Russian invasion of Ukraine
Special Coverage
Vladimir Putin began a full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022, in an escalation of the Russo-Ukrainian War that he started in 2014. The invasion received widespread international condemnation, including massive economic sanctions. Milwaukee’s Ukrainian American community began with immigrants in the early twentieth century, and continued to grow in the years after World War II and the fall of the Soviet Union.
These news stories cover the local connections in Milwaukee to an international crisis, and all the complexities woven into America’s political climate.
- Links to complete news coverage of Putin’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine: mkeind.com/ukraine
- Reports from Ukraine – Series of news reports from May 2022 in Ukraine: mkeind.com/reportsfromukraine
- Return to Ukraine – Series of news reports from June-July 2023 in Ukraine: mkeind.com/returntoukraine
- Selected features that focus on news from Milwaukee’s Sister City of Irpin: mkeind.com/irpin
Featured: Jennifer Vosters: A visit to Kyiv that offered insight, awareness, and an inspiration for solidarity [Feb 24, 2022]
A generation of hope: Young gymnast crushed by Russian missile dreams of competing in Paralympics
When Oleksandra Paskal first took to the mat as a 4-year-old, her rhythmic gymnastics coach saw nothing but potential in a sport where the Olympics is the ultimate goal. Then a Russian missile crushed her summer house in the southern Odesa region, burying her beneath...
President Maia Sandu details Putin’s violent plot to topple her government as prelude to seize Moldova
Moldova’s president outlined on February 13 what she described as a plot by Moscow to overthrow her country’s government using external saboteurs, put the nation “at the disposal of Russia” and derail its aspirations to one day join the...
Support of Iran regime by China’s Xi seen as enabling Russian terror campaigns against Ukraine and Syria
Chinese leader Xi Jinping expressed support for Iran during a visit on February 14 by its president as Tehran tries to expand relations with Beijing and Moscow to offset Western sanctions over its nuclear development. The official Chinese account of Xi’s meeting...
How Russia’s unprovoked invasion of Ukraine restructured global alliances and renewed old fears
Nearly a year after Russia invaded Ukraine, the battlefield has narrowed and stiff resistance has forced Moscow to scale back its military goals. But the diplomatic consequences of the war still reverberate worldwide. The fighting has reshaped global alliances,...
Russian aggression against Ukraine reminds Auschwitz survivors that lesson of “Never Again” was forgotten
Auschwitz-Birkenau survivors and other mourners commemorated the 78th anniversary in January of the Nazi German death camp’s liberation, some expressing horror that war has again shattered peace in Europe and the lesson of Never Again is being forgotten. The...
Building blocks for war: How Putin used 14 years of lies and disinformation to justify a Ukraine invasion
By Juris Pupcenoks, Associate Professor of Political Science, Marist College; and Graig Klein, Assistant Professor of Terrorism & Political Violence, Leiden University As the invasion of Ukraine began in late February 2022, President Vladimir Putin offered several...
Lessons from FDR: It turns out that authoritarian governments depend on the economies of democracies
On June 5, 1944, the day before the D-Day operation in which the Allied forces in World War II invaded German-occupied western Europe, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt gave his 29th Fireside Chat. Roosevelt told the American people that Rome had fallen to American...
Milwaukee’s Jewish community offers vital aid for Ukrainian refugees in response to humanitarian crisis
The Jewish community in Milwaukee has deep and long connections to the Jewish population in Ukraine. And for Milwaukeeans involved in relief efforts at the Ukrainian border, recent experiences of assisting refugees and evacuating Holocaust survivors from Ukraine have...
Russia’s human shield narrative: The lies Putin invokes to justify the slaying of innocent civilians
Since Russia’s invasion began in late February 2022, universities, schools, theaters, hospitals, and many other civilian sites in Ukraine have been destroyed by Russian shelling and more than four million people have so far fled the country. Faced with the devastating...
Why journalists were targeted by Russian forces to conceal crimes of genocide against Ukrainian people
Mayor of Mariupol, Vadym Boichenko, said in a recent interview that Russia was blocking international organizations from entering Mariupol to prevent them from seeing what had become of the city. On April 4, President Volodymyr Zelensky described the horrific...
The thinnest of silver linings: How Putin became responsible for beginning a new era in Washington
I am going to go out on a limb and suggest something that would have seemed utter nonsense as late as a month ago: I’m seeing the stirrings in Washington of a new era of … I am not sure what to call it. “Unity” is way too strong. “Bipartisanship” is premature....
Patriotic Propaganda: Staying silent as a choice when what is seen does not match with what is believed
I have repeatedly heard American TV commentators wonder out loud how it is that average Russians do not believe the horrors their government has inflicted on Ukraine and its people. The most common story is of Ukrainian refugees or people under bombardment who have...
A deal between dictators: How the renewed Russia and North Korea partnership will impact Ukraine’s future
Russia’s brutal dictator Vladimir Putin and North Korean oppressive ruler Kim Jong Un signed an agreement on June 19 that pledges mutual aid if either country faces “aggression,” a strategic pact that comes as both face escalating standoffs with the...
Featured: Photos from the frontlines: Sergi Mykhalchuk documents images of war as civilians evacuate Irpin [Mar 16, 2022]
Featured: Milwaukee formalizes Sister City status with Ukraine’s Irpin [Mar 23, 2018]
Milwaukee has a small but thriving Ukrainian American community, and Irpin is a sister city. Follow our special coverage at mkeind.com/ukraine for updates on Putin’s invasion, and about how the fight by Ukrainian people to preserve their democracy is having an impact on the families and businesses here in Milwaukee. 🇺🇦 Слава Україні! Героям слава!
Help maintain a reliable news source in Ukraine by supporting the Kyiv Independent, an English-language media outlet created by journalists who were fired from the Kyiv Post for defending editorial independence. Donations can be made via patreon or gofundme.
