When will liberals learn what imperialism is?

I'm an anarchist. (I had the privilege of discussing the Maidan revolution with fellow anarchists as it was happening. Our comrades were involved, but had to keep their guard up, because some fellow rioters were far right. Regardless they participated, despite the riot police shooting live ammunition and some fellow rioters being stupid and dangerous.)

Imperialism... is conquering and dominating foreign lands and assembling empires. Unless you have noticed, Russia has never fully left this business - it's an empire that took over Siberia very much like the US took over North America. Nobody has complained as long as they stick to internationally recognized borders. Unfortunately, Putin revived the ghost of needing to be great and feared again.

...as for whether 2014 was a coup, revolution or some other thing - tens of thousands of civilians decided the outcome. That's a pretty revolutionary coup if you ask me.

The president of Ukraine fled to Russia but the parliament remained in place, and provided a way of triggering new presidential elections. By that time, Russian troops had taken control of Crimea and Russian specialists were running the insurrection in Donbas, with constant shipments of supplies from Russia, which would continue for 10 years.

That's the point where it landed on Obama's table and he was not prepared, but did damage control. In Ukraine, they elected Poroshenko as president and he entered the Minsk agreements with Putin - trying to freeze the conflict. The ceasefire did not hold for long, soon both sides were again exchanging small arms fire. Soon enough, heavy equipment was moved in and Russian troops in Donbas were shelling Ukrainians while Ukrainians were shelling them back.

Multiple attempts were made to negotiate something permanent, but they failed. Putin declared Crimea to be part of Russia and stated that he'd never give it back, meanwhile denying the presence of Russian troops in Donbas, which was a blatant lie. Meanwhile, Putin eliminated his opposition. Nemtsov was shot, Kara-Murza was poisoned, Navalny was poisoned, etc.

In the run-up to the full-scale war, Russia held large military maneuvers near Ukraine's border. As a feint, it ended the manevuers and claimed that troops would go home, but troops stayed. Troops themselves were not informed of their purpose, ending up ill prepared and confused.

Another round of theatre started: the "people's republics" of Donbas "applied" for membership in Russia and were "accepted". Russia made an ultimatiumg demanding NATO to abandon its recent members. NATO responded by starting to donate man-portable defensive weapons (antitank and anti-aircraft launchers) to Ukraine.

Then came the provocation phase. Lots of fake material was pushed onto social media during a few days, trying to construct a cause for war. Some of the videos were blindingly fake (e.g. some propagandist used the soundtrack of a Finnish military excercise for an alleged Ukrainian attack). Ukrainian troops had orders not to provoke, so Russia had to stage its own provocations. They did that sloppily. I had the privilege of paying full attention maybe a week before others became concerned.

Ultimately, bombardment of Ukraine started on the night between February 23 and 24. Attempts to land special troops started, and ordinary troops were pushed into Ukraine, some of them unaware of why the "excercise" had turned into a shooting war. Their logistics got jumbled and Ukraine still had ammunition for every barrel, which allowed them to be pushed back under Kyiv.

Currently, I have the doubtful privilege of living 200 km from St. Petersburg and understanding Russian pretty decently, so I can read their Telegram channels, from the opposition and the anarchists to the Z-bloggers and VDV.

Russia has not given up on its ambition of controlling Ukraine. Realistic people understand that they're unable to take it all, unable to take it currently - but the Kremlin gives commands to advance and constantly forms new units to send. A considerable part of the army is extremely frustrated with their bad supplies and leadership, but threat of extreme punishment keeps them going.

Ukrainians are meanwhile extremely tired and frustrated too. They just don't practise extreme punishments, but they have increasing trouble mobilizing soldiers. Volunteers are few, professional soldiers have mostly fallen (dead or wounded) and it's called-up reservists who are fighting now.

Foreign volunteers do exist on the Ukrainian side - there is the International Legion and the Freedom of Russia Legion. The former is considerable, the latter is too small to make a difference.

Y’all are commiting a livestreamed genocide in gaza

If you really want to know - when Hamas attacked Israel, I said that Israel has the right to defend itself. When Israel started bombing civilians, created a famine in Gaza and destroyed their infrastructure, I said: that's no longer self defense.

I have never donated to Israeli causes. But I have donated to Ukrainians and will continue to help them in the ways I can. I do not support every move they make, but they have a right to repel the invaders, and this incldues the right to strike across borders at the invader's command, logistics, storage and production.