Russia Is Creating Facts on the Ground to Support Annexing Eastern Ukraine – Opinion

Putin’s War started out as an unprovoked war of aggression against a weaker neighbor chock full of “clear and noble” goals that would have reduced Ukraine to a Russian satrapy. However, as with many other criminal enterprises, it turned into a maelstrom of murder, violence, looting and wanton destruction. It is now comparable to the Russian land grab in 2014.

In 2014, Putin saw the puppet he’d installed as president of Ukraine thrown out by a populist and popular uprising. In response, he annexed Crimea in a referendum that didn’t even bother to make a pretense of being free or fair.

Obama’s Response to the Crimean Referendum is Too Short and Too Late

Fivethirtyeight.com: The Crimea Referendum

A Referendum on Fraudulent Crimes Exposed

Along the way, he also created two bogus ethnic Russian “republics,” Donetsk and Luhansk, and instigated a civil war there…and he and his fan club have spent the last eight years whining about Ukraine attempting to put down this unlawful insurrection and return that territory to its rightful government.

Russia secured all of Crimea as well as the eastern thirds of Donetsk, Luhansk oblasts in its first landgrab. (map). The new one is trying to gain control of the entire area of Donetsk and Luhansk and create additional “republics” in Kherson Oblast and Zaporizhzhia Oblast (map). This would create a Russian-controlled “land bridge” from the current border of Russia to Crimea. According to Russian operations, the original plan was for Ukraine to take Odesa. This plan was thwarted when separatist and Russian military units were beat like a hired mule. The problem with this plan is that Kherson is 82 percent Ukrainian and Zaporizhzhia is 56 percent Ukrainian, and so Russia must create “facts on the ground” for this operation to have any legitimacy.

Russia is tightening its hold over occupied areas of southern Ukraine, installing pro-Moscow leaders, hunting for dissenters and dismantling Ukrainian state institutions.

As in many other areas, the red, white, and blue Russian flags fly high above public buildings in Melitopol. Russian security forces patrol the streets and soldiers man checkpoints, inspecting people’s identification documents and looking through the contents of their mobile phones, residents say.

In March, Russian forces burst into the office of Melitopol’s mayor, Ivan Fedorov, put a bag over his head and detained him. Moscow designated a proRussian politician from the local area to succeed him. In a prisoner exchange, Fedorov was freed and now resides in Ukraine.

Russia has begun preparations for referendums in Greater Donbas to declare regions that are not under control by the fake Russian-created republics and request an annexation.

#Ukraine 🇺🇦: with sham referendum I mean this. A few hundred Rozivka pensioners were taken to a theater, and asked for their votes on the joining of “The”#DNR” separatist entity.

The vote was cast by hand without any serious counting. You can guess what will happen if yours isn’t raised. pic.twitter.com/uJOOMgXrFI

— Thomas van Linge (@ThomasVLinge) April 19, 2022

Research by Washington Post on a headlined story Do people in Donbas want to be ‘liberated’ by Russia?These oblasts have a majority of Ukrainian voters who want to leave Ukraine.

The estimated population of either the Kyiv or separatist regions in Donbas prior to the war, is used to weight the responses. This shows that more people prefer to stay in Ukraine (42%), than to be annexed into Russia (31%). Only 9 percent chose independence. For this sensitive question with a high degree of uncertainty about Kyiv’s and Moscow’s actions, the “don’t know” ratio is high at 18 percent.

…

In the Ukrainian government-controlled areas, almost 3 in 4 respondents (72 percent) wanted the breakaway territories back within Ukraine. They were twice as likely as those in the Donbas to believe it shouldn’t have any special status than to claim that it should be autonomous within Ukraine.

The opinion of separatist-held territories was less divided. Fourty nine percent of those surveyed said that they would like to become part of Russia Federation. Another roughly equal number stated they want to be an autonomous special area or a regular part of Russia. Fewer than 10% supported independence on both sides. Almost 1 in 5 respondents — on both sides of the line of control — said they did not know.

The Ukrainian government claims that referendums have been planned for the other regions of occupied Ukraine.

The Ukrainian Ombudsman for Human Rights describes the possible outcome of the Kherson referendum.

While anti-Russian demonstrations are still ongoing in Kherson; however, this referendum might give Putin a slight victory to coincide with World War II’s end anniversary on May 9th. pic.twitter.com/yTyM0XOhGP

— Samuel Ramani (@SamRamani2) April 17, 2022

It is difficult to win a referendum in a country where most of the voters oppose it. The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) has reported that the Russian Army has forcibly deported approximately 500,000 Ukrainians to Russia. A mass deportation of this magnitude would mean that all remaining voters are Russians or the Potemkin.

Russia has a long history of mass deportation for restive population. The USSR deported 1,500,000 Volga Germans in 1941; another half-million Germans were expelled from USSR-occupied areas after WW II. During the Soviet occupation, half a million citizens from the Baltic States were expelled. More than 200,000 Crimean Tartars were expelled. There are also a few millions of Finns Finns Romanians Turks Greeks Turks Turks Koreans and other Central Asians.

Any claim that Russia wouldn’t commit such an atrocity is simply ignorant of the history of Russia in its Tsarist and USSR incarnations.

It is difficult to imagine this baldfaced theft ever being recognized by anyone who isn’t telling “genocide in the Donbas” stories in our comments section. Two things are certain. Two things are certain.