As Russia's war preparations against Ukraine escalate, with U.S. officials and our allies indicating that an invasion could come this week triggered by a Russian "false flag" operation, Ukrainians are grimly preparing for the worst. Ukrainians in the eastern, Donbas part of the country, which was illegally seized in 2014 by internal pro-Russian forces aided by Russian troops disguising their identities, are familiar with a low-intensity war. Ironically, before the nearly 8-year war in the Donbas began, most Ukrainians in that region weren't hostile toward Russia. According to this BBC report, that has changed significantly:
"The war in eastern Ukraine has shifted the cultural identity of Kharkiv, a historically Russian-speaking city 300 miles from Kyiv but just 30 miles from the Russian border. Belinska spoke in Russian, but Bobova only speaks Ukrainian now. She abandoned Russian overnight in 2014 when she was was forced to flee her home - a kind of personal protest against the war.
The separatists who seized Donbas attempted to seize Kharkiv too, and briefly they raised their flag on the regional government building in the city centre. The ousted Ukrainian president Viktor Yanukovych fled here in search of political support, but he was met by street protests and fled again to Crimea, and Kharkiv, Ukraine's second most-populous city, remained undisputed.
'Kharkiv was always pro-Ukrainian,' said Boris Redin, an avuncular lifelong 'Kharkiver' who has operated a kind of pro-Ukraine protest tent opposite the local government building since 2014. 'But it has become more pro-Ukrainian since the war started, like every city," he said. 'If the Russians want to attack us, they are our guests, we are not afraid.' [snip]
'People have joined the territorial defence, volunteers continue to go the warzone, all this is working,' said Svitlana Gorbunova-Ruban, the deputy mayor of Kharkiv. 'We are ready to defend our city in any situation and by all means.'" (our emphasis)
The article goes on to describe how Ukrainians displaced from the eastern region of their country have suffered hardships and poor living conditions, something that they attribute not only to the war in eastern Ukraine, but to their government in Kiev for failing to provide resources over 8 years.
Over a 20-year period, Russian thug Vladimir Putin has turned Ukrainians against Russia over his repeated threats of further invasion, much in the way nations like Finland and Sweden have reconsidered their relative neutrality to side firmly with the West over Russia and its aggressive, Soviet-like behavior.
(photo: Members of the Ukrainian Territorial Defense Forces are briefed by a Ukrainian Army soldier near Kharkiv. Reuters)
