Another breakdown of negotiations?
Scott
Verified User
I think that American Professor and Statesman Jeffrey Sachs puts to rest this notion. Quoting from the speech he gave European Parliament on February 19, 2025:
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As you know, Viktor Yanukovych was elected as president of Ukraine in 2010 on the platform of Ukraine’s neutrality. Russia had no territorial interests or designs in Ukraine at all. I know. I was there off-and-on during these years. What Russia was negotiating during 2010 was a 25-year lease to 2042 for Sevastopol naval base. That’s it. There were no Russian demands for Crimea, or for the Donbas. Nothing like that at all. The idea that Putin is reconstructing the Russian empire is childish propaganda. Excuse me.
If anyone knows the day-to-day and year-to-year history, this is childish stuff. Yet childish stuff seems to work better than adult stuff. So, there were no territorial demands at all before the 2014 coup [in Ukraine]. Yet the United States decided that Yanukovych must be overthrown because he favored neutrality and opposed NATO enlargement. It’s called a regime change operation.
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Full article:
Jeffrey Sachs: The Geopolitics of Peace
The author explains manipulative U.S. post-war foreign policy to European MPs, explodes myths about Ukraine and urges an independent European foreign policy. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VjcMoDFU1xg&ab_channel=MichaelvonderSchulenburg This is an edited transcript of Professor Jeffrey Sachs’
consortiumnews.com
It was only -after- the U.S. orchestrated this regime change operation that Crimeans held a referendum to rejoin Russia and Russia accepted. That's as far as it went in 2014, but then Ukraine's new government decided to stir things up in Eastern Ukraine, which started the Ukrainian civil war. For 8 years, Russia tried to negotiate a peaceful settlement, to no avail. It was only -after- those 8 years and Ukraine once again beginning a new assault on the Donbass Republics that Russia had had enough and started its military operation in Ukraine.