Ukrainian Guerilla War is Fast Approaching (Komsomolskaya Pravda,
Russia)
"In Donetsk and Lugansk, we see
all the elements of a people's movement, which is technically impossible to operate
from the outside. ... Quelling unrest in the south and east will only be possible
with the help of the Right Sector - and only at the cost of large-scale bloodshed. In circumstances where the
police and army are unreliable, and for completely understandable social reasons,
when the ranks of the security forces more closely identify with the rebels than
with those trying to give the orders, the authorities will have no choice but
to use the right-wing militants."
A new type of political activist in east Ukraine? An older gentleman mans a barricade outside an administration building in Donetsk: A new class of people has become radicalized, portending a guerilla war.
Ukraine
is headed for a guerrilla war. Not only in the west, as we were promised by liberal
publicists, but in the east. And not in response to an invasion by Russian
troops, but as a result of the use of the Ukrainian army against its own
population.
The
intelligentsia of Kiev and Moscow cannot genuinely believe that workers and the
urban poor, who they contemptuously characterize as lumpen
middle-aged family people, who just yesterday were considered apolitical
residents and Russian-speaking workaholics disinterested in Kiev's political
games, have suddenly not only taken to the streets, but have begun to act
independently, organize and make a history. The comments of liberal publicists make
it clear that the general population of south and east Ukraine consist of
Russian political technologists and GRU Special
Forces. Ordinary people, workers, miners, pensioners and the unemployed, have
been flatly denied the right to their own opinions, draw their own conclusions,
or introduce their own slogans.
However,
in their turn, thousands of these people are going to the streets of Kharkov, Lugansk, Donetsk, Odessa, and Mariupol
in numbers vastly superior to the number of activists in Maidan,
even at the peak of its popularity. They are finding their voices and standing
up for their rights, regardless of what is said about them in the liberal
press, or how intellectuals in Moscow, Kiev or Paris react to their demands.
Only
yesterday, such people weren't involved in politics. That is the case for not
only south and east Ukraine, but for Kiev and Russia and even west Ukraine. A
video from Donetsk clearly demonstrates the radically changing sociology and
demography of the protesters. Instead of young people from the capital’s middle
classes, which we were used to seeing in previous meetings and Maidan, in front of us now are completely different people:
those who, just a few weeks ago, were mostly concerned with how to make money
for their families and would have considered participating in street rallies a
waste of time. Now, though, they have not only taken to the streets, but they
are blocking trucks with the military, organizing and making decisions. In
Donetsk and Lugansk, we see all the elements of a people's
movement, which is technically impossible to operate from the outside. It is
decentralized, chooses its own leaders, and completely unbeknownst to the
outside, it is in the process of creating and developing its own agenda.
Ukraine's
new authorities face an extremely unpleasant dilemma. Quelling unrest in the south
and east will only be possible with the help of the Right Sector - and only at
the cost of large-scale bloodshed. In circumstances where the police and army
are unreliable, and for completely understandable social reasons, when the
ranks of the security forces more closely identify with the rebels than with
those trying to give the orders, the authorities will have no choice but to use
the right-wing militants.
And
here the problem is not the ideology of the Right Sector fighters, and not even
their psychological characteristics. Specially trained police forces are used
to disperse mass protests with the possibility of avoiding bloodshed. Militants
have no such training, and, therefore, immediately start breaking bones and killing.
However,
can they break a people that has taken its destiny into its own hands? Hardly.
