Your questions about the war, answered
Dear Kyiv Independent community members,
Thank you for sending in your questions about the war – here are over twenty of them, answered by our editorial team.
We want to make this a recurring Q&A. But we’d like to hear your thoughts first — please let us know what you think about this idea.
Thank you again!
Comments (10)
Thank you - the questions and answers were very interesting. Definitely to repeat
The Q&A is superb! Even in the first 20 answers, 2 questions that very much interested me were included in the updates; and I learned more from the rest. Please keep them coming.
The question on books reminds me of something I have been looking for: a good book on the Ukrainian People's Republic. I've read a few books, including Plokhy's Gates of Europe and and I have watched Snyder's video series, but these only discuss it briefly. Could anyone recommend one? (I can only read English.)
Not sure if this is what you're looking for but suggesting it just in case: Ukraine: What Everyone Needs to Know by Serhy Yekelchyk.
I believe that the Q&A concept will allow the world to fully understand what Russia has inflicted upon the Ukrainian people. I was born in 1946 in London and experienced first hand the appalling aftermath of a war where bomb sites were my regular playgrounds and the stories regarding those that had died as the result of Hitlers bombing of civilians were amongst my earliest memories. As someone with a Jewish heritage with our family losing all our Polish relatives to the holocaust I have spent my life advocating sustainabllity in all human relationships and endeavours. As part of this work and with over 50 years experience in the construction industry early last year we completed a pair of Passive houses, one of which I live in with my family, in the Isle of Man. These houses can be built in as little as 8 weeks and be wind and watertight in a matter of days. I would be happy to contribute my expertise in this area free of charge to any Ukrainian architects or interested construction professionals who would like to know more.
I absolutely support a recurring Q&A.
The idea of these q&a are great, keep’em going :)
Few weapons systems - speaking as a US Air Force veteran - are more complex to operate and support than a modern fighter aircraft. Literally hundreds of people with literally hundreds of years of training and experience are involved in supporting the mission. As the late SecDef Rumsfeld said: "You go to war with the army [in this case, air force] you have. An additional concern for US and EU policy makers has to be the fact that deployment of US/EU aircraft in the war zones would inevitably lead to calls to take out S-300 and S-400 air defense systems based in Russia. This would cross not an imaginary red line, but a very real one. In any case, this talk of planes is something of a distraction: The issue today is not WHAT but WHEN. Weapons that show up in late 2023 or 2024 will be like the case of champagne delivered on Jan 2.
If Starlink no longer works for use with drones: is there an alternative?
Tell me about Elon... Is this guy going pro-Russia? (Nuts we all know he is)