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Comment by dijit | Hacker News Reader

In an effort to be entirely objective:

disagreeing with a person is not trolling, and Russians do not agree with NATO- which makes sense given that NATO was orchestrated specifically against Russia.

I can't help but pity them, it's like having a pit-bull in the corner that nobody loves because it defended them before in a savage way, so they keep putting up gates and fences and pushing it into solitude. I agree that Crimea was not exactly an ideal scenario but I can see both sides of that too. And neither side is as black as they're painted.

Realistically, with the exclusion of Crimea, Russia has done nothing that any other large country hasn't done with regards to borders, the difference is that when a British fighter jet comes close to France's border nobody cares because we're allied. But we crucify them for it.

As a wise man once said. We make peace with our enemies, not our friends.

(The reason I'm talking about this is because of the recent advances of NATO in putting US military installations in Poland to "combat ISIL", and Russians complaining about it has been tagged as trolling somehow.)

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> disagreeing with a person is not trolling

The word troll has evolved to encompass any sort of dishonest internet activity that is designed to manipulate the response and attitude of the larger audience, but I agree: the right term would be astroturfing.

> it's like having a pit-bull in the corner that nobody loves because it defended them before in a savage way

That hilariously fails to describe Russia in any way most people would recognize.

> Realistically, with the exclusion of Crimea, Russia has done nothing that any other large country hasn't done with regards to borders

That's a pretty big exclusion, but concerns about its borders and the threat of annexation - as elevated as it is compared to any other country - is not the main concern here.

>> it's like having a pit-bull in the corner that nobody loves because it defended them before in a savage way

>That hilariously fails to describe Russia in any way most people would recognize.

I agree. And that's a shame, Russia has always vied for peace and used force where peace was impossible. That's a trend we see all thoughout history (especially in Britain). We can't exactly crucify them for it.

>That's a pretty big exclusion, but concerns about its borders and the threat of annexation - as elevated as it is compared to any other country - is not the main concern here.

Sure. It's not but I was preempting someone else bringing it up.

And while it's a big exemption you have to at least try to understand Russia's position. Not only is it a military base falling into enemy hands, it's control of a southern region, it's potential troubles for its populace that live there in addition and finally they held a refferendum which is certainly the democratically preferred method of agreeing or disagreeing with political change. Just because we didn't send EU troops (who for all russia knows are the same folk who caused destabilisation in the Ukrainian country) to conduct it doesn't mean it was definitely rigged.

It doesn't necessarily mean it was free of corruption either of course but I'm playing devils advocate. Because the devil seems to need one.

I think Russia's problem is it spent its entire history surrounded by powerful enemies, and was frequently invaded. As a consequence Putin honestly believes NATO has the intention of invading it, and so he thinks Russia has to take aggressive actions to prevent that.

What he doesn't get is that, thanks to nuclear weapons and modern industrialization, NATO is not interested in doing that for either reasons of security or wealth. That is why, when the Cold War ended, NATO nations drastically cut their arms budgets. NATO would like to basically leave Russia alone, but Russia's agressive actions are forcing it to respond.

It is all a lot simpler: power, money and sphere of influence. No one is going to give up power and money in a poor country. That's why Mr. Putin and Company build tons of bullshit about external enemies, preventing folks from blaming the government for existing economical and social problems.

Disclaimer: I'm from a country that is in Eastern Europe and borders with Russia. It also has very close relations with it. Russia affects internal politics and mass media. 80% are brain-washed.

>I think Russia's problem is it spent its entire history surrounded by powerful enemies

That applies not only to Russia, but to pretty much everyone. Particularly, it applies to each of Russia's neighbours...

Crimea. Georgia. Transnistria. It's become a pattern for Russia to use military force instead of diplomacy to resolve disputes.

The notion that "Russia has done nothing that any other large country hasn't done" is entirely wrong.

NATO would never use military force to fix stuff, right?

To annex part of a country? I don't remember.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kosovo#Declaration_of_independ...

It didn't annex it, they created a country out of it. And it still is a country. Can you say the same about Crimea?

How could they create a country out of a part of another country without an annexation taking place first?

Or, are you going to argue, that Russia did not annex Transistria and South Othetia because a country was created?

Kosovo?

Annexation?

http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/annex Simple Definition of annex : to add (an area or region) to a country, state, etc. : to take control of (a territory or place)

There is a big difference between separation and annexation.

In general, do we have many examples of countries changing borders forcibly after some time mid-last century? I certainly don't remember such a thing from G7. In this light, annexation of Crimea stands out as a regression to older - and less civilized by some standards - ways of doing things.

Does that change the fact, that NATO did forcibly take a territory from Serbia? That is supposed to be OK? For all intents and purposes, the Kosovo government will do whatever the US government wants. The terminus technicus is puppet government.

Even Crimea itself is an example of stolen territory. It was part of Russia, until (Ukrainian) Khrushchev moved it under administration of Ukrainian SSR in 1954. It was excused as being in the same country anyway. When USSR dissolved, the Crimean referendum about returning it back to Russia was ignored by the newly-formed government in Kiev.

Bismark knew 150 years ago not to try to cheat the Russians. They will always come and take back, what's theirs.

If it worked that way, most of Russia would belong to Mongolia.

If you want to be intellectually honest towards yourself, you must admit that Russia was going to be cheated off Crimea. They didn't accept that. That's all.

I am being intellectually honest. Going back generations and claiming historical territory doesn't work peacefully in the long run.

It's not generation. The generation born when it was part of Russia still lives there. Their land was stolen from them, they took it back.

Trying to cheat them does not work in the long run.

"Their land"? Ukraine wasn't changing any land ownership AFAIK. Russia on the other hand currently might be doing just that, for some people.

(Source: a person a met who was born there. He told me that as Crimea is now under Russian control, the land registry is also moved to Russian system. If you want to ensure land ownership of your home, you have to re-register. It's not cheap, so many people cannot afford it. If you don't re-register, nothing happens - unless you happen to speak out against the new order. In that case someone will notice that you don't own your home, it actually belongs to some new friend of the new powers-that-be, and in fact your home is somewhere in Krasnoyarsk Oblast which is where your family was registered in 1942 or so).

I'm happy to see the mention of Crimean referendum after the collapse of USSR - seems like the will of the people who are actually living there is easily overlooked if it goes against what the West (mostly US) wants.

If Scotland wanted to separate from the UK, would they need UK's approval? Of course not, its a referendum involving the Scots, people who actually live there, whether to stay or not.

To futher the matter Crimea is a military outpost, and was so for hundreds of years, since Russian Tsars took it from the Tartars, which themselves were part of the Golden Horde and the Turks. Messing with this kind of stuff brings realpolitik out real quick.

> Even Crimea itself is an example of stolen territory. It was part of Russia, until (Ukrainian) Khrushchev moved it under administration of Ukrainian SSR in 1954. It was excused as being in the same country anyway.

Not entirely true as it was not a single-handed decision, it has been voted by a council.

> When USSR dissolved, the Crimean referendum about returning it back to Russia was ignored by the newly-formed government in Kiev.

Could you precise which referendum are you referring to? There were only two of them if I remember correctly: 1. Referendum for independence of Ukraine: Crimea participated and voted "for". 2. Referendum to make Crimea an autonomous republic: was voted "for" and made Crimea and autonomous republic (as a part of Ukraine).

The 1991 referendum was: Do you support re-establishing the Crimean Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic as a subject of USSR and a party to the Treaty on the Creation of the USSR? That means to be on the same level as Ukraine in the USSR, not under Ukraine.

There were additional referendums, in 1992 and 1994, but they were asking questions with the reality of being part of Ukraine.

Crimea was an "oblast" (or region) of Ukrainian SSR and the referendum was about re-establishing the Crimean Autonomous republic which was the case and was signed by Ukrainian SSR council: http://zakon1.rada.gov.ua/laws/show/712-12

During the separation of republics from USSR, Crimea stayed as a part of Ukraine (and voted for the independence of Ukraine, btw) which was a logical move in terms of infrastructure.

Like stopping Muslims from being murdered in the Balkans?

I'm not an expert on the history of Russian foreign policy, but there are a lot of credible voices outside of the MSM that tell a different story than the U.S. administration does. For example:

1. http://johnpilger.com/articles/a-world-war-has-begun-break-t...

2. http://www.alternet.org/world/exclusive-interview-seymour-he...

Those focus largely on other topics, but both touch on how the attitude towards Russia (and others) has been manipulated by U.S. media.

Given the U.S. administrations' track records for deceit in manipulating foreign affairs, I'm not inclined to dismiss the alternative narratives easily. Western governments do their fair share of astroturfing and media manipulation as well (can give many sources on that, if necessary).

So Obama is a blood-thirsty imperialist who plans to conquer Russia and turn them into American colonies? Wow, you could have fooled me.

If he is pursuing such wildly aggressive foreign policy, then how come all the hawks in this country continually condemn him for being a wimpy surrender-monkey?

The GOP criticizes Obama like he's the anti-christ for literally everything. They've opposed their own bills that they sponsored just because Obama later made public remarks about them being good bills.

If you're referring to stuff like the "red line" fiasco in Syria, Hersh explains that too. See: http://www.lrb.co.uk/v35/n24/seymour-m-hersh/whose-sarin

So you do think that Obama is a blood-thirsty imperialist who spent his whole eight years as president planning to invade and conquer Russia? Including explaining to the American public why that would be a good idea?

Georgia is the only one of these that can cast Putin in a negative light - he let his personal ambition cloud his judgement. Could have stopped at the border of Ossetia, but decided to push on a bit to show Georgians who is the boss.

For both Crimea and Transnistria they had their own referendums after the fall of USSR where they wanted to separate from Ukraine and Moldova respectively - neither of which were recognized by the larger countries. Its absurd to expect a region that wants to separate to get approval from everybody else. Ultimately it resulted in an armed conflict just as we see today. There is more to the story than MSM is feeding us.

Sir, I honestly think you do not know what you are talking about.

Disclaimer: I am from Lithuania, which was occupied by SSRS almost by 50 years, my grandmother was deported in Siberia for 10+ years and my mother was born there.

That's likely, Actually.

My polish great-grandfather was likely too old to mention the numerous horrors of the Russians of today.

Of course he never actually met them so that may be why.

I think you missed the point of the article or maybe some context. There is a theory out there that Russia employs paid internet trolls to push Russian propaganda on message boards and discussion forums like Reddit.

This article is not about disagreeing with Russia or about NATO, it's about people working for Russian special services harassing a Finnish journalist.

So you exclude Crimea but what about Eastern Ukraine? I have no love lost for the scheming of Nuland and NATO and the rest of that cadre but Russia has some serious internal and foreign-facing issues.

And that man you quoted wasn't really all that wise since you have no need to make peace with your friends.

Those people living in the Eastern Ukraine for generations identify themselves as Russians so of course they fight against a government that hates everything Russian and threatens them. On the other side of the border many Russians feel sympathy for them and send them all kinds of support, even weapons and volunteers.

It's very simple. The country is ethnically split and no side is going to allow the other to conduct an ethnic cleansing without a serious fight.

>hates everything Russian and threatens them.

I am not sure how Ukraine threatens Russia. Perhaps you can elucidate? I can't speak to the alleged hate though I might find it understandable, given that Russia is actively annexing parts of the country.

>Russians feel sympathy[...] send them support, even weapons and volunteers

I think you mean the Russian military is sending troops across the border as has been documented many times? Also, there's the issue of the BUK that shot down the Malaysian air-liner. Perhaps those victims might not cheer too loudly for that "sympathy?"

One reason that people are suspicious of Russia is that Putin and his state-controlled media have made clear his goal is to restore Russia, to the extent possible, to its former superpower geopolitical status, and there is no way that can be accomplished without a very aggressive foreign policy.

In addition, people in the West disapprove of Russia because of its highly oppressive human rights policies, including massive internet censorship, and also its fossil-fuels centered, crony-capitalism economics.

I feel sorry for the people of Russia. It seems to me that Putin has put them on a path that can't possibly succeed.

Britain is also enacting censorship of its internet. Although pushed by the government on ISPs and only for 'indecent content', who decides what's indecent? The government of course.

I don't see Russia being different in this regard, we just don't understand them and we understand the British.

The UK's censorship is still nascent compared to Russia's. (The mechanisms are all in place but the actual censorship remains relatively weak.)

Russian censorship of its internet is much more widespread.

And it is an official law, not some kind of recommendations or special cases or limited measures. "We don't like your site, we block it for good" - that's the law.

My view is that when it comes to internet censorship, and human rights in general, Britain has problems but on the whole is ten times better than Putin's Russia.

dijit, what is you position on this?

I agree on that point. But remembering that British people know what freedom is, I believe that british people would push back harder than russians.

I believe the british government would try to get away with much more if it was in russias position. But that's my feeling and it's not founded in any facts.

I agree with you about the different expectations. Putin can get away with being a dictator because the Russians have never had the experience of a well-functioning democracy.

But that is tied Russia's international history. When you need to be united against dangerous enemies, you need a strong-man ruler to suppress disagreement. And, going the other way, if domestic rule is having unpopular results like damaging the economy, then one way to get support is to tell the public the country is danger from abroad. So a paranoid view of the external world and an oppressive government are mutually reinforcing, and the Russian people, alas, have never known any other pattern.

"with the exclusion of Crimea, Russia has done nothing that any other large country hasn't done with regards to borders"

Haha that's an absurd exclusion. You don't get to pick and choose which criteria are valid when judging the behaviour of a government.

Russia occupied half of Europe, against the will of the countries occupied, for nearly 50 years.

Stop re-writing history.

> Russia occupied half of Europe, against the will of the countries occupied, for nearly 50 years.

Good point. Seems like we forget this.

How would you define "against their will"? I mean, their representatives signed the Warsaw Pact without gun to their heads (however I'm aware about Hungary'56 and Chezhoslovakia'68)

This isn't a fair argument. Imagine, tomorrow USA fails, a lot of its former allies get current marginal opposition in power. They'll line up telling how USA occupied them, did this and that against their will. And they'll be partially right. Partially wrong.

The boundaries in Europe after WWII were determined by WWII. That's how it went.

To expand on your point: It wasn't Russia who invaded Czechoslovakia in 1968. It was entire Warsaw pact. Or, almost entire. There was one country, that didn't take part: Romania. Out of the entire Warsaw pact only Ceaușescu's Romania had the backbone to not invade. Others, like GDR, Poland, Hungary, took their part voluntarily. (That's nothing new: Poland and Hungary attacked the rump Czechoslovakia in 1938 too. That's just expanding your second paragraph).

There is yet another twist - even for USSR, it wasn't Russia itself. It was USSR, which was comprised of many more countries at the time. The units that were in Czechoslovakia were Ukrainians. And before there are arguments, that they were commanded from Moscow, the head honcho at the time was Brezhnev, from Ukraine.

who gave the orders? who was in charge? was it the kremlin or the marsians?

Except those were all non-democratic puppet governments the Soviet Union had installed after WWII. Or maybe you believe communism is a form of democracy?

I was born in the Czechoslovakia.

The thing is, that communists in 1948 really did win the elections. The people at the time really wanted communism.

Just like in 1989 they wanted change for capitalism. Who knows, maybe in another 10-20-30 years they will want a change again. Should it be accompanied with a narrative, that the fall of Iron Curtain was a well orchestrated putsch to rob their countries?

>The thing is, that communists in 1948 really did win the elections.

Elections where the population was presented with a single list and where the police force and officials overseeing the election had been purged - both the army and police force were under Soviet-influenced Communist control. The only non-Communist minister, Jan Masaryk, was found defenestrated outside his office. (This was declared a suicide, but in 2004 Soviet archives indeed confirmed that he'd been thrown out of his window).

In simpler terms, this is called coup d'état.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1948_Czechoslovak_coup_d%27%C3...

>I mean, their representatives signed the Warsaw Pact without gun to their heads

That's because these "representatives" were not representing the people of their countries. They were representing the interests of the USSR in those countries.

I'll give you an example of what it looks like when something does not happen against the will of a country.

In the 1960s, at the hight of the cold war, France asked NATO to leave its country and withdrew its own troups from NATO command. NATO left, and that was it.

They were certainly influenced to unhealthy degree, but those were still national countries represented by people of their nations. I imagine Soviets just took leading Polish/Hungarian/etc communist parties and made them the government. They still were Poles/Hungarians/etc.

In 1968, Albania withdrew from Warsaw pact. And that was it.

The people of those countries were never asked who they wanted to represent them. So there were no representatives.

So you think that any non-democratic country is totally irresponsible for what happens inside?

This in the world where China and Saudi Arabia are top players.

I would not characterise the actions of undemocratic regimes as representing the "will of the country".

The fact that we accept undemocratic regimes as legal representatives of their countries for pragmatic reasons doesn't change that.

Then you should totally stop blaming Russians. Who were under undemocratic regime while a part of another entity (USSR).

I'm not blaming the Russian people. I'm blaming the USSR, that is the regime in power at the time.

I guess what went wrong in this debate - and it was my fault as well - is that for a democratic country, we can often get away with using sloppy language that conflates "country" and "people". But for undemocratic regimes, that no longer works.

The occupying Red Army did not force anyone? People were DYING trying to get away from this shit and here you are, spouting this nonsense. Humans were shot trying to cross over a wall built in the middle of Europe.

The Red Army PURGED the Polish elite, starting in Katyn.

What the fuck.

>I mean, their representatives signed the Warsaw Pact without gun to their heads

There were other representatives that wouldn't have signed, but they had literally had guns to their heads, and trigger pulled. Soviet occupation of much of Europe was by force, lots of it. It involved disappearances and executions of dissenters and even potential dissenters. This was done by USSR in perfect harmony and agreement with Nazi Germany. It really, really was against the will of Central European nations, such as the Poles.

Not everyone there, of course; you can always find honest ideological support, willful lackeys and stupid fellow travelers. But these countries stayed under Soviet influence very much due to literally having guns to the heads of people. Katyn, for instance.

We also seem to forget that most of those countries were part of Hitler's forces that attacked the Soviet Union a few years before that. Small example would be Hungary that sent ~500,000 soldiers to the eastern front. That invasion resulted in ~5 million civilians being killed, let's ignore the military casualties and general destruction.

Every country/nation did all kinds of nasty shit, it's just a matter of how far back you want to look.

EDIT: typo

Poland? Czechoslovakia? What the fuck is going on here at HN? Is this Bizarro World?

Read again: most of those countries. Now make a list of countries that had its forces on the eastern front, and the list of the ones that didn't. Still Bizarro World?

Not that facts matter to you, but Poland attacked Soviets in 1920. Slovakia (Tiso regime) joined Hitler's forces on eastern front. They also attacked Poland and had a war with Hungary, both in 1939.

But given your attitude I'm pretty sure there won't be any meaningful discussion so I'll leave it at that.

and before that Russia occupied Poland together with Prussia and Austria, wiping out Polish statehood altogether for 123 years. Russification, heard of it?

the 1920 war was a result of that, Poles trying to reclaim territories in Ukraine - using the chaos of the Russian Revolution. but yeah, totally attacking Russia.

but all of that justifies the occupation by the Red Army from 1945 till 1989. yup.

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