I’ve read the Russian pilots were a game changer in Korea. They challenged US pilots.
It would be similar to US pilots flying jets in Ukraine. Putin’s reaction might be different from Truman.
This article, by a world-class expert on airpower, has been posted before. He explains why that would be a bad idea.
Well, that is a bit of a muddle. White Russians are from White Russia, which is, it is right there in the name, Belarus (“belii” is the Russian word “white”). Cossacks, on the other hand, are from, you guessed it, Kazakstan. Belarus borders on Poland and the Balkans, Kazakstan borders on China and the Caspian puddle.
I mean, when I was much younger, I would have had no idea that it made no sense (both of those countries were part of the Soviet Union), but it is good to learn of different peoples and their cultures – and, you know, try to respect them, within reason.
Ukraine also has a certain amount of Cossack heritage. It’s even mentioned in the Ukraine national anthem.
White Russian is also used to describe the anti-communist faction in the Russian Civil War, as well as the émigrés who left Russia following the red communist victory. It’s also a cocktail.
The Cossacks originated in Ukraine:
In the context of JaneDoe42’s story, Belarusian Cossacks is plausible.
Same root, different origin. The Kazakhs originated in a political fission from the Uzbeks in the 15th century, with a mobile pastoral section of that state fucking off for new horizons. The Cossacks formed from what was eventually a polyglot admixture of people in the border country between firm Lithuanian control and the Crimean Khanate. Likely they first started as autonomous Turkic mercenary borderers established in a chain of fortifications on the right bank of the Dnieper built after 1412 by the expanding Lithuanians.
As noted some Cossacks were a major component of the anti-Bolshevik White Movement - as with the Don Army. It was drawn substantially from Don Cossacks from, you guessed it, the modern day disputed Donbas region.
All things old are eventually new again 
. I just knew I had talked about this before:
Her story, or rather, her father’s story, is that he was involved in infantry combat with Russian soldiers during the Korean War.
At first I didn’t believe it - I assumed she meant that he had fought against Russians, i.e. Soviets, in Korea, which as far as I know did not happen. But as I thought about it, maybe she’s saying her father fought alongside “White Russians”, not under the flag of Russia but perhaps one of the European countries that sent troops to that conflict? France, for instance, which is listed as one of the allies of the South Korean/US side during the Korean War, may have had Russian emigres with anti-Communist leanings in its Foreign Legion, or some White Russian troops may have volunteered to serve South Korea directly. This is all speculation on my part, but it doesn’t seem that implausible.
Great post!
Yeah, it looks like it was just aircraft pilots that were directly participating from the Soviets.
There was an HMS Cossack involved in the Korean War, though.
The “white Russian Cossacks” could also have been in the US Army as sons of white Russian émigrés.
Caucasians, at least historically, do not all necessarily love Russia so much. Millions of people were wiped out in the 19th-century Caucasian Wars, for instance.
Well said, and worth repeating. I completely agree. For the millions of Ukrainians in Canada, the US, and elsewhere, if their parents or grandparents had not made the courageous decision to emigrate to the New World in pursuit of a better life, that would be them.
Really excellent and balanced video analysing the current situation in detail, including China and the larger picture. Worth watching.
Ukraine say they have retaken Makariv, west of Kyiv.
This is not a matter of other people forcing the Ukrainians to fight - they’re choosing to do that of their own accord. If the Ukrainians want to keep fighting who are we to tell them to stop? This whole shit-show started over whether or not Ukraine should be a sovereign nation.
Consider that we’re seeing what those “seemingly-pointless wars” look like from the other side.
The concessions Putin is asking for means Ukraine will no longer exist as a nation and its leader will be subjected to summary execution or maybe show trials then execution. Putin really shows zero signs he wants to negotiate and it takes two parties to make peace.
A long, protracted struggle - just like in Iraq and Afghanistan.
That’s because diplomacy doesn’t sell cornflakes as well - people in a room talking or even arguing is not as eye-catching or dramatic as dead bodies and shattered buildings.
Also, diplomacy has failed in this case. The Russians have not been serious about negotiating an end to this and without Russia wanting peace there will be no peace.
Also, some sorts of negotiating and diplomacy need privacy. That doesn’t jibe well with current calls for transparency in government, I know, but the last thing delicate negotiations need is the media and the public taking sound bites out of context and whipping up a frenzy.
Eventually, Russia will simply not be able to continue bleeding blood and treasure. Or maybe Putin will be deposed from within. No war lasts forever, it just seems that way.
Since a lot of people are convinced they would die instantly in a nuclear exchange (and not a few of them are likely absolutely correct in that assessment) they won’t have to worry about the consequences or how the world looks afterward.
The people being slaughtered look like us. By “us” I mean the majority of the people in Europe and the US.
A cynical position I know, and not one I personally agree with, but I think it’s the reality.
Actually, my bet is still on Moldova as the next target and not a NATO country.
That said - based on how things are going in Ukraine I don’t think Putin would be able to invade another country right now. Certainly not a NATO one.
I had a brief flash of a baba clubbing him to death with mop and then stuffing his mouth with sunflower seeds. My mind is going in weird places lately.
If Putin thinks he can open up another front in the far east then his cheese really has slid off his cracker.
My interpretation is that they’re recalling people who have already been conscripted for a year of active duty in past twice-a-year campaigns.
From the article:
While I agree with this, I also believe that in addition, they live like us and live near us. Though equally horrible I can’t easily imagine living in Syria and being bombed into ruins and fleeing across the Med.
On the other hand, I can extremely easily relate to what I see going on in Ukraine, to the point that it’s not hard for me to mentally convert a ruined Ukrainian city into a ruined Montreal with thousands of refugees trying to escape by picking their way through the ruins of the Turcot exchange.
IMHO this is only a small part of the reason why Ukraine is different.
That they live like us is the bigger part. Ukraine was a western country, in the sense of being both a democracy and having a developed economy. With Ukraine the choice is between a western lifestyle vs. living in a totalitarian dictatorship. Yes, that was a very recent development with the toppling of Yanukovich and election of Zelenzky. Still, despite their democracy being less than a decade old, they had finally achieved it.
In those other countries the choices were / are between theocracy, anarchy, totalitarian dictatorship, or multiple small dictatorships (warlords) fighting against each other. Western style democracy wasn’t an option due to the people rejecting that as an option. Just look at Syria as an example. The choice there seems to be to either support Assad, or support some version or another of a fundamentalist Islamic theocracy. Afghanistan is another. When given a chance to vote, they chose a corrupt system. Once that choice was removed, they went back to theocracy.