wi Ukrainian army internvenes durig Maidan

[alpha]

What will happen if the army had cleared out those guys at the height of the protests.

 

[ThatOneGuy]

There almost certainly would have been a Civil War. It would be more of a East Ukraine v West Ukraine and It probably would be much like today in Ukraine, just a bigger rebellion and probably more vocal Western support against Yanukovych. I could also probably see some EU intervention depending on how bad it gets. An entire half of the country breaking away could drive Yanukovych to do some pretty bad things.

 

[The Cosmonaut Cat]

If you look at OTL reports from February you will see that protesters took government buildings in areas like Lviv and togather with sympathetic authorities talked declared they don't recognize Yanukovich's rule and declare independence. They raided military bases for guns, defecting Berkut officers joined the protestors and barricades were made using anti-tank guns (I can provide a link to each of these events if you want)

And this is OTL without army intervention.

If Maidan is crushed violently you would have had some sort of Neo-West Ukrainian People's Republic arise instead of Novorussia.

 

[birdboy2000]

Would the army obey?

Yanukovych seemed quite unpopular at the height of the protests, and even the post-Maidan rebels, while challenging the legality of his deposition, never tried to bring him back or claimed to be fighting for his regime.

 

[aktarian]

You'd get a split in army. I'd say between those willing to do it, those unwilling to do it but unwilling to do anything else and those willing to join protests.