“You should leave.”
A response to the most common comment I receive.
That is the number of Ukrainian refugees recorded globally by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees.
Roughly the entire population of the state of Tennessee.
You should leave.
Why do you stay?
Are you coming back?
Have you considered leaving?
Yes.
We should leave.
But we won’t.
These have been the questions presented to me during my time in Ukraine and, most recently, in regards to the attacks on Odesa by the Russian TERRORIST state launched on August 14.2023, which I recorded on my phone and posted to my Facebook account.
My wife did leave. In the beginning. When things looked like the invaders might breach the shores of Odesa.
But Kyiv held, and the invaders were forced to pull back and reconsolidate on the eastern borders of Ukraine, where they lost 60% of the territorial gains they made.
She fled her home in Odesa. She moved through Europe trying to find a place to invest her hard-earned money and start making money to help support her country’s defense of its freedom and right to exist.
We ended up in Romania. We lived there for a year while Odesa settled into some kind of normalcy. The new normal is air raid sirens followed by a ballistic missile and drone attacks. At the same time, a war of attrition rages only 300 km to the east.
She watched the business that her family built after the collapse of the Soviet Union begin to flounder. Her competitors that stayed in Odesa thrived with no competition.
The depression was gradual, but stalwart.
Easter of 2022 rolled around and, against my better judgment, we went to Odesa to celebrate. Her mood changed as we drove through the Moldovan Ukrainian checkpoint. Her smile returned in the following days as we wrapped ourselves in the arms of Odesa Momma.
When we returned to Romania, we talked about her returning to Odesa to run the business while her son finished school. We spent Christmas and New Year traveling around Eastern Europe. Then she returned to Odesa, and the boy and I rode out the rest of the spring in Romania.
I spent much time considering the risk assessment of moving back to Ukraine. Odesa was in a new normal of the occasional ballistic missile attack, and we drew up comparisons to other war-torn countries about what normal looked like.
No.
We are not leaving.
I know it’s dangerous.
I love my family.
Unless the terrorists break through the line in the east, which isn’t likely, we won’t leave.
We will stay. My wife will run her business that feeds into the tax system of Ukraine. We will do what we can to help the war effort. If everyone leaves, who will repay Ukraine’s debt?
Ukraine fights this war with one hand tied behind its back — and it’s winning.
We will not run.
We will stand.
We will not concede land to Russian invaders and war criminals.
Why?
Because my wife is a patriot.
Because I’m an American.
Fuck terrorism.
In the last 30 years, Russia has spread its aggression from Chechnya, Georgia, and Syria.
Putin’s murder and aggression have gone unchecked for the last 30 years. Which leads us to the ongoing genocide of the Ukrainian people.
Putin and Russia must answer for 30 years of war crimes; for the murder and rape of thousands of civilians. He must answer for threatening global food security.
Ukraine will not give land to a terrorist state. Ukraine will not accept a cease-fire that allows Russia to enrich itself and relieve itself from the war crimes it has committed — not just against Ukraine, but against all the countries it has terrorized.
What would you do?
What would you do if someone came in and took your property? Raped and murdered people in your family? Would you let them point a gun at you and give them exactly what they wanted when you know they’ve done this before?
Do you tell your children to continue to reward the bully by enriching them?
Does that solve the problem?
Would you fight?
Would you fold?
