The Benny Show - The Killing Fields Of Ukraine Explained

Episode Date: March 5, 2022

On this Special Episode of The Benny Show, We'll Dive into the History of the Nation at the Center of the World's Attention Right Now - Ukraine. Why is it Being Fought Over? What is its Story? On This Episode, We’ll Take You Through Time to Answer Those Questions and More. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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What is Ukraine? What is a Ukraine? And we thought it'd be actually quite interesting in this show to talk about why Ukraine is such a bloody field that has been fought over for generations by some of the most megalomaniacal and evil bloodthirsty regimes in human history. Why? Why is this place so sought after? Why are these fields so stained with the blood of patriots and innocent civilians? A very brief history of what is Ukraine? What is a Ukraine? So let's start off with Ukraine as a nation as it stands today. Ukraine is the second largest European country after Russia, and it has almost 2,000 miles of coastline, making it very easy to trade,

get goods in and out. The landscape of Ukraine consists mostly of coastline, making it very easy to trade, get goods in and out. The landscape of Ukraine consists mostly of fertile plains crisscrossed with rivers. There are tall mountains in Ukraine, and the snow melt from these mountains feeds the rivers and waterfalls. There are significant natural resources in Ukraine, including iron ore, coal, manganese, natural gas, oil, salt, sulfur, graphite, titanium, magnesium, nickel, mercury, timber, and an abundance of farmland. Ukraine is blessed with rich natural resources. And you will see here that it is those resources that have led to the dark history of Ukraine being one of, I would argue, the worst places for you to want to live, certainly throughout the last 100 to 150 years of European history. Perhaps some of the

most fought over land, this side of the Holy Land and Jerusalem. The Greeks, Romans, and Byzantine colonies, thousands of years ago, set up trade routes throughout Ukraine using its shores. Ukraine was the center of the first Slavic state called the Kievan Rus. This was the largest and most powerful state in Europe in the 10th and 11th centuries. So Ukraine has a very long history in Europe and has a very proud history in Europe as a people. Mongol invasions and civil war weakened this empire, the Kievan Rus, and it was eventually incorporated into the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. The culture and religious legacy of the Kievan Rus laid the foundations of Ukrainian nationalism that we still see today. During the latter part of the 18th century, most Ukrainian territory was absorbed by the Russian Empire. Catherine the Great, ring a bell. Following the collapse of Tsarist Russia in 1917, Ukraine was able to achieve a

short-lived period of independence. That's after the communists took over Russia. The Bolshevik Revolution is what it's called. Ukraine sort of got a little bit of independence, but then was reconquered almost immediately by brutal Soviet force, Joseph Stalin. He engineered two forced famines in which over 8 million people died. That is horrific what Stalin did. There's a reason why the Ukrainians sort of hate the Russians, don't want to be Russian. If you talk to a Ukrainian, they don't really want to be Russians. Well, it's a dark history between Ukraine and Russia. Stalin essentially took those fertile lands of Ukraine, grew crops on those lands, and then brought it all back to Russia, letting the Ukrainians starve to death. Adolf Hitler, obsessed over Ukraine and

its natural resources, especially oil. Germany needed oil. Germany has very little to none to know natural oil. So to run its war machine, Hitler had to go and take the oil fields of Ukraine. After invading Russia in 1941, Hitler conquered Ukraine very quickly. Nazi rule over Ukraine was brutal. 2.2 million Ukrainians were enslaved by the German war machine, brought back to Germany for essentially servant labor. 1.5 million Ukrainian Jews died as a result of Nazi racial policies as they ruled over the country. German and Soviet armies were responsible for seven to eight million more deaths on the soil of Ukraine in fighting and in purging and in militant and civilian warfare and in scorched earth policies that were just horrific. If the

Germans advanced, the Soviets would burn the factories, would strip them apart, would flood the mines, and would essentially destroy the villages. They don't care if people were living in them. As Germany retreated, they did the same. Ukraine got hit hard. Ukraine tallied the second highest casualties of any nation in World War II. This is why people call the territory the killing fields of Ukraine. It's still a dark title that it holds to this day. Ukraine endured 60 more years of Soviet slavery after World War II as the satellite state of Moscow. Russian incompetence managing a nuclear

reactor in Ukrainian territory led to the Chernobyl nuclear meltdown, a disaster which killed and displaced thousands of Ukrainians in 1986. This was the worst peacetime radiation disaster in human history, and thousands of square miles of Ukraine remains uninhabitable due to excess radiation. A report prepared by the International Atomic Energy Agency and World Health Organization attributed 56 deaths to the initial accident and over 4,000 cancer deaths due to radiation. So thousands of people died at Russian incompetence with the management of their reactors. Ukraine won independence in 1991 with the dissolution of the Soviet Union,

but government corruption stalled the efforts to reform, privatize, and allow the Ukrainian people to have civil liberties. So you've always been picky about your produce, but now you find yourself checking every label to make sure it's Canadian. So be it. At Sobeys, we always pick guaranteed fresh Canadian produce first. Restrictions apply. See in-store or online for details. Peaceful mass protests became the norm in Ukraine as multiple presidents resigned after scandals of election rigging and abuse of power. In 2013, most recently, President Yanukovych began to favor Russian

economic ties over the EU. This led to a three-month protest and an occupation of Kiev's central square. You might remember this. The government's eventual use of deadly force to break up the protest led to the president's abrupt ouster from power in the chaotic aftermath russia seized part of crimea you will certainly remember that russian separatist regions broke apart from ukraine also those regions just recently declared their independence and that independence was recognized by Russia. That was the start of this current war. In 2017, Donald Trump approved the sale of lethal weapons to Ukraine amid Russian aggression in the region. In 2019, a television comedian, this is stranger than fiction, ladies and gentlemen, named Volodymyr Zelensky, won the presidency of Ukraine after starring in a TV show about a comedian winning the presidency of Ukraine.

You can go find trailers for that show still right now on YouTube. The current president, Zelensky to the collapse of the nation. He's a comedian and he is showing more strength and honor than anyone in the American political ruling class as it stands today. Well, anyway, he was a TV show actor who starred. I mean, this is real. I mean, it's insane, but this is real. He starred in a comedy about winning the presidency of Ukraine, runs for the presidency of Ukraine, wins it in real life. Power television, ladies and gentlemen zielinski in his real presidency not his TV presidency began an

anti-corruption probe against Russian oligarchs Russian companies and he moved the country towards warming to the European Union this really pissed off Putin and in 2021 Putin began amassing his forces near Ukraine's border and now we get to today that is our breakdown of ukraine's bloody history i think it's important to note that ukraine has often been the jewel in many evil rulers crown they wanted it it is rich in natural resources It is in a strategically important location for many countries in the region. It's massive. And Ukraine has, of course, a very contentious fight each other. Ladies and gentlemen, that has been going on for quite a while, and I doubt that it will end anytime soon. We are extremely hopeful that perhaps the end of this conflict may be at hand as we follow during our show, follow closely the breaking news of the two parties meeting in Belarus

and talking about ending this war and peace talks. You would have peace right now in Ukraine. I don't think there would be a single drop of blood currently in Ukraine if you had stronger American leadership. Weakness leads to hard times. Hard times create strong men because strong men rise in hard times and have the will to power. Those strong men create good times and the good times then create weak men. In life, be relentless. Keep charging. It matters how you talk to yourself, how you look at the world.

That matters. We talk about that. I don't know. I'm fired up. Baseball's back, and it's going to be incredible. I love it. The Mayor's Office with Sean Casey from Believe. Follow and listen on your favorite platform.