He said he wasn't going to invade Ukraine, that was a bit of a porky 
That's why he deliberately termed the incursion as a Special Military Operation, as he answered a request for help from the Russian-speaking populations of Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts who had suffered 14,000 deaths from bombing by Kiev between 2014 and 2021.
Talking of lies, declassified documents show security assurances against NATO expansion to given to Soviet leaders [following German reunification] from Baker, Bush, Genscher, Kohl, Gates, Mitterrand, Thatcher, Hurd, Major, and Woerner. That collective lie led to all this.
Oh, and the Minsk 1 and Minsk 2 Accords (which would have kept Ukraine intact) were guaranteed by France and Germany but they later admitted that they had no intention of honouring the Accords. So they effectively lied.
And, of course, following the initial incursion by 70,000 Russian troops, Ukraine initialed the Istanbul Agreement which, again, would have kept Ukraine intact. As part of that, Russia agreed as a goodwill gesture to withdraw troops from Kiev. Unfortunately, Johnson flew to Kiev and told Zelensky not to sign, but to fight Russia instead. Very bad move.
Had the Minsk Accords and the Istanbul Agreement been honoured, Donbass would have remained part of Ukraine, albeit with autonomy governing language, religion etc.
In a little mitigation, Zelensky has been under pressure from the Nazi element within Western Ukrainian society. These openly display the Nazi salute and have tattoos of Hitler and the Waffen SS.
My late parents both served in WW2 against Nazism. I honour their memory by similarly opposing Nazism in Ukraine.
You won't find all that on the BBC.
However, in 2015 (following the coup of 2014), Consortium News reported: "The U.S. House of Representatives has admitted an ugly truth that the U.S. mainstream media has tried to hide from the American people that the post-coup regime in Ukraine has relied heavily on Nazi storm troopers to carry out its bloody war against ethnic Russians, reports Robert Parry."
https://consortiumnews.com/2015/06/12/u-s-house-admits-nazi-role-in-ukraine/
), but subsequently changed my mind and turned up, you wouldn't accuse me of lying earlier, would you?
