taibbi, Rolling Stone, November 26, 2018. Article: US, Ukraine in 'close discussion' for new lethal arms by Joe Gould, Defense News, November 18, 2018. Article: Facebook purge: Here is the list of pages deleted by Facebook by Patrick Brown, The Western Journal, October 13, 2018. Biography: George Catlett Marshall, United States General, by Forrest C. Pogue, Encyclopedia Britannica, last updated October 12, 2018. Article: Anti-Media shut down by Facebook and Twitter by Caitlin Johnstone, The Anti-Media, October 11, 2018. Article: Facebook purged over 800 U.S. accounts and pages for pushing politcal spam by Elizabeth Dwoskin and Tony Romm, The Washington Post, October 11, 2018. Article: Facebook tempts political backlash with massive purge of 810 pages and accounts by Rhett Jones, Gizmodo, October 11, 2018. Article: The survivors of the Rohingya Genocide by Jason Motlagh, Rolling Stone, August 9, 2018. Article: John McCain passes the torch at the International Republican Institute by Josh Rogin, The Washington Post, August 3, 2018. Article: Exclusive: IMF backs Ukraine anti-corruption court plan by Marc Jones, Reuters, July 25, 2018. Article: Ukraine anti-corruption court law needs amending - IMF chief by Reuters, June 19, 2018. Article: Independent candidates get most votes in Tunisia's municipal election by Tarek Amara, Reuters, May 8, 2018. Article: Trump is gutting the National Endowment for Democracy, and that's a good thing by Stephen Kinzer, The Boston Globe, March 14, 2018. Article: The Trump administration wants to dismantle Ronald Reagan's 'infrastructure of democracy' by Josh Rogin, The Washington Post, March 4, 2018. Article: House Foreign Affairs Chairman Royce announces retirement by Bridget Bowman, Roll Call, January 8, 2018. Article: What the United States did in Indonesia by Vincent Bevins, The Atlantic, October 20, 2017. Article: Is John McCain's pick to lead the International Republican Institute a strike against Donald Trump? by Timothy J. Burger, Town & Country Magazine, August 10, 2017. Article: Confront authoritarianism by defending democratic values by Carl Gersham , Journal Sentinel Online, October 22, 2016. Article: Russia adds International Republican Institute to growing list of "undesirable organizations", International Republican Institute, August 18, 2016. Article: Bernie Sanders is exactly right: The media is an arm of the ruling class of this country by Brian Hanley, Huffpost, March 28, 2016. Article: Pro-democracy nonprofit is banned in Russia by Ivan Nechepurenko, The New York Times, March 11, 2016. Article: Evil internet bill CISPA is back from the dead, cleverly titled CISA by Kelly Weill, Daily Beast, October 28, 2015. Article: National Endowment for Democracy is first 'undesirable' NGO banned in Russia by Alec Luhn, The Guardian, July 28, 2015. Article: Former Soviet states stand up to Russia. Will the U.S.? by Carl Gershman, The Washington Post, September 26, 2013. Article: Russia wields hard power over Armenia by Anne Applebaum, The Washington Post, September 20, 2013. Article: Covert plan for Panama may be wrong message to send the opposition, The Los Angeles Times, August 14, 1988. Article: U.S. assembled a force in 1964 for possible use in Brazil coup by David Binder, The New York Times Archives, December 30, 1976. Article: Oil discovery in Brazil expected to aid economy, The New York Times Archives, December 9, 1964. Resources About Page: International Monetary Fund, Destruction and Reconstruction (1945-1958), Cooperation and Recovery: The Marshall Plan About Page: German Marshall Fund About Page: National Democratic Institute - Who We Are Archived Form: National Endowment for Democracy For 990 (2002-2015) Board of Directors: International Republican Institute Board of Directors: National Democratic Institute Board of Directors: National Endowment for Democracy Donation Page: National Endowment for Democracy FAQs: International Republican Institute - Who We Are Joint Statement: Department of Defense Appropriations Act, 2019, p. 406 Project Info: The Beacon Project, International Republican Institute Web Page: Democracy Assistance is Not Election Meddling: Distinguishing Support from Sabotage Letter: United States Senators to Mick Mulvaney, Director of the Office of Management and Budget, December 20, 2017 OpenSecrets: Sen. Dan Sullivan - Alaska Website: Albright Stonebridge Group Website: Bellingcat YouTube Channel: National Democratic Institute Visual Resources Tweet: @ElliotHiggins February 6, 2017 Community Suggestions See more Community Suggestions HERE. Cover Art Design by Only Child Imaginations Music Presented in This Episode Intro & Exit: Tired of Being Lied To by David Ippolito (found on Music Alley by mevio)