Ukraine In Crisis

The Ukrainian government in Kyiv heard Vladimir Putin's demand loud and clear; dictating to the government that Ukrainian troops must immediately withdraw from eastern Ukraine. This, while about fifteen thousand Putin admirers celebrated May Day in Donetsk with a march-past under the massive statue of Vladimir Lenin in a rally to demonstrate a show of force. There is a population of about a million in Donetsk, how seriously can it be taken that 15,000 pro-Russians have rallied?

Communist party supporters march past a statue of Vladimir Lenin during a May Day rally in Lenin Square on Thursday in Donetsk, Ukraine. A second march by pro-Russian activists ended in violence.  Scott Olson, Getty Images

The parade with participants wearing colours identifying their sentiments and carrying Russian, Soviet or city flags, calling out a synchronized "Glory to Russia" and "Putina, Putina, Putina", alongside loudly broadcasted Red Army songs from the Great Patriotic War against Nazi Germany gave the event an air of bright celebration. Looking on in avuncular comfort were the local police who days previously stood by as some of the same crowd beat supporters of a united Ukraine.

Odessa and Kharkiv up until Thursday have been quiet, in contrast, but that has changed. As it inevitably would, with the presence of armed men representing the unacknowledged Russian military who suddenly appear, lead violent assaults on government buildings to the loud cheers of onlookers and then leave them to occupy the police stations where the police have decided to leave their posts as a courtesy to those who are so anxious to invade the interior, and thus avoid having their heads cracked open.

Ten, fifteen thousand protesters, not many in a population the size of Donetsk, but the sound and fury make up for the paucity of activists, prepared to attack any who dare to contest their vision of alignment with Russia. The action is confined to a relatively small area in and around the city centre where barricades made of mountains of rubber tires, timbers and garbage have been set up, a reliant formula of fortifications seen in the Maidan and now Donetsk.

Photographer: Vasily Maximov/AFP/Getty Images An armed pro-Russian activist stands guard at a checkpoint near the south eastern.

The ethnic Russians dominating the agenda know of a certainty that the chaos that has engulfed their region results from an upheaval caused by the West, particularly the United States, with its malevolent influence on NATO and the European Union. Their duty is to defy this militant engineering, and to side with Russia which has nobly stepped forward in defence of the people of southern and eastern Ukraine.

They are awaiting a repeat of Crimea. But polls indicate a deep divide between the Donetsk population with a knife-edge majority loyal to Kyiv as opposed to the slighter numbers that are in full-throated support of the People's Republic of Donetsk, willing their geography to annex itself into the Russian sphere, as soon as it succeeds in firmly distancing itself from Kyiv.

Beyond the inner city Ukrainian flags still fly over government offices and major city businesses. The possibility that for the Kyiv-loyal the unthinkable could occur, with Moscow directing its assembled military to invade sends fear and loathing throughout their community. On Thursday Russia enacted a major assault helicopter exercise close to the Baltic states, driven to an excess of nervous exhaustion over their own fears of invasion.

As Kyiv ordered armored vehicles and artillery to retake Slovyansk when forces arrived intending to drive out the militants and free the OSCE hostages and international monitors along with the Ukrainian security investigators, two helicopters were shot down by the rebels, leading to the death of the two pilots. In the military melee that followed Ukrainian President Oleksandr Turchynov stated "many" rebels were killed, wounded or captured.

Photographer: Genya Savilov/AFP via Getty Images

Ukrainian soldiers near Slavyansk, Eastern Ukraine, on May 2, 2014.

And Moscow erupted in outrage, demanding complete withdrawal, warning that it is prepared to intervene, to rescue Ukrainians from its central authority, a criminal group of fascists re-enacting the German Nazi agenda of a bygone, but never-forgotten era. In the meanwhile, the mystery of how ethnic Russian Ukrainian 'activists' could conceivably have in their possession sophisticated weapons capable of shooting down helicopters remains unanswered.