The installation of the coup regime in Kiev prompted resistance from Crimea and eastern Ukraine where Yanukovych had his electoral base. The Crimean parliament hastily arranged a referendum on secession and the official results showed 96 percent of the voters favoring rejoining Russia, an annexation which rapidly followed.
Pro-Russian demonstrators also rose up in eastern Ukraine seeking either a federalized state granting their regions substantial autonomy or a referendum on breaking away from western Ukraine and joining Russia.
However, Kerry, along with virtually the entire U.S. news media and officialdom, has presented the Ukrainian narrative as simply a case of Russia plotting to seize territory and acting as outside agitators to stir up the otherwise happy Ukrainian population. Yet, as with the Syrian sarin case, there has been a problem with actual evidence.
Last week, at a Geneva conference called to reduce tensions in Ukraine, Kerry instead exacerbated them with a claim about pro-Russian demonstrators in eastern Ukraine threatening local Jews.
"Just in the last couple of days, notices were sent to Jews in one city indicating that they had to identify themselves as Jews. And obviously, the accompanying threat implied is -- or threatened -- or suffer the consequences, one way or the other," Kerry said.
However, in the days before Kerry spoke, the distribution of those leaflets in Donetsk had already been denounced as a black-propaganda hoax designed to discredit the pro-Russian protesters. Among those denying the legitimacy of the fliers was Denis Pushilin, the person whose name was signed at the bottom. He termed the fliers a "provocation" concocted by pro-coup operatives.
Although the authenticity of the fliers already had been publicly disputed, Kerry still cited them, without noting the denials about their authorship. He seemed to be back on message, using whatever gasoline he could throw on the fire.
Then, there was the case of Kerry's State Department palming off photos to the New York Times that supposedly showed Russian soldiers "clearly" in Russia and then later in towns in eastern Ukraine. However, it soon turned out that a key photo, purportedly snapped in Russia, was actually taken in Ukraine, destroying the principal claim of the photo spread. [See Consortiumnews.com's "NYT Retracts Russian Photo Scoop."]
Sticking to His Story
Despite that embarrassment, Kerry still cited these photos in his April 24 speech as proof that Russian special forces were operating inside Ukraine. "Some of the individual special operations personnel, who were active on Russia's behalf in Chechnya, Georgia, and Crimea have been photographed in Slovyansk, Donetsk, and Luhansk," he declared.
Much of the rest of Kerry's tough talk also should be placed in the context of his now tattered credibility. As with his Aug. 30 call to arms against Syria, Kerry cited information that was either in serious dispute or couldn't be verified independently.
But there was also a bombastic propagandistic tone to almost everything coming out of his mouth, an arrogance that some of us are old enough to remember in the days of the Vietnam War when the U.S. side always wore "white hats" and the other side always wore "black hats."
In the Ukraine context, of course, the neo-Nazi brown shirts who spearheaded the coup on Feb. 22 have been thoroughly whitewashed from the acceptable U.S. media/government narrative. The overthrow of a democratically elected president has been rehabilitated as a "pro-democracy" exercise. Yanukovych's supporters in eastern Ukraine who are resisting the imposition of authority by the coup regime in Kiev are now dubbed "terrorists."
And, for good measure, Kerry sneered: "Russia is actually mystified to see Ukraine's neighbors and likeminded free people all over the world united with Ukrainians who want to build a better life and choose their leaders for themselves, by themselves."
Much as we were told that no one should question the secret U.S. evidence on the Syrian chemical incident, Kerry continued...
"Nobody should doubt Russia's hand in this...."Our intelligence community tells me that Russia's intelligence and military intelligence services and special operators are playing an active role in destabilizing eastern Ukraine with personnel, weapons, money, operational planning, and coordination. The Ukrainians have intercepted and publicized command-and-control conversations from known Russian agents with their separatist clients in Ukraine. "And we've seen weapons and gear on the separatists that matches those worn and used by Russian special forces."
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