(...) In the spring of 2014, Russia annexed the Ukrainian territory of the Crimean Peninsula, after which a widespread, armed "uprising" began in the eastern regions of Ukraine, during which excellently armed and organised military units, previously unknown to anyone, very quickly took power into their own hands. It was all presented as a "people's uprising". However, in principle, state power is capable of suppressing any separatist revolt, provided that it is not being assisted by an unfriendly state from the outside. The "people" turned out to be armed not with scythes and axes or hunting rifles pulled from a garden shed, but with thoroughly modern weaponry, and dressed in Russian army uniforms without insignia.
As an international scandal erupted, the Kremlin denied any allegations that it had sent its troops into Ukrainian territory – claiming that hostilities were being carried out by local separatists on their own. Moscow dismissed all evidence of a Russian military presence in Ukraine as empty fabrications. In March of that same year, Russian President Vladimir Putin stated at a press conference that uniforms could be bought by anyone at a hunting and fishing gear shop, that the captured Russian soldiers had long since been discharged, and that the "blurry photos" from spy satellites proved nothing. Western diplomats had no answer to such claims.
Exactly the same thing happened 100 years ago, on 6 January 1919, to the Head of the Ukrainian Provisional Government, Volodymyr Chekhivskyi, upon receiving a note from the People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs of Soviet Russia, Georgy Chicherin: "We have received your radiotelegrams of 31 December and 2 and 4 January. (..) There is no army of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic in Ukraine. Hostilities there are taking place between the Directory's troops and the forces of the Ukrainian Soviet government, which are completely independent. At this moment, there are no armed clashes between Ukraine and Soviet Russia."
A similar situation was experienced on 4 December 1939 by the second Secretary-General of the League of Nations, Joseph Avenol, upon receiving a reply from USSR Foreign Minister Vyacheslav Molotov that there was no need to discuss the "Finnish question" internationally because it did not even exist – the USSR was not in a state of war with Finland, but was merely providing brotherly material assistance to the Finnish Democratic Republic in its civil war.
Uses a cartoon by Christopher Weyant from the 17 March 2022 edition of The Boston Globe