> No, the original claim was that annexation started before the 21st.

Sorry. Yes. The original claim was that the annexation started before the 21st. Girkin's presence in the Crimea before the 21st (which didn't happen) was supposed to be evidence of that. Much of how to interpret the dates depends to some understanding of territorial sovereignty, and also of course whether Girkin et al should count as active military personnel (we agree yes only on the second).

The other evidence was the metal for the return of the Crimea, but I can not find any source indicated it awarded or existed before February 21st (can you?).

> At that moment it wasn't disputed even by the Kremlin. The "disputing" would come a bit later.

It's status has been disputed in modern history since at least 1991 when Crimea declared itself an independent autonomous state. I would agree that if you believed that the Crimea was not an autonomous state that it was an invasion of Ukraine. Named "Autonomous Republic of Crimea" and recognizing its history it's hard to argue that - and it fact it was the Crimean Parliament (not the Ukrainian Parliament) that was seized. But the issue is of course incredibly complicated and obviously closely guarded and considered by both the Russian Federation and the Ukraine. The jury ("international community"), unfortunately, is one that is led by powers with a direct interest in a result that benefits their objectives.

Bubbling up, though, I want to mention again that while this is an interesting area of international law, it contributes only little to the main deliberation.

> Come on, man. TASS and RT would claim that the Ukrainian military is crucifying infants in Donbass and drinking their blood for breakfast. I'm sorry, I can't trust anything that comes from them about Ukraine. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (mid.ru) is just a propaganda front for the Kremlin.

Could you expound on how the Ministry of Foreign Affairs [1] is a propaganda front for the Kremlin, while the State Department is not a propaganda front for the Executive Branch? (If you were to agree that the State Department was, in fact, a propaganda front - something we could have a very serious and evidenced conversation about - I could understand what you mean. Or maybe I don't understand how the institutions are different [school me]). Similar to what I will write below, propaganda outlets almost always tell some form of the truth (just truth that is beneficial). There's tons of propaganda on both sides. Maybe we could find some nonpartisan criteria for entering in information from sources that have been known to propagandize?

Can you show where TASS or RT have claimed such ridiculous things - the danger here would be putting words into a straw man's mouth. I totally get that TASS and RT run stories that directly benefit Russia and that, like many Western news organizations, spin news for their people. I get that you may not trust it for this reason. But this would be a reason too not to trust many sources I bet you would be willing to enter into the web of evidence to find consistent evidences narratives from.

Regarding RT/TASS: like any good propaganda outlet it needs to use almost exclusively white propaganda - you'll get the same from the Washington Post and Voice of America. In any case, for this particular story its numbers match funding and deployment numbers confirmed later by sources you do trust almost exactly - it would be a kind of strange coincidence for something like that to happen. There's also still the other reporting, for instance from Luders, which you haven't replied to I think need to be called out again lest they disappear into the ASCII tide.

> I'm sorry but that's beside the point. (regarding CSOs)

UNITED and USAID (and Soros, etc) are NOT besides the point and made up the vast majority of the content here. Please do not reply only to the CSO section. The documents all speak quite a bit about funding and cooperation of NGOs. You may consider CSOs another (sister) point that is evidence of Western support of political coup that needs a response of their own, not evidence about NGOs.

The enumeration of NGOs seems to be of interest to you. As I specified in the previous post this would take some time, and may even be a doomed project. Perhaps you would like to help in an enumeration?

[[Because I'm sure the conversation needs this at this point]]

The meta argument (all the way at the top) being made here is whether the West played any significant role in encouraging political disruption and installing leadership that benefited its policy decisions. It may be interesting for both of us to review the branches of argumentation therein and include important pieces of the argument that were silently dropped by the other, and to reform and submit larger arguments where the details have reached a consensus.

I do think the answer is most assuredly yes. I think you may too - though you'll specify that the way it was done was legal or primarily nonviolent. If this is the case, please let me know whether you would still like to continue discussing details and controversial topics, as I am willing to.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ministry_of_Foreign_Affairs_(R...