The war started exactly 10 years ago from today in Odessa

The Ukrainians, the West, the Russian libs, even the Kremlin — they all made up a lot of lies about what happened on May 2nd, 2014, both ten years ago and now.

The political sphere is surprisingly simple and straightforward. Relations between individuals tend to get messy and complicated. Big organizations and states are usually very forthright, even if there are a lot of lies involved.

There's a big city. In that city, there's a powerful pro-Russian movement that gets tens of thousands of people into the streets for pro-Russian rallies, centered around a tent city at Kulikovo Field. You cannot send the police to disperse them: there was a coup d'etat two months ago, power has barely been consolidated, law enforcement is unreliable. It's unclear whether they would even carry out their orders. So, the decision is made to crush the protest movement by “democratic means”.

A train arrives in Odessa. It's full of Kharkov Ultras plus various “Maidan veterans”, equipped with gear, shields, and weapons. Why Kharkov Ultras? Because they were the backbone of the nominally National Socialist street gang that served as mafia enforcers for the guy who became Minister of the Interior after the coup d'etat. Just two weeks before, they shot two people in Kharkov in cold blood. They're reliable, they have street fighting experience, they're ready to kill.

The armed crowd of Banderites marches through the city, then clashes with the weaker Odessa self-defence, who had not yet realized that peaceful politics were over and it's war to the knife now. The Odessans are dispersed, and the local police, who are mostly loyal to their citizens, are prevented from taking action: the governor calls a three-hour all-hands meeting with the city's law enforcement, forcing them to turn off their phones in the midst of the clashes.

Then the Banderites head to Kulikovo Field to carry out their initial task — destroying the protest camp. Why set fire to the Trade Union House? Was it savagery? An accident? No, it's simple — during the Euromaidan, a similar Trade Union House in Kiev also burned down. It housed the headquarters of the Right Sector. The destruction of this building made a huge impression on the Euromaidan protesters. So, in Odessa, they decided to repeat it.

Again, I'll emphasize: people are simple creatures, they do simple things, they follow simple commands. Local firefighters were instructed not to put out the fire, to let it burn, so everyone would see. Dozens of Russian martyrs perished in the flames. Then, for added cinematic effect, they finished off the survivors. They walked up to charred people with broken spines and beat their skulls in. These are the same people who, I repeat, murdered two peaceful protestors in cold blood in Kharkov shortly before that; they simply opened fire from Kalashnikovs out of an office window. It's not strange that they finished off wounded people in Odessa; what's strange is that they hesitated to cut off heads on camera. Later — in the Donbass — after turning into the “Azov Battalion”, they showed that beating a person to death is the very least they're capable of.

So there you have it: naive Russians who thought they'd be allowed their own “Euromaidan”, but pro-Russian, encountered bona fide death squads who were acting according to direct government orders. A week later, in Mariupol, there would be even less pretense: they simply opened fire into a crowd of civilians. None of the members of these death squads were ever punished, and the notion itself is absurd. Punish them for what? They carried out their government's orders, and they did well.

The story is simple: naive, good-hearted Russian city-dwellers face off with Latin America-type death squads. The narrative that arose from this event was full of so many lies: “they set themselves on fire”, “they deserved it”, “you would have done the same”, “if we hadn't burned those teenagers and grannies alive, they would have toppled the government [“just like we did”], “they were all FSB agents”. They lie, they lie, they lie, and the more they lie, the less important it becomes to listen to them.

May 2nd, 2014, is when dialogue became impossible, unless conducted from the barrel of a gun.

May 2nd, 2014, and Russia's shameful inaction afterwards is why God did not grant us an easy victory.

May 2nd, 2014, is when the Ukrainian nation came into existence — those who cheered at the burned bodies, those who joked about “grilled vatniks”, those who made up excuses and lied, lied, lied — they are Ukrainians. That is the only definition of what this particular political identity means. There is no other.

May 2nd, 2014, is why red-blooded Odessans rejoice at missiles striking targets in their own city, and with a mix of glee and grim determination keep sending coordinates to the Russian Armed Forces.

To put it more simply:

May 2nd, 2014, is when the war started.

And it won't end until the Russian flag is raised again at Kulikovo Field in Odessa.