JimofPennsylvan
Platinum Member
- Jun 6, 2007
- 878
- 527
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The United States and allied countries that are helping Ukraine by providing them heavy weapons in their war to stop the Russian invasion should amend the restriction on the use of those weapons that prohibits the firing of those weapons into Russia. Specifically, the restriction should be amended so that it allows Ukraine to fire those weapons up to fifty miles within the borders of the country of Russia as long as it is firing at a legitimate military target! The Russian President Vladimir Putin's behavior in regards to how he has used the Russian military in this war doesn't warrant the consideration heretofore shown to him by the allies in prohibiting the use of donated weapons to Ukraine from being used on Russian soil.
I think that focusing on specific incidents of the almost countless occurrences of bombing of Ukrainian civilians warrants this amendment to policy. One incident cited yesterday in The Philadelphia Inquirer by their principle foreign affairs journalist Trudy Rubin is an example that makes the case for reversing the policy for me. Trudy wrote about a Russian bombing this past Friday in Mykolaiv one of Ukrainian's major cities in the south located on the Black Sea. The Russians bombed a residential neighborhood in the city with cluster munitions, bombs that are designed to breakup into multiple smaller bombs for the purpose of killing and wounding a lot of personnel at minimum more than a singular bomb would, which had the effect of killing seven civilians and wounding seventeen. One of the wounded was a twenty year old young women Viktoria who was out walking her dog with her father; Viktoria was severely wounded in the leg which her Doctors tell her it will take many months and more surgeries for her to walk again. When the shelling started Viktoria's father used his body to cover his daughter and shield her from the bombs and in the process was wounded himself and the injuries ended up being fatal. In the hospital, Trudy said that Viktoria's mother was at her daughters side and was incredibly distraught. So what has Vladimir Putin did with his army here, this young women Viktoria when she thinks of her father which human nature being what it is will be often will have to live with the sadness that he died protecting her and Viktoria's mother will have to live with the sadness of having lost a great husband. All this sadness brought on this Ukrainian family for a completely unjust war instigated by a brutal and immoral dictator, Vladimir. And there is millions of other innocent Ukrainian families that are and will experience great sadness throughout their lives because of this epically immoral behavior of Vladimir Putin using his military to target civilians. If Vladimir Putin is ever brought to the Hague and tried for war crimes and if the case is competently prosecuted the panel of Judges will have to find Mr. Putin guilty and the court will have to say something like this in their ruling, that in this war there were so many cases of Ukrainian civilians being killed by Russian bombings when no reasonable person could conclude the target was a legitimate military target and these incident were reported in the world-wide media that the President of Russia has no legitimate grounds to deny lack of knowledge that civilians were being targeted by the Russian military and because he did not stop this criminal behavior he is fully liable!
The United States and the Free World must stop giving Vladimir Putin this consideration that their weapons will not be used to bomb Russian soil even when that soil is being used to fire rockets and shells deliberately aimed at Ukrainian civilians and killing them. Universal law recognizes the right of self-defense and this principle warrants the allies changing their policy here and allowing Ukraine to defend its people!
Russian immorality in this war has many standout examples. One is the killing of fifty Ukrainian POW's at Olenivka prison in eastern Ukraine at the end of July; the camp had mostly Azov regiment, Ukrainian soldiers that fought at the Azov steel plant in Mariupol. The Russians say that Ukraine is responsible that they fired HIMARS precision guided rocket into the POW prison building. The Russian story has too many holes in it. First, they said that the Ukrainian government bomber the camp because they wanted to create a deterrent against other Ukrainian soldiers surrendering to the Russians; but that doesn't make any sense because President Zelensky himself ordered the Azov regiment to stop defending the steel plant because it facilitated a lot of the wounded Ukrainian fighters being evacuated to the Ukrainian government controlled area. Then the Russians said the Ukrainian bombed the camp to stop the POW from disclosing the war crimes they committed at the direction of the Ukrainian government; that is stupid because the Ukrainian fighters at the Mariupol steel plant conducted heroic actions defending the plant and by so doing tying up Russian forces that couldn't be used to attack Ukrainian forces at other locations in the country. During the Russian Supreme court case where the azov regiment were declared terrorists so they can be tried at terrorists the Russian government concocted evidence that said Azov regiment sniper shot Ukrainian civilians fleeing Mariupol; but that doesn't make any sense from the long hold out of the Azov regiment fighters at the steel plant the media conducted countless interviews with the fighters families many who had evacuated or long ago moved away from Mariupol it wouldn't make sense for these fighters to kill Ukrainian civilians for doing what their family members had done evacuate to safety in the Western part of Ukraine. The Russian story doesn't make any sense; the camp building looks largely structurally intact; HIMARS rockets called GMLRS have a 200lb warhead if such hit the camp building one or more of the building walls would not be structurally intact. Further, fifty Ukrainian POW's were killed in the attack but no Donbas separatist prison guards were killed or wounded in the attack that doesn't pass the smell test on smelling legitimate. The Donbas separatist, Russia allies in this war killed these POW's they hate this unit of the Ukrainian national guard because this regiment beat them in 2014 and kept Mariupol as part of Ukraine; this incident is a shocking scandal that is one more compelling reason the Free World should bring about the Russians not ending up with one centimeter of Ukrainian soil from this invasion!
Another reason why the U.S. and her allies should amend the policy and allow Ukraine to target artillery coming from inside Russia is what is happening in Kharkiv in the north. The Russian's bomb that city from inside Russia every week sometimes two to three times a week. Russia is approaching implementing on the city of Kharkiv what Russia implemented on the city of Grozny during the Chechen war in 1999. Essentially on that strategy the Russians just leveled the city of Grozny which made it easier for their troops to take the city. Kharkiv still has a lot of civilians in it if Russia carries out its Grozny strategy on Kharkiv the civilian death toll will be an embarrassment on the Free World for the Free World should have done more to stop this barbaric behavior of the Russians by at least allowing the Ukrainian military to fire at the incoming artillery sites hitting Kharkiv.
I think that focusing on specific incidents of the almost countless occurrences of bombing of Ukrainian civilians warrants this amendment to policy. One incident cited yesterday in The Philadelphia Inquirer by their principle foreign affairs journalist Trudy Rubin is an example that makes the case for reversing the policy for me. Trudy wrote about a Russian bombing this past Friday in Mykolaiv one of Ukrainian's major cities in the south located on the Black Sea. The Russians bombed a residential neighborhood in the city with cluster munitions, bombs that are designed to breakup into multiple smaller bombs for the purpose of killing and wounding a lot of personnel at minimum more than a singular bomb would, which had the effect of killing seven civilians and wounding seventeen. One of the wounded was a twenty year old young women Viktoria who was out walking her dog with her father; Viktoria was severely wounded in the leg which her Doctors tell her it will take many months and more surgeries for her to walk again. When the shelling started Viktoria's father used his body to cover his daughter and shield her from the bombs and in the process was wounded himself and the injuries ended up being fatal. In the hospital, Trudy said that Viktoria's mother was at her daughters side and was incredibly distraught. So what has Vladimir Putin did with his army here, this young women Viktoria when she thinks of her father which human nature being what it is will be often will have to live with the sadness that he died protecting her and Viktoria's mother will have to live with the sadness of having lost a great husband. All this sadness brought on this Ukrainian family for a completely unjust war instigated by a brutal and immoral dictator, Vladimir. And there is millions of other innocent Ukrainian families that are and will experience great sadness throughout their lives because of this epically immoral behavior of Vladimir Putin using his military to target civilians. If Vladimir Putin is ever brought to the Hague and tried for war crimes and if the case is competently prosecuted the panel of Judges will have to find Mr. Putin guilty and the court will have to say something like this in their ruling, that in this war there were so many cases of Ukrainian civilians being killed by Russian bombings when no reasonable person could conclude the target was a legitimate military target and these incident were reported in the world-wide media that the President of Russia has no legitimate grounds to deny lack of knowledge that civilians were being targeted by the Russian military and because he did not stop this criminal behavior he is fully liable!
The United States and the Free World must stop giving Vladimir Putin this consideration that their weapons will not be used to bomb Russian soil even when that soil is being used to fire rockets and shells deliberately aimed at Ukrainian civilians and killing them. Universal law recognizes the right of self-defense and this principle warrants the allies changing their policy here and allowing Ukraine to defend its people!
Russian immorality in this war has many standout examples. One is the killing of fifty Ukrainian POW's at Olenivka prison in eastern Ukraine at the end of July; the camp had mostly Azov regiment, Ukrainian soldiers that fought at the Azov steel plant in Mariupol. The Russians say that Ukraine is responsible that they fired HIMARS precision guided rocket into the POW prison building. The Russian story has too many holes in it. First, they said that the Ukrainian government bomber the camp because they wanted to create a deterrent against other Ukrainian soldiers surrendering to the Russians; but that doesn't make any sense because President Zelensky himself ordered the Azov regiment to stop defending the steel plant because it facilitated a lot of the wounded Ukrainian fighters being evacuated to the Ukrainian government controlled area. Then the Russians said the Ukrainian bombed the camp to stop the POW from disclosing the war crimes they committed at the direction of the Ukrainian government; that is stupid because the Ukrainian fighters at the Mariupol steel plant conducted heroic actions defending the plant and by so doing tying up Russian forces that couldn't be used to attack Ukrainian forces at other locations in the country. During the Russian Supreme court case where the azov regiment were declared terrorists so they can be tried at terrorists the Russian government concocted evidence that said Azov regiment sniper shot Ukrainian civilians fleeing Mariupol; but that doesn't make any sense from the long hold out of the Azov regiment fighters at the steel plant the media conducted countless interviews with the fighters families many who had evacuated or long ago moved away from Mariupol it wouldn't make sense for these fighters to kill Ukrainian civilians for doing what their family members had done evacuate to safety in the Western part of Ukraine. The Russian story doesn't make any sense; the camp building looks largely structurally intact; HIMARS rockets called GMLRS have a 200lb warhead if such hit the camp building one or more of the building walls would not be structurally intact. Further, fifty Ukrainian POW's were killed in the attack but no Donbas separatist prison guards were killed or wounded in the attack that doesn't pass the smell test on smelling legitimate. The Donbas separatist, Russia allies in this war killed these POW's they hate this unit of the Ukrainian national guard because this regiment beat them in 2014 and kept Mariupol as part of Ukraine; this incident is a shocking scandal that is one more compelling reason the Free World should bring about the Russians not ending up with one centimeter of Ukrainian soil from this invasion!
Another reason why the U.S. and her allies should amend the policy and allow Ukraine to target artillery coming from inside Russia is what is happening in Kharkiv in the north. The Russian's bomb that city from inside Russia every week sometimes two to three times a week. Russia is approaching implementing on the city of Kharkiv what Russia implemented on the city of Grozny during the Chechen war in 1999. Essentially on that strategy the Russians just leveled the city of Grozny which made it easier for their troops to take the city. Kharkiv still has a lot of civilians in it if Russia carries out its Grozny strategy on Kharkiv the civilian death toll will be an embarrassment on the Free World for the Free World should have done more to stop this barbaric behavior of the Russians by at least allowing the Ukrainian military to fire at the incoming artillery sites hitting Kharkiv.