March 29, 2022 - Epoch Times
10:47
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| This is your Daily Facts Matter Update, and I'm your host, Roman, from the Epoch Times. | |
| And as I'm sure you're aware, it has finally happened. | |
| After many, many, many months of saber-rattling, well, last night, Russia began a full-on assault on the entirety of Ukraine. | |
| Now, of course, just I'd like to preface this by saying the situation is unfolding minute by minute. | |
| And just to note, in cases of war reporting, well, things are always changing. | |
| Reports can be quite literally debunked at a later time. | |
| However, let me break down for you what's happened thus far in this conflict, And so you had cruise missiles being fired from Russia's fleet. | |
| You had a ground invasion from the eastern flank, from Crimea, as well as from Belarus. | |
| And you had a large amount of helicopters and fighter jets breaking through into Ukrainian airspace. | |
| Now, it's very much worth noting that this assault is actually spread out across the entirety of Ukraine, because even though a few days ago Vladimir Putin made it sound like he was only going to send a peacekeeping mission to the breakaway rebel-held provinces in the east of Ukraine, that's not what's happening right now. | |
| Surprisingly, you were not able to trust the former head of the KGB in being forthright with his plans. | |
| In fact, here's a map showing you where the attacks are taking place. | |
| And it's very obvious that it's way beyond just the eastern separatist regions that Putin mentioned earlier. | |
| As you can see, almost every major city in Ukraine right now is getting assaulted. | |
| And on that last point, it's worth noting that Russia is pushing into the area right around Chernobyl. | |
| According to official reports, right now, Ukrainian forces are making a last-ditch resistance in the area surrounding the highly radioactive zone, which surrounds the nuclear meltdown site. | |
| However, the local Ukrainian officials there, they are sounding the alarm over a potentially disastrous scenario wherein, because of this fighting, the nuclear reactor, which is currently encased in cement, could be damaged and the radioactive material inside could be released due to the Russian bombardment, which might then cause the radioactive dust particles to blow westwards toward Europe. | |
| Here's what a Ukrainian federal official told the Interfax newspaper. | |
| And then likewise, Ukraine's president also posted this notice on Twitter regarding Chernobyl. | |
| Russian occupation forces are trying to seize the Chernobyl nuclear site. | |
| Our defenders are giving their lives so that the tragedy of 1986 will not be repeated. | |
| Reported this to the Swedish prime minister, this is a declaration of war against the whole of Europe. | |
| Now, besides this site in Chernobyl, you might have seen videos floating around on social media right now, which appear to show a full-scale assault taking place across all of Ukraine. | |
| There are videos that are showing tanks which are speeding across the Ukraine-Belorussian border, with reports further saying that Belarusian soldiers are actually working alongside the Russian counterparts in this invasion. | |
| You have videos of fighter jets as well as helicopters displaying a massive aerial presence above the skies of Ukraine, even shooting down missiles at the ground and taking over airports. | |
| In fact, along that line, Russia's official military mouthpiece, they announced last night that within just a couple of hours into this offensive, all of Ukraine's air defense systems have been taken out. | |
| Although, at this moment, it's unclear whether that's a form of propaganda or reality. | |
| Regardless, though, there are a lot of videos of this aerial assault. | |
| For instance, here's a video of an assault operation using MI-8 helicopters on the Antonov International Airport that's in the city of Hostomo, which, by the way, is only about 15 miles outside of the capital city of Kiev. | |
| According to Russia's interior minister, they said that they have already seized control of that particular airport. | |
| In another video, it shows the military airport in Lutsk appears to be completely destroyed. | |
| And then you also have a ton of videos showing large explosions across dozens of cities, many of those cities, by the way, being heavily populated with civilians. | |
| There are also videos of the aftermath of these bombings showing bombed-out buildings, destroyed vehicles, fires, mangled metal, and displaced people, and so on. | |
| It's... | |
| I mean, it's a war zone. | |
| Furthermore, according to preliminary reports, and again, take them with a grain of salt because, again, these things change minute by minute in wartime, but it appears that some cities have already fallen to Russian troops. | |
| For instance, there's footage showing Russian soldiers hoisting the Russian flag on a hydroelectric plant building in Novo Kokovka, which is 37 miles into Ukrainian territory from the direction of Crimea. | |
| Now, thus far, according to Ukrainian officials, hundreds of Ukrainians have officially been confirmed to be killed, including many civilians. | |
| Although, given the scale of this invasion, that number is sure to, unfortunately, climb in the coming days and the coming weeks. | |
| Now, outside of the actual kinetic on-the-ground aspect, let's discuss some of the politics playing out behind the scenes. | |
| On the Russian side, besides the months of discussions regarding the expansion of NATO, earlier today, one of the spokespeople for the Kremlin, he came out and he said that the goal of this military operation is twofold, the demilitarization as well as the denazification of Ukraine. | |
| Here's specifically what he said. | |
| He said that the operations would only end once these objectives have been reached. | |
| Furthermore, Mr. | |
| Vladimir Putin defended this assault on Ukraine as being what he described a necessary measure. | |
| Here's what he said earlier today in a televised meeting with a group of Russian business tycoons. | |
| Quote, Now, On the Ukrainian side, President Zelenskyy has introduced martial law to Ukraine, and he came out with a statement saying that his government will begin supplying firearms to all citizens who are of fighting age, and they should be expected to defend their homeland in the city squares. | |
| Here's what he said. | |
| We are already issuing weapons and will be issuing weapons to protect our land to everyone, to everyone who is able to defend our sovereignty. | |
| The future of the Ukrainian people depends on every citizen. | |
| Everyone who has combat experience and can join the defense of Ukraine must immediately arrive at the appropriate recruitment centers. | |
| Furthermore, besides arming the Ukrainian citizens themselves so that they can fight the Russian military on the ground, Mr. | |
| Zelensky also brought up sanctions which are coming down on Russia in the very near future. | |
| Here's specifically what he wrote on Twitter just earlier today. | |
| A package of additional tough sanctions against Russia from the EU is approaching. | |
| Discuss all the details with Emmanuel Macron. | |
| We demand the disconnection of Russia from SWIFT, the introduction of a no-fly zone over Ukraine, and other effective steps to stop the aggressor. | |
| By the way, the SWIFT system that he mentioned in that statement works essentially as an intermediary between the banks of different countries, and so to cut Russia off of SWIFT would effectively cut their banks from the global network. | |
| Furthermore, the White House released a statement shortly after this invasion saying that harsh sanctions are on the way. | |
| Here's what it said, quote,"...the prayers of the entire world are with the people of Ukraine tonight as they suffer an unprovoked and unjustified attack by Russian military forces. | |
| President Putin has chosen a premeditated war that will bring a catastrophic loss of life and human suffering." Russia alone is responsible for the death and destruction this attack will bring, and the United States and its allies and partners will respond in a united and decisive way. | |
| The world will hold Russia accountable. | |
| And so what it looks like we are seeing in real time is a severe decoupling between the West and Russia. | |
| And Russia will essentially become a pariah state with heavy sanctions being levied against both the state as well as its people, making it so that Russia will naturally turn to China for help and support. | |
| And speaking of China, it looks like they are taking full advantage of the situation, because shortly after this Russian invasion, well, Chinese military aircrafts, they began to enter Taiwan's air defense zone, although frankly, this is becoming a regular occurrence, and this is actually the 13th such incursion in this month alone. | |
| And so this is the situation that we're beginning to lift through, a true realignment of the geopolitical chessboard, and frankly, who knows how this is going to turn out. | |
| The only thing that's looking likely is that more people will be dying in Ukraine over the next several days and perhaps weeks. | |
| If you'd like to go deeper into anything regarding this story, I'll throw the links to several articles as well as video resources into the description box below this video for you to check out. | |
| And all I ask in return is that you smash that like button below this video so that the YouTube algorithm will pick it up and share it to ever more people. | |
| All right, I'd like to quickly mention that today's episode is actually brought to you by American Hartford Gold, who's not only our sponsor, but they're actually my own personal gold and silver bullion dealer. | |
| So right now, besides the rate of inflation having gone up over the past year to a 40-year high, what's happening between Russia and Ukraine is not only sending the markets into a freefall, but the price of oil is now skyrocketing up to the moon, which I can imagine will only make inflation worse. | |
| Now, I don't give you any financial advice, but to be frank with you, because I've been buying up physical gold and silver for the past five or six years now, I sleep better at night knowing that my savings are protected against not only this turmoil, but also inflation as a whole. | |
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| That's 866-242-2352 So again, give them a call at 866-242-2352. | |
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| Or you can just give them a text. | |
| You can text the word Roman to 65532. | |
| That's R-O-M-A-N to 65532. | |
| American Heart for Gold, thank you so much for sponsoring this episode. | |
| Now, Roman in the studio, back to you. | |
| And lastly, I would like to mention that this upcoming week, I will be traveling quite a lot. | |
| First of all, I'm going to CPAC later today in order to conduct dozens of interviews with lawmakers, policy advisors, veterans, and so on. | |
| By the way, if you want me to ask any specific questions of anyone, even including President Trump himself, you can let me know by writing the questions into the comments section below this video. | |
| That after CPAC, on Tuesday of next week, I will be in Washington, D.C., covering both the State of the Union address as well as the Republican response. | |
| And again, if you want me to ask any specific questions to the lawmakers, you can leave them in the comments section below. | |
| And then lastly, next week, after the State of the Union address, I will begin to cover the Freedom Convoy, which is making its way from L.A. over to Washington, D.C. I will be there following the trucks, interviewing the truckers, getting their stories, what they're trying to achieve, what their lives have been like under the mandates, and so on. | |
| However, again, because of the regime of censorship here on YouTube, it's not actually going to be feasible for me to post the videos here. | |
| And so you'll be able to find all that coverage over on Epic TV, which is our no censorship video platform, which you can find not only my videos, but as well as a plethora of other content such as movies, awesome shows, as well as programs that frankly, due to the censorship on YouTube, as well as all the other social media platforms, we cannot put anywhere else. | |
| I'll throw the link to Epic TV right there. | |
| I hope you subscribe because it's not only a phenomenal way to support the journalism, but it's also a great way for you to get unfiltered information about what is actually happening in this world. | |
| Again, the link will be right there in the description box below. | |
| And then until next time, I'm your host, Roman from the Epic Times. |
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