The situation in the Ukraine continues to be characterized by complete chaos and a gradual and steady strengthening of the resistance in the East.
Following the attack by pro-regime forces on a resistance checkpoint in Slaviansk over the week-end Foreign Minister Lavrov has accused the revolutionary regime in Kiev of breaking the terms of the accord.
One could argue that this attack was decided by the Right Sector (that is the conclusion that the Russian-speakers have come to based on the weapons and documents they seized) and that the cannot control them. That is probably quite true (even though the Right Sector has denied being involved). But the regime also declared that the demonstrators which are currently occupying the Maidan square in Kiev have a permit and are there legally. Truly, whether the regime does not want to enforce the terms of the agreement or whether it cannot do so make very little difference to the Russian-speakers in the East: they still have to bury the same number of people and they still face the same threat. Take a look at what Right Sector thugs did to a Russian-speaker yesterday: (no translation needed)
And this is just one example amongst many.
Another telling video is the one of the man trying to stop an armored vehicle by standing in front of it: (again, no translation needed here either)
To be really honest, I have the feeling that a negotiated solution is pretty much impossible at this point. The East really has nobody to negotiate with.
At this point in time I see the following developments taking place:
1) The resistance in the East get more weapons, more men, more checkpoints, better communication, better organization and discipline.
2) Most cities in the East will organize some kind of referendum.
3) The government in Kiev will nothing done at all.
4) The Right Sector will continue to try to attack all those who dare disagree.
5) The Ukrainian military will not assist the regime in Kiev
6) The West will remain eyes wide shut and defend the regime and everything it does or does not do.
If the above is correct, the the East might as well forget any notion of federation and they should secede. If they do that, they would probably have to join Russia just for their own safety. As for Russia, if the East secedes and asks for protection, it will have no choice other than to provide either troops or some kind of security guarantees. Either way, the West will have a hysterical fit of truly monumental proportions and NATO will even probably organize some grand maneuver to show how determined the West is to resist should Moscow decide to invade Poland, Germany or even Portugal.
As for the regime in Kiev, it is really in complete disarray. Sometimes, this become outright comical. It actually went as far as publishing on open letter of the Ministry of Internal Affairs praising the Berkut police for their courage and asking them to help defend the Ukraine. If these neo-Nazis are now trying to get the help from the very same Berkut which they attacked, stabbed, stoned, shot at, defamed, burned, humiliated and even disbanded – this means that they are really desperate.
As for the West, it has discredited itself with the East to such a degree that I would find it hard to imagine that anybody would take its promises seriously.
If I am correct, we should now enter a phase of decay and break-up.
Stay tuned,
The Saker
Part 1
@anon: 02:08
“And again -yt misunderstands the nature of gold.”
Silly me, but i’m working on it :p
“By no measure is it a commodity – it is a store of value.”
I did not make it up, i just use the word as it is being commonly used.
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/commodity
Also, what makes you think that a commodity can’t be a store of value? Or that a commodity can’t be money?
“The evidence of this is that not one fiat currency (or fiat based instruments such as treasury bonds) have EVER survived. Gold will be the last man standing – again.”
Fiat currencies failing is not evidence for your claim. It just means that currencies are prone to fail, which is true. When they do, you better own something that holds value (buying power, value in barter) better and is not someone elses liability. Depending on the circumstances it can be anything. It can be gold, i agree with that.
“The assumption that gold cannot be repriced is a grave miscalculation and one that is commonly made by students of modern (failed) economics.”
That’s not what i said though, i said it will raise in price. It will do so even more with increasing doubt of the validity of currencies in general. I’m just not having wet dreams about gold being 30.000 US$ with the same buying power of today’s US$. Furthermore i’m none of these students.
“The ‘big’ money will move to gold just as surely as night follows day (if it has not already).”
Some of it will try to, which will make the price to go up substantially. But as of now only a tiny portion has, as you can see in the size of the markets based on the price of gold and the available gold right now. ‘Big’ money _cannot_ be in right now, i don’t have the numbers ready but it is way beyond the (in comparison) tiny gold market. So, i repeat: Right now, big money needs to have a place to be and it’s not piling into gold just yet. This would have the price skyrocket.
“The true value of gold will be measured in ounces not worthless fiat paper.”
Ya, i read that all over the place “worthless fiat paper”. What is money in my daily life? It’s what’s being accepted to pay my bills. Why that is FIAT right now is not important, it’s just a fact. What is gold and silver to me? It’s a way to diversify away from currency and a way to get out of the system for various other reasons. Also, it’s my specultaion that it will ‘hold’ the buying power better than the currencies and even gain further in buing power (a commodity which can be sold later on, to get whatever is ‘money’ then in return).
I guess we still agree in many ways, so let’s not bark up the wrong tree ;)
tbc
-ty
Part 2
@another or the same anon: 01:23
“A huge demand for the US$ comes from the fact that it is the de-facto reserve currency of many countries and institutions (US bonds). As long as there is no _better_ currency, replacing the US$, it will still be the prettiest of the ugly sisters.”
Correct, but this line of thought is itself one-dimensional. It assumes that CURRENCY is MONEY, which is not correct.”
That was not a line of thought, just one additional fact. Also, to me what i use to pay my bills i call ‘money’. It happens to be that currency is accepted as payment right now, cattle or cowrie seashells not so much right now and here.
@Cold N. Holefield
“Gold’s finished except for adornment and use in manufacturing.”
Now that seems to come from the other end of the spectrum and very obviously not being true. Proof for not being ‘finished’: The fact that it is sought after by governments, institutions and individuals.
—
In all of that discussion what we see is an extreme polarization: Gold as a barbaric relic on one hand, and then those who see gold and silver as the solution for all and everything on the other. Black and white standpoints are rarely true, nor helpful.
I am sure i will be told that i ‘do not understand’ this and that or that i’m silly or something. I’m used to that and could care less. I typed this also so other readers can try to follow some thoughts and try to educate themself without just following this or that train of thought like gospel.
-yt
For example, here is a pdf of a presentation at Iowa St University describing Ukraine ag zones. It looks to me like the productive soils are in the South. The North and West have sandy, acidic soils. But I know nothing about agricultural anything.
New York Times “proofs” are fake:
http://www.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/23k8g2/photos_link_masked_men_in_east_ukraine_to_russia/cgxynj5
@ ANONYMOUS, 22 April, 2014 06:11
Your two cents anyway….to set up a rival government which would claim sovereignty over the whole of Ukraine, is the most direct non-violent way to the outcome of any manoeuvre that is discussed till now.
First and most important: Saker, do not neglect the possibility, even the likelihood, that there were third party snipers shooting at both sides in the Slavyansk incident, as there have been previously in Maidan, Damascus, Cairo, etc etc.
I think the argument about gold is pure dogma on both sides and possesses no predictive value whatever. I’ve heard it all any number of times before, on US ‘libertarian’ sites. It’s interminable.
On the other hand, it is wrong to assume as one commenter does, that anybody who talks about the political control of world banking by the US, is an anti-Semite, a red-brown crypto-Nazi entryist, etc etc. The control of global banking by a small elite is fact. The falling rate of profit as predicted by Karl Marx is also fact. We live in a world in which both Left and Right have accurate arguments, if they can refrain from their own mutual sniping long enough to realise it. The world’ most powerful international bankers may or may not be Jews, but the miasma that arises when you ask who in fact they are, is indicative of a sort of camouflage via ideology.
In a rational world, a peaceful division of Ukraine, with the Kashubians in the north-west going to Poland, for instance, would make sense. But I absolutely agree with everyone who says, Russia will have Odessa. the rump west-Ukraine will be landlocked. On paper, just about everything outside of the UKUSA heartlands is an economic basket-case, but paper is the tool of the vile banksters who you don’t have to be a Nazi to loathe, so I shall forget about that.
West Ukraine, surely, contains at least a good part of the “Breadbasket of Imperial Germany”, as described by Webster Tarpley in his magisterial short history of the country. It is not without concrete productive resources, unless Big Agribusiness has already torn it to pieces for some horrible bio-engineering project.
@Penny re: China and your blog link.
Yes, helps. Thanks much!
You have one of the few factual sites out there. Your posting system seems broken. You should by FORCE have only the latest posts show up first. Also you should add a more OBVIOUS posting location, a highlighted icon rather then just the word ‘here’. You can join Ron Paul’s site, if you have not already. Ron Paul has this war pegged identically to you. So those of you showing hate, note that Ron Paul organization is confirming the butchery of civilians by the Ukrainian government also. I am the guy who has family and apartments in Lugansk/Luhansk. You don’t need to post this. When it is safe to visit, I will stop by Florida, I did war gaming (modeling) for years.