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The war in Ukraine is ramping up to new levels

Now that the Shanghai Cooperation Organization summit has ended, we are beginning to see some of the results in the Ukraine situation. Putin talked to the other leaders at the SCO summit and received assurances that no one would object or feel threatened if he annexed the breakaway Republics east of Ukraine.

The real issue that was a potential problem was supporting independence movements, because many countries face their own challenges in that area. Putin did not want to create a situation where revolutionaries in SCO countries might use his policy to justify their own ambitions for independence.

When Putin returned to Moscow, he consulted with his cabinet and then announced plans to hold a referendum to decide whether or not to allow the breakaway Republics east of Ukraine to return to their historical roots in the Russian Federation. The vast majority of the people are ethnic Russians, having Russian culture, customs, language, and Russian Orthodox religion.

People will be allowed to vote on whether they should return to Ukrainian rule, or remain independent, or join the Russian Federation. It is universally known that these ethnic Russian people will follow the example of Crimea (in 2014) and vote overwhelmingly to join with Russia. For this reason, Russia is assuming that the people will want to join with Russia, and is therefore beginning to mobilize the military for an actual war with Ukraine.

Since the US government sent Victoria Nuland to Ukraine to lead the political coup in February 2014, Ukraine has been “de-russifying” Ukraine, banning the Russian language, etc. This caused the eastern parts to declare their independence, which was the start of the Ukraine war. Russia brokered the Minsk Agreements, which were even backed by the UN Security Council. However, the US state department broke the agreements and instigated Ukraine to declare war on the breakaway republics.

This war has been going on since 2014. Ukraine has been shelling civilian cities for 8 years, while Russia did everything it could to put an end to the conflict (and to recognize the right of the breakaway republics to become independent. The war did not just begin in 2022 when Russia began backing the breakaway republics.

Last February, Russia sent a limited number of troops to supply Luhansk and Donetsk with artillery to back their militias and to defend themselves from Ukrainian forces that were laying siege to their cities. Russia has more than a million men and women in its army, but it sent only a small percentage of them to back the militias. The militias continued to comprise most of the infantry fighting the Ukrainian army.

Russia also sent military aircraft, which quickly destroyed Ukraine’s air force and took control of the skies. So just as NATO had provided backing to Ukraine in this war for 8 years, training their soldiers and supplying them with weapons, so also last February did Russia come to the aid of Luhansk and Donetsk to defend their right to declare independence.

The right to be independent has always been disputed by those who want to rule others. In the eyes of the Russians, the precedent was firmly established in the late 1990’s when Kosovo broke away from Serbia. Kosovo’s right to independence was backed by NATO, but they now deny this same right to Luhansk and Donetsk.

The western media has already responded to this democratic referendum, declaring “Foul!” and is treating the situation as if Russia is about to annex these republics against their will. They use terms like “Russia is increasing its grip,” as if to picture Putin strangling these breakaway republics in order to expand the Russian Empire! They will couch the term annexation to portray a forced takeover against the will of the people—in spite of the democratic process in the referendum.

The fact is that the people themselves—after 8 years of being shelled by Ukrainian troops—would never want to return to Ukrainian rule. Too much bitter animosity against Ukraine has been built up over the years. They consider themselves to be Russian and are overwhelmingly pro-Russian. Russia does not need to rig the voting system, nor does it have to threaten or force the people to submit to Russian rule. The people have wanted this for many years.

The only real question is whether or not these people have the right to determine their own future status. That is a question that will always be disputed. But we should not be influenced by the western media which feeds us the hypocritical view that independence was good for Kosovo but not good for Luhansk and Donetsk.

In fact, how should we view the American War of Independence from Britain in the 1770’s? Is it not accepted now by Americans that we did indeed have this right, based on the abuses perpetrated by King George III? If you read the Declaration of Independence, you will see that the Americans justified their independence movement by citing the abuses of King George. Those abuses, they claimed, removed the king’s right to rule the Americans—a point that remained under dispute long after the war was won.

The point is that this referendum no doubt will result in joining with Russia, and this will change the very nature of the current war. Up to now, it was technically a civil war between Ukraine and the new Republics, with each side backed militarily by a different side. Once the merger takes place, assuming that Ukrainian troops continue its shelling, it will be a war between NATO-backed Ukraine and Russia itself.

Russia knows that Ukraine’s president will follow his western masters and will continue to lay siege to the same cities—except that now those cities will be Russian. Any cross-border attack will be an attack upon Russia itself.

This will mark an important escalation that will bring the war to a head. The war will cease to be a “Special Military Operation” that supports “independent” republics. It will be seen legally as a war with Russia. Hence, Russia is said to be mobilizing 300,000 troops to prepare for a war with Ukraine.

https://news.yahoo.com/putin-mobilizes-300-000-more-143828491.html

STORY: Russian President Vladimir Putin called up reservists to fight in Ukraine on Wednesday, signifying a major escalation in the war.

Speaking in a rare, televized address, Putin said Moscow would respond with the might of all its vast arsenal if the West pursued what he called its "nuclear blackmail" over the conflict.

“If the territorial integrity of our country is threatened, we will without question use all the means at our disposal to protect Russia and our people. This is not a bluff."

It is Russia’s first such mobilization since World War II.

Russia's defense minister Sergei Shoigu said the partial mobilization - which begins immediately - would see 300,000 reservists called up.

The western media will try to frighten us with reports of nuclear threats or biological warfare threats. The real danger, especially of biothreats, is coming from Ukraine, where dozens of biolabs were discovered in recent months. They are the ones with the ability to engage in biowarfare and blame Russia!

In the big picture, we know that Babylon is falling to the armies of the kings of the east, as prophesied in Rev. 16:12. Russia and China are the main nations fulfilling this prophecy today, and as far as the actual war is concerned, Ukraine appears to be the focal point. But the war is much broader than that. It is also a war of technology, of communication (propaganda), of trade, and of finance.

Because of this, it is clear that it involved the BRICS nations and those who are seeking to join it. It also involves the SCO. A big part of this is a war between currencies and commodities. The financial system of the West is based on fiat currencies, backed by the “faith and credit of the United States.” The financial system of the East is moving toward currencies backed by commodities and natural resources.

It is clear that the East will win this conflict, unless, of course, this turns into an all-out nuclear war—in which case, no one wins, and we all have to live in heaven because the earth is destroyed. But Scripture does not prophesy such a thing. When we poured out the sixth bowl of wine (and water) into the river at Fruita, Colorado (in 2005), we marked the time when the sixth angel was to be loosed to prepare the way for the kings of the earth in their mission to destroy Mystery Babylon (Revelation 16:12).

Just as God used pagan kings like Cyrus the Persian and Darius the Mede to do His work of judging Babylon, so also is God using Putin and Xi Jinping today. God is not dependent upon believers to do His work.

He was not ashamed to call Cyrus a “messiah” in Isaiah 45:1. Darius was the one who re-organized the Persian kingdom into 120 satraps, a number that the Bible associates with the outpouring of the Spirit. Darius then promoted Daniel to be one of three governors ruling the kingdom (Daniel 6:1, 2, 3). Daniel immediately distinguished himself above the others in his ability to rule competently and without bribery or corruption.

The point is that while Isaiah speaks about Cyrus in prophecy, we cannot forget Darius as well, for he too had a big role in the fulfillment of prophecy. Darius re-organized the kingdom and put the main overcomer of that day into a position of power. For this, Daniel’s competitors were jealous, and they plotted to have him thrown into the lion’s den. But God used that situation to cause Darius to declare in Daniel 6:26,

²⁶ I make a decree [by the law that cannot be changed or altered] that in all the dominion of my kingdom, men are to fear and tremble before the God of Daniel; for He is the living God and enduring forever, and His kingdom is one which will not be destroyed, and His dominion will be forever.

So even today we await a greater fulfillment of this decree, where all are commanded to acknowledge the God of Daniel, “the living God,” whose “enduring” Kingdom “will not be destroyed.” (This repeats an earlier prophecy in Daniel 2:44). This is emerging in our time, and we ought to rejoice and not be afraid. We have long prayed for this day of independence from Babylon. Let us not complain when our prayers are answered.