I think calling the protests in the Ukraine a 'violent coup' is dangerously misleading. The time line of the events leading up to the protests, the then-President's reaction and the use of force are all key milestones in what lead to the violence. Both sides have a large part to play in the bloodshed.
Actually, the use of snipers by the government is now heavily disputed.
If you look at the Estonian foreign minister's leaked phone call to Catherine Ashton (EU), there are strong suspicions that it was the leaders of the Maidan that ordered the snipers to hit policeman and civilians, which makes it a potentially a false flag event.
A. I don't know how much truth there is to the Tibet thing, but I do know that the Dalai Lama didn't start an uprising. He's a Buddhist monk, they're so opposed to violence they filter their water so they don't kill microscopic organisms. So yeah gonna call your bluff there, so to speak.
B. Russia just mobilized it's army, and are lining up on the Ukraine border. Not Crimea. Actual Ukraine. So yeah I'm gonna go ahead and just say Russia isn't using imperialism anymore, which in the modern world is treated as a frowned upon but acceptable reason... No, they're straightup getting ready to tell Ukraine they either belong to Russia, or will no longer exist.
C. Ukrainian government is illegitimate 80% of the time because of Russia's "influence". The other 20% is it's Ukraine. They base a lot on bribes, not just politics.
A)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CIA_Tibetan_program and
http://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1964-68v30/d342
The Dalai Lama was paid by the CIA to lead an uprising. This isn't even up for debate, the CIA released declassified documents on this stuff. They weren't opposed to violence either. There is significant evidence to show that Tibet was a serfdom where the DL and his oligarchs in the temple pretty much kept the rest of Tibetans as slaves, and mutilation was a common punishment for people who stepped out of line.
B) Well, that's one reason for mobilising its troops, the other reason for doing so may be because you have Svoboda leaders (who have great say in the new government) openly calling for war with Russia. Do you really expect them to sit still while this sort of rhetoric is going on?
C) Oh, so a Ukrainian government is now legitimate because of US/EU/NATO influence? The Americans invested $5 billion dollars in this coup.
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Now,
Soul Fly :
I'm just going to make it relatively short on your response about Tibet, since this is a thread about Ukraine and I don't want to go off-topic. Firstly, if you read
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tibetan_sovereignty_debate, you will see that it says:
...[Britain] instead adopted a policy based on the idea of
autonomy for Tibet within the context of Chinese
suzerainty, that is to say,
de facto independence for Tibet in the context of token subordination to China. Britain articulated this policy in the
Simla Convention of 1914.
While at times the Tibetans were fiercely independent-minded, at other times, Tibet indicated its willingness to accept subordinate status as part of China provided that Tibetan internal systems were left untouched and China relinquished control over a number of important ethnic Tibetan groups in Kham and Amdo.
The
Provisional Constitution of the Republic of China (1912) stipulated that Tibet was a province of the Republic of China. Provisions concerning Tibet in the Constitution of the Republic of China promulgated later all stress the inseparability of Tibet from Chinese territory, and the Central Government of China exercise of sovereignty in Tibet.
So, Tibet was not really an independence country in its own right, but an autonomous region under a larger country, a bit like Hong Kong, Taiwan, and... Crimea. This will be important a bit later.
so yeah that's that. And don't you dare discount it because blahblahAMERICAN-INTERVENTION-OBV-FAKEblahbah. It was not so much as an intervention as humanitarian support... (India and Britain provided arms and training to local tibetian troops, far more overt than anything the US ever did), there was nothing for US to gain here. No oil, no territory, to bombed buildings. Only the anti-communist sentiment, which spurred them to aid Lhasa.
This is just naive. If you read
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CIA_Tibetan_program and
http://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1964-68v30/d342 and
(In Chinese, but has English subtitles, the guy's from Taiwan too), it is clear Tibet was provided with funding and arms support. So, I don't think it was "humanitarian support". Actually, I guess you could call it humanitarian support, if you use the traditional US definition (which is bombing the crap out of another country). It is also incredibly naive to think that Tibet has no value to the Americans (or any other great power). Tibet has/had incredible geopolitical significance, especially in the Cold War when it was right next to the Soviet Union and the newly founded PRC. Geostrategically, the Himalayas are an incredible barrier to project power across, it's almost like an ocean. There was very little way of projecting power onto the PRC mainland or onto the Soviet Union (note when the problem actually started, in 1951,
just at the height of the Korean War). There was a reason why Britain invaded Tibet in 1904. Also, if you read
http://www.theglobalist.com/tibet-and-21st-century-water-wars/ you will know why Tibet is so important to China and the rest of SE Asia. If you control Tibet, you control most of the water supply that goes into the region, giving you a huge leverage over those countries.
Anyway, even if Tibet is truly an independent country that China invaded (again, I'm going to drop this because this thread is about Ukraine, not Tibet), there are couple of major inconsistencies in your argument regarding Ukraine, if you put it together with your assessment of Tibet.
1) Tibet was "invaded" (by your own terms) back in the 1950s. If you follow your argument about historical ties and how they play no impact on the conduct of today, then you can safely say Tibet is no longer its own country and is now legally part of the PRC, just as most of North America is now legally part the US and Canada and a bunch of other states, not the former American Indians.
2) As mentioned above, Tibet was not actually an independent country more than an autonomous region just like Crimea was. So if you want to say that Tibet IS its own independent country, you must also recognise that Crimea is now ITS own independent nation. The parallels are actually pretty close if you think about it. In 1949, Tibet was an autonomous region under China, which changed its central government through a revolution. If your analysis is correct, Tibet no longer wanted to be a part of that system and the PRC was hostile to it. Fast forward 65 years to 2014, you have Crimea that was an autonomous region of Ukraine, happily minding its own business. The central government of Ukraine was changed through a violent coup and Crimea no longer feels that it should be a part of Ukraine. You can accuse Russia of having massive influence in Crimea, but the same was in Tibet, which was funded by America, Britain and India. What's the difference? You can't have your cake and eat it at the same time. Which is it? Is Crimea still a part of Ukraine or is Tibet independent from China? You can't pick both (Actually, you can't pick either because neither are correct, but I'm not going to stretch out this point, I'm just picking on the contradiction of your argument).
Finally,
And actually no, the referendum wasn't held under the aegis of the Ukrainian govt. but was enforced by the local Crimean council which is pretty much in the pocket of Russia. That's why it's having all the trouble being legitimized by international law, since the Ukrainian constitution doesn't acknowledge referendums unless exclusively authorized by their central government.
Find me a line in the Ukrainian constitution that allows its central government to be overthrown in a coup and you can have your assertion that the Crimea referendum is illegitimate. Crimea is in the pocket of Russia, yes, but the new Ukrainian government is firmly in the pocket of US/EU/NATO's agenda (and bribed $5 billion by Victoria Nuland too!)
