The Battle for Novorussiya

[Paul Rigby]

Poroshenko is all in. He has no other choice.

By Parmen Posokhov

http://fortruss.blogspot.co.uk/2015/01/n...henko.html

Original here: http://jvatnews.ru/obshestvo/poroshenko-idet-va-bank/
Translated from Russian by J.Hawk

The situation is unfolding in very interesting ways, and I'm writing this on Christmas night after midnight. Intense battles are swirling around the Donetsk airport, and the main Ukrainian propagandists are quiet.

Tymchuk is quiet, the last time he made an appearance on Facebook was on 16 January. Butusov likewise is not touching the topic of the fighting, except for his cry from the soul concerning the visit to the airport by the GenStaff chief Muzhenko. Keep the senior leadership out of the way and let us fight.

Shiklinov, the pathos-laden bard writing about the "cyborg exploits" likewise disappeared, pathos and all. And all of this is happening against the background of victorious pronouncements emanating from CTO leadership. It means that things are not going so well for the "cyborgs" and CTO forces in general located in the vicinity of the Donetsk airport.

There's the bombardment of civilian houses in Donetsk and Gorlovka is going quite well, including by the recently used aviation. But one does not write about such things.

On the other hand we are seeing reports of DPR army counterattacks against Peski and Avdeyevka. Ukrainian media briefly mentioned the use of TOS-1 Buratino, which caused many casualties among Ukrainian troops. Rings true. Let's wait until morning and see what other weapons the militia will use. No doubt it will use them.

The path for their use was cleared by Peskov's announcement concerning Putin's latest peace initiative, and Poroshenko's ignoring it. As they say, "you've been warned." Tomorrow it will begin, unless phones don't start ringing in the Kremlin and the White House, and Putin and Obama don't reach some kind of an agreement. Possible, but not likely.

Wheels are turning, and neither Obama nor Putin can stop them, although they started turning rather sooner than they expected. Poroshenko had no choice. He had to choose between a bad option and a very bad option. Not starting the war meant overthrow and physical elimination already in February. Nobody needs a living (especially living in exile) Poroshenko, not Kolomoyskiy, not Turchinov, not Yatsenyuk, not Obama. Starting a war for which the Ukrainian army is not prepared, thus risking military defeat, is also suicidal, but at least there is a tiny chance for success, plus the war can always thrash the volunteer battalions which answer to Kolomoyskiy, thus depriving him his coup strike force. That's why these battalions, especially Azov, are being sent to the front line.

Poroshenko is now motivated by his self-preservation instinct.

Continuing the ceasefire only hastens his demise, while the war makes the situation ore uncertain, from which he is hoping to find an acceptable exit. Giving the order to shell Donetsk and Gorlovka, he is forcing the militia to respond appropriately, regardless of what Moscow wants, and stopping the militia now, after the bloodshed of civilian population, will be very difficult if not impossible. In his attempt to save himself or, what's more likely, to delay the inevitable, he made the war unavoidable.

They seem to understand this in Moscow, and Peskov's statement only confirms it. Likewise in Washington. Nobody can stop cornered Poroshenko.

We can only watch which side will turn out better prepared for this turn events, which army, Ukraine's or Novorossia's, will prove stronger. Obama did not manage to transfer weapons from Afghanistan to Ukraine. Poroshenko, by prematurely starting combat operations, lost to Putin. And, perhaps, he was cleverly provoked into taking this step. If so, all I can do is applaud the Russian government's skillful handling of the situation.

P.S. Poroshenko has turned to drink. He arrives at work only by 2-3pm. While talking to visitors in his cabinet he likes to throw items from his desk. By 10-11pm he's drunk. He is driven home every night around 1-2am

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Translator's Note: This is entirely probable, though one has to consider the possibility that Yatsenyuk and Turchinov are running the war entirely behind Poroshenko's back, reducing the president to the role of figurehead. Still, the above analysis still holds even assuming it's Yatsenyuk/Turchinov who are trying to stave off their overthrow, because the silence from the Ukrainian propagandists and from, well, Western governments who tend to sound just like Ukrainian propagandists, is deafening. The fighting has been going on for a few days now, it's as if the West has written off the post-Maidan crew but has no post-post-Maidan team in mind, waiting to take over. Which suggests that Ukraine is facing the possibility of a power vacuum at the center, leading to the splintering of the former Ukrainian state.