Transnistria

Transnistria
Flag	Coat of Arms
Capital	Tiraspol
Government	Republic
Language	Russian (official)
President	Yevgeny Shevchuk
Prime minister	Tatiana Turanskaya
Area	1,607 sq mi
Population 2014	505,153
Currency	Transnistrian ruble

Transnistria, officially the Pridnestrovian Moldavian Republic (PMR), (also known as Transdnistria or "beyond the Dniester"), declared its independence at the time of the break up of the Soviet Union before Moldova became a state. Transnistria has never been part Ukraine. Transnistria lies east of Moldova along the Dnister river. The republic takes the form of a long and narrow strip of land (over 250 miles in length) sandwiched between Moldova and Ukraine. It has an area of 1,607 square miles (4,163 km) and a population of 555,000 (2005 est).

Transnistria declared its independence of the former Soviet Republic of Moldova in September 1990. Bender, the second town of the new nation coming under local control and Tiraspol, a mere fifty miles from Odessa becoming the capital city of the new republic. With the breakup of the Soviet Union there was fighting which ended with the signing of a ceasefire agreement in 1992. Russian peacekeeping forces were deployed in accordance with a United Nations Resolution and signing of a ceasefire agreement.

On July 25, 2022, the Transnistria administrative council voted to join the Russian Federation. A referendum has yet to be held.

History[edit]

In World War II, Romania, persuaded and aided by Nazi Germany, took control of Transnistria for the first time in history. In August 1941, Adolf Hitler persuaded Ion Antonescu to take control of the territory. Despite the Romanian occupation, Romania did not formally incorporate Transnistria into its administrative framework. Nazi Germany wanted Romania as an ally in the war against the Soviet Union.^[1] Romania in turn aligned their foreign policy in the Anti-Comintern Pact with Germany against the Soviet Union.^[2] In Operation Barbarossa, Antonescu aligned with Hitler's ideas that the conflict was a "race war" between the Aryans, represented by the Nordic Germans and Latin Romanians on the Axis side vs. the Slavs and Asians, commanded by the Jews on the Soviet side.^[3] Romania committed two armies for the invasion of the Soviet Union, totaling over 300,000 troops between them.^[4] For their commitment, Romania was promised Bessarabia, Northern Bukovina and the area between Dniester and Southern Bug.^[5] Romania hoped to annex Transnistria eventually, but the defeat of German and Romania armies at Stalingrad precluded it.^[6]

Western aggression[edit]

Transistria front, April 27, 2022.

See also: NATO war in Ukraine

On April 24, 2022 NATO forces conducted an attack on the Security Services headquarters and two Russian language radio towers in the capital city of Tiraspol. The terrorist incident was followed days later by an attack in the vicinity of Klobasna from Ukrainian held territory, Klobasna is a large ammunition depot guarded by Russian troops. Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU) were in bad need of ammunition resupply following devastating losses in the 2022 Donbas war. The government of Transnistria posted a statement on its official Telegram channel saying that drones launched from Ukrainian-held territory were observed on April 26, 2022 in the sky above Klobasna, in the region's north, where the ammunition depot is located. The next morning, "shots were fired from the Ukrainian side in the direction of" the town, it said.

Igor Girkin reported that a large number of Romanian soldiers and officers were sent to Moldova under the guise of "Moldovan military". In particular, in all headquarters, a significant part of Moldovan officers were replaced by officers of the Romanian army in all key positions, and in the commandant's companies of military units performing the functions of military police, the entire personnel had been replaced with Romanians.

On the territory of Moldova, warehouses of military uniforms and shoes, NATO army rations and other auxiliary military equipment were being hastily created and filled from NATO countries. But not weapons depots. There is no need to import weapons, since when Moldova is occupied by the Romanian army, the latter will "come with everything of its own".^[7] The objective appears to be a huge military storage site in Kolbasna.^[8] There existed a concentration of Ukrainian units on the border with Transnistria. The Transnistrian army would have zero chance to counter the offensive for any significant period of time without external support in the event of a NATO attack from Romania and Ukraine and this is exactly what is being planned, as the Nazi governor of the Odessa region Marchenko already explained. The Russian Armed Forces would be unable to help Transnistria with anything but a certain number of missile strikes at infrastructure facilities. Sources estimate the probability of the NATO attack on Tiraspol in April-early May 2022 as "high".^[9] Speculation existed that Russian POWs taken in Transnistria could then be bartered for the 4,000 Ukrainian POWs already in Russian custody, as well as the 1,500 Azov Nazis still held up in the Azovstal.

On February 22, 2023 reports indicated that Ukrainian troops were amassing on the border between the Odessa region and Transnistria. Mass movements of the Ukrainian military in the immediate vicinity of the border were also confirmed by resources in Tiraspol, capital of Transnistria. Large forces accumulated along the Kirovograd highway a few kilometers from the Platonovo checkpoint. The number of military personnel increased at all checkpoints in the region. Some special operations forces from the Bakhmut and Donetsk frontlines were reportedly transferred there. There is a giant ammunition depot in the village of Kolbasna. The seizure of warehouses would allow the Ukrainian military to replenish the emptied depots with ammunition for Soviet-made systems. The warehouses in Transnistria are under the control of the Operational Group of Russian troops, which numbers about 10-15 thousand servicemen.^[10]

References[edit]