...under threat of lethal violence. Their offices/residences were assaulted soon after they fled. Many people were murdered during the "protests". Is a "coup" really determined by whether the overthrown leader is nimble enough to evade arrest/murder?
> Giving her support of a particular candidate is not "orchestrating" any coup.
Please, let's be real. If Lavrov were caught saying things like "Trump should be President over Desantis. Let's keep Desantis out of government for now. Also let's be discreet about this. Putin is on board." and then all of that actually happened, like Desantis dropped out and endorsed Trump, what do you think the American reaction would be?
Some Americans even believe that something like this happened in 2016 ("Russiagate conspiracy theory"), but there is scant evidence to support it. In reality, Trump was impeached over far less evidence.
We can debate semantics over the preferred definition of coup, but the bottom line is there was extraordinarily blatant foreign interference in Ukraine's democratic process, and the US government clearly played a central role and achieved their goals.
I can see how it can be called a coup because of the protesters' violence and arguing that difference is pretty pedantic so I have no problem with that.
The main point I was making was in response to you confidently claiming Nuland orchestrated the coup. I don't think the call shows evidence of that. They only talk about coordinating their support for a candidate.
> If Lavrov were caught saying things like "Trump should be President over Desantis. Let's keep Desantis out of government for now. Also let's be discreet about this. Putin is on board." and then all of that actually happened, like Desantis dropped out and endorsed Trump, what do you think the American reaction would be?
If DeSantis dropped out because of Putin, it would be Russian influence again but on another level. Going to war level. DeSantis and Trump would be traitors and Russian co-conspirators, but I'm not sure if it would be a coup. Although I'm sure some would say that, the fact he was voted in would remain.
There is something to be said for manipulating the electoral process to a degree where it can't be called democratic, such as the situation in Russia at the moment where Putin's potential electoral opponents are jailed, killed, scared off, or oppressed to the point there is no other viable candidate to choose. So yes, I'd say there is a point where manipulating the democratic process prevents it from being fair and is unlawful and it could be considered a coup in that scenario, but I don't think the US meets that threshold here. Would you call every other leader selection process where the US has given their support for a candidate a coup? I agree it is wrong and shouldn't be done, but do you really think it qualifies as a coup?
The US caused a coup in Panama when it bombed their infrastructure, invaded, and took their leader under arrest. The US caused a coup in Iraq when it invaded. The US caused a coup in Iran when it staged riots, paid off journalists, and paid off generals resulting in a change of leadership. There are many more examples of this, but all that was shown here was Nuland coordinated US support for a candidate. That's not enough.
You said the US orchestrated the coup so confidently and absolutely as if it was another one of these scenarios. It was a call for coordinating and exercising the US' influence on Ukraine. Not a coup though.
> We can debate semantics over the preferred definition of coup, but the bottom line is there was extraordinarily blatant foreign interference in Ukraine's democratic process, and the US government clearly played a central role and achieved their goals.
Unfortunately semantics is where we have gone. The call does not show the US orchestrated any coup. That's a significant mischaracterization. Influenced? Yes. Interfered with? By talking to their politicians, probably. Orchestrated the overthrow of their government? No.
I could definitely see the US actually being behind the coup though. They've shamelessly done it countless times throughout history. It's just nothing out there so far is evidence of it.
> Would you call every other leader selection process where the US has given their support for a candidate a coup?
That's clearly a mischaracterization of what happened in Ukraine. Yes, Washington declared its support for the opposition in Ukraine. It also:
- bragged about spending $5 billion funding the opposition over preceding years.
- participated closely in the Yalta European Solution for decades, which was a forum for Washington power brokers + Ukrainian oligarchs.
- endorsed the overthrow of Yanukovych (i.e. by not demanding his democratic government was restored, which e.g. Washington did in Niger recently).
- and so on
It was a coup. It was primarily achieved through covert action, which by definition avoids yielding smoking guns that would cater to your personal, precise, technical definition of "coup", but given the totality of the circumstances we can only conclude that it was a coup.
> It was a coup. It was primarily achieved through covert action, which by definition avoids yielding smoking guns that would cater to your personal, precise, technical definition of "coup", but given the totality of the circumstances we can only conclude that it was a coup.
What it seems like is that there isn't much evidence or sources. Anyone could claim anything was achieved through primary covert action and has not yielded any smoking guns or real evidence.
I could claim that all the coup hubbub was started by Russia as an attempt to ferment a civil war in Ukraine as a pretext for invading as achieved through covert action.
And when that failed they used there 'little green men' to start the civil war instead.
Exactly. There is no real evidence, so we can't conclude one way or another. A lot of people are treating the Nuland call like a smoking gun, but it isn't one.
...under threat of lethal violence. Their offices/residences were assaulted soon after they fled. Many people were murdered during the "protests". Is a "coup" really determined by whether the overthrown leader is nimble enough to evade arrest/murder?
> Giving her support of a particular candidate is not "orchestrating" any coup.
Please, let's be real. If Lavrov were caught saying things like "Trump should be President over Desantis. Let's keep Desantis out of government for now. Also let's be discreet about this. Putin is on board." and then all of that actually happened, like Desantis dropped out and endorsed Trump, what do you think the American reaction would be?
Some Americans even believe that something like this happened in 2016 ("Russiagate conspiracy theory"), but there is scant evidence to support it. In reality, Trump was impeached over far less evidence.
We can debate semantics over the preferred definition of coup, but the bottom line is there was extraordinarily blatant foreign interference in Ukraine's democratic process, and the US government clearly played a central role and achieved their goals.