The US effectively did. There's no other explanation for why US elected and career officials were present in Ukraine during small and violent anti-government protests, and there's no other explanation for how and why the US state department chose the next leader of Ukraine after the democratically elected and widely supported President Yanukovych was forced to flee in fear for his life. Ukraine for all practical purposes lost its sovereignty in February 2014.

If you're talking about the small peninsula of Crimea, the residents of Crimea democratically chose to secede from Ukraine and rejoin Russia.

It's not easy, but it's very much worth taking some time to understand what sovereignty and democracy actually mean, both in theory and in practice.

[–] Skua@kbin.social 1 points 1 year ago (2 children)

No, the US effectively didn't. Russia actually did. It's truly incredible that you're promoting the results of a referendum held by an invading military force as legitimate and then telling me that I don't understand democracy. You can't have democracy at gunpoint. Would you be defending an American-run referendum to see if Basra wanted to join the USA in 2003? Because that is what you're doing right now.

[–] OrnluWolfjarl@lemmygrad.ml 0 points 1 year ago (1 children)

A couple things wrong with your comment:

a) you are deflecting because you can't answer

b) you are seriously comparing an outright unprovoked invasion from US into Iraq, with one where Russia is defending Russian-speaking people against a Nazi-un government that has been bombing them for 8 years.

c) even before the invasion, these people wanted to join up with Russia. They went all the way to Moscow multiple times to beg for Russia to intervene.

d) it is obvious you know next to nothing about Ukraine and its situation. You only know what the US state department has told you and you repeat the exact same talking points.

[–] Skua@kbin.social 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

A) It's not deflection to limit a response to the parts most relevant to what I had actually asked.

B) I compared an unprovoked outright invasion to an unprovoked outright invasion. If you can annex land because there's a civil war there and the people speak the same language as you, you'd be in favour of America annexing Ireland during the Troubles. Or Britain annexing it, for that matter. Never mind whether or not you're fomenting the civil war in the first place.

C) I'm in favour of self-determination for people - hell, I want the place I live to leave the country hat it's currently part of - but getting invaded is not self-determination.

D) Fun fact but you do not need to parrot the US State Department to think that Russia invaded Ukraine. If I was as virulently pro-America as you seem to think I am I probably wouldn't be using a thing America did as a negative comparison, would I?

[–] OrnluWolfjarl@lemmygrad.ml 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

A) it is when you ignore every single point except the one you can twist

B) and you were wrong

C) yet you've been minimizing the Ukrainian coup orchestrated by the US, and denying the right of self-determination to people in the Donbass

D) you didn't use it as a negative at all. Nowhere in your comment do you condemn the Iraq war. In fact you are whitewashing it by implying that somehow the US should be praised for not doing ethnic cleansing (which they did, lest we forget the 1.5 million dead Iraqi)

[–] Skua@kbin.social 1 points 1 year ago

Okay, I just want to focus on D for a moment because I genuinely can't work out how you could arrive at this conclusion. We can come back to the others afterwards. I was arguing that a referendum run by an invading army should not be considered legitimate and used a hypothetical one run by America in Basra as an example. I even specifically called the invasion "unprovoked" in my first response to you. Please explain to me how you think that this is me saying that the invasion of Iraq was praiseworthy.

[–] knfrmity@lemmygrad.ml 0 points 1 year ago

So a few things.

If the election weren't legitimate, why do Crimeans still stand by the decision they supposedly made at gunpoint to this day? Why don't they remember there being Russian soldiers being present during the referendum? Why would Ukrainian citizens be welcomed into Crimeans communities now if this had simply been a nationalist land grab? Why didn't Ukraine invest in Crimean infrastructure and social services between 1991 and 2014? Why would Russia invest in that same infrastructure and social services post 2014? Why weren't Russian citizens allowed to vote in the referendum, only Ukrainians with Crimean residency?

https://www.mintpressnews.com/return-russia-crimea-story-referendum-lives-since/262247

Comparing this situation to the relationship between the US and Iraq/Basra is grotesque and intellectually dishonest so there's no point in discussing that further.