Imagine the most disgusting thing in your life. Something that causes you to have a gag reflex, contempt, and rejection. Imagine being stuck in a toilet where drug addicts have been defecating for weeks. There's urine, shit, and blood.
This is exactly what Ukrainians feel when they tell us about Mariupol. Disgust and rejection.
Sticky smelly mucus, which you want to wash off immediately with streams of water.
Your first thought may be related to corpses on the streets. Do Ukrainians feel disgust when they see the corpses of their children? No.
We feel the same pain as you do for your children. Total fear and insane pain for the people closest to you. This fear is the same for both you and us.
Maybe this gag reflex is related to the Russian occupiers? No. We are forced to systematically kill them like rabid dogs.
We treat prisoners humanely. We are investigating several cases where the rights of prisoners have been violated. We believe that these people should be brought to justice as war criminals, it is important to save their lives.
Moreover, sometimes we feel sorry for Russian soldiers. It is one thing when they are professional assassins from the FSB, army commanders.
However, among the soldiers are children who are only 18 years old, born in 2004. They cry and ask their mothers to bring them back home. We even feel sorry for them, these deceived, skinned, and uneducated children. We feed them, treat them, give them warm clothes and call their mothers.
Ukraine is setting an example of humanity to the whole world, even despite fire and wounds.
So why do we feel such unspeakable disgust? If not from their killed children, not from Russian soldiers, then from what?
We are disgusted by specific world politicians. From the cynical theater of hypocrisy around Mariupol.
Our conversation is something like this:
- Today, February 24, we were attacked by Putin, his army is many times stronger and more powerful than ours. We will be very grateful if you can give us weapons!
-We are monitoring the situation and will impose the toughest sanctions!
- A week has passed, we are very grateful to you for the sanctions, those will really help, but not earlier than 4-5 months. But right now our people are dying every day, the siege of Mariupol begins. Could you please give us or sell us weapons?
- We will react in the harshest way and impose a number of sanctions! In general, it is strange that you are still holding on, we expected you to surrender to the army of the nuclear empire in 3 days.
-A few more weeks have passed, there’s a humanitarian catastrophe in Mariupol!
The cities are being wiped out: Kharkiv, Chernihiv, Sumy. Strikes on Lviv, Rivne, Zaporizhia. Kherson is under occupation. Kyiv is surrounded. Please give us weapons, we are ready to buy, but you do not sell!
-We will consider your issue at the highest level, the world is deeply concerned about what is happening! We cannot allow our soldiers to fight and we will not close the sky! We can give you some more Javelins and Stingers. We are very concerned about what is happening in Mariupol.
-Listen, a month has passed. Mariupol was almost completely destroyed.
According to some experts, about 100,000 people have already died in this war. No one knows the exact numbers, hundreds of corpses lie on the streets.
Warehouses, oil depots, nuclear power plants, hospitals, schools are being stricken, they are on fire. Cities with a population of millions of people each are on fire. Our women are being raped en masse in front of their children, our elderly parents are being tortured in basements, maternity hospitals and churches are burning while people are inside.
Phosphorus bombs were used. Mass use of chemical weapons is planned, Putin directly says that he can use nuclear weapons.
We are not asking to send your soldiers, we are no longer asking to close the sky.
The only thing we ask for is a weapon!
We keep saying we're ready to buy, but you're not selling!
The Stingers and Javelins you sent are only enough for a few days of defense. We need serious weapons. Thousands more people will continue being killed weekly just because you don't want to give us some hardware!
Please sell us tanks, planes and air defense systems!
- We are doing everything possible, unfortunately, we can not make certain decisions in order not to provoke Putin. We must also think about the security of our countries.
We gave you some weapons. We think that's enough. Our "military experts" will definitely give a series of interviews and write articles to convince everyone that this is enough and everything necessary has been done.
-We are very concerned about what is happening in Mariupol!
-It is the second month that we are holding back against one of the strongest armies in the world. We protect the whole free world, both ours and that of your children. Do you really think that having seized the first largest country in the world with 5 nuclear power plants, hundreds of production plants, metallurgy, gas, minerals, access to two seas, airports, and seaports - do you really think they will stop at it?
Don't you understand that our country will simply become a springboard for further invasion?
Are you sure that NATO will protect Lithuania or Estonia if Putin starts threatening to use nuclear weapons? Look at the map, compare the size of our countries.
We are already fighting in French armor, we have American walkie-talkies, British NLAW.
So why are you afraid to sell us serious weapons? What is the criterion - why are you not afraid to give us a few drones, but taboo on planes?
We understand that you are scared. But we are fighting for your freedom as well, for the fate of the democratic world.
Thousands of people die every day because you don't give us weapons. Sell us at least 1% of your tanks and planes. Ours are almost used up in battle!
The Russians are throwing thousands of new tanks, armored vehicles, planes, air defense systems, and artillery daily! Your people sincerely support us, but you are deceiving them. You say that you give all the necessary support, although in reality, this is not true. You just procrastinate while we are being murdered. You watch the war online and make pathetic political speeches from high tribunes. Your "experts" had already predicted that we would surrender in 3 days. They persuade you as much as they can to not give us weapons, they are sowing doubts. But who of them are here with us under fire? They are in warm houses, in front of their PC monitors, they are just getting paid for using a lot of military terminology with serious facial expressions. Their opinion will be valuable when they come here and see the real situation.
We ask for only one thing.
Please, just give us weapons and we will save those who stayed in Mariupol. We will protect you and our world of free people!
- We are deeply concerned about what is happening in Mariupol. We will send you some more anti-tank systems, bandages, and dry food. We care for you, we are very sorry for Mariupol. We believe that Putin is behaving unacceptably.
- For God's sake, we need weapons, we are raped, tortured, and killed!
-We are deeply concerned about the situation around Mariupol.
I want the whole world to know how we feel when dying in Mariupol, Kharkiv, Chernihiv, Kyiv. How do we feel in our last minutes?
We feel disgust and repulsion for the sticky political hypocrites, who condemned us to a slow death. Death to the sound of their false speeches. You are complicit in this crime of genocide, a crime against humanity.
And when we die, we feel grateful to the whole world, to all free and honest people.
https://www.facebook.com/masher.berlinska/posts/7798425283515930
Ukrainian Text by Maria Berlinska. Translated into English by Oksana Kozenko-Klochko – Mar 30, 2022
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