By Andrey Babitsky
Translated by Ollie Richardson and Angelina Siard
cross posted with http://www.stalkerzone.org/andrey-babitsky-democracy-isnt-for-donbass-right/
source: https://donetsk24.su/opinion/demokratiia-ne-dlia-donbassa-tak-chto-li/
So, it is clear that the mentioning of the topic of a referendum by Vladimir Putin – and the proposal, judging by the fact that Washington already had the time to reject it, was indeed made – is a well thought over trap that Washington fell for, even without assuming that such a thing in general is possible. The sense of a plebiscite in relation to the intra-Ukrainian crisis is to try to stop military operations, having found out how the population of Donbass sees its future and what options of establishing its own destiny they consider to be acceptable.
This indeed could be discussed. For example, the results of any referendum do not necessarily have to be recognised as legally binding. It is easy to imagine there being an agreement on a poll being equated to sociological research, and that the scheme of the autonomisation of the region being developed on the basis of the obtained data about the unwillingness of Donbass to come back into the structure of Ukraine. I.e., wherever you look, you see the same option drawn everywhere – the Minsk Agreements, which indeed have no alternative. Vladimir Putin is absolutely right about this. Under no circumstances will it be possible to do something with these republics without the opinion of the inhabitants of the two people’s republics. Regardless of how much lethal iron Kiev would drop on the land that has been tormented by four years of war.
But Washington, via the lips of the representative of the National Security Council of the White House Garrett Marquis, already refused to discuss the initiative of the Russian president, and Kiev even more so fell into another catatonic fit as soon as it learned about the proposal made by Putin. The Ukrainian authorities continue to show to all corners of the world that it operates not with human interests, but exclusively with notions of property ownership on territory that is thought of as an abstract allotment. This also concerns Crimea, because the demands to return it permanently ignore the results of the Crimean referendum, and in principle the probability of most of the inhabitants of the peninsula being categorically against returning to Ukrainian jurisdiction. And their approach in relation to Donbass is the same. Whatever the inhabitants of the region may think, it must by hook or crook be “reintegrated”, as is said by Kiev.
Putin’s proposal, if to try to translate it into usual human language, is a reminder that Donbass mustn’t be considered simply as a piece of land that appeared to be in someone’s artful hands. People live on this land who, according to all democratic rules and norms, have an inaliennable right to decide their destiny. Anyway, there is a need to talk and reach an agreement with them, even if their opinion of the Ukrainian regime displeases someone. It’s as if Vladimir Putin says: “yes, we remember that you didn’t recognise the results of the referendum in Crimea”, having referred to the fact that whilst it was taking place no international observers were present. “This time everything will be as you so desire. Question people yourself, and on the basis of the received results we will start looking for ways to resolve the conflict”.
The idea of a referendum itself doesn’t assume any radical schemes of the repartition or dismemberment of Ukraine. It simply gives the chance to be convinced that the population of Donbass acts on its own, and not imposed from the outside will, defending with weapons in their hands the right not to be reconciled with nationalism, the desire of one ethnic group to dominate within the Ukrainian State, and discrimination against the Russian language and culture that is native for all this rather big territory.
The refusal of Washington to discuss this subject is understandable. It is absolutely obvious for the Americans that the Donbass separatism and its aspiration by all means to be separate from Ukraine is a uncancelable reality that should be reckoned with, but there is no strong desire to so. After any referendum – even if it will be given the status of an opinion poll – the existence of this reality will be documented and forcedly recognised. And then it will again be necessary to taxi to the Minsk process, within the framework of which Donbass and its inhabitants receive the political subjectivity denied by Kiev.
The fact that the White House doesn’t wish to use that democratic tool that is considered universal and obligatory whilst trying to solve any public disputes in the world – where the priority of the rights and freedoms of the person is proclaimed – looks awfully nasty. It’s as if they consider Donbass as the storeroom of anachronisms where democratic procedures are inapplicable, although, of course, this is relevant here. The recognised results of the referendum would simply open the road to recognising any – not only in Donbass – separatist aspirations as being justified and subject to satisfaction. And neither Washington, nor Brussels can allow this for many reasons at the same time.
Firstly, they will be obliged to recognise that Transnistria, Abkhazia and South Ossetia, and Crimea are not the inspiration of Moscow, which the West has affirmed for many years, but the realisation of the human right to choose a worthy future, free from discrimination. Secondly, the numerous European separatists, who won’t fail to raise the Donbass precedent on their shield, also stand in the queue for recognition.
And it is here that the most interesting thing begins. I am already ready to predict in what form the Russian president will start to formulate his pretensions to western “partners” in connection with the refusal to discuss the idea of a referendum. I think that he will softly regret the fact that “colleagues” don’t want to share democracy with Donbass, but verbally they stand for spreading it everywhere. I even see how the head of Russia throws up his hands in bewilderment: “So it means that there are good people who are worthy of a referendum, and there are bad people who don’t deserve one – right?” Such Jesuit trolling can last as long as is desired.
Well, Kiev in all this story again shows its intrinsic attribute – deep-rooted cannibalism. It doesn’t know and doesn’t want to know any other ways of preserving the territorial integrity of Ukraine besides murdering people. It rejects the Minsk Agreements, in which a working, real mechanism of ending military operations is outlined. Employees of the OSCE protected by missionaries of the UN could indeed stand between the parties to the conflict, and in this case guaranteed calm would set in at the frontline. This option is also being rejected. And concerning any referendum – there can’t be any conversation in general. But guys – stubbornly choosing war over and over again, one day you might find out that it is being waged not according to your rules. I think that you will be seriously afflicted.
Western leaders’ love for democracy can be felt everywhere. Iran in 1953 felt a lot of western love for democracy. More recent examples are Trumps election, which the establishment desperately tries to undo. Or Brexit, “leaders” like Tony Blair say the vote can be ignored and the course reversed, isn’t that great? How much love is the EU showering the Brits with by trying to punish them so hard, no other state would ever dream of staging a referendum on the issue of leave?
Let me give you an example from Germany. Angela Merkel promised she would not privatize the Autobahn (highway) before she was elected. As many people know, she rules a government coalition of 3 parties. Her own CDU (Christian Democratic Union), the SPD (Social Democrats) and the CDUs sister party from Bavaria, the CSU (Christian Social Union). After her election, the CSU forced an ultimatum on her. Either they privatize the Autobahn, or they reintroduce direct democracy like it used to be during the Weimar Republic, and should have been after the war, were it not for the american occupiers who didn’t want the people to decide anything. Switzerland currently has direct democracy, or real democracy if you will.
Angela Merkel, voluntarily stuck deep inside uncle Sams bottom, decided she would rather become a liar in the eyes of the nation by going back on her word, than let people decide anything more than who occupies her chair.
PS: The absurdity of the western narrative on Crimea is insulting to common sense. 16000 Russian “foreign soldiers” on a traditionally Russian peninsula with over 90% ethnic Russians living there, forcing millions of people to vote for something they wanted since 1991. Western ignorance is the biggest threat to world peace.
Western insatiable greed is the biggest threat to world peace.
Btw, don’t be naive to think that Merkel was against the Autobahn-privatizations.
Merkel has no personal opinion, she is working in the interest of the German elites
(bankers & industrialists), not Uncle Sam (a common misbelief).
If they want it, Merkel makes it happen.
Any public pre-election promises and/or opposition is just for show.
Western is only possible because we have too many ignorant consumers and not enough informed citizens. If people knew of all the crap the reigning elites are up to, we’d have finely pedicured elite-feet dangling in town squares in every corner of the western world.
And I never said I believed a word which comes out of Merkel. I merely stated what she said and that she was willing to break her own word to prevent forsaking power and giving it back to the people.
You are white-washing the Western populations.
If you had more “informed citizens” in the West they would
even more vehemently support their elites’ warcrimes,
as they too profit from the loot their elites bring back home.
All those unsatisfied persons in the West, protest because they want a bigger
cut from the loot, not because the loot should ever be stopped.
Never forget:
Drang nach Osten
Never forget:
Yankees stole a whole f!cking continent & genocided the whole population
living there – wrap your head around that one
So, you are aligned with James Warburg (son of one of the Council on Foreign Relations’ founders), whom in 1950, emphatically decreed to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee,
“We shall have world government whether or not you like it – by conquest or consent.”
https://www.globalresearch.ca/one-world-governance-and-the-council-on-foreign-relations-we-shall-have-world-government-by-conquest-or-consent/5541363
As someone who was in many of the large American protests from the Vietnam War until they were prevented under Obama, I can firmly state you have no friggin idea of what you are talking about. I gather that you were not there yourself? That has to be, because anyone who was in those crowds and met the people involved and spent time talking with them and traveling with them would laugh at how wrong your statement is.
This is so also for the Iraq war, of GW. Largest protests ever (?). Estimates 300,000 to 400,000 in NY city, one day alone.
One should not forget the Central Park protest by the “Nuclear Freeze” movement of one million people on June 12 1982. The protest was against the Reagan administration’s policies of rapid military build-up, expansion of nuclear weapons programs and the stated policy of fighting a “winnable” nuclear war. The goal was to “freeze” (and not expand) nuclear weapons programs. Reagan also was provided momentum for the movement by his rhetoric characterizing the Soviet Union as the “Evil Empire”. In contrast to the Carter administration Reagan was perceived as seeking to destabilize and overthrow the Soviet system through accelerating the arms race. A very dangerous strategy.
A democracy can not exist when the political candidates openly lie to the voters without consequence.
Democracy is supposed to place the power of the society in the hands of the people. Yet, when the politicians lie during a campaign, that removes the power from the people to make choices. The only choices they are given are lies presented by liars. They refuse to say what they will do if elected, and thus render any choice made by the people invalid.
If a true democracy was ever again formed on this planet, the one hard and fast rule would have to be that candidates can not lie to the voters. The voters should have a massive distrust and rejection of any candidate who has lied to them. In a real democracy, a candidate who’s lied to voters in the past should be massively rejected by the voters as what is the point of voting for a liar who will then do different things or completely opposite things from what they said in the campaign?
Notice, I do not think that America nor most of the west are democracies. All are organized to keep the power away from the people, which makes them the opposite of anything like a real democracy.
Its always fascinating when the mask drops and they reveal their absolute hatred and disgust at any sort of real democracy where the people might have the power to make decisions that effect their lives. Those moments are always revealing and educational.
There is one other point which needs to be stated. In the 19th century the US fought two wars against Mexico, annexing territories which currently make up the south-west parts of the US, like Texas, California and others. Ukraine did the same with Crimea, which was bestowed to Ukraine by Khruschev, who was Ukrainian. His gift was never ratified in the Soviet Union, which makes it non binding even by the laws of the then Soviet Union. Political economist Lyndon LaRouche has even stated that Khruschev was a British asset, removing Crimea from Russia under British (NATO) instructions, who had their eye on Sevastopol. This is not impossible, bearing in mind how Khruschev was removed from power.
By protecting Ukraines “rights”, ie. annexation of Crimea, the US is protecting itself and the territories it annexed from Mexico. A referendum, from the American point of view, is of course out of the question, bearing in mind that such a course of action could be demanded in the US, as the birth rate among Mexicans is higher than the birth rate of the Anglo-Saxons. Worse for the US, it had a civil war in the 19th century, and the states of the former Confederacy could, potentially, demand a referendum, bearing in mind secessionist movements in the US are active (you have them in California, Texas and in the former Confederate states).
As for Europe, it would see referendum demands in a number of states. For example, in Italy you have the question of South Tyrol, which used to be part of Austria.
The chief problem for both the US and EU is that Ukraine is an artificial creation, which has no historical reasons to exist at all. Ukrainians are of Russian descent. The name of Ukraine is derived from the Slavic name “Krayina”, and it means “frontier region”. Ukraine was the western frontier region of Russia, while the original Russian state was centered in Kiev. When it comes to the Ukrainian language, 90 % of the words are Russian, the remaining 10 % being Polish, with some imported Western words. As I have written before, when the West instigated that coup d’etat against Yanukovich in 2014, it started a chain reaction which cannot be stopped. It’s a matter of time before the bulk of Ukraine is reunified with Russia. By December of 2017 a total of 4.4 million Ukrainians had already fled to Russia. I am afraid the West will in the end have to accept reality, as it exists in the field..
What?! So you mean to tell me that the ancient Greeks didn’t speak Ukrainian, as claimed by the nationalists?
In all seriousness, reality will come crashing down on the racist heads of the western “values” society soon enough. Portugal, Spain, France, Italy, Austria, Britain all are shells of their former, imperial selves. If they weren’t tools of the US empire, they would sink into complete irrelevancy, even more than they are now. The US is clinging to power for the moment, but debt, the financial bubble and the rise and increased independence of certain States, moving away from dollar, will ensure that the collapse of the empire will not be slow and more painful than necessary. Not to mention the fact that nothing is done to soften the fall, all they do is accelerate.
Serg
I fully agree with you. The US is following the path of ancient Rome, which was ruined by the greed of it’s elite. We now have the US empire, headed by the US, which has the greatest foreign and domestic debt in the world, while the dollar is printed backed by nothing. I have been watching this situation for years, and I still have to see how the US intends to resolve the situation it has found itself in. Ah, yes, it is resolving it with more imperial bully boy tactics, thinking they will work. No they won’t. They always fail in the end.
As for Europe, it is drained financially by the EU, which is also subverting EU states with mass immigration. As more than one analyst has stated, the only ethnic group which in the future will save the native populations of Western Europe will be the Slavs, headed by Russia, who will take over the political center of power once held by West European states.
You might be right but, there are 2 questions to be answered.
1 Was the Collapse of Soviet Union a peaceful separation by consent, or a hidden, internal bloody war in a new Dimension, by very powerful mysterious forces?
2 Are the Russian people, able to do anything, in what is left after collapse of USSR, to derail them from the track of N.W.O?
In my personal opinion the Hegemon fixed Russia since December 25, 1991 as:
Mikhail Gorbachev resigned as president of the Soviet Union, transferring control of the country’s huge nuclear arsenal to Russian President Boris Yeltsin as the red Soviet flag atop the Kremlin was lowered for the last time.
Speaking from his Kremlin office at 7 p.m. (noon EDT), Gorbachev said: “This society acquired freedom, liberated itself politically and spiritually, and this is the foremost achievement — which we have not yet understood completely, because we have not learned to use freedom.”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1991/12/26/gorbachev-resignation-ends-soviet-era/00444c16-0fe3-4b35-96df-e514956ee354/?utm_term=.673965434611
In fact this process, officially was initiated since December 8, 1991.
“The final act came on December 8, l991. Yeltsin met secretly with leaders of Ukraine and Belarus and together they agreed to dissolve the Soviet Union. In its place would be a voluntary union, the Commonwealth of Independent States.”
https://www.pri.org/stories/2011-09-26/gorbachev-yeltsin-and-demise-ussr
There was never ever anything by consent in any of the communist countries. The decisions were made by the ruling clique and then presented as, let me quote your quote of Gorby’s BS: “This society acquired freedom, liberated itself politically and spiritually, and this is the foremost achievement — which we have not yet understood completely, because we have not learned to use freedom.”
Hmm, all I can say is that shortly after “his autobiography” was published in the West. I am not even sure he wrote this himself. He collected some royalties from sales of the book. Hmm, this would not have been a payment from destroying the USSR, would it?
Yeltsin followed with tanks against the parliament (Duma). Wow very democratic, guns always beat the Referendum.
categorically against returning to Ukrainian jurisdiction…….So why than is Putin offering referendum??? When these people recognize themselves as sovereign nation and Republic. PR face Putin and 5-6th colonists, oligarhs with whom is he connected are scare of war, scare of responsibility to také down liberal system. They are just good pretenders.Interconnected in a web of different interests. Beside atlantistic structures, Chinese and German capital are also scared of any form of final solution. So the best thing is to freeze everything until economy talks and „big boys make money“.Mr Navalni is a product of a common structures. What kind of nationalist is he? Propaganda. I belive that Russians have orderd or at least agreed with taking down all battalon commanders in Donbas. Now they are running game. Putin is artificialy pumped by western media as an enemy, but exactly he always let Russians to swallov bitter pills. Allways when oligarhs interests, kgb soviet masonic interests are confronted to people ones. His ratings are purposly blown by foreign media, conscientiously by jewish, unconsciously by cabalistic ones. He is a filter. If they momentaly have better army systems why than they dont také an advantage of them before the foreigners catch up with them. Before foerign services drill agin holes in all structures. Who is running russian foreign and domestic policy? The same ones who did alow Afganistan to happen, Andropov style people. Former KGB people who allowed SSSR to be dismantle so that they can earn some money and become russian elite. Lot of them conspired with local mafia, jewish interests, german ones and so on. These people are killing Russians, killing efforts of honest officers and politicians to straighten Russia. They are taking care that it is always bent. Only Army staff can change this situation and give the enemies their medicine. Both internal and external. After victory they will alowe economy to roll over. Americans elites will never alowe any kind of nuclear confrontation between main powers. Only proxy wars. Where they would go? On Mars or in bunkers. Funny. They are the ones who are selling propaganda of a nucear war with Russia just because of bigger control, but as a main fact, they are the main oponent. Otherwise, during war time everybody have weapons. Their family lives and interests would be threatened. I am the war generation, and still remembering how difficult was for MP to arrest military personel. Any other “democratic” form is just an illusion. They are behind every coup and revolution. Helpinh each others not to change status quo. Great example is Serbia where all of them including Americans, Europeans, Germans, Chines, Russians are supporting a “winnig horse”. Putin sholud be dressed in uniforme or change for a more competent cheaf of staff. Without borders any form of nationalist ideas are just imagination. Capital as well as ideology are international values without borders. Putin is just a manager who is selling them.
The bald fact is that the Americans do not want a settlement of the Ukraine crisis on the basis of negotiations; What they do want is a continuation of a proxy war against Russia – using the bought and paid for Kiev regime. End of. Same foreign policy playbook. So it might be a good idea to dispense with all the semantics and call a spade a spade. This is reminiscent of the ”The Manufacture of Consent’ by Herman and Chomsky, where there were ‘deserving victim’s, e.g. Pussy Riot, Kosovar Albanians, and ‘undeserving victims’ like Palestinians, Yemenis and Syrian civilians and the countless thousands in latin America who fell victims to CIA-sponsored thug regimes.
One more reason for the west and ukronazis to vehemently oppose to referendums, Minsks, etc. is an inherent instability of Ukrainian “state”. Referendum in Donbass/Lugansk region will trigger similar aspirations in Kharkiv, Mariupol, Berdyansk, and Odessa-Nikolaev regions. As well as in Uzhgorod-Mukachevo. Geography (and its derivative==history) of the territory between Don and Dnieper rivers preclude formation of a fully sovereign entity in a sense that survival of any administration there critically depends on good relations with its eastern neighbour. In short they cannot go to war and hope to win it. With good administration Ukrainian state will survive. With present admin. it will not.
The Crimean Referendum was supervised by 139 observers from 23 countries.