War in Ukraine | DW Documentary
On 24 February 2022, Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered an all-out attack on Ukraine. This was a drastic escalation of a conflict that had been simmering for decades. Was war the inevitable result of Kyiv’s 2013 Maidan protests?
The documentary looks at how this war came about and why it was not prevented.
In late 2013, after Ukrainian President Yanukovych suddenly refused to sign the European Union–Ukraine Association Agreement, protests began on the central square in Kyiv known as the Maidan. Soon after, war broke out in Ukraine’s Donbass region. Was this war the Russian response to Ukraine’s push to break away from Russian influence?
The film looks back on a decade of conflict between Ukraine and Russia. Local perspectives are interwoven with world political developments and diplomatic dynamics, as the documentary analyzes events in Ukraine leading up to 24 February 2022 — the day Russian troops invaded.
The documentary tells a story of conspiracy, corruption, the ongoing global power struggles between the US, Russia and the EU and the energy crisis that is now affecting people all over the world.
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When the revolution started I felt that we started to understand who we are and what we could [Applause] do often Russians are trying to achieve their own geopolitical goal they just can’t allow Ukraine to leave Russian zone of influence in the terms of uh being foretold all the signs were there Vladimir Putin has essentially been at war with the West for at least the last 10 years
We really understand that if we fail uh we will lose our Country I grew up on the south of Ukraine the city called Zapia This is my like a native land for filmmaker Alina gorova and many of her generation Ukraine is unmistakably a part of Europe I don’t know why Russian people I don’t know why Putin needs this war I’m sure that these people in Kev this uh Young Generation but they don’t need all of
This they don’t need corruption they need the clearance of the authorities they need new possibilities Alina started making films in kees Maiden Square in 2013 the socalled euromid protests marked the crossroads at which Ukraine stood when they were watch the footage from maidan I understood that really the
War actually the war started already there but you understand it only right now or when you see the whole situation from from the distance Russia has invaded Ukraine by land air and Sea these are among the darkest our for Europe since the end of World War II R I think the Russian invasion of Ukraine is very very personal to Putin and I think actually most well average Russians and even people close around him were absolutely shocked they really did not think it would come to this this wasn’t something new to the ukrainians
Like it was to us in the west this was something they understood they understand the weaknesses of the Russians they understand the corruption in Russia Russian oligarchs have been really involved in Ukraine as well lots of the Russian major companies like sparbank for example or L oil the gas
Prom other guys been working on a full scale in Ukraine at the same time lots of the Ukrainian oligarchs they had business in Russia back in the days it was pretty obvious that all communicating All Connect all making money all involved in some Wars between each other related to the who’s going to
Control what I started to feel that our country is very corrupted on some level we understood that this is the same regime as in Russia in Belarus they wanted to make Union between Ukraine Russia Belarus we understood that there will be no freedom in the country when the
Revolution started I felt that we started to understand who we are and what we could do in November 2013 protesters at the maiden Square demanded their president Victor yanukovich sign an agreement with the EU this would spark the beginning of the euromid Revolution using Facebook more more
People gathered in the center of keev to show their desire to be a sovereign part of the EU first a group of students started demonstrating they were dispersed by Riot police that created a reaction and soon uh there was this huge occupation by the people of Kiev of the maidan
Which is to say the uh the the Independence Square in Kiev and adjacent streets That went on for months in freezing cold and which transmogrified into the largest proe demonstrations in history not just of of Ukraine but of Europe Yanukovich arrived at the EU Summit in vilnus Lithuania to meet with heads of the commission and the council 20 heads of government from the EU were planning to discuss the r of six former Soviet republics at the Eastern partnership Summit negotiations continued with Ukraine vukovic he’s the person who
Actually leading the charge uh for the application of Ukraine to be an associate member of the uh European Union along with a number of other countries like Georgia for examp Do For yanukovich had reversed course causing an uproar in Ukraine and consternation in Europe expected more uh he even actually prepared the the Ukrainian public opinion including in the East that he would sign and then at the last um minute he was partly tempted and partly threatened by
Vladimir Putin not to sign Moscow makes it very clear that if Ukraine goes down this path there’ll be consequences and yanukovich because he is well disposed towards Moscow panics and he basically along with some others in his uh Circle pulls back Ukraine’s bid from and this Sparks off a whole series of protests
This becomes known as the Euro maidan Revolution or protests because it’s in favor of joining the European Union and there are European Union Flags waving everywhere this is however also seen as an expression of national self-determination and sentiment because ukrainians are voluntarily wanting to join the European Union this isn’t you
Know being being forced in anywhere this isn’t being subjugated this isn’t being for forced into a block like the Eurasian economic Union or before that the Commonwealth of independent states dominated by Russia often Victor Yanov videos show angry crowds at the maiden Square expressing their rage ever more emphatically against Victor yanukovich’s drastic decision The increasingly violent measures used to suppress demonstrators raised questions about who was giving the [Applause] Orders do of for Ukraine had clearly become a pawn between Russia and the US with the us trying to influence the opposition in Ukraine An intercepted phone call then caused a diplomatic Scandal uh I don’t think CLE should go into the government I don’t think it’s necessary I don’t think it’s a good idea US ambassador Victoria newand didn’t believe Klitschko was fit to govern and she didn’t believe much in the EU either So that would be great I think to help glue this thing and have the un help glue it and you know the EU uh I don’t have any other independent details about the origin of the YouTube video you’re you’re you’re right this is uh clearly happened overnight and is
Relatively new uh but this is something they’ve been actively promoting posting on tweeting about the reflex of the Russia watcher machine in the west is to say what will Moscow do now and it’s the wrong question it’s been the wrong question for some time where it puts all
Of the momentum all of the decision making in the hands of the Kremlin Ukrainian president yanukovich met his Russian counterpart Putin in the Kremlin in the hope of financial aid from Moscow which was needed to plug a 12 billion Euro whole in the Ukrainian state budget yanukovich could not expect any more
Money from Europe after declining an agreement with the EU this decision have been driving people in Ukraine onto the streets for weeks ladimir Putin it’s it’s really important to understand him uh on a number of levels but one of the ones that that’s critical important to me is
You have to understand him as a career KGB officer we have a KGB officer who’s been the president of Russia for for 20 years and he’s using the tools of a stalinist intelligence officer to run a 21st century country so he sort of built up this you know powerful Kremlin with
Him at the heart of it almost like a modern day Zar Russians don’t need politicians being charged every time you have a politician in charge country going down garbacho great example dreamer populist and a politician person who never served in in a in a state intelligence or military pretty
Much yelon second thing um now they have Putin and the Russians historically they need a war leader the war chief someone who can run the country with the iron feast and who can achieve and make something happened Russia is more designed and built as a Byzantine Empire
You have one guy’s in charch and one guy is pretty much his will and his power he is able to achieve whatever whatever he wants I think um the what we’ve learned from looking at Russian Doctrine and how the Russians have been thinking through what is Modern Warfare uh is that these
Things are all layered and connected um and in the Russian mindset now it is very much information is the critical domain in All Phases of of conflict so whether you’re preparing for something or in an active phase of War um information is always a tool that you’re
Using to try to shape whatever the battlefield is Alina gorova experienced firsthand how the peaceful protests at the maiden Square turned violent she sens that this would not only create International tensions but would also Mark a turning point and not only for Ukraine when uh they started to fight
With the protesters uh we really understand that uh this is the war against probably our future also this is the most important moment that we have to win if we fail uh we will lose our country We Camp or when then [Applause] what do you see here right on the front line is a battle between the elements the protesters are using smoke and fire and the police are using Water For on February 20th around the miden square Sharpshooters had killed almost 100 people victims relatives today suspect that not only were ex-president yanukovich’s special units behind the killings but there were also unknown foreign snipers hunting demonstrators it culminated in a massacre uh uh in which around 100 people died and a mediation
Effort by um uh German French and polish foreign ministers in February 2014 A lot of people came to key from different region of Ukraine I remember that a lot of people gathered um and also my father came my father came I remember during the night and it was like um also a sign you know because I know my father but he came and he said
Uh like other Ukrainian that he disagree that it shouldn’t be in this way this is unfair to beat these students okay you could like uh you could occupy authorities you could uh not could you you could want yeah you want to occupy authorities you want to build your system inside the country but
You couldn’t beat these children Maiden Square remains an important Gathering Place in keev to this day a place of mourning and Remembrance When I was U on the maidan I I had only like a hopes and expectations for the best best future for our country but right now we understand that what kind of the way we should uh go through you know to achieve this EX Russians are trying to achieve their own geopolitical goal they just can’t allow Ukraine to leave Russian zone of influence they can’t let Ukraine be part of NATO or join the European Union because they do consider Ukraine as a pretty much a Russian um backyard in this case if you wish again
Unfortunately for Ukraine they have a really huge neighbor and all the major countries large countries they are naturally historically really paranoid about their neighbors and Russia is not exceptional in this case let’s imagine that Russia or China this hypothetical scenario put its own military basis or decided to bring Mexico for example into
The bricks or shanhai operation group or decided to put the military installations all around the Mexico how quick United States will react on that you America’s got a whole lot of challenges uh Russia is a regional power that is threatening some of its immediate Neighbors not out of strength but out of weakness Ukraine has been a country in which Russia had enormous influence for decades since the break up of the Soviet Union uh and you we have considerable influence on our neighbors we generally don’t need to made them in order to uh
Have a strong Cooperative relationship with them in March 2014 Russia annexed the Crimean peninsula in southern Ukraine and pro-russian separatists seized the donbas region in the east of the Country The BBC can’t independently verify this footage but video has emerged which appears to show president yanukovich’s Entourage fleeing from his luxurious mansion outside K For In In He was part of the KGB the sword and shield of the Soviet state but even in a role where he was trying to protect the state he was unable to do anything as their state fell apart so you can see there’s a series of events that start to
Make it very clear that Putin and the people around him have got his in for Ukraine one way or another but of course the main turning point is the annexation of Crimea in 2014 Russian President Vladimir Putin casts his shadow across the boundary of Europe and Russia this morning more unidentified Pro Russia
Armed militias patrolling the streets of crimea’s capital heavily armed wearing camouflage uniforms of a Kind known to be issued to the Russian military a platoon of troops deployed this morning around the main airport in Crimea this is Sovereign Ukrainian territory these were not Ukrainian troops despite having removed all identifying marks from their
Uniform that much was certain I tried to ask whether they were from Russia or Ukraine rki orski they simply turn their backs there is this green men as you may recall that show up in Crea and I remember at the time I think I was in Ireland for some
Conference or something but I was sitting in my hotel the only English language non-local Irish TV channel was of course RT English and uh they were covering what was going who are these people what is going on who we do not know what is happening in cria and if
You look back at even real news coverage of that time period of the first few days of the Russian invasion of Crea there was this you know the buying into the deniability we do not know who the men with no insignias are it’s like who else is it going to it’s the Chinese
Like clearly it’s the Russians as many as 20,000 Russian soldiers have been on the move across Kier in the past 24 hours and they have taken over without firing ing a shot and then in the skies above came a flight of Russian military helicopters heading south towards sasta pole flying brazenly in Ukrainian airspace and then very
Quickly rolling into the fake vote for uh Independence and joining Russia so this was all in the period of 3 weeks we’ve been working for the largest Uh Russian internet News website it was huge uh in terms of the audience you could compare it with the national television few weeks before the Crimea
Annexation our editor-in-chief was fired it was it was done because the Kremlin wanted to fire her and the owner you know decided to do it and it was I would say it was part of the preparations of Russia for the Crimean events because normally in Russia before huge historical events the authorities are
Cleaning up the media environment I think you need to be super optimistic if you do media in Russia and also you need to be stupid enough to do media in Russia because if I would if I if I would predict what will happen next I probably wouldn’t choose this way this is a hard
Way to go and you know of course we we understood that it’s it’s not going to be easy Everybody was watching Russia invade and Annex a neighboring country’s territory with no consequences and no one could come up with anything else to do except like wave their arms and maybe some sanctions I can’t even remember when the sanctions were first enacted but no one tried to stop it meeting like this the
G7 made a physical statement and issued a political one too we were Consulting and putting in place the framework the architecture for additional sanctions additional costs should Russia take this next [Applause] Step the mistake was that the West advised Ukraine not to fight uh Ukraine didn’t have a president at the time uh who in Ukraine is commander-in Chief and so Putin was able to uh do an anas of Crimea without having to fire a shot and after that there’s an effort on the part
Of the Russians to spark off uprisings and insurgencies all over Ukraine all over the territory of the South and the hope that donbass will follow the same path as Crimea and uh and join uh with Russia conf Sloans this morning the inhabitants are awakened by the noise of battle this
Man too is at his Wit’s End the skirmishes seem to be escalating into a real Civil War Ukrainian soldiers use helmet cameras to document what happened separatist attacked an army checkpoint and tanks exploded the Army’s combat helicopters came to the resc too late and heavy losses on the side of Fighters loyalty key
Continued the conflict in the east of Ukraine has been marked by armed fighting and bloody confrontations Alina gorova has been filming the everyday life of the people here for 10 years an everyday life stained by War in summer we decided uh to go to dbas and to film there what’s going on we
Filmed farmers who are growing some food and what’s going on with them right now I realized that it’s another War because I was in Don Basi in TW from 2014 it even this war sounds in another way I mean weapon another weapons another type another like amount of Weapons the war zones in the East and the capital of Ukraine have long felt like Worlds Apart since February 2022 however the war has come to Ke clearly after Putin took the dbas region and he took Crimea after 2014 there was some diplomatic Talk Amongst Europeans and ukrainians to try to make some sort of agreement to at least ceasefire and stop the fighting but I think this is part of naive of the West
Is assuming that you can actually make an agreement with Vladimir Putin a diplomatic agreement with Vladimir Putin is something that is just a way station on getting to where he wants to go I was surprised that Russians didn’t go into Ukraine at this moment because most
Likely West won’t be able to resist and do anything and Ukrainian military forces were not prepared our country was extremely divided and back in the day lots of ukrainians were pretty much neutral pro- Russian in this case especially south and east so I was really surprised why it didn’t happen so
It already was let’s use word strange and fishy why they didn’t do it I recall my last um meeting with Sergey lavro in 2014 uh with um Frank valter steinm who is now president of Germany um which was already after the annexation of Crimea uh and uh we were trying to
Persuade him look this this will not stand this will this is a mistake we can help you to get out of it and I was telling him look if you take on the west like the Soviet Union did you will lose the European Union and the United States together are 18 times bigger
Economically than Russia you can’t win this I think Sergey lavro understood the question in my mind is whether he had the courage to to to put put such arguments to President Putin and I doubt that in June 2014 billionaire chocolate producer Petro poroshenko won the election in the first round and became
Ukraine’s president-elect penka is oligarch himself right people been saying we’re standing to get rid of all the oligarchs out of our political system in Ukraine this good idea great idea actually I really don’t like them to um when porosenka became president it was kind of strange feeling that okay
You guys been standing for let’s get rid of all the oligarchs and now you you elected the oligarch as a president so what’s the Difference I’m Christiana poor in Brussels tonight something has changed with poroshenko’s election and with the stakes Sky High for the entire region I sat down with him to ask whether he’s the one to deal with Vladimir Putin if it would be some negative economic reaction of uh uh President Putin
Unfortunately this is possible even not taking to account that in Normandy president promised not to undertake these steps For It was a very onesided set of agreements in which really Russia was trying to use European powers particularly the Germans and the French to hold Ukraine accountable to whatever it was that Russia wanted to see implemented and to actually uh make it impossible for Ukraine to be able to
Take back any of the uh territory that it had lost to Russia in the course of those battles in the donbas region the main issue was Western economic interests especially the thirst for gas bought cheaply from Russia the Minsk agreements froze the conflict in Putin’s favor at least for the time Being [Applause] I think what we’ve seen with Minsk one and and two is that they were always just meant as as a means for Vladimir Putin to sort of hold serve until he can attack again to restore Security in the disputed territories the Ukrainian president proposed an international peacekeeping operation in accordance
With a mandate from the world Security Council many doubted however that weapons would remain silent after the Ukrainian Army withdrew And the French and the Germans and you know some other of the European uh Powers were very concerned about their own long-term relationships with Russia many European countries have very complex and complicated historical as well as more contemporary relationships with Russia certainly for Germany they had invested an enormous amount of political Capital
By various different German political parties in trying to reconcile with Russia because of what had happened in World War II there was a lot of guilt in German political circles about um not just the invasion of Poland and the rest of Europe but what had actually happened in the Soviet
Union well there are people who did notice that Putin was Waging War on us in uh the propaganda field he was sending uh death squads to Britain to Berlin to kill his opponents uh he was building northstream many many people and countries noticed and uh we wared warned our German friends repeatedly I
Did it myself on every occasion so it’s a little surprising that they didn’t know well there is an explanation for why uh Germany wasn’t listening to our warnings uh namely Greed the that’s the former German chancellor has been working for years with a subsidiary of Russian state-owned oil firm gazprom has a close relationship with Russian President Vladimir Putin Putin was using these economic relations to try to benefit Russian Behavior to benefit uh the Kremlin and and sort of
To weaken the West a good example of this is former Chancellor schroer you know he’s been put on the board of of large oil companies he’s been FedEd by Putin as somebody like oh you can help us build this relationship between the two countries all politicians you know
Maybe when it’s their chance to make some money think this is a a great idea and Putin as an intelligence officer understands that by using those relationships by using money he can get his hooks into people there’s a term for this among academics is called Elite
Capture it’s sort of trying to to use money in relationships to get people to serve your needs he’s been spending money like a like a drunken sailor around Europe and United States hoping to take advantage of these relationships when he needs them so I was living with
Sergey Sergey at the time was a senator for an area called tuver which is north of Mongolia he was having contact with Putin obviously all the time and he had to go to these meeting you know they had these big Senate meetings Putin was there and and I saw this s of weird
Energy where it’s almost like a caricature of a sort of Mafia film you know like the Godfather or something these people are just from what I saw brutal they don’t have empathy they don’t have normal human values they don’t respect each other they’re absolutely ruthless you know he was already a dictator then
And everybody was bowing down to him and frightened of Him G we regarded the entire northstream investment as pure geopolitics there was never any shortage and still isn’t any shortage of gas pipeline capacity between Russia and Germany so the only thing that nordstream was achieving was for Russia to be able to pump gas directly to Germany bypassing Ukraine Slovakia Czech Republic and Poland
Gabri For for for This war is not only being waged in Ukraine the internet has long since become a Battlefield 2 where Russia has also been particularly active we have exclusive new information tonight about an attack on the Pentagon by Russian hackers National Security correspondent David Martin has learned how last year they seized the email
System used by the nation’s top Military Officers the attack which officials now blame on Russia began with 30,000 emails sent to a West Coast University of those 30,000 four were forwarded to members of The Joint staff and one was opened allowing the hackers in since it was an
Unclassified Network the attack had no real intelligence value they’ve used these domains and tools so well the Russian goons uh to create this perception of Russian power in this new era that has really provided them security for what they have been doing for the last 15 years years I think that Putin’s war
Against journalism started when he first became a president he felt humiliated by journalists he didn’t look strong as he wanted to be 20 years ago the television was the most powerful instrument you could only have in Russia to have these political control and um I think it was
Another turning point when they realized that internet is also has to be strongly controlled by the government and in few years in next few years they actually took all the internet in fact I think the political Warfare was going on for for years already the attack on us elections in
2016 was a form of political Warfare about as as provocative as you can get the problem with with with rt and um and other International part of Russian propaganda is the fact that they are manipulating facts they are lying directly into your face you know there are examples from other countries and it
It’s not necessarily Putin who does that like Fox News uh probably is the biggest and the most you know popular example when people are doing something that looks like journalism and people consume it like like it’s journalism but it’s not journalism this is the problem I Donald John Trump do solemnly
Swear US president Trump and Russian President Putin seem to have sympathy for each other with Trump obviously trusting Putin all I can do is ask the question my people came to me Dan coats came to me and some others they said they think it’s Russia uh I have uh President Putin uh he just said it’s not Russia so I have great confidence in my intelligence
People but uh I will tell you that president Putin was extremely strong and powerful in his denial today and what he did is an incredible offer he offered to have the people working on the case come and work with their investigators with respect to the 12 people I think that’s
An incredible off well Trump saw in Putin a strongman leader the kind of leader he actually aspired to be and Putin would help to seed out the idea and encourage ideas that Ukraine rather than Russia had interfered in the 2016 election Trump was so narcissistic that
It was very easy to flatter him and Putin also knew that Trump knew very little uh not just about American history but about obviously about Russian and Ukrainian history and so Putin could quite easily convince Trump and sometimes didn’t even have to convince him that
Russia was in the right Trump was a fan a fanboy of Vladimir Putin so in terms of the strategy documents I uh authored uh a lot of them were geared towards deterring Russia uh averting a uh a war uh that I saw was uh was on the horizon
Either with with Russia or with NATO that was the whole purpose of of the strategy documents to to avoid this outcome to um constrain Russia’s Behavior to redirect them it to be less of a malign actor so ultimately obviously I failed you know tragically in that regard
The war in Central Europe still seemed far away for many meanwhile thousands of people were falling victim to the fighting in eastern Ukraine I was invited to film uh uh some short documentaries this film invisible Battalion is about the female soldiers in Ukrainian Army I thought that it will about heroic person but when I met aana yakubova in reality in KF I realized during the meeting that she has post-traumatic stress disorder
She could tell her story because we had this social problem because the war started unexpectedly and uh we hadn’t we didn’t have any wordss during long period of time to we had no like um impression or understanding that the soldiers uh came back with post-traumatic stress disorder of course you
Understand it you understand as a person but you don’t have this experience and the country uh as a country as a society we we didn’t have any experience of this one thing that Ukraine had going for which I think aot surprised a lot of people and how successful they’ve been
Taking on the Russians is Ukraine lived in the Soviet Union they lived with Russians they speak Russian they understand the Russian mindset and so this constant effort of the Russians to to undermine them and use Cyber attack and use lies and disinformation and propaganda so they were able to use that
Sort of as as a weapon to push back against the Russians more effectively than we have in the west disinformation is not always false information but I think what was so interesting is for the eight years between 2014 and 2022 how much that Narrative of the
Ukrainian nais and the far right and the influence of the far right in Ukraine really just tumbled around and ched and churned and churned and did have a ton of influence in real systems in the United States there were a bunch of congressmen and congresswomen who are
Not idiots who uh sponsored a bill basically saying we should stop funding Ukraine and our military support for Ukraine The For when I was growing up I I had this antipathy towards Ukraine I in certain ways bought into the propaganda because I didn’t know enough that it was the ukrainians that were involved in conducting the the pgms Deep anti-Semitism of the of the Ukrainian Jewish population and I turns out that’s
Not true the Russians were often times pulling the strings uh equally bad sometimes worse than the ukrainians and what’s fascinating as I’ve worked on this area is I’ve discovered how far the Ukrainian Society has come in terms of embracing the Jewish population one of the the the most you know kind of
Powerful examples is that when president zilinski became president of Ukraine in [Applause] 2019 actor and comedian Vladimir zalinski became the new president of Ukraine at the age of just 41 I think his rise to power as a comedian uh but really known from his roles on TV shows and in his silly YouTube acts and whatever so his whole team were sort of people that came out of this universe of Ukraine’s very sophisticated media environment um but
They had a good understanding of being Zippy on social media and and sort of how to message directly but they were really kind of just silly uh and I think if you had asked most people myself included a year before the war is this
The guy you’d want to go into a war with you would have been like no like he’s kind of young and he doesn’t have any grown-ups around Him but um I think to his credit I think he understood that which was as an actor I need to be the president and he convinced himself to be the president and what you see now is very authentic it is who he is it is who he has become
Well this was one of Putin’s great mistakes he underestimated his adversary he probably saw those uh uh Clips videos of President zalinski singing and dancing and thought uh I can rail this guy he fundamentally underestimates the power of democracy to Rally around one of the advantages that
Ukraine turned out to have is that the Russians often look down on them and underestimated them they almost see them as as little brothers who automatically should be trying to sort of you know ask for Russian help and that and and you know work with the Russians the mindset
That Putin has about you know maintaining power state power at all costs you know using the Monopoly of violence to maintain the maintain the the Integrity of the state these are all things that that that were part and parcel of the Soviet intelligence Services there is the publication of an essay about Ukraine in uh 2021 that Putin writes in his covid isolation he’d already written something similar 201 2012 Ukraine becomes a fixation for a 10-year period but I think everybody was telling themselves that oh no this is just about these specific uh sets of
Disputes and so in the terms of uh being foretold all the signs were there time and again Putin voiced territorial claims to Ukraine until the violence Escalated it so essentially Putin thinks that there is no such thing not just as the Ukraine as a country is the Ukrainian country but there are no Ukrainian people that if for example Ukraine was originally a native Russian speaker that means that they are a Russian I don’t think Putin
Deceived anyone as a matter of fact he was pretty transparent uh he all but signaled that war was coming when he wrote his his um you know Manifesto in the summer of 2021 about the illegitimacy and the right of um Ukraine to exist and then he put 15 160,000 troops on NATO’s border
And refused to negotiate so there was no mistaking it the problem is that too many analysts thought it was it was a bluff Kiv is Ukraine glory to Ukraine Russian troops and ships muster on land and at Sea and few places in Ukraine feel more vulnerable than kak here is only 30 m from the Russian border it’s a city of about a million and a half people at least 75% of them
Speak Russian as a mother tongue demonstrations like this are important CU this City could be one of the first to get attacked in the event of an invasion vamir zalinski the president has warned as much and US officials are saying that Vladimir Putin could order an attack at any Time for me for Russia launches a fullscale attack on Ukraine from multiple directions Ukrainian CCTV captures these images of the Russian military crossing the border from Crimea to the South Early in the Morning are warning the people of ke of War during the first day of the war we didn’t realize what’s going on we were prepared in some way we packed our stuff so we were ready and my friends woke me up and say Alina stand
Up and I already knew in the morning around 5: or six I already knew what happened because of course I think like every body was waiting in some way for this moment of course we had this messages from USA from Europe and you know I have seen that how many
Politicians also from Germany yeah how much time they came to Russia and again to Ukraine then to Europe I had this feeling like intuition that everything is very bad and when they stopped to do this it was a feeling that nobody could help us so this is
How people are leaving in on the Metro station and they’re using like shter in the midst of the shock of the Russian invasion Alina gorova did what she had done at the miden protest and in Dumas she documented the events with her camera uh hello everyone I see the process of the
Evacuation uh from the little towns little cities uh around ke and we we we could see uh how it looks like this is a very very important place to see how the war crimes look like because uh I call it like the cemetery of the cars all these cars are civilians
Uh people are tried to evacuate uh with their families uh from bua baranka and as you could see these cars were [Applause] destroyed With her camera woman Christina Ina liag goop Alina gorova is giving a voice to her country she and others of her generation want to show what war Means and a lot of people tried to evacuate here under the bridge there was big crowd of people who tried to rescue from arine in arpine a lot of people died I think that it will stay in some way this Memorial and I think that it’s also like one of the symbols of Resistance you know before the invasion of Ukraine in February 201 22 there was this very long period of signaling especially coming from us uh National Security entities that we were seeing this was coming that we saw what was happening that we knew what was going to happen um and what’s so frustrating
About that of course is we didn’t do anything to stop it uh because we were stuck in this narrative that we have believed for too long of Russian power and this idea that you know Russia was going to sweep across Ukraine and take keev in 3 days and it would all be over
So like why bother doing anything about it I mean we were in that mindset until like the fifth day of the war which is just unexcusable we are the only country in the in the European Union and in NATO which is a neighbor of both Russia and Ukraine so two of our important
Neighbors were at War uh one uh invaded the other um for us it’s very simple if Putin were to conquer Ukraine without resistance he would come for us next hello everyone right now I’m staying in ke in Ukraine so hello from the hell they’re bombing us they’re killing us
They monsters and we should stop it we should stop it it’s our mission and I thought that we are alone but right now I see that we are not alone we are all together with you he and we could we should give an answer but please understand me right these
People know only the language of the violence and power I think the ukrainians really learned that lesson from 2014 when the eurom maidon protest started at the end of 2013 and then into early 14 at the time most most of Ukraine was still Russian social media based they were all
On VK and on nolas Niki and these other platforms that aren’t really used anymore for us and they realized early like nobody’s seeing what we’re doing we need to get on Facebook we need to get on Twitter we need to get on YouTube like people need to see our stuff and
The way that Ukrainian media networks have really United to amplify the truth of what’s happening in the war the truth of what’s happening to ukrainians the stories of The ukrainians Who are fighting this War and what they’re sacrificing and what it looks like in a way that is so sophisticated and so
Like informal in many respects they just all understand if we don’t do this nobody else will we Witnesses all these awful crimes because of social Med media we have seen a lot of deaths we could receive all this very quick way I think that all ukrainians went through
All these events Al together because of social Media I actually was surprised how delinsky took it I was not expecting this from him I can’t call him a hero because he’s pretty much doing the job which any leader is supposed to do and uh respect to him because he has gots to do this job which be question how other leaders
Can they do the same thing in this type of circumstances I can’t see any one I don’t want to bring this but I don’t see anyone in Europe can do this job as he’s doing right now [Applause] CL for for it’s the most horrible evil tragic tragic thing you know for Ukraine and also for Russia it’s really horrific for Russia I have been going to Russia since 1992 and I’ve seen that ostensibly it’s become more Western capitalist Moscow has a very sophisticated life you know incredible restaurants new businesses I
See my friends running businesses and I suppose I ignored the bad bits and I hope that you know it just was getting better you know we hear such different things like 75% are pro the War I mean it’s very very difficult to assess but a friend of mine from Moscow came you know
All her Circle she comes from the sort of artistic intelligence and she’s all her friends are anti but they’re too scared they can’t talk you know they’re traveling in Europe but still they are too scared to say anything because they they literally will go to prison why
Putin is so strong because he has two most important tools he has violence in one hand and he has propaganda in the other hand and just these two strong tools give him a lot of power within the country even even after 21th of February though a lot of people including myself
Predicted that it’s not going to be possible for him to keep you know to keep power after starting the war with Ukraine this is something Beyond any logic this is something Beyond any moral you know like they had the plan that they will win uh in like two days but we
Have a lot of forces a lot of weapons thanks to European union and other countries we have a real like real strong condition of our mind I don’t want to live in Poland in Germany I really love these countries I really love the people but we have our own home
We have our own Country Alina gorova still lives in keev and has continued to work on her documentary about the effects of the war in her [Applause] Country it’s important to show also to ukrainians to our military forces that we are united with them and we are supporting them and I thought also that it’s important to show them to these people who are ready to fight uh because I could I couldn’t fight it’s true it’s
Important to show them that we are staying old Min uh so yes we’re here we stay in K I’m standing in K I’m planning to do it I think it’s very important uh people are trying to protect every street every meter every kilometer of our country of our land [Applause] I you know we read 75,000 soldiers are dead and these 75,000 soldiers are from Siberia from you know very poor regions and when you look at them they are not ethnically Russian they don’t even have Russian names they’ve not really nothing to do with Russia and it’s very like
Stalin who you know FW through hordes of Turk men’s into Stalingrad and just as Canon fed to slaughter them this I find very very sad because these poor families you know they don’t have the internet all they hear is what they hear on television and these spoiled families
From Moscow none of their children none of their children are conscripted or go and yet they you know often support the war this is the beginning of something else in fact we’re well into the beginning of something else because the war most definitely started in 2014 with
The annexation of primier but we can go back to all of the signs that Russia was on this path before and this conflict will set a precedent for anywhere else in the world where countries have designs on their neighbors territory or what other countries think that might
Makes right and the more powerful you are if you have nuclear weapons or you have the bigger Army you can force your neighbor uh into giving something up Territory Resources sovereignty this kind of thing my hope for Russia is obviously that they remove Putin um but
Then you know even if they remove Putin I’m worried who would be the next leader you know Vladimir Putin who would have wanted to have you know a weak NATO a weak West Americans out of Europe and Ukraine completely subservient and focused on on Russia he’s essentially
Created just the opposite I think this is a strategic mistake of of you know huge calculation for Vladimir Putin today the euromid protests of 2013 seem to be far in the past but the Young Generation has not yet given up their hopes for a fresh start in Ukraine I really hope that this
Experience that we had and that we have right now that we could transform to the energy I really would like to see uh this in our country trans form all this experience to the energy to move forward I believe that it’s Possible Sh
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Video “War in Ukraine | DW Documentary” was uploaded on 02/17/2024 by DW Documentary Youtube channel.