💥Biden Weighs Deploying Several Thousand US Troops—As Well As Warships & Aircraft—To NATO Allies In Eastern Europe and Baltics, a less restrained response amid mounting fears of a #Russian incursion into #Ukraine - The New York Times nytimes.com/2022/01/23/us/…
NYT: Senior Pentagon officials presented Biden several options that would shift US military assets to Eastern Europe. "options include sending 1,000 to 5,000 troops to Eastern European countries, with the potential to increase that number tenfold if things deteriorate." #Ukraine
Biden weighs buildup as Russia escalated menacing Ukraine—100k troops on border + in Belarus
Blinken: US is building up defense, bldg up deterrence. NATO will continue to be reinforced in a significant way if Russia commits renewed acts of aggression. All of that is on the table
"So far, none of the military options being considered include deploying additional American troops to Ukraine itself, and Mr. Biden has made clear that he is loath to enter another conflict following America’s painful exit from Afghanistan" #Russia#Ukraine
🔥"[A]fter years of tiptoeing around … how much military support to provide to Ukraine, for fear of provoking Russia, Biden officials have recently warned that the [U.S.] could throw its weight behind a Ukrainian insurgency should Mr. Putin invade Ukraine." #Russia#Ukraine
Pentagon: “This is clearly in response to the sudden stationing of Russian forces in Belarus, on the border, essentially, with NATO. There is no way that NATO could not reply…[Russia is] only escalating the situation with all of these deployments … increasing the danger to all”
If Biden approves deployment, some troops would come from US & others would move from elsewhere in Europe to NATO’s vulnerable eastern flank
Possible ground troop reinforcements include more air defense, engineering, logistics, artillery forces, & more aircraft. #Ukraine#Russia
USAF has been flying intelligence planes over #Ukraine since late Dec. to track #Russia's troop buildup & movement—>>"especially interested in any indication that Russia may deploy tactical nuclear weapons to the border, a move…Russian officials have suggested could be an option
In the event of a full-scale #Russia invasion, US intends to move its ~150 military trainers (in western #Ukraine for yrs) out of country quickly. "But it is possible that some Americans could stay to advise Ukrainian officials in Kyiv, the capital, or provide frontline support"
Move would be "Major pivot"— Biden had been taking a restrained stance on #Ukraine, out of fear of provoking #Russia into invading. But as Putin has ramped up his threatening actions toward Ukraine, and talks failed, the admin. is now moving away from its do-not-provoke strategy.
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#BREAKING UK govt says the Kremlin was developing plans to install a pro-#Russia leader in #Ukraine — and had already chosen a potential candidate — as Putin weighs whether to order the Russian forces amassed on Ukraine’s border to attack. via @NYTimesnytimes.com/2022/01/22/wor…
UK: Russian planners were considering installing former member of Ukrainian Parliament Yevgeniy Murayev as leader of a pro-Kremlin puppet govt in Kyiv. He was a member of #Russia-backed Party of Regions—the party of corrupt Yanukovych who fled #Ukraine after Euromaidan protests.
#Russia’s planned coup in #Ukraine involves installing 5 men—Murayev & 4 others from the pro-Russia Yanukovych days. All worked w/ Paul Manafort, Trump campaign manager & adviser to the disgraced Yanukovych who fled to Russia in 2014. US sanctioned 1 last week—Vladimir Sivkovich.
Lol @StateDept’s factsheet exposing #Russia’s propaganda tactics was so good, the Kremlin responds w/ silly finger quotes and whataboutism🙄
But saying US did it too doesn’t refute & kinda confirms Fact 4: Russia is using disinformation to create a pretext for war in #Ukraine.
#Russia doesn’t even try refuting Fact 1: Russia invaded #Ukraine in 2014, occupied Crimea. Instead it’s the same old propaganda denying Ukraine CHOSE #democracy: US/NATO backed a fascist coup & forced poor Russia to invade. That’s the Kremlin MO: Lie, Blame, You made me do it.🙄
Does #Russia even know what debunking means?? Apparently, just putting “Fact” in quotes is good enough for the Kremlin.
Even if it were true (it’s not) that sending weapons to #Ukraine fuels war in Donbas, how does that debunk Fact 3—that 100,000 Russian troops threaten Ukraine?
Ordinary Ukrainians have begun training in firearms & urban guerrilla warfare - part of #Ukraine’s strategic defense plan to foster popular resistance if the Ukrainian military is overwhelmed if #Russia attacks
“Many of the volunteers are old enough to remember when Russians and Ukrainians were Soviet brothers…Ukrainians did not have such a strong separate identity….But now, thanks to Putin's military aggression and propaganda…a true Ukrainian nation is being forged” #Ukraine#Russia
"Why did they start this war? Because they don't even consider Ukraine as a proper nation…They think of Ukrainians & Belarusians as Russian, but a kind of second-class Russian… [T]hat's why they're always saying, 'Aw, come off it…with this independence stuff.' It’s offensive”
😳Putin spokesman Peskov served up #Russia's #propaganda-lies along with demands on CNN today:
❌NATO "guaranteed no political or military expansion" east
❌2014 "coup" in #Ukraine
❌"Gradual NATO invasion" into Ukraine threatens Russia
❌"No Russian troops in Ukraine or Donbas"
Peskov—w/o irony whatsoever—to @FareedZakaria: "You cannot create the security of 1 country at the expense of the security of another"
#Russia is literally demanding dismantling security of 14 COUNTRIES—50% of NATO's 28 European allies—b/c #Ukraine is now an intolerable threat??
@FareedZakaria Zakaria asked the right question: Why now? What's changed? Peskov said it's been building since early 1990s. Well that's not new, so it's not why. What changed is robust democratic movements on Russia's border. Ukraine, even Belarus rose up. Role models threaten kleptocrat Putin.
Shocker: Putin Sets No Deadline For Withdrawal of Russian Troops From #Kazakhstan - raising the specter of #Russia’s forces staying indefinitely in yet another former Soviet country nyti.ms/3f8MJ5g
#Kazakhstan says order is restored and foreign forces will "probably" be gone in a week.
"But Russia has a record of sending 'peacekeepers' who do not leave. Troops it sent three decades ago to the breakaway region of Moldova and the Abkhazia region of Georgia remain there."
Never missing a propaganda opportunity, Putin likened #Kazakhstan protests to #Ukraine, spewing familiar Russian lies blaming the West for fomenting "color revolutions"—his term for democracy movements—by "well-controlled militants…apparently trained in terrorist camps abroad"🙄
Disappointing CNN re Ted Cruz groveling. It’s not that Tucker Carlson was right & Cruz used “terrorism” many times. It’s that GOP said terrorist early on b/c their initial #propaganda was that Pelosi allowed a terrorist attack on Capitol. GOP was literally blaming Dems for #Jan6.
@FWhitfield Ted Cruz-Tucker Carlson exchange is about the evolution of GOP #propaganda—lies—about #Jan6. GOP acknowledged terrorism but blamed it on antifa, then Dems/Pelosi. After the gaslighting & whataboutism failed, they began rewriting the facts, erasing history. That's #fascism, folks.
@FWhitfield Blaming Ds failed so Rs began rewriting #Jan6, fed by Fox propagandists. Tucker Carlson explains the propaganda, shoving it down Ted's throat: "By no definition was it a terrorist attack. That's a lie…Why do u use that word? You're playing into the other side's characterization"