Ukrainian troops sent by Kiev defect to anti-government protesters.

[Tommy_Carcetti]

169. In conspiracy theories, the burden of proof is always on the person espousing the theory.

In this context, that being you.

And yes, claiming that the regime change in Ukraine came about not as the result of a populist revolution but rather a US backed "coup" is most definitely a conspiracy theory.

Subscribers to this conspiracy theory have more or less repeated the same facts over and over claiming it is smoking gun evidence of a US led coup:

1. Victoria Nuland gave a speech where she said over the past two decades, the US has given several billion dollars to various NGOs working in Ukraine
2. When visiting Ukraine, Nuland handed out cookies/sandwiches/pomposhok to some of the protesters on the Maidan.
3. A discussion between Nuland and Geoffrey Pratt was overheard where they discussed who they preferred to be in charge in Ukraine.

All of these can be spun to be devious machinations, but none of these--read either independently or together--provide any sort of solid proof that the United States played an active role in the events in Ukraine of late last year and early this year.

Forget the smoking gun; there's barely any smoke, let alone the gun.

None of what you conspiracy theorists claim can dispute the fact that:

1. Ukrainians were very upset at the demonstrable level of corruption in the Yanukovych government
2. Yanukovych's decision to embrace the Russians on their questionable aid offer upset Ukrainians for very logical historical reasons
3. At least 600,000 Ukrainians--and probably more--physically participated in the Maidan protests, while millions more sympathized with their cause
4. Protesters were further upset by Yanukovych's use of the notorious Berkut riot police to violently crack down on protesters
5. As the Maidan protests reached a fever pitch, Yanukovych pulled the ultimate Eric Cartman "Screw you guys, I'm going home!" and up and left Ukraine and went to Russia
6. Given that the Ukrainian Rada was still up and functioning, and not wanting the country to descend into anarchy and chaos, they chose an interim government to lead until elections for a permanent government could be held in May.
7. As it stands now, elections are still on schedule to take place in May.

Your whole "Why did we give money to Ukraine when they could have given it to us?" is totally irrelevant when it comes to the question of whether the change in power in Ukraine came about as a result of the a US involved "coup". So too is name-dropping "fascists" and "neo-nazis" which are merely a blatant appeal to emotion and scare tactic, but have nothing to do with that particular question.

You claim the United States has no right to "be in" Ukraine. Fine. The United States is not in Ukraine militarily, and never has been. We have no bases there. We have no troops there. The only Americans currently in Ukraine are there for either diplomatic, tourism or expatriate purposes.

So you're assuming facts not in evidence.