The New York Times reported Friday that the Biden administration is considering backing an insurgency in Ukraine in the event of a Russian invasion.
Although the Russians strongly deny that they are planning to invade Ukraine, the Biden administration continues to warn of the possibility. Now, the US is accusing Russia of plotting a “false-flag” operation in eastern Ukraine to create a pretext for an invasion, another accusation Moscow denies.
The Times report cited unnamed Biden administration officials that said the US has made clear to its allies that the CIA and Pentagon would back a Ukrainian insurgency if Russia quickly captured territory in the country.
Administration officials said the US would “almost certainly” give the insurgents weapons. Other types of support could include training in nearby NATO countries, the supply of medical equipment, and sanctuary during Russian offensives. A report from Yahoo News on Thursday revealed that the CIA has been training Ukrainian paramilitaries since 2015.
Since the US-backed coup in Kyiv in 2014, the US has provided Ukraine with about $2.5 billion in military aid. On Wednesday, a group of Senate Democrats introduced a bill that would authorize an additional $500 million in military aid, on top of the $300 million that is allocated to Kyiv by the 2022 National Defense Authorization Act.
Russia has little to gain from invading Ukraine, but if Moscow decides to take the breakaway regions of Donetsk and Luhansk, there would likely be no insurgency considering the separatists have previously asked to join the Russian Federation. The Times report pointed out that there was no armed resistance when Russia took Crimea, which is because the people of the peninsula overwhelmingly voted in favor of being absorbed by Russia following the 2014 coup.
If Russia has to invade Ukraine, they won’t occupy it except for the pro-Russian Black Sea coast. An insurgency anywhere else in Ukraine won’t concern Russia.
These reports are really taking on a strong aspect of hysteria and rabid obsession. It is not hard to see when viewing the the two top officials from state who are running to the mics at almost every opportunity-it really is childish and the Russians should stop responding to this childish game.
The Russians have stopped. There will be no more talks. Now the Russians will respond with action.
Nope. Russian aren’t American neocons.
They don’t have to do anything, so they won’t.
Just let Soros’ shills stew impotently.
Nope. The Russians are going to do something. They’re making that abundantly clear. They’re going to make counter-moves over NATO at some point – probably within months. No one knows what those moves will be and quite likely none of the guesses being floated are right.
The real question is what is going to happen in Ukraine in the short term (1-6 months.) Russia appears to have been moving its forces around in preparation for a major military operation – or at least to prepare options for such. Not necessarily just for Ukraine. But it seems clear to me that Russia expects some action on the part of Ukraine and they’re getting ready for it. Russia is not going to “invade” but they are leaving their options open in case Ukraine attempts a new offensive on Donbass.
I see that as almost inevitable.
I agree. You and Dave DeCamp have summed the possibilities. Russia has (1) loudly proclaimed its intention to invade should NATO incorporate Kyiv (even informally); and (2) Russia would prefer Ukraine stay independent and autonomous, but once she invades, the actuality of the security consequences may force her to annex and administer the Donbas; and (3) Her overwhelming desire would have NATO moot the issue altogether by acknowledging the legitimacy of her stated concerns and terminate their aggression.
So, finally, the truth or falsity of the respective narratives is all in the spin. We are deep in the fog of war, and there’s the problem of cultural translation, but Putin, Lavrov, Ryabkov & co. know Washington better than our “David Sangers” and will and must keep their voice until silenced by WestExec and the Ministry of Truth.
I would agree the Russians have finally resolved to push back, but not with a Ukraine war.
For example they floated the balloon of setting up a presence in Cuba and/or Venezuela.
Russian bases established peacefully abroad are a relatively inexpensive symbolic challenge US hegemony.
Shoring up a historic ally like Cuba, has geopolitical effect orders of magnitude above the superficial and not-particularly-potent appearance.
Except the Russians aren’t interested in a “symbolic challenge”. They want NATO out from very real positions in eastern Europe and to prevent any more countries, including Ukraine, from joining or even being supported by NATO in the manner Ukraine is currently being supported.
It’s going to take a war to do that, as well as the disposition of strategic forces in the area of conflict as well as places like Cuba.
Also setting up bases is not inexpensive. More likely just to deploy ships and aircraft temporarily at local ports and airbases owned by the host country.
War can’t be fought. All players and most observers understand this.
The only Russian Ukraine war trigger, is Kiev victory in Donbass.
Care to explain how that can happen if Kiev doesn’t aggress first then win?
Russia, can’t be viewed through the lens of Western imperialism as another imperial people who see war as the first and only way out. They aren’t that kind of people, even at the elite level.
Apart from nukes, there are the unaffordable costs of conventional hot war at that scale.
The hard checks and balances have been maintained.
After that its all just posturing and maneuvering in diplomatic gamesmanship while the real war is being fought economically.
Russia, holds all the cards. They win just by surviving another day. But they’re more than surviving, they’re advancing full-spectrum; short of thriving, but not exactly hurting either.
There is desperation from some in the West to change that dynamic trajectory, but Russia cannot be goaded, led, lulled, bullied, cajoled or tricked into war.
“The only Russian Ukraine war trigger, is Kiev victory in Donbass. Care to explain how that can happen if Kiev doesn’t aggress first then win?”
You’re assuming Kiev won’t attack first (or foment a false flag.) As I said before, I see zero evidence for that assumption. And you haven’t provided anything but assertions which go against the history of the conflict and the nature of the parties involved.
I can only assume that you’re one of those who can’t believe the war will happen – so you don’t, and have invented this notion to explain why.
Unfortunately, I and many others don’t see it that way. But in the end, of course, we’ll see. You may turn out to be right. If so, I’ll acknowledge that.
… Huh? I just said, Kiev would have to attack Donbass and win… they make the first move, not Russia.
This ‘everyone else’ you’re referring to, seems to want everyone to believe Russia will attack, pushed to pre-emptive measures by US obstinacy.
Yet ironically that would in turn “justify” a Kiev pre-emptive attack against the imaginary Russian pre-emptive attack, even if Russia never attacks or planned to.
US positions too often assume that the Russians will foolishly do whatever is worst for themselves.
In this case, it is that they will try to occupy some of Ukraine, where the population is hostile, but not all of it.
It seems far more likely they’d do one or the other. Either take only the relatively smaller parts with friendly population, or take the whole thing and push out masses of hostiles as refugees off into camps in Poland and Slovakia (exactly as it has done in Syria).
The US imagines it can operate insurgencies in protected havens around a rump Ukraine made up of hostiles, but there is no reason for Russia to allow that rump, or to respect those next-door camp headquarters running an insurgency against them. The US freely crossed the Pakistan border with drone strikes and covert special forces to attack Taliban camps, and Russia might very well do the same to Poland (which anyway it hates and which already hates it).
There is a distinct lack of realism in US ideas, in favor of best case wishful thinking. Putin is much nastier than that, not likely to be self defeating in service of the hopes of The Blob for free shots at him.
“The US freely crossed the Pakistan border with drone strikes and covert special forces to attack Taliban camps”
And how did that work out for them?
I said it would be likely. I did not say it would work out well.
My fear is the starting of a war. How it might end is a separate problem. Those who start wars often cannot end them.
A Ukraine war isn’t really a US position anymore. Its not even a factional division anymore. Its just a dead letter neocon doctrine now.
The Soros-linked neocons want to conclude Ukraine before the old guy passes on, but there’s nothing to fight with anymore and they seem to have isolated themselves from the rest of the political elites.
They could stage something, but there would be no followup from the rest of the public state or Deep State.
I don’t see a shred of evidence of that. But we’ll see.
Saker probably could, He’s more familiar with the lore.
Saker had a piece up in October in which he said he considered a Ukraine-Russia war “(almost) inevitable.”
Why I see a war in the Donbass as (almost) inevitable
https://thesaker.is/category/breaking-articles/saker-analyses-interviews/page/3/
Odd; Saker sees what anyone can see, acknowledges the Russians know its a political trap, yet somehow they ‘fear’ being forced to invade?
Again, the only trigger for war in the Donbass is a successful Kiev victory in the Donbass.
Yet, whomever is the aggressor, loses.
Kiev cannot deliver successful aggression themselves anyway; they need NATO help. US +EU NATO, cannot go to war, the resources of materiale and money aren’t there.
War s a game of attack and counter attack. Neither Russia nor US +EU NATO can follow up an attack with defense against counter-attack. Whomever commits forces first, loses twice, politically then materially.
Then there’s the geopolitics of the oligarchs. Western Europe versus Eastern Europe versus the USA.
Western Europe, is not going to concede to a Ukraine-centric future, especially not for Soros.
Meanwhile, the USA is under Soros’s spell, but not completely.
War no longer a simple matter of tipping a war-eager, war-ready USA into war, but overcoming a leviathan dead in the water.
this false flag would be a pretext for the US (and its puppet states in NATO) to ‘invade” and “occupy” the Ukraine, not for the Russians to ‘invade’….. which they have no intention of doing…
the NYT is once again engaging in Fake News, with all the usual “unnamed officials” as the usual suspects
if the Ukies do attack the Donbass, like it appeared they were going to do last March, the Russians have more than enough stand-off weapons not only to defeat those forces but to take out the entire economic, political and military leadership of the country, if they decide to.
the Russians would never have to have any boots on the ground at all to destroy the country’s leadership, all of them.
Seeing as how well the insurgencies in Turkey, Iraq, Syria and lastly Kazakhstan worked out, I am sure that Russia is quaking in it’s boots.
Russia has evolved a simple but effective strategy :
1) Expel all foreign NGOs.
2) Round up and shoot all insurgents.
Looks a lot like what happened in Kazakhstan.
To the best of my knowledge, Russia does not engage in “false flag” operations.
That’s Israel’s forte.
You’d think after fighting insurgencies all round the world, the Americans might have an understanding of them, at least read some of the more effective practitioners such as Mao.
” The guerrilla must move amongst the people as a fish swims in the sea.”
US allies in western Ukraine can’t provide even a puddle for insurgents in eastern Ukraine.
But if Russia were to back pro-Russian insurgents in the Ukraine they’d be ‘terrorists’. See how it works?
Notice Biden predicated action on a Russian action that’s not going to happen.
For all the talk, what forces are on the table are in defensive postures logistically unable to do anything more.
Its surreal to watch. Like that US attack helicopter in Iraq that slaughtered those journalists, the neocons are all but ordering the Russians to attack so they can attack, except their guns are empty and they don’t care.