I think it’s very important to cover the “nationhood” of Ukraine.

This issue gets almost no coverage anywhere, but if you look into history you realize that Ukraine is not a “nation” in a way that, say, France or Italy or Spain or even Germany are.

Ukraine is a frankenstein of territories, assembled into single entity as part of USSR under Ukrainian SSR for administrative management. The very fact that this hodge-podge “state” exists is because of a stroke of Yeltsin’s pen. It’s borders are not drawn with blood, sweat and tears the same way as other EU countries is.

In a sense, Ukraine is closer to modern day Iraq or Nigeria or any of the other poor african “countries” whose borders were drawn with a fucking ruler with no regard to actual people living on the ground.

The infamous Dulles in his report on USSR called Ukraine “as inseparable part of the country as a Great Lakes region is to USA”.

As a Donbass native, I can speak for overwhelming majority of people there — this is not an invasion for us. It’s a homecoming long overdue.

I would also advise a bit of emotional note at some point. Something from western sources like Laura Bonnele’s movie “Donbass”, Graham Philips’ channel (he does war reports from DNR side), or even the fresh Maryana Naumova’s response to Arnold Schwarzenegger.

In a 1996 interview, CBS journalist Lesley Stahl expressed her concern about the effect of US sanctions on Iraq: “We have heard that half a million children have died. I mean, that is more children than died in Hiroshima. And, you know, is the price worth it?” Albright unhesitatingly replied: “I think that is a very hard choice, but the price, we think, the price is worth it.”

My only regret is that she never faced tribunal.