Waiting for the Russians in Ukraine | Hacker News Reader

Waiting for the Russians in Ukraine

palladiummag.com

32 pointsimartin2k30 comments

I am a Ukrainian, living in Kyiv. This reads like a Russian propaganda. While there are no obvious lies in the article, it shows a one-sided view, making the reader believe Ukraine is a failed state and people living there being indifferent to Russian invasion.

There are political rallies for unity. One on 12.02 with thousands participating https://youtu.be/Xv0B6G05OIU

While politics is generally broken, and yes, oligarchs control most of politicians and state media, we are moving in the right direction. There is a strong civil society. Some push against corruption. Some help army. Millions of people donate to them. We have had a huge breakthrough with anticorruption in the past years, with new specialized agencies and organizations successfully prosecuting top officials.

People on the streets in Kyiv talk about possible war all the time, and a lot of them are prepared. I think we are generally used to the war already, so recent developments did not in fact change a lot in people’s lives. However, I see some of my friends moving abroad, some to western regions. Thousands are joining Territorial Defense Forces. We are definitely stressed and worried now.

No one sells fake IDs in the open, especially in Maidan. Those are just covers.

Ukraine had a huge drop in GDP in 90s, and we are slowly regaining it. However. Huge part of the USSR economy was military-oriented. It is true that most of the factories in defense industry, and related heavy industries were closed or slowed production since then. We are making a switch to the economy that works for peoples needs.

And yes, this story just does not belong to Hacker news.

Not sure why this was posted here?

After reading this article, you’d think Ukraine is a terrible, dying place not worth visiting - a take that strays into “Russian propaganda” territory. But it’s not; even with all the corruption and dysfunction, Ukraine is a fun place to live, full of smart, energetic people. They’ve got so much potential.

Also: the capital is “Kyiv”, not “Kiev” - Kiev is the Russian spelling (but maybe that was deliberate?).

In English it has always been spelled Kiev, and now when I check on Wikipedia it is Kyiv. This is a very recent change that I suspect most English speakers aren't even aware of.

Russian language was banned by Ukraine after the Maidan Massacre and anti-Russian revolution. So this is part of Ukraine strategy to move away from Russia and toward The West.

Russian language wasn’t banned. I’m a russian speaking Ukrainian. Everywhere I go I can speak russian. Legislature was changes to require workers to greet in ukrainian, yes. However, there are no restrictions on anyone speaking any language. This measure is supported by me, and most of my friends, as a way to counter-balance russification, a centuries-long process of forcing russian language in every sphere of life.

It is difficult for me to switch to Ukrainian, but I support any measure for next generation to use the language of our country.

Even if it means World War?

In a way, Ukraine might be safer than the west in case of ww3, since Russia wont want to nuke itself or nearest neighbour.

As an American I’ve always seen it as “Kiev” in sources/media.

#KyivNotKiev[0] slowly adapted by news media in last years.[1,2]

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/KyivNotKiev

[1] https://twitter.com/CorrectUA

[2] https://twitter.com/search?f=live&q=from%3AMFA_Ukraine+inclu...

In Anglosphere we always spelled it Kiev. I understand their desire to separate from Russia, but you can't force other countries to change their language. We don't use Deutschland or Kyiv.

> but you can't force other countries to change their language.

You are a bit late, because Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine already doing this.[0,1,2]

On Twitter 'MFA_Ukraine' and 'CorrectUA' already posted successful cases.[3]

[0] https://mfa.gov.ua/news/67521-correctua-mzs-ukrajini-zvertaj...

[1] https://poland.mfa.gov.ua/pl/news/67529-correctua-mzs-ukraji...

[2] https://kenya.mfa.gov.ua/news/6885-whats-in-a-name-the-switc...

[3] https://twitter.com/search?f=live&q=%23KyivNotKiev+from%3AMF...

Oh I know about the campaign, my point is that you cannot force people in other countries to change their language. We spell Kyiv Kiev.

"You may know it as Myanmar, but it will always be Burma to me" -Seinfeld

"It might be rice wine to you, but it's saki to me*"

- Laugh-In, 1968

* 'sock it to me'

I don’t think anyone can predict exactly when/if Russia will attack Ukraine. I just think it’s suspicious that Russia has over 50% of its army at the border. To say nothing is going on is naive at best and reminds me of “there is no war in ba sing se”.

> “there is no war in ba sing se”

War is ongoing for 8 years already, since February 20, 2014.[0]

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russo-Ukrainian_War

It's been going on since 2014, so it's more question of remembering than predicting.

> an old lady openly selling IDs near Maidan Square

I live in Kyiv, and 100% sure she wasn't selling actual fake IDs like author implies, but protecting covers for them. They sometimes have official Ukrainian insignia on them, so might be mistook for real IDs.

I live in Kyiv and I too cannot see it as a possibility

Hacker news relevant how? Please, if I want to read war news I go to reddit or any other new source.

> Hacker news relevant how? Please, if I want to read war news I go to reddit or any other new source.

There are a lot of 'hackers'/programmers & IT-companies outsource departments in Ukraine, so any "full-scale war" on whole territory would cause IT sector worldwide, including many large corporations and open-source projects.

Of course, does 40 million lives in Europe, even single life of Ukrainian HN user matter for non-Ukrainian HN's on Hacker News?...

JFTR, I'm from Ukraine.[0,1]

[0] https://twitter.com/app4soft

[1] https://git.io/DailySolveSpace

If you have time and interest, would you like to share your views on the threat of invasion, how it impacts you and your business? Does the article accurately reflect the views of the general population? Do you have any contingency plans for yourself, your family, and your business in the case of invasion?

> If you have time and interest

Of course!

> your views on the threat of invasion, how it impacts you and your business?

I suggest the first thing, "IF" Russian would invade further, would be full disruption of electricity, mobile network and Internet.

As I'm actually freelancer (my Patreon[0]), I highly depend on Internet.

I'm involved in few open-source projects as manual QA, so those projects "may lost my fingers" too.[1]

> Does the article accurately reflect the views of the general population?

Yep. Article accurately reflect the views of the general population.

> Do you have any contingency plans for yourself, your family, and your business in the case of invasion?

To be clear, I and my family would stay and resist — I has no plans to leave Ukraine; I would defend if it would be needed as long, as possible.

In worst scenario, me and my family would move from actual location (central Ukraine) to safer place somewhere to the West of Ukraine (or where it would be safer at the moment).

As for business, all I need is just a laptop, smartphone and Internet.[2]

P.S.: I just hope that world would not ignore Ukraine and in any possible way would help Ukrainian if horrible things would happen.

[0] https://patreon.com/app4soft

[1] https://github.com/Symbian9

[2] https://twitter.com/SolveSpace/status/1484163030887841794

Thread on Twitter: https://twitter.com/app4soft/status/1494992402788065280

This isn't a news article.

I don't think that he will invade; Putin is a lot of things, but he knows some history and he is not a suicidal idiot. I think it's all for show.

22/2/22 - i was apparently wrong with my argument. Very unfortunate development...

Putin is surrounded by people who can't say no. I'm not sure how in touch with reality he his.

Is he, though? Or is that a meme? I know it’s easy to see Putin’s entourage as a cartoon villain lair where saying no to anything will get you shot and replaced, but Putin, evil as he is, is really good at what he does and I don’t think it’s possible to be that good without being surrounded by some amount of other really intelligent people.

In general I don’t think it follows that he could still be in power if he weren’t in touch with reality.

Also, he speaks German very well (he even talked German during parts of the 3 hr meeting with Germany’s chancellor last week), which means he has easy access to different viewpoints if he’d choose to read German media. Now I have no idea if he does or if this really is an argument against him being out of touch with reality. But it could be.

I have been following the show for a while, here is an interview with retired Colonel-General Leonid Ivashov in Russian. You can read about him in wikipedia [2]. Based on this assessment: i think that Putin might get a very similar professional assessment from his general staff. I mean similar in substance, but certainly not in form.

(my grandparent comment was: 'I don't think that he will invade; Putin is a lot of things, but he knows some history and he is not a suicidal idiot. I think it's all for show')

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iXOcuzQjzdo

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leonid_Ivashov

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