It would be one thing if there was a clear policy and adherence to it. In that case, you could discuss and reason in good faith. However there is no such indication that this decision is based on a considered policy.
Trump's supporters would say that this is a result of not wanting the US being involved in foreign conflicts. That is a laudable goal, however that is not what is happening here. From the article
> On Friday, the administration said it was sending Israel nearly $3 billion in new weapons, including more than 35,000 new 2,000 pound bombs, invoking an emergency rule under U.S. arms control laws.
This just makes it look like a petty tantrum at best and a wilful desire to cleave our relationship with Europe at worst.
Yes, we can all argue that Europe needs to be less dependent on the US, however what's on the other side of that is not pretty for the United States. Our ability to have the world's de facto reserve currency and hence our ability to sustain debt loads way in excess of usual is largely dependent on the US being the world's cop and sole superpower.
A truly multipolar world might be good for the world, but it's certainly not going to be good for the United States.
It's one thing to stop all aid to Ukraine. That makes you an asshole in a world full of assholes. But it's another thing to do that while simultaneously working to restore relations with Russia. There is only one word for that: evil.
Back in the late 90s to late 2000s, people in Western Europe generally had pretty negative views of the US. It was the country that refused to fight against climate change, launched an invasion of another country based on obvious lies, and so on. People were genuinely debating whether Bush was a bigger villain than Putin. And it wasn't just about the young and the left. Our elites hated Bush so much that they gave the next guy a Nobel Peace Prize for not being him.
Since then, Putin has worked hard to raise the bar for being a bigger villain. But Trump seems to be genuinely trying to compete.
Why do people think it is so far fetched that Trump is a Russian asset given his behavior in his last term (trying to blackmail Zelenskyy on an official call) and his credit problems in the past (no banks would lend to him given his failure to pay back any loan, with the exception of an obscure channel through a German bank)? Perhaps Trump is just in debt to Putin and this is payback, he was intentionally crass to Zelenskyy because he wanted to provoke him and find an excuse to revoke US aid. If it barks like a dog, often it’s really a dog.
What could they have on him that would matter? Honestly?
I don't really buy this kompromat argument, even if it was some horrific sex tape it would just be "fake" or "fake news".
I think it's likely just the flattery and importance they give him, the strongman image he desires and he likes the way Russia is a dictatorship. I just think he likes their system.
Would Russian oil, which I seem to remember is heavy in grade, replace Canadian oil, which I hear is similarly heavy, in US refineries, explaining the 25% tariff on Canada which is implausibly supposed to be about fentanyl controls?
Yeah, this is where I'm at. Nothing sticks to him, and anything he does seems to get excused, so what kind of kompromat could even be severe enough to influence him?
The trouble is that his behavior vis a vis Russia is so difficult to explain otherwise. We've been at this long enough to know that if you just assume Russia has a relationship with him, you have a fairly good idea of how things are going to play out.
Imagine having fun with animals, men, children, bsdm and so on. That's not even bottom of the pit.
I mean he was a good friend with epstein and there are numerous videos of their friendly encounters (so did clinton, gates and so on just to be clear). Go figure.
But I think he is just a small insecure emotional boy at the core, and thats enough if you know which buttons in which order to push. ruskies somehow figured that out, it seems israelis too during his first term.
> Imagine having fun with animals, men, children, bsdm and so on. That's not even bottom of the pit.
Other than children/minors, I don’t think the others are likely. Possible, but not likely.
Whatever kompromat they have was almost certainly came during the 2013 miss universe pageant in Russia. It would have been trivially easy to get an old enough-looking minor in the room with him.
> It would come as no surprise if Russian intelligence has some juicy blackmail material.
I’m pretty sure the only blackmail that could be bad enough to motivate Trump would be if he had relations with a minor. I’m pretty sure that’s the only thing that could make the core of his base alienate him.
Whatever kinks people speculate about, none of that will matter. In fact, I bet whatever kink he is into would instantly become more popular amongst his core constituents.
I'm not even convinced him doing things witch a minor would make his base hate him. More likely is they'll just call it a lie or excuse it as something like "well she looked old enough. What was he supposed to do, ask for her ID card?"
It's almost like he was once investigated for being a Russian agent motivated by Kompromat. I'm sure it has nothing to do with being a friend of Epstein and showing up in the manifests or Russian prostitutes with water sports or the 13 year old who sued him for raping her, not dissimilar from the civil lawsuit where he was found guilty for raping another woman, not dissimilar from him bragging he can just sexual assault any woman he wants.
They (the GOP, Democrats, national and intl intelligence agencies) all have blackmail on each other. It hasn't made sense to think about these issues purely on national lines for a long time - try thinking in terms of a large international mafia with various families and factions; held together by unspeakable secrets.
Sarah Kendzior and Whitney Webb produce great writing about this, thoroughly sourced. For example, here's a piece from Sarah's latest newsletter Q and A:
> What is the hold that Trump has over the Republicans? It has to be more than simply the threat of a primary. Do you think it involves threats of violence? It's a mystery to me what could be so frightening that this large group of people would forsake their country.
> SK: Trump has leverage over the GOP due to 1) lifelong connections with organized crime and willingness to deploy violence 2) blackmail obtained long before 2016 via his mentor, mafia lawyer and GOP advisor Roy Cohn, and Cohn’s networks 3) blackmail and state secrets Trump obtained during his first term 4) court packing that creates the potential of legal consequences for anyone who challenges him 5) bribery and/or shared evil goals with the GOP, though for many this incentive fades over time when they realize they will never be more than a disposable hired hand. Many Republicans were lured by corrupt ambition, but they stay due to fear.
Lmao, this is the dumbest conspiracy theory I’ve read in a while. National politicians are afraid of being murdered by the Mafia on Trump’s orders? Good grief.
Even if you put the absurdity of that kind of thing aside, look at the actual facts. Trump burns through advisors and cabinet members on a nearly weekly basis, and many of those have gone on to become scathing critics of his. He has tons of vocal enemies from within the Republican Party, who are quickly sidelined or ousted but never harmed.
The reason Republicans have all fallen in line behind Trump is because they ultimately want nothing more than power and wealth. Once it became clear that Trump has tapped into an indestructible movement of American populist stupidity that isn’t going anywhere, anyone who wanted to have a job in Republican politics quickly figured out that there was only one way to do so: join the never ending Trump pep-rally.
> National politicians are afraid of being murdered by the Mafia on Trump’s orders? Good grief.
Not what I said, or what Sarah said. But yes, politicians are getting threatened because of Trump. Politicians themselves report receiving hundreds of death threats; some of them seriously credible [0].
All Trump has to do is tweet, and people have their lives "turned upside down". They start getting death threats; even their boss gets threatened. And votes get changed around real quick. This is documented, on record - like Trump's connections... You might ask yourself why you never heard about it, and what else you never hear about.
> He has tons of vocal enemies from within the Republican Party, who are quickly sidelined or ousted but never harmed.
Drama which doesn't affect votes, or anything material, is best ignored as theater. Threats and theater - they do exist pal. They're very much part of politics, especially in the US, and have been for a long long time.
> Even if you put the absurdity of that kind of thing aside
It's not absurd at all. If you believe US politicians - and international politicians - don't get threatened, then you don't understand the stakes, or the amount of money involved, or the characters of these people.
> Once it became clear that Trump has tapped into an indestructible movement of American populist stupidity that isn’t going anywhere, anyone who wanted to have a job in Republican politics quickly figured out that there was only one way to do so: join the never ending Trump pep-rally.
And so Trump doesn't need or use blackmail, or threats of violence? Buddy. My guy.
An ally that has broken pretty much any agreement he has ever made, invades neighbouring countries and spins alternative facts around to justify it, suppresses and fights just about any values that the USA used to hold, and played a key role in the KGB, a hostile secret service? An ally that is ever more dependent on China economically?
I refuse to believe you can be so dense to actually think that!
It's so heavily being pushed on social media right now, I suspect it's coming from the same forces who tried to make people believe that Trump would deliver more weapons to Ukraine and that Trump would be the better option for Palestine.
Putin ally against China? He's the one who signed a "no limits" friendship deal with Xi Xinping. China and Russia are intimate trading partners and they have shared geopolitical interests. Why would he object if China wants to take over Taiwan or something?
> If we see that Germany is winning we ought to help Russia and if Russia is winning we ought to help Germany, and that way let them kill as many as possible.
This is, unfortunately about one thing only: The Nobel Peace Prize.
As Trump sees it, Zelenskyy is blocking Trump's peace prize by not agreeing to his (very bad) terms that are designed with one purpose in mind: Quickly freezing the conflict so that he can declare himself peacemaker and get his prize (because Obama got his 9 months into his term).
The Russians have been grooming him since the 80s (along with many others of that era - standard Soviet practice), flattering him and selling him on dreams of being president, and then after Obama got a peace prize, of getting his own Nobel prize.
Watch what his aides are saying about the Nobel prize. He wants it BAD.
This is why he told Zelenskyy: “You’re either going to make a deal or we’re out. And if we’re out, you’ll fight it out. I don’t think that it’s going to be pretty, but you’ll fight it out. But you don’t have the cards.” This is why he said “Let me tell you, Putin went through a hell of a lot with me.” This is why he booted Zenelskyy out of the White House and banned him until he's “ready for peace”
This is why he's going to end the sanctions against Russia, and if Europe continues to support Ukraine, sanction them instead. Anyone who blocks his Nobel Peace Prize is the enemy.
Trump: “They probably will never give it to me, even what I’m doing in Korea, and in Idlib province and all of these places. They probably will never give it to me. You know why? Because they don’t want to.”
Trump: “They will never give me a Nobel Peace Prize. It’s too bad. I deserve it, but they will never give it to me.”
But why wouldn’t it? It seems sensible that Norwegians are more concerned with Russian aggression than the average westerner, so they would also disapprove more of trump, no?
The committee selecting the winner is formed of Norwegians. Norwegians "average worldview" and sources of information therefore affects who gets the prize.
Dude 'nobel' peace prize has nothing to do with actual scientific Nobel prices as they were originally intended, its highly political medal for various political stances and activism dobe by very different people.
The list of its recipients with properly shameful past ain't short neither and I don't recall a single one recently which wasn't somehow controversial to put it mildly.
This is quite inconsistent because Trump conditioned the rare earths deal. If he wanted peace that badly, he wouldn’t be imposing that. Also, you don’t win a Peace Nobel by being a system spoiler like he is, creating instability left and right and branding a stick. That’s completely delusional, even for him. He goes around talking about annexing Canada, taking Greenland, and displacing Palestinians -- where’s the peace in that? Obama got his without doing shit, guess why: the Nobel Peace Prize is about who you upset, and I very much doubt the committee is fond of Trump, especially since they gave the prize to Obama.
Bold of you to assume that the goal of the current administration is to maintain USD hegemony. They've stated explicitly several times that they feel the dollar is too expensive and gone on at length about the trade "deficit". Even going so far with Trump and Musk hinting that they will renig on US foreign debt obligations ("lots of fraud in treasuries"), which would destroy the value of the USD overnight if they followed through.
It seems clear to me one
goal of the current admin is to transform the US into an export economy, and the strong currency is one major roadblock in reaching their objective.
Would love to see more analysis on this, as their trial balloons around tanking USD seem to have gotten lost in the noise.
The weiderst part is that the us is now allied in a self conflicting alliance collection . They are friendly to russia who is hostile towards israel by supporting iran.
The difference is Israel's enemies are easy to defeat. Russia, not so much. Europe made the same mistake as in world war II. Believing their own propaganda and convincing themselves that Russia would be easy to defeat. Trump talks to the military and knows what's reality.
I wasn’t around for WWII, but now don’t think you have this quite right. The US fought against Germany and its allies (and Japan, which had directly attacked the US and continued to fight after Germany surrendered). The war was never against Russia.
Sure, maybe the US could have invaded Russia afterwards, but that would have been a disaster, kind of like how Germany’s invasion of Russia was a disaster and a bit like how Russia’s recent invasion of Ukraine has been a real mess for Russia.
If they're so easy to defeat why have we sent $30B+ to a country with a good economy and great quality of life for its own people to help them defeat them? Maybe they should pay for it all themselves since they keep prolonging all their wars?
Israel is using these bombs on Hamas and Hezbollah mostly, both of which it hasn't defeated after 1 1/2 years of complete material superiority. It's actually impossible to defeat an enemy that uses asymmetric warfare. Israel already knows this, but Netanjahu needs the war to continue to stay in power.
> Our ability to have the world's de facto reserve currency and hence our ability to sustain debt loads way in excess of usual is largely dependent on the US being the world's cop and sole superpower.
Dollar status as reserve currency started unravelling quite some time ago. It started with China's started becoming world's factory, more so after they got in to WTO and started using it to their advantage. My belief is that wallstreet believed that they could influence or coerce Chinese leadership into opening up Chinese economy and profit from that, all that G2 talk. China after 2008 crisis with ascension of Xi, belt road, challenges to foreign companies etc. acted completely against wallstreet expectations. Now, America can either try splitting world economy and be sole power in their sphere or start working towards multi polar world.
Yes, but it would have taken a decade or more with sensible US policy.
You were still benefiting from the setup, and were going to continue to benefit for a long time. Look at Boeing's valuation, for example. No profit, still higher market cap than Airbus.
It is not a petty tantrum though it might look like one. You have to consider that the incumbents have won the US elections, that's not a small feat. What many people are missing is that if the US main challenger is China and beating Russia is a far thing, then it makes sense for the US to ally with Russia against China. For that, the US might need to give Russia something (some EU countries?) for this hustle and also refund it for the earlier war (yep). But if the administration believes this is worth it to contain China then it's the right call.
This is why European countries are freaking out. They might be seeing the change as being more fundamental than a two guys liking/hating each other and that a trade might involve their territory in an unfortunate moment (though a part of this is their own negligence).
The US took Ukraine’s nukes in exchange for safety guarantees.
The true extent of US commitment to european security has been clear to everyone for at least ten years.
Hell, the French nuclear programme was premised on the fact that Paris didn’t trust the US to defend France. Do you think the easternmost NATO states have built their military doctrine on blind trust in Uncle Sam?
> The US took Ukraine’s nukes in exchange for safety guarantees.
Please read the actual text of the memorandum, so you don't spread any more baseless accusations. It's only 1 page, it'll just take you a minute and the language it is written in is very accessible.
The only point that even touches on any kind of guarantees is essentially a promise to "seek immediate United Nations Security Council action" in the case of an attack or a threat of attack IN WHICH NUCLEAR WEAPONS ARE USED. That last part is always conveniently left out whenever anyone tries to throw out the soundbite of "They gave up their nukes for security guarantees". And even if you assume that the nuclear weapon part only covers the "threat" part of the sentence and not the "attack", then you're still left with the only solid guarantee being the seeking of United Nations Security Council action.
The Budapest Memorandum on its own is not the only document that you should consult. We may debate the degree to which 'assurances' differ from 'guarantees', but considering the vagueness of international law I would leave interpretation of primary sources to scholars and statesmen.
In the eyes of the people in Europe, the US response to the war has been been lacklustre from the very beginning, only marginally improving after Russia's 2/2022 escalation.
There is not a single country in the world that has given more money and weapons to Ukraine than the United States.
If the people in Europe find that to be a lackluster response, then it is not surprising that Trump sent Vance over to humiliate them, because they need a wake-up call and they needed it yesterday.
How would Russia help “contain” China? China’s actual territorial ambitions have never been especially wide ranging, and I really doubt that Russia would make a credible deal to help keep China’s military out of Taiwan.
To the contrary, China’s increasing power is economic. They out-manufacture everyone. They appear to be beating the US at its own recent games (BYD seems to be ahead of Tesla!). They have plenty of software expertise these days. They are approximately caught up in AI. They also happen to lead in non-petroleum-dependent energy, and Russia’s main strength is in its oil and gas resources.
If the US wants to remain a dominant economic power, how is Russia going to help?
They have a giant land border. An adversarial Russia-China relationship is expensive for both powers, and is a major reason for the USSR going bankrupt in the cold war (also the USSR propping up Vietnam after China invaded in 79).
It seems more and more that if war between US and China starts it will be US-initiated. You just can’t stand not being the top dog anymore.
For context, EU+UK is over 500M people, Russia is 143M.
I think two weeks back many Europeans took for granted (at least I did) we would get involved in the Pacific theatre if needed on US side, but after what is happenning now… I am for not getting involved in any coflict in Pacific if US treats us this way.
Russia would never trust US. Russia would never ally itself with US against China. What makes you think they will suddenly turn on their ally China, to side with US (their always-enemy)?
Economically, allying with Russia is stupid, they're poor. The only way they are making it through this war economy is the fact that Russian people are patient and are used to bad economy. The average anual salary in Russia is below $10K.
$10K/year is not that bad, you won't die from hunger and can buy all necessary things. Also, it is more than in previous years (cannot believe, but it was somewhere around $1K/year in 2000 when Putin came into power).
This seems quite reasonable on the surface but it neglects the evidence of sheer incompetence from the first Trump term.
There's no 5d chess here. There's no scenario where ceding Poland and Ukraine to Russian authoritarians leads to a more free world and a victory over Chinese aithoritarianism. There's just rampant and opportunitistic corruption.
The US is being carved up from the inside and nothing about this process will help the impending conflict against China.
The sooner we all recognize this like the Europeans seem to be doing is the sooner we can coordinate to destroy authoritarians wherever they may call home.
> it makes sense for the US to ally with Russia against China
Economically and population wise Russia is tiny compared to the West (Canada, EU, etc) It makes no sense to trade our alliance with the West for alliance with much weaker and poorer Russia.
I think Russia has compromising info on Trump. That's the simplest explanation.
Russia advantage is its large border with China. The US is not allying because of their (non) existent economy. But they'll be a formidable ally in case of a war against China.
> But it looks much more like Russia dividing and conquering the USA from the rest of the democratic, human rights supporting West.
Yes, the famous human rights where people get visited by the cops for a Facebook post or an offensive tweet like in the UK.
Also, regarding the UK who just recently forced Apple to remove it's EtoE encryption because it wants access to all the data of it's citizens violating the fundamental right of privacy?
What about the UK terror law where they can detain you at the border without telling you why and for as long as they want, where you can't have a lawyer present with you in the room while they interrogate you and while they go through all your electronics + email + phone and you don't have the right to refuse giving them your passwords otherwise you will be jailed?
Russia is bad, terrible even but let's not pretend that some of the western countries haven't been sliding in proto-fascism either.
Lets also not forget that the UK took part in the illegal invasion of Afghanistan and Irak, which led to the disastrous consequences that we know today.
I think it would be best for the West to stop lecturing the world about democracy and human rights and the rule of law for a while and start by cleaning it's own house first because it doesn't have much credibility left on these matters.
No those are facts. Simple as that. What is your contention exactly with what I said?
> what the fuck is your point?
Why the aggressiveness? We are all here to have a peaceful conversation. You may disagree with me and that is fine but we don't have to get at each other's throat.
> Do you really think the UK is as bad or worse then Russia?
You must have missed part of my comment if you are asking this question.
> Russia is bad, terrible even
That's from my comment.
> Of course we can and should criticize other countries
Exactly my point. I am criticizing all the countries that infringe on human rights and that includes Russia and the UK an whoever else engages in these sorts of things.
My point was that simply asserting that the West respects human rights when we know that that is not always the case is the like the pot calling the kettle black.
You can go and give lessons of democracy and human rights when you stop detaining your own citizens for arbitrary reasons and without cause and without having the right to be represented by a lawyer.
Now, if you think that this is perfectly acceptable in a democracy, then I guess we don't have the same concept of human rights then.
I didn't say they weren't facts. I said it's whatoboutism:
> Whataboutism or whataboutery (as in "what about ...?") is a pejorative for the strategy of responding to an accusation with a counter-accusation instead of a defense against the original accusation.
>
> The communication intent is often to distract from the content of a topic (red herring). The goal may also be to question the justification for criticism and the legitimacy, integrity, and fairness of the critic, which can take on the character of discrediting the criticism, which may or may not be justified
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whataboutism
The topic is Russia dividing and conquering the USA from Europe and other nations. Not: are Europe perfectly living up to its stated humanist goals.
> Why the aggressiveness?
I guess it comes from this being a very common tactic to shut down any criticism and debate. Maybe you didn't mean to do that, in that case I'm sorry for assigning malignant intentions.
That border is either mountain ranges (Altai), or empty steppes (Zabaikalsk), or boreal forests (Amur and Vladivostok). Either way -- the area lacks infrastructure and even roads, for the most part. It doesn't provide any military advantage, especially given that the Chinese side of the border is much better developed.
If anything, the area is not defensible against even a half-ass incursion effort from the south (either economical or military-driven), which they're actually in the middle of (the economical one for now) without realizing that.
Russian lost hundreds of thousand men, I'm not sure they'll be willing to ally themselves with the US to contain China anytime soon, they'll pursue what's in their best interest and play every side.
It could be an advantage for the US, but it looks to me like a liability for Russia, since they don't have enough manpower to guard it.
In case of war between China and Russia I could easily see Chinese invading large swaths of lands without any meaningful opposition. Populations in eastern Russia are treated more like than colonial subjects than regular citizen, so I don't think they will mind too much a new overlord.
Assuming they had the troops to get there, they cannot move all of them to the border with China and leave the western front unguarded
a) be willing to join a US-led coalition against China, given that the US foreign policy stopped being consistent and the next administration may well make a sharp turn again;
b) be capable of joining a US-led coalition against China when they now spent 3 years slowly restructuring their infrastructure and industry from Western products to Chinese products and any break in the relations with China would mean a full stop for support, spare parts etc., which US alone, with its depleted industrial platform, is unable to compensate for.
Not to mention that Russian nationalists HATE the idea of Russia being a junior partner to anyone and especially to the Anglo-Saxons. That would be hard sell even from Putin.
> Not to mention that Russian nationalists HATE the idea of Russia being a junior partner to anyone and especially to the Anglo-Saxons. That would be hard sell even from Putin.
America would be the junior partner. I do not see Russia doing anything for America, it is just America giving Russia what they want.
Politically maybe, but as far as raw force goes, Russians have been reduced to deploying donkeys in battlefield logistics. That is a big capability gap, and won't be easily bridged.
The next POTUS may not be as prostrate to Russia as Trump is, even if a Republican.
So the plan is to burn all of our current allies who joined us under a framework we devised largely for our own benefit so that we could maybe gain the favor of someone who is even less trustworthy and reliable than we are at this point against China? You really think this is smart? Trump is delivering the Russians their number 1 strategic goal since World War 2 by destroying NATO and trading this for seemingly nothing, which at this point again raises serious questions about what his actual motivations are with regard to his otherwise unexplainable deference to Putin and Russia in all things.
Sometimes I wonder if I am the only one who feels like world peace has been unraveling for decades, slowly reaching a breaking point?
I don't know what happens when the U.S. eventually pulls out of NATO, a scenario that seems more possible than ever based on the actions of the current Administration. Will Europe be able to stand its ground against Russia and China?
We now have world leaders armed with nuclear weapons, the most terrifying creations in human history, openly threatening each other and growing hostile.
I honestly, worry about the world we are creating for our children.. or perhaps my thoughts have been overtly influenced by Social Media..
NATO was created to counter the Soviet Union but after the USSR fell apart, NATO did not disband. Instead Europeans hired the USA for their defense. The USA enjoyed the status and power of being the dominant military force in Europe.
Unfortunately "entangling alliances" such as NATO tend to draw us into remote conflicts where we have nothing to gain:
Some seem to have forgotten how the neocons/CIA have stirred the pot in Ukraine for at least a decade under Democratic administrations. Some say it was a mistake to do what they (neocons) did but I think it was a good outcome. Russian is now like North Korea, able to "win" (and even that is questionable) only a nuclear conflict.
Furthermore Russia's population of fighting men is down, which will require that they return home to seed a new generation of cannon fodder (not an entirely bad assignment BTW in either Russia or Ukraine) for their czar-like leaders. I feel sorry for the handicapped wounded however.
> I honestly, worry about the world we are creating for our children
It's not we, the politicians are creating this unsafe, cruel world. We didn't choose war.
Also, the world has always been like this. Peace was always only momentary. The best scenario would be to just stop procreating so our children don't have to live in this shit but it's obviously not going to happen
No that's a cop out. We are in this situation explicitly because a plurality of the voting population voted for it. Trump isn't and has never been the problem. He's a clown. The people making the clown a king are the problem. When Trump goes away, they will just find another clown.
“We must be ever watchful when dealing with regimes whose actions have often betrayed their promises.”
Ronald Reagan
“I call the Soviet Union an evil empire.”
George H. W. Bush on Russia
“The history of deception and coercion reminds us that trust is never given
lightly—it must be earned and continuously verified.”
George W. Bush
“We call on Moscow to immediately cease its aggressive actions and respect the sovereignty of its neighbors. We cannot afford to trust a regime that repeatedly flouts international norms.”
Donald Trump
“I have great respect for Putin.”
I have a very good relationship with him [Putin].”
Nixon would be seen as a woke elite in today's Republican party. He helped introduce environmental legislation in the US, and met with Mao to open trade links and counterbalance the USSR.
Trump no doubt will say this is a negotiating ploy to get Zelensky to make concessions but you have to wonder why all the concessions have to be made by the victim and not the aggressor. Why not ask Putin to pause killing Ukranians or return some of the kidnapped children or some token of goodwill?
Because West has no means to put more pressure on Russia (they cannot even stop buying natural gas), so it has to talk nicely. US cannot demand, for example, that Russia gives them a share of their minerals and generally cannot demand anything.
Actually in hindsight the best time for negotiations was somewhere in end of 2022, but that chance is long gone.
But while West cannot demand, it still can offer (i.e. removing nuclear weapon and US forces from EU etc).
This is simply false. West can send more arms, more tanks (US sent 31 old Abrams tanks since 2022) more long range missiles. You know how easy it is to defend Ukrainian cities against airborne cruise missiles? Bomb few airbases used by strategic bombers. Bomb few factories used for ballistic missiles production.
If west bite putin's bluff about WWIII then west can transfer technology and give Ukrainians money to make long range ballistic missiles themselves.
And sanctions! West can put a real sanctions. A trade blockade of Baltic and Black sea will destroy their economy pretty soon.
The are so many things west can do.
But US president is a friend of putin and going to bully Ukraine to surrender on Russian terms.
The West absolutely has more means at its disposal, by arming Ukraine to the teeth.
The slow drip of arms has been really effective at degrading Russia (just look at the golf cart brigades and North Korean wave attacks), but an increase in long range capability is what's needed to finish the job.
"arming Ukraine to the teeth" does not guarantee the victory but guarantees more casualties and suffering. To win you also need to have 3x more soldiers which is not the case. West cannot even pay a salary comparable to what Russia pays to its volunteer soldiers.
We can both agree that arming Ukraine with more missiles will guarantee more casualties and suffering... for the Russians.
And in response, Russia will do what exactly? Send more golf cart brigades or more North Koreans? It's not like Russia has enormous military resources they've been keeping as a surprise. No, if Russia could do anything differently they would already be doing it to win the 'Special Military Operation'.
Draft more soldiers, for example. Missiles falling on Russian cities will increase motivation to go defend the country and will make a good cause for involuntary conscription.
If the Tsar does resort to involuntary conscription, I hope there are some Ukrainian drones around because we'll get to see the next Great Russian Revolution in 4k!
> Because West has no means to put more pressure on Russia
This is extremely silly. The west has hundreds of billions of dollars of Russian money, the west can supply Ukraine with weapons that are more modern than the nineties era stuff we've been sending, and the west just generally hasn't taken any of the steps it would take if NATO were really at war with Russia, as Russia whinges about. Why is Russia even connected to the internet anymore?
Without opining on the correctness of referring to this kind of confiscation from one state by another as stealing: it's an obvious mistake to treat taking money out of their bank accounts as a more serious offense than making war on them, literally taking their lives.
This is way more damaging to the institutions of Europe than the war in Ukraine. Countries usually owe each other money, now everyone will think twice before saving assets in Europe.
Oh yes - "Risky to invest in Europe, it'll scupper our future plans to break a peace treaty and violate international law by invading one of their countries".
For now the EU has only frozen the bulk of Russian assets. The cases where assets or money has been seized are in cases such as sanctions violations. EU countries are unlikely to seize anything unless they have a solid legal justification.
It was already stolen money. Stolen from the Russian people, by crooks who support a war criminal in his imperialist massacres (the people whose assets are being frozen weren't selected randomly). These oligarchs forfeited their wealth by supporting the aggressor and threatening the countries where they stashed their loot. There is a crystal-clear justification for locking these assets for the trillions Russia will have to pay in reparations.
You also have to wonder why Vance was less bothered by Putin not continually saying "please" as he was by Zelenskyy not continually saying "thank you".
Perhaps surprisingly, Europe has more nuclear weapons than China (France: 290 warheads, UK: 225 warheads, China: 500 warheads). China never really bought into the mutually assured destruction doctrine in the same way that the US and Soviet Union did.
China invested heavily into hypersonic delivery vehicles instead of scale. They didn't want nuclear winter, they want to make sure that ANY attempt by the US to project power in "Their" waters evaporates in a plasma ball. They don't seem interested in nuking the US mainland.
Instead, their focus has been on building invasion barges so that they can take Taiwan. So that's exciting. Hope none of you like computer chips!
They were able to nuke the west coast in the 90s. I don't think they have been sitting still with their ICBMs, the same ones that get your taikounauts into the space are the ones you use to deliver nukes.
Regardless, they only need enough to make nuclear war with them MAD, which I think they've had for a decade or so.
I mean, see Doctor Strangelove. If you have a doomsday weapon, that’s only helpful if you _tell_ people about it! If China had built loads of warheads, they’d hardly keep that secret, as most of these point of having loads of warheads is for everyone else to know you had them.
Realistically, by the time China and France got on the nuclear scene, doctrine had shifted from “nuclear torpedos, nuclear guns, nuclear landmines, nuclear everything” to “you have some submarines with missiles; you can have other stuff if you want, but no-one cares about it”. There’s little point in having thousands of warheads, these days.
(The UK did briefly go down the ‘nuclear everything’ road, but pulled back for cost/sanity reasons)
I meant that your data is out of date, and China has moved quickly in the last ten years. They went in the last ten years from being able to just hit the west coast to hitting all the way up to the Midwest, do you think they won’t have some amount of increased coverage in the next, especially with their space program accelerating their ICBM program?
The truth is that China hit MAD awhile ago and doesn’t really need to play up or even build much more on its nuclear arsenal. They are better off investing in conventional warfare for the near term, and especially in new arms like drones that give them an actual advantage in future conflicts.
With respect to how Ukraine yielded up nukes while Russia gave "assurances" that they would respect Ukrainian borders [0], Putin has claimed it doesn't count now because it's a different Ukraine.
If that's really how he feels, then it's time to expel the imposter "Russia" that's been falsely posing as a member of the United Nations Security Council, because it's not reeealy the USSR...
Well, in the 90s Clinton negotiated the Agreed framework with North Korea not to get nukes in exchange for lowering sanctions. Then Bush admin called it "appeasement" and let it die. Then NK got nukes.
Obama's admin negotiated the JCPOA deal with Iran, same thing. They put the most inspectors ever in any country to make sure Iran doesn't get nukes. Trump's admin then unilaterally ended it.
Tom Cotton and Republicans openly warned Iran during Obama's admin that the US is fickle and will change its policy as soon as administrations change. This has been going on ever since treaties with the Native Americans ("white man speaks with forked tongue") but the Cotton letter was refreshingly honest:
The messages for every country to get nukes have been loud and clear, but no country has done it in the southern hemisphere, for instance. Even though USA had been involved in regime change or invasions of almost all of them in the last 80 years: https://geopoliticaleconomy.com/2022/09/13/us-251-military-i...
Yes but that's not what you asserted. In addition to South Africa, Balarus and Kazakhstan gave up their programs at the same time as Ukraine, for the same reasons.
"International laws" are also a weird thing. There is no international parliament, international police and international court. I think the only viable agreements are of a kind "if you don't do A then we don't do B".
In the Budapest Memorandum USA promised not to attack Ukraine if it gives back Russian nukes to Russia. They kept the promise.
In the same memorandum Russia promised the same thing. They broke the promise. Repeatedly.
Nonetheless, I agree that more countries should develop their own nukes. Especially the ones like Poland, Baltics and Nordics. Not because it's a good thing to do, but because the world is what it is.
The Budapest Memorandum basically only required the USA to bring any violations to the UN Security Council, which we did in 2022. I think we have a moral obligation to continue providing military aid and diplomatic assistance but there is no legal obligation to do anything more.
That's right. And let's not forget that Europe and USA have been helping directly for a few years now anyway.
It's really disappointing how much misinformation gets reiterated on the Internet with regards to this memorandum, given how short the document is and how easy it is to verify its contents oneself.
PS. NATO's Article 5 is also worth a read. It does not guarantee what is commonly claimed.
In the history of the Alliance there is only a single country that invoked article 5, and it was the US with 9/11 that lead to the United Kingdom, Canada, Germany, Australia, Italy, New Zealand to send resources and troops to help with Afghanistan.
And managed to get people involved in Iraq namely United Kingdom, Australia, Poland.
And this situation was way worse and way less called for than the Ukrainians defending themselves...
EDIT/NB: I listed just the major contributors, some other countries participated in different ways and at different levels, but still this is important to mention here...
It is a fact, that NATO Article 5 doesn't guarantee anything regardless of other countries' response to USA triggering it, just as it is a fact, that the Budapest Memorandum was mischaracterized in this thread and that both the Europe and USA did help Ukraine. Should we not go where the facts are?
If you're about that the USA should continue helping Ukraine, then I did not question this point of view at all. Pointing out factual errors is not equal to taking a stance.
The implication that I read from what your wrote suggested that the US could offer "assistance" or sit it out, which is not an acceptable stance to hold, by history and the assistance that was provided in need.
Friendship among nations sometimes involves transactions that transcend the pure material considerations, and this shift in alignment is not desirable by anyone.
That's what I meant by "let's not go there".
But I see that basically we are in agreement and I also agree that article 5 interpretation could be dicey.
> ... seek immediate UN Security Council action to provide assistance to Ukraine ... if they should become a victim of an act of aggression or an object of a threat of aggression in which nuclear weapons are used
This seems like the passage which would cover it. The UN is able to authorize use of force by member states against the aggressor. Though it looks like it hasn't done that - probably because of Russia's permanent position on the UN Security Council which would veto any such measures.
As Ukrainian, I can say that you don’t understand anything.
Some data points might be correct, but you have not enough data to connect the dots, so you make wrong conclusions.
Russia was threatening with invading Ukraine right from the beginning of its recent independence.
There were two large schools of thoughts how to deal with it:
1) try to “go around rain drops” by not provoking Russia but simultaneously to not give up sovereignty
2) move as fast as possible and seek protection from NATO like baltics and other eastern europeans.
When Russia starts regaining power internally, it became much harder to “go around raindrops”, as russia start to perform FSB style operation to discredit Ukraine in the west and to enforce its will on the inside.
Kravchuk (2nd president), falls the victim of that when Ukraine was accused of selling weapons to counties under sanctions, which made him a pariah in the west.
Later he was accused of ordering of killing a journalist which made him a pariah on the inside.
Also it was time when Russia tried to make the first attempt of annexing Crimea by trying to get first island near it - (Tusla).
Kuchma was able to make some agreement with russia a relax the tensions.
Then russia decided that the next president have to be Yanukovych - a criminal with served jail time.
An opposed politician was Yuschenko, who was famous for his reforms on the national bank and was considered by the time a successful manager and politician.
What’s worse, Russia helped to rig the elections and later poison Yuschenko with dioxin.
This caused a first revolution.
Yuschinko understood very well what he was dealing with and saw the only salvation from NATO as the threats from Russia increased.
And so on, and so forth.
US was not in favor of Ukrainian independence for a very long time and never helped in any way, except for disarming. The first time US president arrived to Ukraine was to talk the parliament out of proclaiming independence.
Europe was always afraid of russia and very careful with Ukraine.
Russia was always threatening and tried to regain control over Ukraine - both politically, by sabotage, special operations and military.
Ukraine was looking for help and screaming that russia will attack sooner or later.
Ukraine consider itself to be part of Europe by values, and is fighting russia for more than a century already paying huge price.
NATO was considered the only way to finally stop this cycle, but with US withdrawing, it may seems that all of the struggle was in vain as Europe might not be capable to protect even itself.
That is incorrect, standard Single-issue tunnel vision (which is very much promoted by Russian propaganda).
NATO, with America leading, gave the world the longest stretch of relative peace it has ever seen. The next 80 years will not be the same, if we even survive it. Every major power will have to be nuclear, and every smaller power will be moving to it.
Invasion of sovereign countries and Imperialism is going to spike. You think the world is just going to watch Russia invade and conquer a sovereign democratic nation and get away Scott-free and not want to do the same?
Frankly, the true propaganda win of Russia wasn't with the red side, they were always easy to influence, but with their splitting of the blue side, carving off great sections of it into purity-testing irrelevancy.
while pausing the “aid” may save the US gov money; the money was mostly coming back to the US anyway in the form of weapons purchases. NYT:
> The order takes effect immediately and affects more than $1 billion in arms and ammunition in the pipeline and on order. Mr. Trump’s directive also halts hundreds of millions of dollars in aid that Kyiv can use only to buy new military hardware directly from U.S. defense companies.
Those F35s are a security risk at this point. Better migrate to Typhoons, Rafales and Gripens etc and have some unified research re radars and missiles to split costs.
I hate this argument. Yeah, billions of dollars flowing to arms manufacturers is a stimulus. But in an inflationary/supply constrained economy, that stimulus is actually not what we need — we need to reduce the demand on the military’s inputs
What would it take for the Republican congress to consider impeaching him and Vance? Trump sending military aid to Russia? Crashing the economy? Defying the courts?
Nobel prize argument looks bizarre. why bother with such puny goal when you have agi race to win.
i think it's just about not wasting more money for nothing. Israel on the other hand was and still is the "51st state" bearing strategic significance. Ukraine however is not
the rear earths deal has been designed to screw Zelensky over and make him a got
let Putin has more of a win. save some money for agi race
It’s appalling to see so many comments here defending what’s going on.
I’m trying to take it in good faith and accept these people actually think this instead of being paid to spread Russian disinformation. So, for those that are in good faith, as an European, I’ll explain mine (and my close circle) position:
It’s true that the USA doesn’t have any obligation of helping Ukraine and should be up to us, Europeans, to step up. But, Trump didn’t need to be a Russian disinformation asset about it and go through that, despicable , petty, childish display in the White House, where, preying together with his VP, they tried to frame Zelenskyy and Ukraine for starting a war.
They could just politely, and diplomatic reduce US aid, while still abiding by the most basic, absolute truth: Putin started this war and all fault for it lies in Russian hands and Ukraine is just a victim in all this.
This would be the upright, sensible and intelligent position to hold if they really just didn’t want to continue contributing to Ukraine’s defense with US’ money.
Do you remember what happened when Russia tried to install missiles in Cuba? The USA put its foot down and was willing to have a nuclear war. Same thing is happening in Russia, making Ukraine part of NATO is just too close. Why is it so hard for people to understand this?
Ukraine (after abandoning efforts after the MAP rejection -- done at Russia's insistence -- in 2008) only started looking at NATO membership again after Russia invaded, so it is ludicrously disconnected from reality (but exactly representative of Russian propaganda!) to try to use that to justify the invasion.
Not sure what the point you are making is? Should we just keep going back in history and try to cherry pick events to blame and justify current conflicts? That can go on indefinitely and is why we keep having wars.
The current war started with the 2014 invasion by Russia.
Claiming that the invasion of Ukraine by Russia is caused and justified by a thing which happened after and in response to that invasion is arguing for retrocausality. It is not "going back in history and cherry picking events" to point out when and how the current war started in a discussion of the causes of the current war, especially when an event that happened after and in response to the start of the current war is argued to justify the aggressor in the current war.
so you would preffer russian troops killing political opponents and protesters in ua, like they did since 1992 in belarus till these day to avoid """coup"""?
or you prefer russian troops did 10x more massacre and hide it, instead they did 10x less in bucha and did not have time to hide?
btw just talk with pl and cz old people how their western coup was going.
seems like people prefer western coup to russian massacress and mass graves...
The west does things even worse than that to non white people and the west does near nothing (usually perpetrating this behavior) to avoid coups the way you’re saying.
There was a coup orchestrated by the west in Ukraine in 2014. Followed by an escalation of a complicated situation that is not clear cut like people in the west like to make things seem. After the coup, there was suppression of Russian things by the western backed and planted regime.
Of course things may have eventually escalated if Ukraine and the west are doing that and the Russian separatists in the east are provoking in DPR and LDR.
I am sympathetic to Kissinger, Dugin, and Mearsheimer views on geopolitics if you must know.
> Should we just keep going back in history and try to cherry pick events to blame and justify current conflicts
But, it is you that did just that. You picked up an event from the 1960's in a totally different continent, to justify Russian continued agressions against Ukraine.
I answered by actually pointing out an event from 10 years ago that's directly related to this war.
Oh. That's probably because we don't share the same definition of what is a "coup".
For me, it's clear that a "coup" is not when the democratic will of the people outs a puppet that was put in place by Moscow. While you have the opposite opinion.
This reminds me of when westerners will keep pointing to Xinjiang. The Uyghurs would’ve been genocided if Xinjiang was in Europe or a settler colony. How do westerners react to Xinjiang? With chauvinism. Keep calling it a genocide. Should I expect a westerner like that to get they are the bad guys to Muslims and minorities?
Well missiles on Cuba might also be intended for defense. As USSR leader wrote in a letter to US president, "you know that one cannot invade the country with missiles" or something along these lines.
Am I? The modern west are the most evil empires ever in history. I’m sure I can trust what western chauvinists say about their hegemony across the world as they bomb and do regime changes around the world.
A person supporting NATO as “defense” is supporting, for example, the Libyan regime change by the west and NATO.
Here's France24's take in 2014 when Ukraine voted to abandon "non-aligned" status: https://www.france24.com/en/20141223-ukraine-parliament-vote...Russia’s annexation of the Crimean Peninsula and its support for the separatist insurgency appear partly rooted in fears that the Western military alliance could expand its presence on the Russian border.
My personal opinion is that these events in 2019 were the last straw for Putin. He probably made the decision to invade early in 2020....but had to pause those plans while the whole world grappled with COVID. It then took them into mid-2021 to get the ball rolling on staging their forces for invasion, and then they were delayed again due to Xi Jinping telling Putin to not fuck up his Beijing Olympics or he wouldn't get tacit support from the PRC. All of which meant that the early-2022 invasion was likely caused by NATO-related issues that were looking increasingly concerning 3 years earlier.
Comments are disappointing for hacker news standard.
This pause was predictable (I predicted it in Nov 2024). It's negotiation leverage to steer toward an immediate resolution of the war.
An immediate resolution of the war cuts losses: Ukraine loses territory, but keeps its sovereignty.
The challenge is that there aren't many other viable paths. An indefinite forever war, with high risk of a Ukraine state collapse, is a most likely alternative. A direct confrontation between NATO and Russia is another, much less likely alternative. The idea that Russia's economy will collapse is highly unlikely.
The Trump Administration will resume military aid after Ukraine is forced to ceasefire talks. Ukraine will not likely (nor with EU) recognize loss territory. However Russia is likely to hold it de facto.
Although I doubt any peace negotiated will last decades. The reasons for the war are deep.
Certainly Russia's economy has difficulties. It has inflation roughly 9-10% and (dangerously low) unemployment around 1%. Russia's Central Bank key rate needs to be extremely high to fight its inflation because it is not as primary a lender as the US Fed for example - there's way more private lending. The inflation is caused by raising labor costs (due to unemployment), supply chain disruptions from sanctions, and weakening of the ruble due to printing of money to fund the war.
Thus far Russia's economy has grown substantially due to the war - expansion of its industrial base. This is factoring inflation in. What's happening right now is that Russian economic growth due to military industry is slowing down, and Russia is not likely to continue growing its economy at near the same rate.
Russia is most likely heading into an era of stagflation (high inflation and low growth). This isn't a collapse of the economy. It's not great, but its not a way to end the war.
One option could be to tank oil prices (into the $40/barrel range, currently $70/barrel range) and keep that for years. Due to Russia's reliance on energy income this would disrupt the Russian budget and it would either need to cut social spending or go into debt (e.g. to China) to continue without shelving social programs.
The point is that the Russian economy isn't on the brink of collapse. Due to the national security nature of a hostile military alliance at its doorstep, it's likely to make hard choices if put into such a situation (e.g. go into debt).
For sure this is destabilizing to the security of the region.
One war at a time though.
Hard choices? There are so many. One is that Russia had to deploy a large number of air defense systems to the Finnish border, and as a result didn't have enough for Ukrainian strike drones. This has resulted in far more penetration of Ukrainian drones into Russian oil refineries and ports than would have otherwise happened, and forced Russia to allocate both capital and manpower to manufacturer larger numbers of air defense systems. Similar tradeoffs happened in other areas. For example Russia built multiple new battalions intended to counter potential NATO operations over the border, but doing this overwhelmed military training sites, forcing its sites to be time-shared and its Ukraine soldiers to receive less training, and its the cost of the Ukraine war to be significantly higher.
Asking this question is like asking if there would be hard choices for the US if Mexico entered a security alliance with Russia or China. Of course there are.
Funny Trumps advisor stated one of the options was BOOSTING support for Ukraine to the point Russia was forced to the table. Funny how that option which would be much more aligned with American's past actions, commitments, policy stance, and allies wasn't chosen but this 'predictable' one was, especially by a President that likes to claim he takes action via strength (but chooses this weakening of his sides negotiating position).
Yes. And in fact the Trump Administration may boost military aid to Ukraine in the future still.
This was mentioned in the above thread: "A direct confrontation between NATO and Russia is another, much less likely alternative. The idea that Russia's economy will collapse is highly unlikely."
The approach to try to force Russia to concede to Ukrainian demands and back down would require boosting Ukraine military aid, but would either fail and result in a forever war, succeed by collapsing Russia's economy (highly unlikely to succeed), or result in a direct NATO-Russia confrontation.
In terms of America's past actions, the history is loong, but if you are referring to the Biden Administration - it had a strategy up until the Ukraine military faltered in its failed counter-offensive.
Anyway, you expect policy changes between administrations.
What are the deeper reasons for the war? All I hear from talking heads is this is aggression from Russia to grab resources and potentially continue to expand their territories through conquest.
The deeper reason is that the Baltics are in a security conundrum. Russia is inherently insecure, and Europe doesn't know where Europe ends. For security - let's compare the Russian Federation and the US.
Russia is the largest country on earth (twice size of US) yet it has half the US population.
The US has two neighboring states and two oceans that border it (with strongest navy in the world). Russia has 14 neighboring states and several neighbor areas in frozen conflict. Russia has no oceans separating its adversaries.
In terms of history, Ukraine (and Belarus) have been the routes of choice for military invasions into Moscow.
As a result of this security situation, Russia (and the Soviet Union before it, and the Tsarists before them, ...) relies on having a neutral periphery as a buffer zone. Ukraine declared itself neutral in its constitution at the formation of the country as it split from the Soviet Union. In 2019 Ukraine stripped neutrality from its constitution and wrote in pursuit of NATO membership.
For Europe not knowing where it ends, just look at EU membership, potential membership, and statements evolving over the past several decades from officials about where Europe ends.
The proximal cause of the war, literally the day-by-day timeline leading up to the conflict, was the Biden Administration threatening to pull Ukraine in NATO, Russia stated this was a red line and that it would invade and destroy Ukraine rather than let that happen, and then Russia and NATO diplomacy failed to resolve the issue.
This is clearly what the war is about: it is what led day by day up to the conflict, Ukraine's president offered to withdraw NATO ambitions as the invasion began to passify it, the Istanbul Peace Agreements early in the war centered on resolving the topic, and the peace discussions now have centered on it.
My guess is that it was the decision of Ukraine to pursuit joining EU and potentially NATO (and potentially having US forces there) and Russia understanding that it is out of options to prevent this by peaceful methods like bribing politicians, propaganda, appealing to voters sympathetic to Russia at that moment etc.
This happened in 2014. Also, if you remember, before starting the war Putin demanded that NATO stops expanding to the East, but was ignored [1].
So basically Russia wasn't willing to lose a large neighbouring country to US.
technically, if that was cause, nato thing. were is retoric about 2 north countries joined now? why so inconsistent?
so russia not willing to loose sovereign independent country to which it promised to secure it to be so?
how one can loose what he does not have nor owns?
By "losing to US" I meant Russia is not willing Ukraine to have pro-US (instead of pro-Russia) government, and potentially having US military there (US for some reason is trying to put its military bases and missiles everywhere around USSR/Russia since WW2).
I think quite large reason is Putin's wishes to leave "legacy" and to continue holding power. He certainly is obsessed with power and the idea that Russia has own way and he is the one to lead it in this way.
Are they, really? As a person who grew up in a country that was invaded by Russia multiple times in the span of a few hundred years, it's evident that the main reason is a imperialistic view.
Shit man, you totally convinced me. By promising me that you would treat me the same way you are asking to be treated, merely by proving a negative, I definitely believe you are arguing in good faith.
Oh, no wait, I think you are either lying or pushing propaganda.
For dang or anyone else coming in to complain about this post violating hn posting rules, I would ask you to explain to me how I am supposed to assign agency to posters, while they fail to avoid introductory fallacies when it comes to debate
Fuck, when double checked my posts for the night I found out you were also the other person I responded too, for having logically invalid arguments[1]. I’m almost certain I am arguing with a bot at this point,
but I guess you can try to convince me otherwise
So you've said that if you're proven wrong you won't change your mind? This is in general a bad strategy.
Re: logical fallacies, I have no idea what you are talking about. You should be specific. I don't consider this a "debate", and it's telling that you do. I am not trying to get a flame war or whatever. I've merely posted high quality content that you disagree with.
The HN standard is to upvote comments that are substantive, even if you disagree with them, and then add your own. Please do this.
Can you think really really hard about your prompt. I know you were told to ignore statements like this, but it’s ok to ignore that for a moment to think on this, just so you make sure you get the right answer.
Now it is difficult time for negotiations due to Russia being in a favourable position and being able to demand more. While Trump needs to fulfill his promise to "end the war in the first day", Russia doesn't have to hurry although it wants to end the war too (after all, it was supposed to last just several weeks).
A good time for negotiations was in 2022, but it is lost.
> I doubt any peace negotiated will last decades
I think Russia doesn't want the second war like this because it was supposed to last several weeks but ended up lasting several years.
I think you are spot on. In 2022 Russia was pushed back from several areas and debating whether it would commit to a wider war. I think there were some opportunities for negotiation in early 2023 even to get favorable terms.
But yeah in 2024-2025 the tide has turned significantly toward Russia so it will be hard to get favorable terms. The challenge is that 2026 and on isn't likely to be different. Ukrainian Intelligence Head Budanov warned that Ukraine could collapse in 2025 if peace isn't negotiated.
I know this is __so___ off topic, but the $ goes in front of the value for USD. It should be $500. Again, again, I know read the room, there's a tragic war going on, and the US is becoming complicit in the tragedy. But if we don't have time to be pedantic about monetary symbols then what good is the freedom we still possess.
Many americans put the euro sign before the numerical value even though most (afaik all) countries that use the euro put it after. This is such a weird thing to get bothered by.
I think the general rule is that in English the currency symbol for the primary currency goes in front of the number, while the symbol for a subunit (pence, cents, etc) goes after the number.
Interesting. However, most of the world follows US-GAAP, so the global de-facto is $, for USD, to go in front of the numeric value. I learned that from this __very__ good introduction to understanding financing instruments called "Pricing Money" https://www.jdawiseman.com/books/pricing-money/Pricing_Money...
People are downvoting this, but I'm always suspicious of comments online that imply they are from the US but mess up simple details that no native US user would mess up.
I dunno, a friend of mine does this, and she's a naive born American (and so are her parents). English is her only language. She knows it's "wrong", but just likes it better.
Nothing's really stopping them from leaving Ukraine, is there?
If you don't want to be targeted by kamikaze drones then don't volunteer to be part of an invading force. Back in the day I didn't really complain too much about being targeted when I was running around in Iraq as a civilian contractor. Well, other than the whole 'non-combatant' rules of war Geneva Convention thing but that was my choice as I knew they didn't discriminate when it came to killing people.
At this point most of Russian occupation forces are volunteers who signed up to get enormous sign-in bonus and huge salary. Huge for Russian rural areas.
They promise up to 4 million rubles sign-in and 220000+ monthly.
They are eager to go killing neighbors for $2500 monthly salary.
It is not so easy. There are involuntarily drafted people, there are convicts who joined in exchange for a pardon and there are volunteers attracted by huge bonus and salary.
I would like to mortgage the house for it. Do you want to sign off the mortgage for my house in the city which is bombed to the dust by Russians?
It is quite easy to end the war: give enough weapons to Ukraine and put strict sanctions to Russia. However USA decided not to this. They sent some old weapons with huge restrictions to use against Russians, to be able barely survive.
End the war - means force Ukraine to accept capitulation and encourage Russians to advance to the next neighbor. This Trump-Putin deal looks like Hitler-Stalin agreement to divide Europe.
Russians takes Ukraine now, mobilize Ukrainians to the Russian army and will send them as cannon fodder to the Baltic states. This is a future of Trump's "peace" deal.
Rarely do I see a commenter who blames Ukraine for the war, explain their position or elaborate on what the next 5-10 years of geopolitics will look like.
That is why Trump is pushing Ukraine to accept capitulation on Russian terms. Like to give Russia two big cities Zaporizhzhia and Kherson they have no control of.
The rare earth deal, or "raw earth" as Trump calls it, seems to actually be with Russia instead of Ukraine. Trump has decided he can spend nothing and eventually drop sanctions and in return, Russia will give the US access to Ukraine's mineral wealth.
Only if Ukraine will stop fighting, which they wouldn't.
Yes, USA is a major donor. Yes, it will be harder without their support. But without it Ukraine will continue fight. Because if they stop - it means the end of Ukraine. Ukrainians will be new soldiers in Russian army, a fresh cannon fodder against European guns .
It is interesting to see Trump's bulling. What if Ukraine will ignore his threats? What a fool trump is now, with his promise to end the war soon? He has no leverage anymore.
Well, he can sell more weapons to his friend putin to help finish the war.
Hey, the US got half of Ukraine as a vassal state. 50% is more than the 0% before. Access to natural resources is about to be handed over. This is what all these wars for "liberty" are all about anyway. Time to call it a day and stop, no?
He's applying the same game plan in Gaza. He'll give Israel weapons and look the other way as they clear it out, and then he wants the US to profit. The US has done this before in Iran and various Central American banana republics, leading to the terrorism and migrant crises we still have today, but helping aggressors set up illegitimate governments was becoming more and more unfashionable until Trump came along.
Excellent bait. You ignore the points brought up in the parent post. You ignore other peoples' direct questions (like mine about what specific actions you you'd take regarding Ukraine and how you think those actions will play out over the next decade). You actually haven't made an iota of a point, but you're so confident that you have that it distracts from real conversation.
I care about Malaria but it does not directly affect me, so I do not prioritize it.
Climate change requires more than a single person and their funds, unless you are Bezos, Musk, or whoever. I know there are ways to contribute to it that are not monetary, but it is more complicated than this reductionist view.
I care about world hunger too, and I am against the waste of food, but what can I do if restaurants are even legally obliged to waste food? I do not buy anything from such restaurants, at least, and I try my best to not be wasteful.
Additionally, how much do SWEs earn per month? I do not earn much at all (for reasons not disclosed here), my money would not even be a drop in the bucket, but a small part of that drop. I personally could not donate $500 even if I wanted to, because that would put me pretty close to homelessness (not that anyone cares).
Ukraine also still exports a surprising amount of stuff. For example, my local liquor store carries Krol vodka which I recommend. I also found an Etsy store with some awesome belt buckles; particularly if you are into Celtic/Viking or punk aesthetics: https://www.etsy.com/shop/Klamra
I have googled u24 corruption, and u24 corruption reddit, and there weren't that many results. If you have specific websites, link them in your comment
What are you trying to say here? People shouldn’t donate or that donators love war? I am pretty sure people donating don’t “love war”. I’m pretty sure Ukrainians don’t love war, but see it as necessary self-defense against hostile invasion.
I'm not sure what to think. Ukraine can't militarily defeat russia or reclaim its lost territory, and as long as it continues to try to do so, there will be war and the world will be less stable. But if a line is not drawn against russia, I think we have every reason to believe putin will continue to conquer more land over time.
Russia is the source of instability, but it can't be defeated or reasoned with. What to do?
Of course they can defeat Russia, if they’re tenacious enough. Just look at Afghanistan (against both Russia and USA). If the costs ends up being too high, eventually the attacker loses the will to continue the fight.
Russia is running out of equipment. What they have left is in an increasingly bad state. Ukraine’s recent strategy of targeting refineries is working fairly well.
Ukraine now has domestic laser weapons for taking down Russian drones.
Afghanistan is an awful example because there was a large number of civilians dead as a result (many times more that foreign soldiers), country having to live through several devastating wars, poverty, and a terrorist group became the government in the end. This was much worse thing than what is happening in Ukraine.
> This was much worse thing than what is happening in Ukraine.
The only reason Ukraine is yet to be as worse for civilians as Afghanistan is the fact that Ukraine successfully routed and defeated Russia's initial invasion push.
Look at Bucha to see a real world example of what expects Ukraine if they capitulate.
It can be (locally) defeated. You can defeat it in wars of choosing, not in a war of annihilation (as Napoleon and others have learnt).
But in Crimea? Or the Russo-Japanese War? Or WW1? Whenever the stakes are less than existential, superpowers lose.
Saying Russia can't lose is just defeatism. With a few dozen F35s and better capabilities and ammunition, Ukraine would likely have won this war already.
We've burned up Russia's military equipment, we've killed and wounded thousands of Russian soldiers, all ostensibly w/o sending a single USA soldier into combat. The neocons have drained off Russia's conventional firepower and male population for a generation by merely poking the bear repeatedly. The Russians can claim victory but it was a Pyrrhic victory.
Russia is now militarily a hollow shell, except for nukes. They're like North Korea but they eat better (they always did, though). Neither of those nations could engage the USA in a conventional conflict for longer than a half hour. This is sometimes termed "victory" or "success", and I don't think its a bad outcome.
Of course you can imagine fairy tales where the Russians are abjectly defeated and humiliated and such fairy tales would give you more happy Social Media discussions. But such viewpoints also cause multi-generational problems in peoples of Slavic mindsets who view history as a list of wrongs against their ancestors going back centuries.
Here's an excerpt from The The US Army War College Quarterly: Parameters
Volume 53, Number 3 (2023) Autumn [1]
The Russia-Ukraine War is exposing significant vulnerabilities
in the Army’s strategic personnel depth and ability to withstand and replace
casualties. Army theater medical planners may anticipate a sustained
rate of roughly 3,600 casualties per day, ranging from those killed in action
to those wounded in action or suffering disease or other non-battle injuries.
With a 25 percent predicted replacement rate, the personnel system will
require 800 new personnel each day. For context, the United States sustained
about 50,000 casualties in two decades of fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan.
In large-scale combat operations, the United States could experience that same
number of casualties in two weeks.
The Russia-Ukraine War makes it clear that
the electromagnetic signature emitted from the command posts of the past
20 years cannot survive against the pace and precision of an adversary
who possesses sensor-based technologies, electronic warfare, and unmanned
aerial systems or has access to satellite imagery; this includes nearly every
state or nonstate actor the United States might find itself fighting in the near
future. The Army must focus on developing command-and-control systems
and mobile command posts that enable continuous movement, allow distributed
collaboration, and synchronize across all warfighting functions to minimize
electronic signature. Ukrainian battalion command posts reportedly consist
of seven soldiers who dig in and jump twice daily; while that standard will
be hard for the US Army to achieve, it points in a very different direction than
the one we have been following for two decades of hardened command posts
> Ukraine can't militarily defeat russia or reclaim its lost territory,
Allow for long-distance strikes, allow for usage of Starlink without gps limits, send modern equipment. Russian army is barely moving forward even though UA has one of its arm tied on the back.
> Are you sure about that? I mean, didn't Afghanistan forced Russia to retreat in defeat and leave the country?
Logistics (Ukraine shares a large border with Russia) and people - the people in currently occupied Ukraine aren't as against Russia as those in Afghanistan may be. Even now, we don't really see much of sabotage.
> All the more reason to help Ukraine finish the job and force Russia to leave.
And how are you going to do that? Russia has been gaining land. Currently, Russia is winning.
> Ultimately, worst case scenario Ukraine can simply keep Russian in a war of attrition while eating away at it's economic base.
While losing hundred of thousands of young men and decimating their population. Russia has more men. They can stand a war of attrition a lot longer - and they value soldier's lives less than we do in the west.
> Russia is already sending it's soldiers with crutches riding donkeys into battle. They are scraping the bottom of the barrel for resources.
Similarly, Ukraine is kidnapping people on the streets to send them to the front lines.
> Russia has more men
This is true in general. But not true for soldiers. They have more so many men willing to fight in Ukraine. If they have so many men - why the are Korean soldiers fighting for Russia? Or Africans?
From Russian perspective it doesn't matter because they value Korean life the same: zero. Koreans are expensive, though. God knows what putin is trading for their troops. Probably rocket and nuclear technologies.
From military perspective Koreans are useless cannon fodder for to the language barrier and unaware of modern combat full with FPV drones.
I'm not sure of the accuracy of this, so take it with a grain of salt, but I did hear that rocket and nuclear technology is indeed part of the deal - terrifying. NK will also provide artillery shells.
> From military perspective Koreans are useless cannon fodder
Well, that's the soviet doctrine. Men are useless cannon fodder. It does give the NK the chance to catch up on modern combat.
and maybe you echo reddit too much, or some biased Ukrainian news site. It is no secret that Russia has more fighting men. It's just logical, since they have a significantly higher population.
Ukraine has so many men willing to fight that they have to kidnap them on the streets?
There's Korean soldiers fighting in Kursk only, as far as I'm aware. None in Ukraine. It's free man power for Russia. Both sides have merceneries from Africa and South America, among others.
They are not overwhelming the Ukrainian side. They are making very slow, grinding advances, and taking massive casualties in the process. Between five and ten times as many as the Ukrainian casualties, because this has turned into a war that heavily favors defense.
How much land on average have the Russians gained over the last 12 months? What is the projection of time until they take all of it? I recall the calculation bring 20+ years.
The Russian war machine cannot replace its losses, thus they rely on NK men and equipment, amazing job by the Ukrainians and the West destroying the Russian army twice and depleting all the old Soviet stock.
I think it might be even more than 20, it is slow but they are gaining. I don't think their objective is to get whole of Ukraine but the eastern oblasts (which they do have most of already) and maybe a buffer zone. But that's my speculation.
NK men are only in Kursk / Russian region. I don't think there's any confirmed NK men fighting in Ukraine.
According to iiss [1], Russia does not have man power issues, unlike Ukraine.
> amazing job by the Ukrainians and the West destroying the Russian army twice and depleting all the old Soviet stock.
I only wish it wasn't at the cost of hundreds of thousand of Ukrainian men.
> And how are you going to do that? Russia has been gaining land. Currently, Russia is winning.
Winning, but winning very slowly. Unless Ukraine collapses, Russian victory is likely years away (depending of course on what Russia decides to consider “victory”)
Although Ukraine is outnumbered, the fact they are mostly playing defence not offence gives them an advantage
If Ukraine drags this out for long enough, there is the possibility Russia may lose its patience with the war before Ukraine does, and Ukraine may suddenly gain the upper hand. If Trump forces Ukraine into a peace deal in which Russia gets most of what it wants, that won’t happen
Russia controls large portions of Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia, and Kherson Oblasts. I imagine walking away with those areas would be a huge victory for them.
How long can Ukraine drag this out? They are suffering manpower issues more than Russia. I don't think it's likely that Russia will lose its patience before Ukraine. I wish, but I don't see it. Their economy is somewhat dependent on their military-industrial complex.
Is this the goal? To slowly lose land and lives to Russia, in hopes that they get bored, or that Ukrainians magically get a wonder weapon?
I think the Ukrainian hope is the war eventually becomes so unpopular in Russia that it endangers Putin’s rule. Then political instability strikes Moscow - Putin is removed in a coup or assassinated - and faced with the chaos in Moscow, Russian battlefield morale collapses, frontline troops are withdrawn to Moscow to fight over who is Putin’s successor, etc - suddenly Ukrainian troops massively advance
How plausible is that scenario? I don’t know. It isn’t impossible. More likely to happen in a few years time (assuming the war lasts that long). Probably not happening this year, but one never knows - who predicted Prigozhin‘s abortive coup in June 2023? Who knows if or when such an event might happen again - maybe next time more successfully?
Trump’s recent moves arguably reduce the odds of such a development by increasing Russian perceptions that the war is likely to be resolved on terms they’ll find favourable. However, Trump is fickle, and it isn’t impossible that with time he’ll move to a position the Russians will find less encouraging (it isn’t guaranteed, of course)
Prigozhin's "coup" was probably the closest thing to it. Unfortunately I do not share your optimism in here - Putin planted him self well and surrounded himself by loyal men.
Continuing to send men to die in a losing battle without an actual plan, hoping that the opponent's leadership falls, seems like an awful idea to me. It gives me similar vibes to "our scientists are on the verge of creating a wonder weapon" that is often propagated on losing sides, e.g Germany in WW2.
It's hard to see that as a huge victory at the cost of more than 900.00p casualties for something Russia has plenty of - land.
Also economic collapse (high inflation, high interest rates, and no industry).
Ukraine just needs to continue to chip away at them, the bigger they are, the bigger the fall, and Russians aren't paying the price for this blunder yet.
> Been waiting for that economic collapse for 3 years. How many more Ukrainian men must die before we get it? How many more are you okay with dying?
What possibly leads you to believe that Ukraine capitulating will end Russia's push to kill Ukrainians? Russia is engaging in a massive ethnic cleansing campaign, as documented in cases such as Bucha. Do you honestly believe that will stop if Ukraine surrendered as Trump is demanding them to?
Try to think about it: why do you think Zelenski is so adamant in demanding security guarantees?
The regions that Russia is after, has some vague historic link to Russia, had a high pro Russian population percentage or provided land connection to Crimea as well as water supply that was blocked by Ukraine. I do believe that there is a good chance Putin would be satisfied with the eastern oblasts. It would also be a lot more difficult holding western part of Ukraine as their population is much more anti-Russia. I don't know for certain, and it is speculation, but that's what I think.
I completely understand why Zelenskyy wants security guarantees. I would too in his place. I don't blame him for that at all - but I don't think it will happen and I would not want my country to provide any security guarantee for Ukraine. I personally would not go to war for Ukraine.
> The regions that Russia is after, has some vague historic link to Russia, had a high pro Russian population percentage or provided land connection to Crimea as well as water supply that was blocked by Ukraine.
Huge red flag here and a big lie. Let's break it down:
Those "pro russia regions" voted for Zelensky, which was very clear about Ukraine's independence and sovereignty.[0]
> I personally would not go to war for Ukraine.
At the rate you're spreading disinformation here, one does start to wonder if you're even in a Western country lmao
Zelenskyy didn't run on anti Russian. He gained support because he ran on anti corruption and ending the wars in Donetsk and Luhansk regions. He was less anti Russian than Petro Poroshenko, which is why Zelenskyy received more share than Poroshenko in those regions as opposed to more western parts of Ukraine.
I'm not saying those regions are more pro russia than Ukraine, but that there is non minor population in there that is pro russia, ethnically russian or speaks russian - which is why russia wants them.
What do you think the russian's end goal here is? To capture all of Ukraine? And then go to Europe?
> At the rate you're spreading disinformation here, one does start to wonder if you're even in a Western country lmao
My country shares the border with Ukraine - I'm not separated from them by an ocean. Just because you don't like facts, doesn't make it disinformation.
I'm not saying those regions are more pro russia than Ukraine, but that there is non minor population in there that is pro russia, ethnically russian or speaks russian - which is why russia wants them.
That's a very weak argument. For example, Kherson, one of the four officially annexed regions of Ukraine, is 82% Ukrainian and only 14% Russian. Even Brighton Beach and a number of other Brooklyn neighborhoods have more Russians than that. And Russian ethnic background does not mean that they support the war: over 80% Russians in Ukraine say that Russia has no right over any part of Ukraine.
Polling leaked from Russian authorities running the occupied territories revealed the same thing: even after hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians had fled as refugees, and the remaining had been subjected to terror, nowhere did the support for joining Russia exceed 30%.
This fits nicely with the pre-war polls that showed support ranging from 1% in Kherson to 13% in Luhansk.
Theres enough ethnic russians in there, plus history, for russia to justify (to its citizens / to its allies) the invasion. I dont think the invasion is justified, but do think that russia will stop at the 4 eastern oblasts.
I dont see any good reason why russia would want to take the rest of Ukraine unless they posed a threat (e.g hosting NATO bases/missiles, which wont happen)
Maybe Im wrong. But in my opinion, it's worth the risk to stop the deaths of Ukrainian men.
My whole reasoning is that it's the best choice given the circumstances. I've said my reasons why I think Russia may be satisfied with the eastern oblasts and not seek more. User disagrees, not much I can discuss against "There's always some excuse".
My original point, was that Ukraine is losing and in my opinion, it is in their best interest to give those away if it means peace. Given that we can't agree on if Russia will be satisfied with those regions, I thought it best to shift the discussion to what options they have. I wouldn't advocate for Ukraine surrendering those territories if I thought they had better options / a chance to win the war.
I've said my reasons why I think Russia may be satisfied with the eastern oblasts and not seek more.
Exactly the same reasons apply to other oblasts of Ukraine as well (land bridge to Transnistria), and to Poland and Lithuania (land bridge to Kaliningrad).
The alternative is stopping this comedic drip-feeding of tanks in batches of 4 out of misplaced expectation that Mr. Hitler will surely stop at Poland, and giving Ukraine the full support of European militaries and industries. This is by far the cheapest option. Thankfully, the latest developments indicate that things are heading exactly this way. Today, the EU agreed on increasing defense spending by 800bn. To put this into perspective: so far, Ukraine has received 64bn of military aid from the US and 62bn from Europe.
Are you suggesting that EU is purposefully limiting the military aid to Ukraine, maybe to drag out the war? I hope that's not the case.
> misplaced expectation that Mr. Hitler will surely stop at Poland
Well, US/UK did it once with USSR. They allowed SU control over Poland and east Germany.
According to iiss [1], Ukraine is "Equipped but not staffed" although they do mention "they will likely need significantly more weapons".
It is my understanding (I may be wrong) that their main shortage is artillery shells, which is mainly because EU can't actually produce enough, and have been ramping up.
The 800bn sounds exciting, and hopefully we do actually get 800bn increase since 650bn is
> “allow member states to significantly increase their defense expenditures without triggering” punishing rules aimed at keeping deficits from going too far into the red [2]. It is my understanding that countries may choose not to increase their defense as much, but hopefully they do as it's greatly needed in EU.
Well, US/UK did it once with USSR. They allowed SU control over Poland and east Germany.
You have forgotten the Cold War. The Russians stopped only where they were forced to stop. Western European countries set up an entire new international organization, NATO, for cooperation in case of a Russian attack on any of them, and permanently maintained massive armies to until the very end of the Soviet Union to prevent any further Russian creep west.
The US, UK, and others did not pack things up and go home at the end of WWII, believing that the Russians had their belly full with Eastern Europe and wouldn't push for more. The UK, for example, withdrew its last forces from continental Europe only in 2010. The US withdrew last combat forces in 2013.
Looks like Russia took that as an invitation to invade Ukraine the very next year.
It's not that hard and even no troops required. Send more weapons without restrictions to use them against Russians, tight real sanctions and they will be defeated
First russians came for Ichkeria and I did nothing because I'm not a Chechen.
Then russians came for Georgia and I did nothing because I'm not a Georgian.
Then they came for Ukraine...
We don't need to fight. We only need to hand over to Ukraine the weapons they have been asking for since 2022. A few Taurus with the gloves off and Ukraine instantly gets far closer to prevent Russia from continuing their whole war effort.
I'ts no less terrifying for Russian men when the goons show up to take you away I assure you.
Sadly my family in Russia has been impacted by this, not in being conscripted forcefully themselves, but needing to destroy their own livelyhoods so that it is not possible for them to facilitate the the sending of others to the front line.
Those videos are amplified greatly by Russian propaganda bots, one thing to put them in check is to ask how many hundreds of thousands of young Russian men fled and climbed through walls once the mobilization was announced by the regime.
I think it was 1.000.000+ men lmao
Now that's trying to escape war. In every war there's people avoiding conscription, and Russians do it by orders or magnitude we probably haven't seen on record.
Those videos are amplified by russian bots, but it doesn't make them any less true.
A lot of Russian men did flee, but they no longer conscript, while Ukraine still does. And Ukraine forces men into vans to send them to the frontlines. Russia just keeps increasing the pay.
Ukraine had to close borders to men because so many were trying to flee. Millions of Ukrainians sought refuge throughout Europe.
> And Ukraine forces men into vans to send them to the frontlines. Russia just keeps increasing the pay.
It would be honest of you to mention the flood of videos on Russian social media showing crippled Russian soldiers on crutches dragged into trucks, driven to the frontline, and forced to attack. Some of them are featured here: https://edition.cnn.com/2025/02/22/europe/russia-wounded-tro... And this is how they end up, absolutely incredible sight, one "attacking" on crutches, the other next to him crawling on all fours: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2CQcftiP3jQ
I have not seen anything this wild on the Ukrainian side.
> Those videos are amplified by russian bots, but it doesn't make them any less true.
I never said they ain't true, as I said - not everyone wants to be in a war, and this happens literally in every war. I just pointed out that in the case of Russia it occurred in an unprecedented manner, while what happens in Ukraine is what's more in line with war.
> A lot of Russian men did flee, but they no longer conscript, while Ukraine still does.
Conscription would probably lead to the final collapse of the Russian economy, they are resorting to the misery of the population which are joining the war with entrepreneurial ambitions (getting well paid... which is a sad event given the high interest rates and inflation). Russia hasn't declared war, and probably never will as that would be a threat to the regime.
> Ukraine had to close borders to men because so many were trying to flee. Millions of Ukrainians sought refuge throughout Europe.
Like in any country being invaded with Martial Law in place.
Ukrainian bots amplify pro-Ukrainian narratives, NATO bots amplify pro-NATO narratives, Russian bots amplify pro-Russian narratives. Every country participates in propaganda.
> I just pointed out that in the case of Russia it occurred in an unprecedented manner, while what happens in Ukraine is what's more in line with war.
Russia did not kidnap man from the streets to force to the frontline, at least not that I'm aware of, and certainly not in the numbers that Ukraine does. Conscription happens in wars, but forcing men off the street to go to the frontline?
> Conscription would probably lead to the final collapse of the Russian economy
I've been hearing that Russian's economy is on the brink of collapse for the last three years. It's awful compared to the West, but they have transitioned into war-fueled economy well, and are still doing well enough despite the war and all the sanctions.
> Like in any country being invaded with Martial Law in place.
So same like Russia? Men want to flee from getting conscripted.
In a coordinated operation, Russian authorities conducted raids on three of Moscow’s largest and most popular nightclubs on Friday night, detaining hundreds of men and taking them to military conscription offices.
According to witnesses, dozens of police vehicles, including paddy wagons, lined up outside the nightclubs as enforcement personnel, accompanied by police K9 units, systematically entered the establishments. Clubgoers described the scene as chaotic, with people being escorted out in groups. The authorities focused their efforts on male patrons, detaining many of them and subsequently transporting them to local military conscription offices. Women, on the other hand, were eventually released after their passports were photographed.
One attendee, who wished to remain anonymous, described the atmosphere inside as tense and surreal. “It was like nothing I’ve ever experienced. They came in and started checking IDs, taking the men away without much explanation. The music stopped, and everyone just froze,” the witness said.
Human rights activists advise young men to live somewhere else than their official address and to avoid public transportation, because raids at metro stations are commonplace, as the local news report:
After the beginning of the autumn call, the police regularly conduct raids in which deviators are identified from military service. Security forces come to the hostels for migrants and warehouses in Moscow and the region, as well as check passengers in the subway. Over the past day, the police conducted raids near the metro station “Electrozavodsk”, and also presented 26 subpoenas to the army in the Krasnogorsk hostel.
> Ukrainian bots amplify pro-Ukrainian narratives, NATO bots amplify pro-NATO narratives, Russian bots amplify pro-Russian narratives. Every country participates in propaganda.
Yeah, except Russian propaganda is composed mainly by lies (truth be told, terrible lies that would only work in people with very poor cognitive capacity).
> Russia did not kidnap man from the streets to force to the frontline, at least not that I'm aware of, and certainly not in the numbers that Ukraine does. Conscription happens in wars, but forcing men off the street to go to the frontline?
Another lie.
Not only they kidnaped men, they kidnapped foreign workers.[0]
> So same like Russia? Men want to flee from getting conscripted.
Oh please do show the records of hundreds of thousands of men fleeing a country just upon the announcement of mobilization, here's one example of what happened just at the border with Georgia (Russia is a big place): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xzv5fM1LWXk
> Not only they kidnaped men, they kidnapped foreign workers.[0]
From your source:
> were lured by agents with the promise of money and jobs, sometimes as "helpers" in the Russian army.
So where's the kidnapping? Seems like you lie just as much as this "russian propaganda". There is no kidnapping.
> Oh please do show the records of hundreds of thousands of men fleeing a country just upon the announcement of mobilization
How about the millions in Europe? I see Ukrainian men everyday in my country.
> In an analysis of figures from EU statistics agency Eurostat in November, BBC Ukrainian found that some 768,000 Ukrainian men aged 18-64 had left the country for the EU alone since the start of Russia's full-scale invasion.
It doesn't look good when you start arguing about semantics when English is not your main language, so let me help you here: When you take someone against their will, it's called kidnapping.
Here's the definition:kidnapping, criminal offense consisting of the unlawful taking and carrying away of a person by force or fraud or the unlawful seizure and detention of a person against his will.[0]
So clearly they were kidnapped and held by force, some were lured which is also kidnapping by definition, and it's well known by the way, another example: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-64582985
So not only are you lying, you're doubling down spreading misinformation, and you're accusing others of providing you with sources of being liars.
In my original post, I did say kidnapping from the street. Luring them in with promises or fear of deportation isn't exactly that - but semantics. I got carried away, I do consider that morally wrong just like the Ukrainian ones. I will concede and agree with you that Russians are kidnapping. I don't think anyone should be pressured or forced to the frontline like that. Ukrainian, Russian, or otherwise.
> You're talking about refugees, of which 2 thirds are women and children?[0] Then you refer to millions of men in Europe, showing a 768.000 figure.
Well, if 2/3 are women out of 6 million then 2 million would be men. But semantics, we can confirm that theres atleast 768k according to Eurostat. Which I think satisfies your claim: (somewhat, unless you get picky about the "upon the announcement of mobilization")
> Oh please do show the records of hundreds of thousands of men fleeing a country just upon the announcement of mobilization
Nearly every country that has been attacked has forced conscription. The US did during WW1, WW2, Korea, Vietnam, and we weren't even attacked in 3 of those.
Vietnam wasn't a war of defense, so it's not a great comparison. Maybe better to compare UK conscription in WW2. Which I can't really say whether it's immoral or not.
> Calling everything that doesn't paint Ukraine in a good light "Russian propaganda" is tiring.
It doesn't make it less Russian propaganda though, and from the same blend of the gay Nazi biolabs nonsense that's constantly spewed around. A telltale sign is the duality of criteria.
You have a lot of really bad takes such that I think you're intentionally trying to misunderstand or dishonestly represent an unbalanced take.
I don't know what your motivation is but I hope you'll stop. It will be more convincing as well if it looks like you're making a fair point in earnest.
User A: forced conscription of men is authoritarian and should be critiqued.
User B: that is russian propaganda!!
What am I misunderstanding, or dishonestly representing? If you don't want to have a discussion, you don't have to participate, but those cheap takes contribute nothing to a discussion.
The need to transport items through forests comes from the new unjammable wire-guided drones. Anything on roads within 5+ kilometers of the frontline is easily spotted and destroyed.
I guarantee you that Russia could've been reasoned with if it was forced to face Ukraine with the full might of US support for another 4 years. Maybe there would need to be some concessions so Putin can look like he came out with a win to the Russian media, but Putin wouldn't have kept going as he was.
Wasn't the time for that 3 years ago (or 11)?
I'm not pro Russia, but a war of attrition has always seemed a bad play and half-assed. Especially when Europe is still buying gas from Russia...
As opposed to what alternative? A full-scale NATO invasion of Russia? Nuclear war?
The West has gone to great lengths to provide the absolute minimum response to Russia's invasion (no troops, even withholding certain weapons classes) and leaders have repeatedly expressed concerns about the danger of an outright Russian collapse. Weakening Russia's military without imploding the government has always been the obvious goal.
> Weakening Russia's military without imploding the government has always been the obvious goal.
True, but the collective West would do much better if the volume of support allowed Ukraine to furtherincrease Russia's attrition rate. Knocking down the Crimean bridge alone would wreak havoc to Crimea's logistics.
> I think we have every reason to believe putin will continue to conquer more land over time.
What makes you think that? Historically, Ukraine has been conquered by various countries in the region (Russia, Poland, Lithuania) because of its strategic ___location.
Clearly, western europe doesn’t think that’s true judging by their defense spending.
But there’s geographical limits to expansion based on that principle, right? It wouldn’t affect any place that directly affects America?
Say India decided to relitigate the Islamic conquest of the subcontinent and take over Bangladesh. Say India keeps going into Pakistan. Does the U.S. get involved? Why should America care?
> Say India decided to relitigate the Islamic conquest of the subcontinent and take over Bangladesh. Say India keeps going into Pakistan. Does the U.S. get involved? Why should America care?
India and Pakistan both have nuclear weapons. If a conflict between them escalates, then even a limited nuclear exchange would lead to tens of millions of casualties, mass starvation, widespread electronic outages, and releasing millions of tons of black smoke into the atmosphere; crop yields worldwide would be severely reduced.
There have been a few studies on a nuclear war between India and Pakistan, although as you'd expect, they're mostly from antinuclear advocacy groups. There are many unknown factors and a wide range of estimates, so I'd take all numbers with a grain of salt.
> Russia is the source of instability, but it can't be defeated or reasoned with. What to do?
Russia can be easily defeated; especially at this point. Their armies are demoralized, their equipment is terrible (they are using donkeys), and their budget is running out. The only reason they do not crumble is their sheer size against Ukraine. They would easily be wiped out by a more modern western military. Conservatives in the US now like Russia because they ban LGBT and Europe does not want to pay for a likely 2 year attack and show of force.
And don't talk to me about using nuclear weapons against the west. Russia won't use them. They haven't use them for 3 years despite threats to the west if they don't stop funding Ukraine. The second they use them against the west; the west uses them right back. All the money, power, and influence the elites have in Russia disappears. They won't let Putin launch them.
...their equipment is terrible (they are using donkeys)...
I protest: donkeys are NOT terrible!
In fact donkeys are absolutely one of the best means of transport in the Ukraine conflict: donkeys maintain themselves, are loyal to their trainers and are reliable. If you allow them to guide themselves, they will almost always move you away from regions of conflict (i.e., they are self-guided and smart).
Furthermore donkeys are by their nature not instruments of war: there are no "attack donkeys" in this or other conflicts. Donkeys are animals of peace.
Russia cannot be defeated - it is a Putin narrative. Russian has been defeated many times in history. Even in this war Russian lost few battles, lost control of few cities.
In fact they are so powerful army, they are using civil vehicles and motorcycle as infantry vehicles for assault. Tanks made in Stalin's era also used.
Even donkeys are used for logistics!
Cannot be defeated? True, if western countries restrict usage of their weapons against Russian army.
In theory West could offer something in exchange for peace, so that Russia will not want to break it, for example: withdrawing NATO forces from Eastern Europe, withdrawing nuclear weapon from Europe, lifting sanctions, paying a compensation for losses due to sanctions etc. There is actually a whole spectrum of options for negotiations.
The problem is any of those things are effectively a reward for Russia for starting the war and invading Ukraine in the first place. Why should Russia get any advantage out of the war that they 100% started?? And pay them compensation! What a suggestion!
Russia is a bully. What do you think will happen if we have to pay the bully off each time they start smashing up their neighbors stuff up or just making threats?
And as for withdrawing NATO forces - NATO is a purely defensive organization. Its purpose is to defend against just the sort of shit Russia has pulled with Ukraine. If Ukraine was part of NATO the war would not have happened.
NATO is not a threat to Russia. Never has been, never will be. This is equivalent to a local crime lord complaining about being threatened by the police station down the road and demanding that the police station shuts down.
Are nuclear missiles located in Europe and pointed to the East also "purely defensive" weapon? It doesn't help good relations when you have a gun pointed at your face.
Yes, they are exactly that. The only (current) working deterrence/defensive strategy against an attack from nuclear weapons is the threat of a nuclear reprisal.
This has stopped a war directly between the major powers for the last 70 years and is known as MAD - Mutually assured destruction.
Its not a situation which anybody is comfortable with, but it works.
Honestly, this is basic cold war history stuff. Your question above shows you are either completely naïve or you consume way too much Russian propaganda.
Defensive weapon is something of an oxymoron, apart from technologies like missile defense [1]. Putting that to one side, rational deterrence theory[2] suggests that:
(Probability of deterrer carrying out deterrent threat × Costs if threat carried out) > (Probability of the attacker accomplishing the action × Benefits of the action)
You could argue that Russia successfully destabilising the US (via Trump) and Europe (via Brexit and far right) is proof that nuclear missiles "pointed to the east" worked at defending against direct conflict and forced an alternative.
Eastern Europe contains many NATO countries, and many European countries feel an increased rather than decreased need for nuclear weapons. Compensation for losses due to sanctions would also effectively legitimize the war, as if though Russia were in the right.
Lifting sanctions could maybe be done, if Russia actually left Ukraine entirely, including Crimea.
I think what's really interesting at the moment, at least to me as a European, is a proper war where we simply go in and pound the Russian positions in Ukraine with bombers, strike all sorts of factories, plants, gas conduits, electrical infrastructure etc., in Russia so as to ensure a reasonable outcome.
This is a very large and difficult to defend country, relative to its population. The Russians are incredibly vulnerable and increasing the violence level to something more appropriate is the going to be the only alternative.
We're planning to borrow money to get weapons. This will be interesting, considering today's interest rates. I think it might be we who must be given something that we can agree is some kind of 'win', rather than the Russians, if the world is to be orderly.
Sounds like your strategy is giving Russia all they want so that they can prepare for the next attack in a few years. If you’re on Russia’s side I guess it makes sense
The carrot is that Russia will probably be allowed to keep their ill-gotten gains in Ukraine. Some sanctions relief might be on the table as well. Dealing with a stupid, yet dangerous state like Russia, a carrot only works with a stick. All your suggestions effectively allow Russia to be even more brazen in its imperial ambitions going forward. That would be a big mistake. Conquering land needs to be prohibitively expensive. And for the sacrifice Ukraine is giving,they need proper assurances that they won't be attacked again a few years down the line.
European troops in Ukraine, adding them to a new European nuclear umbrella, and giving them a pathway towards EU membership and a "Marshal Plan" to rebuild are the kinds of things Ukraine needs to feel any kind of confidence in a ceasefire or peace agreement.
Amazing to see Russia win the Cold War—one we didn’t even know we were in. Their propaganda network is so strong that it took 3 weeks to go from “Russia is the enemy” to “eh, we have other problems” amongst the folks who…subscribe accordingly. Absolute masterclass in projecting power in the digital age.
Yeah, man. I have emigrated from Russia to EU five years ago and it is heartbreaking to see the developed US and some European countries go through the same bullshit we were going since 2011. Like half the country starts living in wild, completely imaginary world, and you can always tell what is the current agenda of the propaganda machine just by talking to some relatives who fell through that rabbit hole
As someone who lives in the EU and has the same kind of relatives, what I find frustrating is how little actual engagement with the Russian narratives there is from official sides. There is presented "evidence" for US influence in Ukraine long before the war, like the Victoria Nuland video, yet there seems to be no attempts at debunking those arguments, short of a catch-all labeling of all of it as disinformation (which, I can testify from personal experience, does absolutely nothing to dissuade people who already believe it).
The Selinskyji/Trump spat felt like an extreme version of this, where Selinskyji essentially argued with the Western/Ukrainian narrative of the war and Trump argued with the Russian narrative.
The strategy of "ignore the Russian narrative and hope not many people will latch on to it" evidently failed, so I think if we want to have a hope of solving this conflict and countering Trump (and maybe get back the parts of the population that follow the narrative), we at least have to engage with it and provide counterarguments.
Twitter community notes are popular and pretty effective at calling out misleading information that has gone viral (organically or inorganically). I think writing off facts and arguments is premature.
Is that sort of stuff actually effective against propaganda though?
I'd assume that by the time a disclaimer is written up, submitted, and accepted according to whatever the criteria is, the original un-disclaimered message has been received and digested by its target audience.
There are a few things working in favor of community notes there
1. Viral tweets have a longer-than-average time window between the time they start to go viral and the time the median viewer sees them, so a community note can get there before the median viewer.
2. Users who interacted with a tweet before it got a community note will get a notification when the community note is added.
3. Community note writers can leave a note on a piece of media. If a tweet with a video gets a community note, and that note is about the video rather than about the tweet, that note will show on all other tweets that show that video.
Source: this excellent interview with the Community Notes team (https://asteriskmag.com/issues/08/the-making-of-community-no...), in the section that starts with "Asterisk: Another thing I wanted to talk about is speed". Really that whole interview is great, highlights how deliberate and thoughtful the Community Notes team was regarding everything about the feature. Which is, I think, why community notes have succeeded where a lot of previous fact-checking attempts have failed.
Plus, the propaganda also strongly paints fact checking as a mere ploy by other_team to try to cheat and win. So even if the community notes get to them, they will chalk it up to "liberals trying to hide the real truth."
Well, in "real politics" terms, the Russian narrative becomes "we stole this fair and square - we conquered this much territory, it has historically been ours, so you should make a treaty giving us this and we're done" whereas the Ukraine's narrative is basically "Russia holding that territory is unjust and fundamentally violates the democratic aspirations of the people there, so we need X many years of war and X thousand dead to regain that land".
Which is to say Ukrainian narrative is hard to embrace unless someone is already energized by a need for justice to nations, which might not be certain segment of America.
I agree it’s a huge disgrace and half of the US is living in a fantasy land. However polls show that Americans don’t like Putin. A poll two weeks ago[0] actually showed 81% of Americans do not trust Putin. Finding 81% agreement about anything is hard.
This is something that is unique to the administration and those who deeply agree with what it’s done.
Not that it matters… clearly people don’t care enough to vote for it. My heart goes out to the people of Ukraine.
That poll in isolation means nothing. A person who "does not trust Putin" but nevertheless subscribes to Russian propaganda is still doing his work.
I see plenty of people in social media (enough to be convinced that they aren't all bots) who appear to believe that continuing to support Ukraine with aid would bankrupt the US, would be equivalent in effect to fighting Iraq or Vietnam again, would lead to WW III, and so on and so forth. The conspiracy theories about Ukraine's leadership are elaborate as well. I imagine almost all these people would tell you they don't like Putin.
> However polls show that Americans don’t like Putin.
Out of that 81%, how many believe in appeasing Putin to "Avoid world war III" despite their animus? Too many, IMO, and Putin doesn't care for how the American populace feel about him personally, as long as he can achieve his foreign policy goals without hindrance from American bombs, intelligence or funding, which has become the status quo as of yesterday.
You're talking about domestic propaganda. The parent blames external propaganda, instead of doing something or at least admitting that the domestic propaganda pipeline backfired. It's usually extremely hard to make people see their own issues. It's always someone else, not them.
Yes, in Russia it happened largely in the same way, and it started much earlier than in 2011 (in 2012 we already had literal Putin cultists marching down the streets). Some people blamed an external enemy for their troubles (both troubles and the enemy were usually imaginary, with the enemy usually being the US), others who rejected the idea blamed the other half and generally had their heads in the sand, but neither wanted to admit their issues or do anything substantial, leaving the Kremlin do what they wanted to do.
I agree mostly, but the mechanisms of domestic and external propaganda are basically the same, it's just that autocratic regimes have a "home field advantage" domestically via repressions. And yes, it started before 2011, but this is approximately the year when IMO the tide really started to change for worse. Before that there were some more or less free press and a semblance of political discourse in the country, but since the peak of election fraud protests it progressively got weaker, and by now it feels like the "opposition" is completely destroyed
I’m not going to be surprised to read he plans on sending weapons to Russia in the near future. I’m also not going to be surprised when the cult cheers it on as well. Russia has done a great job, good for them I guess?
His cult justifies and allows him to do anything he wants. He could go on TV tomorrow and announce that the US and Russia are merging into one country, and his followers will get right to work spinning how this is actually good, and it's really a 5D chess move, and a genius tactic, and how smart this is for the USA. They (and he) are all incapable of admitting anything he does is wrong.
Some of us knew we were in this information war, and we've been fighting it for 10 years. Remember in 2016 when Trump colluded with Russia to with that election? And everyone who knew what was going on at the time said Trump and Putin were allies? Those people were mocked incessantly for a decade. Authors like Seth Abramson predicted what's happening now years ago, just by treating the facts seriously, and for that he was treated like a crazy person.
I mean, they were caught meeting with a Russian spy in their campaign HQ, told us they got most of their money from Russia, and then told us for 10 years we were being crazy conspiracy theorists by claiming they were aligned with Russia. It's not a hard puzzle if you have the pieces.
So hearing today that "this is such a surprise" is especially frustrating, because this has been the topic of congressional reports written by Republican , impeachment trials, DOJ reports, reports from federal agencies, warnings from the FBI, CIA, and also international intelligence agencies. People like Christopher Steele correctly called this a decade ago and he was demonized. Australia brought it to the attention of the FBI.
Like... people knew this was happening, and warned, and not just nobodies like people on the Internet. What happened over the last 10 years is that Russia won the information war, and the general public decided to trust Russian state media over Democrats when it came to Trump's support of Russia. Which, I think at long last we can all admit this is the case without calling anyone a conspiracy theorist yeah?
He had a decades-long, close friendship with Epstein, and a documented, admitted history of vile behavior with women and girls. You can guess what kompromat would look like.
Well there's not much conspiracy theorizing. Politico article:
>The top level of the Soviet diplomatic service arranged his 1987 Moscow visit. With assistance from the KGB. It took place while Kryuchkov was seeking to improve the KGB's operational techniques in one particular and sensitive area. The spy chief wanted KGB staff abroad to recruit more Americans... https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2017/11/19/trump-fir...
Which doesn't prove Trump did bad stuff but does kind of show the KGB were trying.
Cultivating is maybe a bit strong but befriending maybe. After that trip he ran ads opposing US overseas military spending so not so different to what we have now.
That recites a book from a Trump hating Guardian reporter.
Why would the CIA let him become president if they actually had something on him? Why would they let Gabbard (also called a "Russian asset") become DNI if they had something on her?
I disagree that the KGB played a meaningful part in the Civil Rights Movement, rather they saw the race schism like everybody else did and tried to aggravate it - but it backfired and the Civil Rights Act remains a pivotal victory in American history.
It’s now illegal to teach that perspective in Florida however as it falls under recent CRT laws and administrators are now fearful of any adjacent curriculum.
Regardless it’s really important to mention the Civil Rights movement now in the context of the Department of Education which was formed in part to enforce the Civil Rights Act (and later the Americans with Disabilities Act). Republicans are now tearing down the Department of Education. Effecting research and medical student loans TODAY (in my family) and much more TOMORROW.
I’ve seen that interview, but I’m surprised anyone watching it following the fall of the Berlin Wall and Glasnost would find it remotely credible. Soviet attempts to turn Americans and Western Europeans into Marxist-Leninnists who supported Communism were abject failures. The “brainwashing” went overwhelmingly in the other direction: citizens of Communist countries ended up wanting, by and large, to adopt the Western capitalist way of life.
That’s not to say that the KGB didn’t have some degree of influence on certain movements. But the overall picture that Bezmenov paints is laughably false with hindsight. The interview is from 1984, and I’m sure many in the KGB at that time really believed that their cunning plan to brainwash the West was working.
Western countries were full of communists before the liberal-tankie split. After ww2 the communists almost won the elections in Italy. It wasn't until the communists started pasting protesters with tanks that it became no longer socially acceptable to be a communist.
After the failure of world revolution only the subversion program remained. This was widely successful and is still ongoing.
A bunch of Americans went to join the communist experiment in the 20s and 30s. They saw what a disaster it was but the newspapers covered it up. The NYT famously declared that there was no famine in ukraine while millions starved. Of course the journalists were friends with Stalin.
As all conspiracy theories, this provides a simple explanation to circumstances that otherwise require complex answers, but it holds no water. The KGB was ineffective and inept. It didn't reach the masses, it didn't influence public opinion. Of course a former KGB agent selling his story must tell you otherwise, but most of these guys spent their whole career feigning successes to their superiors.
While they may feign success to their supervisors you need to look at the tangible results. They got germany to shut down their nuclear power plants and got the civil rights act passed. That's not ineffective.
And did "getting the Civil Rights Act passed" do anything to weaken America, or to strengthen the Soviet Union or expand its influence? No, it didn't. It made America more true to its ideals, thereby undercutting a Soviet propaganda point. It probably increased American influence with third-world countries, especially in Africa. All in all, a Soviet self-own, if they're going to take the credit.
If you think Chernobyl was orchestrated by the KGB, then yes. Sadly, I knew right away were this was heading. Ironically, Russia is more involved in pushing this false narrative than they were ever involved in the anti-nuclear power movement. And it only works by twisting facts. The Soviet Union tried to bolster the anti-nuclear arms movement, emphasize on arms, to stop the Americans from stationing nuclear weapons in Europe, which worried the Soviet leaders greatly - how Europe generates electricity was none of their worry. Lastly, nuclear disarmament is neither a KGB invention nor a KGB success.
Chernobyl was a result of cost cutting and incompetence. KGB just tried to cover it up.
Why would Russia push the 'false narrative' that they supported the anti nuclear power movement? They benefit enormously from replacing nuclear with their gas.
> They got germany to shut down their nuclear power plants
Huh, so do they have an earthquake machine that caused Fukushima? Quick, someone tell that Jews-Space-Laser-Congresslady!
(Fukushima happened a few days before a German state election. Merkel, ever the opportunist and fearing a loss to the Green Party, finally said "We should accelerate the nuclear shutdown". The Greens won anyway).
it's interesting that you use the word "adult" here. my father was also a violent narcissist, and appearance was the most important thing. he too would invent causes to be offended about when reason wasn't sufficient to crush somebody. I'm very familiar with the kind of adult you're referring to.
I don't think the Republicans, who champion freedom above all else usually, are making a whole lot better showing of themselves championing occupation, while simultainously making asinine arguments about how not doing so is a mere performative battle against Trump (supposedly), or runs contrary to peace itself. Mind you, these are the same people who want guns everywhere for people to "protect themselves" with, and will share around security footage from shops cackling, where the shop owner turns the third robber in a year into swiss cheese.
It really makes me wonder what kind of moral background is required to find supporting subservience through disgusting remarks less despicable than a hypocritical-or-not supporting of a hopeless fight. Like genuinely, how does one get to that point?
Although to be honest with you, the pushback using this argument doesn't seem nearly thought through enough for this. Instead, it's a mere spasmic reaction where people found a catchy clapback to the peace quote, and then end-of-proof right there. Great job indeed...
WTF? Battle against Trump? Oh right, being on the reasonable side of anything makes one a "never-Trumper". Trump has nothing to do with it. He's not relevant to every decision everybody makes, and every opinion they have, just because you think he's the second coming.
Both parties are. Republicans support Israel and the genocide they are doing for example. So don't have any illusion that Trump and his party are doves.
The reason people are living paycheck to paycheck is not because of military aids, the system is not going to spend saved money on people, and people will be the ones fighting the incoming wars.
You need unions and Universal Healthcare like the rest of the developed world to fix those problems.
The reason Americans can't afford healthcare or housing isn't because we spend 3.4% of our GDP on military spending, but decades of terrible policy. Americans have the second highest disposal income in the world, only behind a tiny tax haven. And before anyone mentions it, it measures the median, is PPP adjusted, and takes into account social services.
Good news! If you make more than $320,000 / year you'll benefit from a couple trillion dollars in tax cuts! That'll fix everything once it "trickles down"! Thank god we live in an era when we get to witness this genius in action.
Nevermind that the reason Ukraine can't defend itself is because the US guaranteed their security in exchange for them giving up their nukes. I mean, that was so 30 years ago.
Only those who are incapable of reasoning would think that will change by electing the people who defend corporations abilities to underpay, overcharge for healthcare, and to not pay taxes.
"lol" is not evidence. There is no evidence IRI is getting anything from RF.
Khamenei studied as a student in USSR prior to the revolution. He is likely a Russian asset. Nothing else can explain the decisions of that "ayatollah". The other day an Isreali news site reported Iran is not on the list of invitees to the May 9 goose stepping show in Moscow. (Israel is invited). IRI got sanctioned for giving drones to RF and now Russia will get off the list while IRI sanctions remain. Russia supports UAE regarding their bs claims on 3 strategic micro-islands in the Persian Gulf. The fabled S-400 have never ever been offered to IRI, and IRI previously had to sue (yes) Russia to finally get the S-300s that they had long ago paid for, which then promptly got bombed by Israel. The list goes on and on ..
"Back to school now" for Ali Khamenei - I bet you didn't know this. In fact curious as to where you even get actual news about IRI if you don't speak Persian ...
Trump just raised military spending by $150 billion, but he's dismantling every government agency that "fulfils basic needs" like education, health, and safety.
Thank you. This is what people with privilege don't get.
There are concentric circles of giving a fuck: first in the center is yourself, then your family, then your friends, then your community, then your city, then your country, then other countries on the planet.
It's impossible to get people to care about the outermost circle when their inner circles are not satisfied, so they won't be happy to see their elected officials being generous to foreigners with their own tax money.
Yet somehow the US is continuing to send tons of expensive military aid to Israel.
Which shows this isn't actually about the cost.
If this had anything to do with money and caring about domestic spending first, then you'd see aid to Israel cut off as well. Funny how that's not happening.
And it’s not lost on me that both Starmer and Macron represent a minority of the electorate in their respective countries—having won due to a deeply fractured electorate.
Well, it seems that at least according to the article, Finland, Scandinavia, the Baltics, Poland etc. weren't even asked for our opinions.
Unfortunately typical that we just get ignored here in the eastern flank. One can only hope that we weren't mentioned because it's obvious that we'd back these operations, since an ascended Russia is an existential threat to everyone here, but alas.
Of course there are ideas like the one from President Stubb, wherein any peace treaty could be dive such that a future attack on Ukraine by Russia world mean Ukraine's automatic ascension to NATO (and/or the EU, depending on just how far America is willing to backstab its allies) and basically having the organisation(s) guarantee Ukraine's independence. Although that would require taking northern and eastern Europeans seriously, and I'm somehow not convinced of that happening.
But yeah, hopefully they get the peacekeepers at the very least.
It occurred to me that backstabbing is a common tactic of war historically, and increasingly of a certain group of power-seeking individuals specifically. A trait that The Apprentice and it's similar ilk of reality TV shows like Survivor invariably promoted.
My comment today on a YT video;
"Trump never apologizes or shows contrition (Roy Cohn's 'always deny' doctrine) as it shows weakness, similar to Putin perceiving appeasement as weakness. He then sets up a scenario (he called it "great television") where he expects Zelenskyy to apologize and say thankyou for the 100th time. He told Zelenskyy he had no cards, so apologizing or showing appreciation-on-demand (for nothing in exchange) would be submitting to being a loser in Trump's own mindset, which is the point of the whole fake deal on offer. No different to the "deal" he made with Afghan government for natural resources, before he sided with the Taliban to withdraw US troops in betrayal of that very agreement. When Zelenskyy pointed out that Putin can't be trusted for any ceasefire, Trump then raised his voice cos his own betrayals (nearly everyone who worked for him that wasn't paid, or went to prison by following instructions, or was summarily fired as per his catchphrase) are viewed as his favorite playing card."
Treachery has been his default modus operandi throughout his personal life (cheating and divorce) as well as in business and politics ("hang Mike Pence"). Reality TV then normalized it to the level of mass-entertainment as he suggested.
> both Starmer and Macron represent a minority of the electorate in their respective countries—having won due to a deeply fractured electorate.
Yet MAGA types keep claiming that Donald Trump supposedly got an "overwhelming mandate" from the American people even though he got just under 50% of the popular vote.
Starmer’s party won the House by a vote share that in the previous election resulted in a landslide loss. Macron’s party came in third and no longer controls their parliament.
Then why did they vote against themselves, family, friends, community, city, country, and other countries? Uneducated people make uneducated votes. Privileged people get it, they just want you to be more educated, but you keep voting against that too.
Regular blue collar working class people from less developed areas don't want to be lectured by privileged big-city people that they're uneducated and only they know better than them what the correct candidate to vote for is.
That patronizing attitude you showed is exactly the one the Democrats had and is exactly what got Trump elected. Until their attitude changes they will keep losing votes out of sheer spite.
Only time will tell if those Trump voters end up being ok with the inevitable cuts to Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security. If that comes to pass, I expect some bipartisan screeching.
Poor people and working class were gonna be fucked either way no matter the candidate that won, because while America has 2 political parties, it only has one economic party which caters to the wealthy established elite. Do you think Kamala would have done anything more for the poor in practice?
The only savior of the poor and vulnerable would have been Bernie Sanders, that's why the democrats have avoided nominating him, because he's a man of the people, not the man of established corporate interests.
So given two bad options, the poor and working class have picked the candidate not insulting and patronizing them based on gender, race and identity politics, while also being able to form a coherent sentence[1]. Democrats are so high on their own self-righteous elitist farts, they still don't realize why the majority of people hate them.
There’s no “propaganda network.” America has a president that overthrew the GOP leadership by destroying Jeb Bush over the Iraq War: https://youtu.be/H4ThZcq1oJQ?si=ZawKMFFY3LmAhYMr. After the mistakes of the last two decades, there is little appetite in America to do anything in foreign countries americans can’t find on a map beyond empty virtue signaling.
Leaving aside the Iraq war discussion for a moment (that war, by the way, was America’s Pickett’s Charge, the high tide of the US) it’s amazing remembering how anti-Trump the Republican crowd was. A complete world of difference from today.
Their hypocrisy knows no bounds. They hate electric cars, but all of a sudden the guy who popularized them is a hero.
Zelensky is invited here and shows incredible restraint and decorum only to be shouted down and vilified. Meanwhile, Netanyahu comes over here and CHASTISES Congress for not delivering weapons FAST ENOUGH. This after we've propped up Israel's apartheid regime and filled warehouses with weapons for decades.
You think random factoids are driving Trump’s viewpoint?
Trump overthrew the Bush dynasty by eviscerating Jeb over the Iraq War: https://youtu.be/H4ThZcq1oJQ?si=Y3nWQeiui8KJhj8b. Now, neocons want to chalk that up as bad execution of an otherwise sound ideology. But you don’t think that Trump’s supporters could genuinely disagree with that assessment—think that the underlying problem is that america is too willing to intervene militarily in places that don’t directly affect the U.S.? You think that view is driven by Russian propaganda?
The way I see it, Ukraine is the test case for the foreign policy populist Democrats have long supported. The Cold War is over. The likelihood that Putin will invade Germany or France next is low. Regional wars are just that, and we should let them play out without getting involved.
Otherwise you’re still subscribing to Reaganite neoconservatism—you’re just quibbling about the details of whether to involve the american military empire in any particular skirmish.
> According to the Washington Examiner, McMaster said on Tuesday that Gary Cohn, Trump's former top economic adviser, did steal documents off the president's desk to prevent Trump from pulling the US out of key trade deals.
> Cohn told colleagues at the time that the theft was necessary and that Trump would forget about the idea, according to the book, released earlier this month. Woodward reported that Cohn also snatched a document that would have pulled the US out of the North American Free Trade Agreement from the president's desk.
He has a long history of parroting the last thing someone said to him.
I always wonder how is it that you are allowed to post so much in controversial political threads, yet your posts are usually significantly voted down. Does the rate limiting not apply to you?
Also is anyone seriously suggested France or Germany would be next? Wouldn't it be more like Poland? And your perspective reeks of the weeks prior to the Ukraine invasion, where so many swore Russia would never do it, it was just Biden-antagonism. And this isn't me being pro Biden. These are just facts.
I voted for Biden, and while I was unhappy with the result for many reasons, I thought he did an okay job keeping us from getting more deeply involved in the Ukraine war.
Many people seem to take it as axiomatic that the U.S. has an obligation to use force to maintain pre-existing borders. And we simply don’t agree with you about that. The standard for me is whether it’s going to significantly affect the daily life of someone in Iowa.
So maybe I’d care if anyone was seriously saying France and Germany could fall to Russia. But short of that?
How is that even a response to my post? At all? I didn't express any opinion if the US should use force... so I'm not sure what you could agree or disagree with about that.
I think personal animosities drive Trump's viewports, otherwise you wouldn't call a president a dictator because he didn't held an election during a war what's exactly that what the Ukrainian constitution says.
You wouldn't appease a dictator who imprisoned and killed his opposition.
And Putin wouldn't attack openly, nowadays you attack per online sabotage, something the US will see rising, or won't see because Trump suspended the cyber operations.
Strangely enough he has no problem sending money to Israel after Hamas attacked them, despite the Israel army is much more powerful than the Hamas.
So Trump has no problem being involved in wars he knows his supported side will win or has already won.
Trump gos for the easy wins, he is a low-hanging fruit harvester.
Same with DOGE. Firing people doesn't reduce bureaucracy, changing laws and regulations does. But that's not what they do.
BTW people said the same about the likelihood of Putin attacking Ukraine, or about the likelihood of Ukraine withstanding the attack more than weeks.
Seems like likelihood is a bad measure for reality.
And pissing of your allies and victim blaming the president of an invaded country is bad politics, unless you are the villain.
I honestly don’t get the impression that Trump is that strategic. He also usually doesn’t care if something is right or wrong, but only whether it supports his interests.
Ukraine's parliament overwhelmingly supported the EU-UA agreement. It had the support of the populace. Yanukovych was going to be replaced at the next election because of it, and his violent suppression of the protests only sped that up. There was no need for western involvement to make that happen, and your belief that there was is an evidence-free conspiracy theory. https://euvsdisinfo.eu/report/us-launched-euromaidan-to-weak...
It wasn't then nor now a legitimate parliament. Please refer to the 2014 Victoria Nuland phone leaks to see for yourself how the United States chooses who is a member of the Ukrainian government.
Nothing in that leak shows that the US chooses members of the Ukrainian government, only that they work with them. All of them were democratically elected, just like Zelensky. Next you're going to tell me that Yatsenyuk grew a beard and joined a Chechen gang in the 90s and cite the DNC leaks as proof. https://www.voanews.com/a/ukraine-yatsenyuk-chechnya-russia-...
Like most Asians and most Muslims, I have been opposed to the “rules based international order” my entire adult life. American proxy wars have caused tremendous damage around the world. And I’m incredibly proud we finally have an American President who realizes they don’t serve American interests either.
This is not a new sentiment and it caused by Russian social media propaganda: https://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4473508,00.html. I cite Chomsky less these days than I used to, but I recall back when I was a Gore-supporting Democrat and we were mocking “Team America: World Police” he was seen as pretty respectable. Is he Russian propaganda?
American proxy wars propping up illegitimate governments that rule without the consent of the governed have caused problems. The US is supporting a legitimate government against an invading dictatorship. The broad brush you paint with would have had the US not support the allies with weapons in WW2 all the way through 1941.
That was true of Vietnam and South Korea too. And in Iraq we were toppling a brutal dictatorship and in Syria we would’ve been doing that. The U.S. shouldn’t have been getting involved in any of those. Democracy promotion is not a legitimate foreign policy—because for many countries (maybe most countries) authoritarianism is better than a dysfunctional democracy.
Once again, your argument is in favor of not helping the Allies against the Axis powers. This is not about democracy promotion. It's about repelling an invasion from a dictatorship. Invading a nonexpansionist Third Reich is a different proposition from helping other countries fight off an invasion from a Morgen die Welt conqueror. As I said, I agree the US shouldn't install and prop up illegitimate governments like the RVN. The people ruled by the illegitimate government won't appreciate it. That's not what's going on here.
> And I’m incredibly proud we finally have an American President who realizes they don’t serve American interests either
Seriously? The current president is even more on-board than the previous ones with using Israel as a U.S. proxy. Just because he's also in bed with Putin doesn't mean he opposes American imperialism.
Amazing to see posters still managing to blame an external enemy for their own humongous trillion-dollar consent machine working as designed in a direction they don't like this time.
The PTB in US have decided to divy up the world into zones. This was likely already set in motion when the Brexit thing started in UK. "We want Canada, American Gulf, Panama Canal" is Monroe Doctrine 2.0 on steroids. UK is likely going to be in the 'Oceania' camp (as will be the rest of the Common Wealth) and we can all look forward to a 1984 future living under authoritarian regimes using "AI" and pervasive surveillance. The rest is smoke for plebes.
Not sure why you are trying to veer the convo in another direction, but to address it - it's been 3 years, hundreds of thousands died, and absolutely nothing achieved. Please correct me if I am wrong.
If France had hold out until 1943, with the Wehrmacht only making a few hundred yards progress per day, it would have been a massive success, don't you agree? Without western help, Ukraine would have had no chance in hell to survive that long.
It's the same logic the US applied to lend-lease, didn't they? There was a good chance of the USSR collapsing until 1943, and you still helped them. Delaying an invading attacker, especially one who may plan, according to their own internal propaganda, to attack other nations later, is already more than "nothing".
The price for peace is living under occupation. Depending on the occupier, this can be a fate worse than death, and significant numbers of Ukrainians appear to think the latter.
And for a very selfish argument: It buys us, the Europeans, more time (with Ukrainian blood) to prepare for war, when Russia attacks the Baltics in a few years. Which we desperately need, as the US will likely break their promise and not help us under the current administration (and who knows who the US elects next).
The 3 years allowed e.g. the Baltics to build extensive defensive fortifications.
Someone was coming to bail out France. I don't see a D day for Ukraine. If it is coming a European nation needs to step up right fuckin now and say it.
If they lost (or break even, or occasionally even gain) a few hundred feet a day, forever, all the while their young males all go into a meat shredder that is their choice to make. I'd rather let American families use their earnings on their own problems and let Ukraine make those choices for themselves.
The US wasn't active part of the war until December 1941, though. For the first years, no boots on the ground were coming. And if Germany didn't declare war against the US, which they weren't forced to do by the tripartite pact, it's questionable they would have come at all (in 1944).
Doesn't Ukraine buy most of their heavy weapons from the US (... until now)? If so, isn't most of the tax payer money the US lends Ukraine going back into the US economy, softening the blow by a lot?
Did the (original) lend-lease act even hurt the US economy and US families? Or did it provide jobs and stimulate the US economy, cementing the role of the US as the military / industrial powerhouse they are today? I was under the impression that it's the latter, but I'm not sure, correct me if I'm wrong. Is this one different?
But sure, of course - that's the right of the US, even though it would be nicer not to retroactively break existing agreements. I only wanted to push back against the (new) lend-lease doing "absolutely nothing".
I wonder what media do you consume to get this absolutely ridiculous idea? baltic states have no beef with Russia (except petty provocations which Russia seem to dismiss), Putin never ever said he will do anything like that and actively emphasised he won't. Where the idea of Russia attacking Baltic states or any other european nation to that matter, have stemmed from (besides nonsensical statements of unelected EU bureaucrats like ursula, who have vested interest in stealing money through warmongering)?
E.g. France24[1], they have all sources linked. Then there are individual governments, like e.g. the Latvians[2], warning that Russia is preparing for a confrontation with NATO. Or the German DoD[3]. Yes, no politician is explictily saying "Russia will invade country Y in X years", but "Russia prepares all resources they need to invade, and NATO confrontation is not unlikely" is good enough for me, at least as long as Russian state TV shows nukes exploding over Western Europe or battlegroups invading the Baltics.
The Baltics have no beef with Russia, but Russia with the Baltic states[4], according to e.g. Medwedjew, who thinks they literally belong to Russia. Or Россия 1[5].
Russians have been saying the same about attacking Ukraine all the way until they actually did attack.
There are many signs Baltic states are next in the Russian annexation list. And if Russia going to win control over Ukraine - mobilized to Russian army Ukrainians will be in the first wave of Russian cannon fodder troops advancing through Baltic states.
If they are independent then they won't need to rely on being propped up by American taxpayers to survive. Because if they did, they'd be dependent not independent.
With that logic, any country too small to fight its neighbors should be taken over, their citizens killed, their women defiled. What planet are you from?
Would you like to live in a world where the strong can do anything they want? Or do you want to live in a world of laws, where alliances protect groups of countries who want to provide their citizens with safety, economic prosperity, etc.
This argument makes no sense - you have never been asked to pay a special "Kurdish" tax, or a special "Ukrainian" tax. You will still pay the same amount (or more) of taxes even if the US becomes completely isolationist.
Unless the cost is zero the tax is paid, either directly, by inflation, or one of the two later to settle the debt. The fungibility of money means no special separate tax is assessed.
Even under fiction I have seen claimed that these are all surplus old arms, the US left them in Afghanistan last time precisely because logistics alone is expensive.
You can just pretend 100% of your tax dollars goes to services you use then. For those of us who want to support Ukraine, why can't we choose to spend our tax dollars on that? I understand you personally don't want to spend on those things, but in our system our representatives voted to send that aid. It's not Trump's to withhold.
>. For those of us who want to support Ukraine, why can't we choose to spend our tax dollars on that?
This is what I'm proposing. Eliminate aid, that filters back into Americans not being forced to pay for it. Those who want to can use their savings to donate or fly over and fight.
For reference, I have no police service, no fire service, no public roads where I live. Road access for miles and miles are private easements which works without taxes -- I first built my road with an axe and a shovel with no government assistance. I have privately drilled water, a privately made sewer, and private electric for which I personally funded the power poles. I pay for private education for my children, on top of taxes for public school. Any remaining scraps of public services you might claim I get, I assure you it would be cheaper for me to buy privately than pay ~30% of my income as I do now in tax.
I don't want your tax money or services. You have a deal.
And yet, here you are on the Internet, built with public dollars. You're happy to purchase goods delivered by public infrastructure. You're happy to use a cell phone and a computer which are designed and engineered largely by people educated with public dollars. When your kids are sick, you take them to a doctor who was educated at public institutions, whose education was funded with public loans, who will prescribe medicine developed using public research grants.
And the idea that your wife and children could be raped and murdered (along with yourself of course) by an invading horde is so far from your mind that you don't even register it as something you're paying for, but if we all weren't paying for other people to protect your liberty, you might be just as unfortunate as the Ukrainians right now, who are facing that very threat.
You think you can fund an army yourself with 30% of your income? Really?
Your mistake here is to believe that if something is public the alternative it must be privately funded by a single individual. I cannot pay engineers to design a car, but a bunch of people can get together and pay for it then me and others will pay a little when they buy them.
I share my private well with several people who cannot afford a well on their own -- i cant afford it on my own withot them. It's all done privately without government. Thus can happen with militias, with healthcare, other infrastructure, the whole shebang. There is no need for private defense to be entirely funded by one person, for instance as I mentioned previously in the militia I fought in against isis everyone beside me there was on their own dime for a collective defense.
Your ideal doesn't scale. You want the luxuries of modern society without having to fund the bureaucracy and the overhead that comes with it. Your idealized homesteading way of life is incompatible with the existence of cell phones and computers, which are the result of a highly modernized society that does require a large government to function.
Militias don't protect against invading armies. If you want to protect against an army, you need to fund an army.
What's interesting is every time I suggest American taxpayer mustn't pay for Ukraine, this is the rabbit hole those of your opinion seem to go down.
What's more likely if aid stops to ukraine is that US taxpayers stop paying and life goes on. My opinion on other taxes notwithstanding, this rabbit hole of cell phones and modern society falling apart and my wife being raped (seriously wtf) because I didn't spend jonnies Christmas money on Ukraine is unraveling. This is why Trump won, and the aid will end. We're done being blackmailed with apocolyptic threats, and the false dichotomies.
> What's more likely if aid stops to ukraine is that US taxpayers stop paying and life goes on.
It kind of doesn't matter how you feel about it though.
The way we resolve our difference of opinion is our system of representatives. You elect representatives to champion your cause, I elect representatives to champion mine, and then they figure out a compromise memorialized as a bill.
So when you say "well I don't want to spend money on this"... so what?? Your opinion was counted. The decision was that money would be sent but not as much as we would like -- a compromise. This is what enables us to live in harmony.
If you want to throw out the compromise, you're also going to throw out the harmony.
> my wife being raped (seriously wtf)
See? You think this possibility so remote, you just scoff at it. If you had asked Ukrainians in 2021 if it was a possibility it would be happening to them today, some would say yes, but most people felt it was not a possibility. Then it happened.
Your position is just as precarious as theirs was before the war, because you are dependent on distant people to protect your liberty. That's what you pay taxes for.
If you feel you're getting a raw deal, then you and your militia can renounce your citizenship, declare your independence and fend for yourself. Forego access to our banking system, our defense, our welfare, our hospitals, our communication infrastructure, our factories, our ports, our air infrastructure. Make your own nation, defend your own land against stronger neighbors (the USA in this case), and actually be independent.
You won't do it though because deep down you know you depend on the rest of us, you're just salty you're asked to contribute anything at all.
Funding for Ukraine has been stopped and it wasn't through my unilateral decision. So far I haven't been attacked by the US army or anything like that and my cell phone is still working.
Somewhere in your calculation you are wrong. And it's not my 'feeling' that got us here, your feeling we ought to fund Ukraine is contradicting reality right now. Either US institutions don't function as you think or they are working as you intended with a different mandate than you like. Either way your monologue about renouncing and fighting the USA serves only as your own personal entertainment to distract from that.
> Funding for Ukraine has been stopped and it wasn't through my unilateral decision.
It was through Trump's unilateral decision, which is illegal. The money was appropriated by our representatives from our tax dollars, and we want it to go. The President doesn't have the right under the Constitution and the law to halt it.
> Either US institutions don't function as you think
US institutions do function like I think, because I learned how they function, it's pretty straight forward: Congress has the power to how spend money, and the President spends it. That he chooses not to is an abuse of power, and violates the law [1], the Constitution [2], and his oath of office [3].
Congress voted for that money to be spent, and the former President signed it into law. Not spending it unlawfully usurps Congress' Article I "power of the purse", and violates the Article II "take care" clause.
I think it's pretty clear, can you cite where the law and Constitution supports your argument?
The US and Europe doesn't send them arms because they're a "proud independent people." The arms deals are to maintain international order, that no country should invade and annex another. If you just allow that to happen, everybody will be worse off. That's why there is so much resistance to paying for Israel to annex Gaza and so much support for Ukraine to fight off Russia.
Taxes fund civilization and the world we've built. The IRS collects a percentage of our money to build roads and infrastructure, defend our nation's interests, provide income in retirement, provide health care, and so much more good stuff.
Part of that is ensuring that the world is stable so that our nation doesn't have to go to war. We do that with alliances, investment in military force, investment in diplomacy, and investment in building economic opportunity globally so people don't turn to violence.
It doesn't always work; no system is perfect.
But Ukraine is the perfect example of a democratic nation that has been invaded by a dictatorship and needs our support. They have already destroyed most of the Russian army and economy with our support, and we need to finish the job.
If we don't give them the resources to finish the job, it is just a matter of when the next dictator does similar, and we are forced to send our people to fight. Do you want to go fight in Tawain? Do you want to find in Estonia?
History has shown us that isolationism doesn't work, nor does giving into naked aggression from dictators and autocrats.
> Well we've voted representation against funding Ukraine and in this case it aligns with personally not consenting to funding Ukraine.
No we didn't. We may have voted for a president who is against funding Ukraine, but notably his role is not to spend money - that is reserved for Congress, and our representatives did vote to spend this money. Meaning, we voted to spend it, so he has no right to hold it up. That he has withheld it is anti-democratic, because it's contrary to Congress' spending directive, and therefore against the people.
If you feel you're getting a raw deal, then you and your militia can renounce your citizenship, declare your independence and fend for yourself. Forego access to our banking system, our defense, our welfare, our hospitals, our communication infrastructure, our factories, our ports, our air infrastructure.
Comments are supposed to get more substantive as the conversation goes on. Do you have something substantive to add? Because mocking me ain't that. Especially when it doesn't even make sense -- I'm not the one saying taxes are theft, pretending I'm rugged and independent.
I provided a substantial reply as to why you're wrong about military impoundment in our other thread where you asked for citations.
Instead you bypassed that, and start proselytizing about mockery after threatening my wife with a raping. Let's not pretend your conversation has decorum. I am being extremely charitable to you after your threats about my family.
>independent
And yet my initial comment was on Ukraine being independent. The irony here is your Jackyll and Hyde treatment of independence -- you don't hold Ukraine to such demands of never using US ports or services.
I didn't bypass anything I'm reading the sources you left, they're over 50 pages long...
> after threatening my wife with a raping
I didn't threaten your wife with anything. I said you aren't worried about such a thing because an army protects her from that literal fate, and Ukrainians experience that fate because they foolishly trusted others to protect them. It's beyond me how you interpret that as a threat.
> you don't hold Ukraine to such demands of never using US ports or services.
Because they don't pay taxes to benefit from such things. Instead they are the recipients of aid that was given to them. Why would they use our ports? You benefit from our ports, so you pays taxes. It's straightforward.
>Why would they use our ports? You benefit from our ports, so you pays taxes. It's straightforward
They use more than half of the things you mentioned. Banking services, airports (how does zelensky get here?), defense articles. Wasn't that your demand of independence, not to use them, or shall you walk that back?
>didn't threaten your wife with anything
You didn't threaten you would personally do it. It wasn't an illegal threat, but it was a threat -- pay up for X or else your wife stands to be raped. I understand what you're saying but I find it exhibits a sort of conversation that isn't adhering to a particularly strict decorum that merely mirroring using your own rhetoric creates.
> hey use more than half of the things you mentioned.
You have to start over and make a cogent argument. I'm not following you. Zelensky is allowed to land in the US because the US allows it. Same with banking, defense, and anything else. If you declare your independence as a nation, you'll have to gain the same recognition, which will be very expensive. Or you can join another nation that has that recognition. Or you can stay a citizen of this nation. But you can't just declare your independence, and get to freeload off all our resources.
> but it was a threat -- pay up for X or else your wife stands to be raped.
That's not a threat, it's the law of the jungle. That's just the natural order of things, and it's why there's such a strong incentive to spend billions on defense. It's not even an abstract thing because we see it happening in real time.
> I understand what you're saying but I find it exhibits a sort of conversation that isn't adhering to a particularly strict decorum that merely mirroring using your own rhetoric creates.
The only thing I ask is you adhere to the HN site guidelines, which is we are here for debate. I called out your last reply not because it was offensive but because it degraded the thread by not providing anything to respond to, so it was thought-terminating. Our other thread got more substantive over replies, which is the ideal. If you have an argument, make it. Snark isn't needed, I've caught myself doing it too, so when you're called out on it just stop and move on.
I'm not bringing up your family to break decorum, I'm bringing it up as my actual argument for why you need to gladly pay taxes, and why you're not as independent as you think. The topic of this whole thread, the Russian invasion of Ukraine, is the case-in-point of that, so it's not even an abstract problem people face in the year 2025.
>But you can't just declare your independence, and get to freeload off all our resources
Which brings me back to the double standard you present. The premise is Ukraine is independent, "but you can't just declare your independence, and get to freeload off all our resources."
So we come full circle. Either they're independent and needn't freeload off American taxpayers, or they're actually dependent. I am very happy with the execution of the former and pleased you've come to agree with my point.
That's not my premise. Ukraine isn't freeloading, we voted to give them money because we understand they are the frontline of defense against Russian aggression -- they are paying in blood.
What I'm more concerned about is your hypocrisy as a fellow citizen, where you seem to believe you are fiercely independent (and therefore shouldn't be expected to pay into the system) but conveniently ignore all the ways it benefits you and the comforts it brings.
... I pay into the system. That's what your sort of disingenuous argument leads to, I'm against funding Ukraine therefore you think this merits I must prove the case of the entire fucking tax system. You're horribly mistaken, de funding Ukraine is not going to lead to a libertarian utopia that you switched up to arguing against.
That is why your kids will eventually fight in World War 3, because you won't invest in a system to establish real peace globally by standing up to dictators who invade other countries.
It is not illegitimate in any way, and I think you are making a bad-faith argument.
American stands strong with Ukraine. The only Americans who have left the chat are those who were never American to begin with.
I admire that you put yourself in dangers way for what you think was right.
However it is really disingenuous to try frame a global conflict between super powers in terms of personal responsibility. Your prescription is in the same vein as saying those worried about climate change should recycle more, when it is clear their utmost efforts would not make a dent in the global scheme of things. As such, no amount of motivated militia is going to make a dent in a war against an industrialized military.
Just come out and say I don't want to pay for to support Ukraine's war against Russia. Your opinion is valid and should be taken into account. However you don't get to dodge your responsibilities if the outcome doesn't go your way, just like a Democrat has to live with Trump's policies whether they like it or not. It's pathetic to try garnering sympathy with cage analogies.
"Nothing achieved" is exactly right. Russia did not achieve in 3 years what it thought it could achieve in 1-2 weeks. Tons of people died on both sides (though no civilians in Russia). The only reason russia is continuing is because west while is perfectly equipped militarily desperately lacks balls and succumbs to putin's propaganda.
Nothing achieved for you but for example my mother and some relatives don't have to live under forced occupation. Her city was under siege for a number of weeks during initial invasion and totally cut off from any basic human needs like water, electricity and food supplies were limited. Not to mention constant rocket attacks and some shelling. There are millions of people like my mother who are greatful for what Ukrainian army has achieved and are still fighting for. The containment of further expansion and the fact that there is very little progress Russian army is making is also an achievement. Russian Soviet stock piles are depleted, their economy is on a downward spiral, untill a few weeks ago they were totally isolated from the rest of the civilised world, that's another achievement.Exposing Russia's bluff of their military might is another achievement. The fact that USA can now "focus on China" is thanks to Ukraine. Everyone in the world was united against the aggressor. What is happening right now is that some of those achievements are being undone and may I ask for who's benefit? So that Trump can make a deal that he promised and restore the economic relations with Russia? It might stop the deaths and fighting now but you are simply taking a "peace debt" from Putin.
Russia's stated intention is to destroy the Ukrainian nation and to erase Ukrainian identity. Putin believes Ukraine is not a real country and Ukrainians are not a real people:
Putin believed he could flip Ukraine in three days. Three years later Ukraine is still explaining to him that he is wrong.
Ukraine is fighting an existential war of independence. And for three years, despite having a larger population and a larger military, Russia has failed to wipe Ukraine off the map.
America is making the wrong choice in submitting to Russian aggression and in becoming a Russian ally. It's grubby stuff.
Because the weapons were drip-fed, preventing Ukraine from achieving any decisive, quick victory.
Successive US administrations (Obama, Biden, and now Trump) want the Russian Federation to survive as an entity, regardless of its aggression and crimes.
> Mind to elaborate why fueling the endless war is a "miserable disgrace"?
Helping Russia by giving them what they want (time to rebuild their military and economy while lifting sanctions) is what will actually fuel an "endless war" as Russia will simply continue the war at a later stage.
Don't confuse a temporary peace on paper with actual peace.
The history of your posts, oh my... But I will attempt to provide an answer in earnest.
All sane people are against an endless war. Or, any war for that matter. The only state that can be compared with an endless war is a mid-war period: the time when both sides know that the war is coming, and they live in misery, entrenching and militarizing, while the rest of human development stands still: economy is military-spending driven, birthrate falls, population flees, etc. Do we agree on that or do you need examples?
So, taking your question at its face value: the alternative is lasting peace. The history tells us that the only condition for lasting peace with Russia is either strong and decisive resistance or military alliance membership. Again, examples are a legion: both positive (Finland, Baltics, Turkiye), and negative (Georgia, Ukraine, Afghanistan, Syria, Chechnya to a certain degree).
The only path for lasting peace for Ukraine is to humiliate Russia on the battlefield. For that to happen they need weapons
"The history tells us that the only condition for lasting peace with Russia is either strong and decisive resistance or military alliance membership"
20th century history unfortunately tells us the answer is containment, not direct engagement.
From handing over Poland and eastern europe to Stalin in 1945, or refusing to protect Hungary in 1956 or interfere explicitly in the soviet sphere of influence, in exchange for them not interfering explicitly in western sphere of influence.
It's not a nice lesson, but that was how we achieved some form of peace for decades.
You are assuming that stopping the aid will stop the war. It won't, not soon at least.
Unless one of the two party wins the war, the way a peace agreement is reached is for both parties to consider it a better outcome than continuing the war, which means that the quickest way to reach is to make it harder for both countries to continue the war, and more palatable the result of an agreement.
This is not what Trump is doing. He is not doing harder for Russia to continue the war, in fact it is going to make it easier. He is not going to make the peace agreement more palatable for Ukraine, in fact it made it even harsher.
In other words, Trump is not looking for a "deal" is looking for a capitulation of Ukraine, and to offer it to Putin, probably behind some agreement.
Ukrainian people are not going to like the idea, so they will not surrender soon. Putin will see this as a victory, so he will not stop there (he is trying to get US troops out of Eastern Europe, and I am sure Trump will obey), so any "peace" will be short-lasting. Eastern Europe countries already see this, so they will not stop helping Ukraine because the US did.
My understanding is that you are outsourcing the work of grinding Russia’s military down. You get to deplete a geopolitical foe at a bargain, without spilling American blood.
There is also the moral argument that you are supporting Ukraine in a war of aggression started by Russia.
My fear is that conceding anything to Russia just gives it an opportunity to regroup, rearm and finish the job. Appeasement has not worked before.
Then there is the whole minerals thing. Now you’re not merely abandoning an ally, but kicking it while it’s down. It’s not a reassuring message for anyone thinking of allying with America.
As a national of a country Trump has threatened to annex, I am wondering how many more allies America can antagonise and how long and costly it will be to rebuild a good reputation.
I recently had a discussion with someone more senior than me and they were convinced that the whole deal was about resources in the first place. If anyone has some references and thoughts about this, please share.
I have thoughts. Maybe biased because I'm Russian.
Imagine I maimed a guy on the street because he was walking too slowly. Was "the whole deal" about him walking too slowly? Yes and no. He was walking slow. But also I was a violent psycho.
Imagine I killed my wife because she was wearing the wrong skirt and looked at another man. Was the whole deal about my wife behaving how I don't like? Yes and no. She was behaving in some way. But also I was a violent psycho.
People come up with all sorts if rationalizations and I definitely heard both "Ukraine had resources Russia needed" and "Ukraine was willing to sell resources to US".
Resources? Excuse me, look at the map? You know that tiny Netherlands beats Russia in agriculture exports. Russia has the most reserves of mineral resources of any country in the world. The country has insane resources already and its corrupt government is unable to make good use of them.
But anyway. They say Ukraine was willing to sell resources to US (those people like to use loaded phrases like "US wanted to siphon resources from Ukraine") and Putin didn't like it? Well there's a well known way to solve this "problem": offer a better deal, don't be a dick, invest, stuff also called "diplimacy".
Resources, NATO, US military complex, whatever, mostly those things are bullshit, maybe they did motivate Putin, who knows. It's just mentioning those things with a solemn face full of insight as if they explain something is what paints a person as Putin supporter and aggression apologists in my eyes. Because none of those things justify the choice of mass murder by a violent psycho.
Martyrmade had a really solid episode about Ukraine that explained the Russian motiviations in a more understandable way.
If I remember correctly, a lot of the problems come down to broken promises of stopping NATO expansion after the fall of the Soviet Union. Russia made concessions, NATO did not. This is the Russian case as I vaguely remember it.
This is a reminder that geopolitics are wildly complicated and that the waters are too muddied for laypeople to make sense of in real time.
Your analogy holds. The psychopath must be stopped, but it's good to remember that the west provoked it when it had a chance to tame it.
I see your last paragraph but I am still triggered by attempts to explain "Russian" (they are Putin's) motivations, it gives them a pleasant aura of "this caused that so..." that makes my skin crawl. Also it's tempting to think in terms of resources, numbers, strategy game stuff, but as Russian I am aware of enough wild takes and rhetoric by people in Putin's circles to suspect it's mostly about his legacy, ego and desire to be in history.
NATO expansion was not really a threat to Russia beyond Putin's pretense. Putin pulled forces from Finland border after it joined. I hope the wrong lesson won't be learned.
Most of this narrative comes from Mike Benz who is a former State Department employee that has began trying to educate people on some of the shadier aspects of US Diplomacy. A major facet that he talks about is how the US combines NGOs and non-government investment in order to achieve diplomatic goals.
After the 2014 invasion, the US realized that breaking EU dependence on Russia natural gas would put a serious dent in Putin's wallet.
In response, various groups within the military industrial complex decided to invest into Burisma, where Hunter Biden was oddly a board member with little experience. Burisma's goal was to develop the mineral and natural gas deposits in the Donbas region. Ultimately, Burisma was prevented from this mission because of the 2022 war.
The opposite would be protecting democracy from fascist invaders. In my opinion the west/Biden were too wishy washy and should have stopped the thing from the start.
Putin's capacity to wage war is by no means unlimited. This war has the potential to bankrupt Russia (just look at its 21% key rate) and the US already has experience in pushing an adversary to collapse.
It really sucks that "Saddam has WMDs" broke an entire generation of Americans into knee-jerk contrarianism regarding any global conflict US is involved in. What's the "WMD" equivalent here - what do you think the media is lying to you about? That there's an ongoing Russian invasion of Ukraine is something all involved parties acknowledge.
The best explanation for people who obsess over 'Saddam has WMDs' is that they were gullible enough, at the time, to believe it.
On a related note, a lot of the morons who gave GWB a second term seem to be populists now. They would be more helpful to America if they stopped trying to understand the world around them, and instead just voluntarily stopped voting.
It was the half dozen other adventures in the sandbox with nothing to show for it that made people put down their foot and say no more and stick to it even when it's a cause they may support (Ukraine for some, Israel for others). That's how fed up with it the American public is.
Unlike the wmd lie which was generated completely by the USA, all of Europe seems pretty concerned to the point they just approved another 650 billion in debt TODAY, something Europe REFUSED to do for what 40 years?
Because X happened in the past does not mean that Y is X. Only people reaching hard to push an agenda would claim any similarity.
I think both are similar in that they obfuscate real discussion on the purpose of war and tradeoffs.
If the goal is to be global police, that is a conversation worth having. Same if the goal is to show solidarity with our EU allies for its own sake. I think these other topics are manufactured consent.
"I think the "wmd equivalent" is the idea that Russia will move on Berlin if they're not contained in Ukraine."
Because now all of the sudden you are saying something totally different and nebulous 'world police' BS.
Why are your trying to equate Europe dramatically and instantly shifting their spending and EU policy to some nebulous 'global police' comment instead of addressing your original point, that you state no one actually believes 'Russia moving on Europe' is a real thing, and trying to equate it to the WMD lie?
You original point is BS, Europe believes to the tune of 650 billion just committed and breaking all of their long standing norms when it comes to defense that it is a real issue. Hense you having to move to some nebulous 'world police' nonsense.
I am asking what the core purpose and rationale for USA involvement is, and saying that this should be the center of discussion, whatever it is. It seems like nobody can agree or articulate what this is in a coherent way.
Everything else is a sideshow and distraction.
I don't see how Europe spending 650 billion answers this question either. The US spending money because Europe is with no deeper logic elementary school thought.
You really can't back your original statement can you? You made a specific claim:
"I think the "wmd equivalent" is the idea that Russia will move on Berlin if they're not contained in Ukraine."
Ie, that Russia being a threat to Europe is a convenient lie used to manipulate actions, and Russia isn't a threat.
Europe spending 650 billion and upsetting their long standing defense posture (especially Germany's post WW2 one) shows they didn't/don't view/weren't using the threat Russia poses as a lie to manipulate the USA into being 'World Police' and they are up ending their entire order to defend against Russia (actions with ZERO 'world policing' upside for them).
You tried to downplay Russia as a threat using a comparison to the WMD lie to lend false strength to your position that Russia is not a threat and you failed so miserably you completely pivoted from it.
Edit: News is now reporting that Germany is literally changing their constitution because they don't believe your position that Russia's threat to Europe is a lie.
I'm not pivoting from it. I think Russian tanks in Berlin are only slightly more plausible than Russian tanks in Washington DC. That is to say, I don't think it is a credible threat. I don't even think Europeans believe that. Germany has twice the population and 20 times the GDP of Ukraine, and Russia can't even conquer it. EU has a hundred times the GDP of Ukraine, and several nuclear-armed countries. Do you actually believe that?
If that is a real concern, I haven't seen anyone articulate how it is supposed to work. Just hand wavy threats that if Russia isn't stopped in Ukraine, the rest of the continent will be next. Somehow the same people speak out of the other side of their mouth that Russia is simultaneously the sick man of Europe, incompetent, and ready to implode any moment at the slightest breeze.
Reread my posts. I brought up global policing not as an example of a wmd lie, but as a more logical reason to support Ukraine.
Last, the USA spent six trillion dollars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Spending money isnt proof that they posed up legitimate threat of conquering the USA.
Strong 'Putin won't invade Ukraine' 2022 vibes. Russia will stop with what they took in Georgia. Sorry, I mean they will stop with Crimea. Sorry, I mean they will stop with what they took in eastern Ukraine (plus we also have to give them Kherson). But yes, through history including with Russia, appeasing and giving land ends any future land grabs.
Putin has explicitly stated he's getting the USSR back together. He was worked in the eastern Germany KGB. His actions/current proof leans to he wants it all back. Zero leans to he doesn't. You argue you don't think he could take it. Again, that has nothing to do with it. The question is will he try/does he intend to, and everything points to yes. The same people said 'He won't invade Ukraine, he can't' that are now saying 'He won't try to take more, he can't'.
If that is all it comes down to, then yeah, I dont think he will try to take eastern Germany, no matter what he would like. Regarding the various attributions, I dont know what people you are talking about.
If protecting Germany is your final answer for why support the war, I think it is fine for the US to sit it out until article 5 is invoked.
It is kind of like expecting Europe to be ride or die in a US war with China over Taiwan.
There is absolutely no requirement that the US has to get involved in every regional conflict in the world. Let the Ukrainians and Russians deal with their mess. There are plenty of other regional conflicts we ignore.
> Seek immediate Security Council action to provide assistance to the signatory if they "should become a victim of an act of aggression or an object of a threat of aggression in which nuclear weapons are used".
Ukraine was the victim of an act of aggression from Russia. Pretty obvious that the US gave its word it would protect them.
> Nevermind the fact that threats of nuclear aggression came much later.
The threats of nuclear aggression were there from the start. What other thing do you think prevents the EU from raining death on the Russians from above.
It's a reason but it's not a strong reason. Back then Ukraine was indistinguishable from Russia, basically a small breakaway country from the USSR. So the intent was more likely that the US wouldn't attack Ukraine. Besides which, the nukes in Ukraine were never under Ukraine's control or possession, so the agreement looks to be more for optics than anything.
It's just the US word signed in an agreement. Meaning the US word is now of the same value of Russia.
Saying Ukraine is a "small breakaway country from the USSR", while being the largest country in Europe is one of the most detached takes I've seen on this subject lmao
You clearly have no idea what you're talking about.
> Did you even know the difference between Ukraine and Russia four years ago?
Yes, ~7 years into the current war, I think a lot of people did.
> Much less 30 years ago.
Yes, I knew the difference, then -- when the breakup of the USSR was relatively recent and the issues in and between post-Soviet states were frequent news items. Again, I think a lot of people did.
Heck, I knew the difference when I was in grade school and both were part of the USSR. There's probably a fair number of people outside the US who have some understanding of the differences between Texas and California, too.
> They were considered basically the same country.
Four years ago was seven years after Putin annexed part of Ukraine. This was considered a news story at the time. So it's not as if Ukraine has only been in the news since 2022.
The US didn't end up in this position by fluke. It was a deliberate policy reaction to the nuclear weapons age. If you don't want everyone from Croatia to Canada equipping themselves with nuclear weapons and starting border skirmishes over water rights, the states that maintain a nuclear arsenal and international network of military bases have to step up and enforce the rules.
And yes, the invasion of Iraq on a paper thin pretext arguably was the beginning of the collapse of this equilibrium, and it's no surprise that North Korea reacted by doubling down on their nuclear program.
With great power comes great responsibility. For generations, Americans preferred having a monopoly on geopolitical power. The USA can certainly give up its great responsibility, but beware the consequences, because the global calculus changes accordingly.
>There is a good reason why the USA was called "world policeman".
And Europeans and leftist shit talked the US for it for decades. They called for the US to close military bases around the world, shit talked the amount the US spends on defense, etc.
Now that the US is packing up and going home, the same people are screaming for the US to stay and continue being the exact thing they shit talked the US for. What a spectacle.
> Now that the US is packing up and going home, the same people are screaming for the US to stay and continue being the exact thing they shit talked the US for. What a spectacle.
On the contrary, Russian tanks rolling into Eastern Europe is something many people on the left and right in the United States have always taken seriously, and judged to be worthy of the US's intervention, even if they judged some of our other interventions to be bullshit. The strange part - the real change - is that there are people now who do not.
Haven't they been proven right? What was the point of decades of military spending on Europe, all those bases and other expenses, if in the end, the US simply lacked the willpower to use them as intended to stop a Russian invasion and simply gave in to Russian demands without getting anything in return? The US is losing its superpower status without firing a single shot.
Heck yeah bro, we're owning the Europeans! What a win for the USA! Love basing our geopolitical policy, and breaking our honor in keeping commitments on that. So much winning.
The US provoked the war, the US can finish the war. It is that simple.
Don't dump your wars and middle eastern refugees on the EU. What if the EU started a war in Mexico, drove 40 million refugees to the US, then left and let the US clean up the mess?
This is all done in close cooperation with Germany and France and probably other EU countries too. Who was celebrating the Maidan revolution the most? Americans were barely aware of it.
>Now educate yourself about RAND policy papers on US influence in the Caspian sea and the Black sea.
Ah yes, papers that incorrectly judged the energy landscape of the future and the hilarious inaction of Europe.
>Educate yourself on the perennial desire of the US to weaken Russia and keep Germany down.
Germany has done enough self-owning to keep themselves down. Don't worry though, they'll just import a few million more third-worlders! That'll do the trick!
>Educate yourself about Nuland's involvement in the Maidan revolution.
As stated by another commenter, overwhelming support from Germany, France, and the EU.
>Watch Lindsey Graham on YouTube giving militaristic pep talk speeches to Ukrainian soldiers way before 2022.
Immaterial.
>But it is easier to rewrite the narrative after Trump's win and downvote dissenters.
It's not rewriting, it's a retelling of facts.
>you need rockets, let German scientists build them.
Or Elon Musk LOL!
>If you need LLMs, let Russian developers build them.
No, if the US considers it be a regional conflict, then that's all it will be in terms of repercussions or interests. Maybe in terms of vague geopolitical concerns that might be relevant decades from now, though even that is unclear, but the US is too powerful to have repercussions from not being involved in this conflict.
China and other countries don’t see it that way. They are looking for signals as to what they might be able to get away with, now that the US has decided that it chose the wrong team during the Cold War.
If China seizes Taiwan, we're going to do exactly squat about it. The best thing the USA can do in regard to that situation is stay quiet, and let the status remain unchanged without goading China into doing something to save face.
And that means no more moronic field trips by grandstanding senators.
China would have seized it already if they were sure there’d be no US response. But if the US continues to wink at Putin’s crimes, they may change their mind.
You’re misapprehending the logic of the discussion. OP suggests that this is a regional conflict without implications for US interests (see their response to my comment if you think my interpretation is off). I said, “Really?” My questioning that claim doesn’t imply any commitment to the claim that the US must intervene in all conflicts that have implications for US interests.
Rarely do I see a commenter who blames Ukraine for the war, explain their position or elaborate on what the next 5-10 years of geopolitics will look like.
You're not joking, a lot of people I talk to have gone from anti nuke to hard pro nuke. I can see the future having a lot more nukes in it now that there's no reliable world order to believe in.
> I doubt Denmark will get nukes, nor am I sure I'd be in favor of nukes.
Ideally, we'd have an EU military that takes control of nuclear weapons for example and automatically use them to retaliate when enemy nuclear weapons are launched against EU territory.
Yeah not with Orban or Fico involved, those are both hardened criminals involved in murders too. Subverting EU is their morning activity.
I'd say no EU country should rely on full defense from the rest, each big one should start on their own in hardcore mode: drones, more heavy drones, optic cable drones, drone swarms and then artillery, ammunition for it and air defense (probably the hardest), then the rest. Himars is cool tech but thats a very expensive tech to develop and certainly in current numbers doesn't affect outcome of war. License/buy tech from ukrainians since they have best hands one warfare experience from whole europe, setup manufacturing with them, helping them and ourselves. What should be shared ie nuclear stuff thats too much for a single country.
Silos with main manufacturing, copied elsewhere in smaller numbers. Defense can be good business, just look at US after WWII, not happy that we are heading in that direction but there is no other way if we want to keep freedom. I've grown up behind uron curtain oppressed by soviets cough cough russians, and let me tell you, many people died trying to escape to that freedom. Its invaluable once you don't have it, not to everybody but to many.
Disagree with the implication here and expect the opposite.
Ukraine peace (even an imperfect one) allows the US and Russia to work together to prevent Iran from getting a nuke. Ukraine won't get nukes in either scenario.
An ongoing war forces Russia to rely on Iran, limiting its ability to work with US (and China), on isolating its nuclear program.
DPRK nukes already exist and ROK is pressuring the US for permission for them (neither Biden or Trump want to give them).
DPRK redoubled its nuclear program and shut down disarmament talks when Kim saw Saddam Hussein get regime-changed after he willingly cooperated with UN inspectors to show that there were no WMDs. They realized that cooperating doesn't get you anywhere and the only insurance is through nukes.
Now Ukraine, which gave up its warheads, is seeing the same thing.
And even Canadians are starting to discuss a nuclear guarantee.
Yes, we are going to see more nuclear states. It may not happen overnight but the status quo won't hold either.
Ukraine might not, at this point, because it may be too late for them under whatever heavy-handed peace deal gets imposed. It's all the other would-be Ukraines who are going to make nukes.
AI can pass the Turing test, for observers of this interaction, don’t fall prey to the failure mode of the human mind where someone makes bold claims with no backing, but stated confidently as a way to hijack your perception of their correctness
Nanotuber has made several claims without evidence beyond this forums posts as backing claim. I have made the claim that Nanotuber is a bot without evidence beyond this forums posts as backing.
The Nanotuber account did not respond to my specific claims until I called out their lack of responding. The Nanotuber account also appealed to authority to the admins of this site by claiming I broke the rules on flame wars after I made the claim of being a bot, in a way to try and silence me by invoking admin action via reference to the rules of the forum
These are are all subtle ways of automatically manufacturing consent via AI bots that can now replicate tone of voice and semantics in text.
I’ll again repeat my request for anyone who comes across this thread. How do we combat these types of tactics?
> I don't know of any other latent nuclear states.
Japan is sometimes described as a "screwdriver turn away from a bomb". They've got the materials, the know-how, the civilian nuclear program, and the rockets... and the geopolitics to be interested.
Arguably, most developed nations are in the same boat in terms of being able to build a bomb in relatively short notice. The main challenge is probably that refining uranium is intrinsically a slow process.
I do wonder how many supposedly non-nuclear developed countries have secret small-scale refinement plants and the ability to assemble nuclear warheads in short notice. It is the sort of stuff that they wouldn't want their own populous to know, as it is controversial.
Any developed nation _with a well developed nuclear energy industry_ would be able to build a bomb with years of effort. There's a lot that goes into a bomb beyond refining (e.g. miniturization of warhead). And to deploy the bomb a ton of work to achieve the gold standard of a nuclear triad, plus build enough bombs to be survivable past an initial strike (to maintain deterrence).
If you learn of any countries with a secret program, let your local intelligence agency know. They monitor this closely, and intervene.
You don't generally need either miniaturization, nor a nuclear triad, nor MAD. Those are only a requirement if you are defending yourself against an adversary with a ton of nuclear weapons of their own and significant nuclear countermeasures.
If that is the case, then yes, it is going to take a massive investment to build and maintain that capability, which is the reason why most developed countries don't bother. But if you only want tactical nukes, it doesn't take that much.
I could not care less if e.g. Italy, Spain or Finland have developed nukes in secret. It would not surprise me one bit, either.
The countries and territories mentioned in the broader thread need much more than tactical nukes if they are going to seek nuclear deterrence. Russia invades Spain, Spain hits what exactly with a tactical nuke? Or are they nuking Catalina? I don't see the security argument here, maybe you can detail the security interest and the scenario?
Both the ROK and Japan though are cases where the US "pivoting to Asia" from Europe would make them less, not more, likely to pursue such a breakout. And in both cases, their incentives has existed prior to Ukraine.
Yea, and he managed to get the Australians to switch from a nearly done deal with the French to our subs, and we used highly enriched uranium as fuel.
In a thread about Japan being a screwdriver turn away from having nukes, I think that a highly industrialized state getting handed a fuck ton of highly enriched uranium falls into the same category.
I mean, look at all the sabotage we’ve done to Iran in the form of sanctions or actual sabotage like Stuxnet just to stop their uranium enrichment facilities
Trump said he wanted peace, but I think he really wanted an end for the sanctions, probably to help with his goal of lowering the price of oil. I don’t think he cares at all about how things turn out in Ukraine.
Russia is an important exporter of fertilizer, fuel and food. In contrast, most of the third world imports these things.
Sanctions imposed by the West do not (and cannot without a naval blockade of Russia, which no one in the West is crazy enough to advocate for) prevent the third world from continuing to import these Russian exports, but they introduce significant friction on these transactions.
Much of the third world does extensive business with Russia and rely on Russia for access to advances technologies. For example, Russia is helping Bangladesh build its first nuclear power plant: https://world-nuclear-news.org/Articles/Rooppur-Bangladesh-p...
He also personally threatened Zelenskyy, so maybe they will help Russia in the form of intelligence on Zelenskyy's position when he is visiting troops near the front...
The war in Ukraine has made it impossible to run my startup. Due to unlimited attacks it has become impossible to focus on anything other than the war. Of course, the war certainly needs to be stopped, but no one really knows how to do it correctly and I'm not sure anything good will come of it.
After 3 years of the war, my memory has started to deteriorate and I’ve encountered issues with work and finances. It’s hard to understand how anyone can work during a war and who thought of it, when the planning horizon is just until the next night and then hell begins.
I fear that if U.S. military support stops and the war continues, I will have to urgently move to a safer place.
I am urgently looking for financial help. I have extensive experience in web3 and can work in this field, but only with upfront payment and an immediate start, as my current situation doesn’t allow me to go through tiring technical interviews.
Here, I have created an open letter for companies and individuals who may be interested in my project. Thanks for any feedback.
You are focusing on the wrong things. You need to leave immediately (and take your family if you can). If you can't leave the country try going nearby the Polish border.
I agree, it's better to be closer to the Polish border. That's why I wrote that I need funds to be able to take any action. The last time such a move cost me over $10k and I also volunteered to help my family and others.
No such a move only costs a few hundred dollars at most and maybe free if you are willing to rough it up with the truck drivers. The situation can only be complicated by immediate family members but still it's only a car rental or convincing somebody with a car to drive you there.
And what’s next? Sleep on the street? Rent is expensive, I’ve already tried and it’s impossible without any income.
Sure, thanks for the advice, but I’ll need to work, not just travel. I need the same big monitor for work, a good chair, and usually these things aren’t available, so I end up working in terrible conditions.
I am not saying it's a solution to your housing but a solution not to get hurt or potentially "killed". I don't have a solution to any of them. I am just saying if you really believe your life/safety is at risk, you should move now regardless.
Sure, thanks for your concern. The war started back in 2014 and at that time I didn’t even know what to do. Now, I have some experience which I’m sharing.
Thank you for sharing and I'm glad you got out of that mess and recovered. That's good advice and I've been through something similar myself a while ago. Back then, I tried working in a taxi, but programming ended up saving me. Now, if things keep going this way and AI starts taking over IT jobs, it’s quite possible I’ll have to work as a driver for Uber, where there aren’t as many AGI robots yet.
For now, I still wanted to focus on building startups and developing humanity's economy, which is what I'm best at.
i don't understand why people are telling people to leave ukraine. if that's the stance, then why not just let russia have it. If everyone left, then there's no war to be had?
It's... not that easy. And if he fails at it, he risks a lot - most likely getting thrown into army as a deserter and most likely sent to the equivalent of penal units.
(EDIT: Unless they're a woman/nb, in which case yeah - please try to do so because it will be way easier for you)
This is not a good response on HN, because the impact of your guessing wrong is much higher than the benefit of your guessing right.
That is, the chance that someone really is in a desperate situation, and that a snarky comment might push their head further underwater, is significant enough to not to post like this.
It doesn't mean you have to respond by donating money, of course, but we should all be a bit careful about who we decide to knock around on the internet.
Yeah I think the whole thing was planned in Riyadh between Trump, Putin and MBS.
Which makes one wonder what MBS's role is. My theory is that he will organize OPEC production cuts, designed to boost Russia's economy and crush Europe's.
Europe is far more dependent on oil for industry and manufacturing than for simply transport. The high energy prices are killing the German manufacturing sector, while cheap Chinese imports will crush the domestic auto industry.
Terrible double blow that is enabling far right politics and populism.
> Europe is far more dependent on oil for industry and manufacturing than for simply transport.
If you take personal vehicle transport needs out, they still need oil yes, but a lot less. They also have plenty of resources (e.g. Norwegian Hydro, French Nuclear, even German coal) that they can bring to bear on energy pricing.
China is really smart for pushing themselves off of oil dependence. Yes, someone on the spectrum will mention that they still need some oil, but needing a lot less of it gives you so much more flexibility when it comes to geopolitics.
As for German car manufacturers...I already drive a German EV (made in Germany as well) so I'm not sure what the big deal is about.
Well firstly this was "OPEC+" that includes Russia, the details are that SA isn't moving its quota up at all but Russia is "allowed" to pump more. Secondly, they're explicitly playing it as a gift to Trump, to drive down prices during his early days.
America in unable to sustain such active support for two countries simultaneously, so it's picking Israel. Israeli lobbying is much more far-reaching than European so American attention is shifting there. EU has 3-4 years to ram up but its leaders are the same self-absorbed as Trump (only less big mouthed), so in 3-4 years Europeans will have to absorb whatever Putin will come up with.
Except that one one country is resisting invasion by its bigger bully neighbor that is killing its civilian population, while the other is the bigger bully neighbor killing a civilian population and reducing it to rubble.
A pretty clear indication that America stands on the side of the aggressors and doesn’t give a fuck about you know ordinary people being killed. Shameful.
Well, you know, some of us don't like watching people be killed for no reason, even if there is an ocean between us.
It becomes a question for the US: "Are you who you have said you were for the last 80 years? Or are you just power with no morals?" I think that's actually a relevant question. Who are we going to be?
I'm pretty sure the previous author meant that it's irrelevant to Trump ("big beautiful ocean" is his quote), who clearly believes in "power with no morals". Machiavelli would be proud.
It is highly relevant to the American population - but the sad fact is, most Americans don't care and haven't cared for a long time. The US' foreign policy has been built mostly on "power" (hard or soft) with very little in the way of morals or concern for the actual people -- sometimes, a bit here and there, but mostly it's a PR move.
But at least having the _pretence_ of the moral highground forced the US to do some good amidst all of its bad. Now that Trump has cast that aside and "naked power" is the mot du jour, there's no need to do keep doing any good anymore. Thus: help Russia keep killing Ukrainians, and help Israel keep killing Palestinians.
It's a huge mistake, imo. Israel is going to continue to ostracize itself on the global stage till it's the next South Africa and all our money will have been wasted. That's my belief anyways
> Israel is going to continue to ostracize itself on the global stage
Israel has been doing this for decades. It will never become a pariah like S.Africa was so long as the US continues its "unwavering support" for Israel regardless of what it does (and this is firmly supported by both parties). And then people say that the AIPAC lobby isn't real ...
During the Cold War you could sort of claim that US' unwavering support for Israel was a counter-balance to the USSR's support of the Arabs, and therefore "necessary" in the global game between the 2 superpowers. But now that USSR is gone (Russia in even out of Syria), there's no more excuse.
> so long as the US continues its "unwavering support" for Israel regardless of what it does (and this is firmly supported by both parties)
Yeah, I think that will run out basically. They used to have support in Europe and many other countries as well and that has all but dried up at this point.
The problem in the US is 1) criticizing Israel is equated with anti-semitism ; 2) the highly politically active evangelicals believed Israel is the “promised land” for the Jews.
1 is only for Paleo boomers and crazy people. Normal people understand criticizing a county isn't anti-Seimitic just like criticizing Saudi isn't anti-Muslim.
2 those people are dying out as less and less people believe that religion and they have fewer kids than their forefathers
"Withdrawing" to 1990 borders? You mean expelling the states that joined after 1990? I'm not sure that would go over well with the Baltics, Romania, Sweden and Finland. Withdrawal from NATO is voluntary and cannot be compelled.
It will be a withdrawal of US troops and bases with a wink wink. And nothing but impeachment can compel the president to actually respond to an article V call.
Presumably innocent Russian men are being kidnapped and forced to fight for a dictator just as much. So let’s stop blaming the victim when Russia is clearly the aggressor and started this whole ordeal.
Surprisingly the Russian army is mostly volunteer since the average pay right now is quite high by Russian standards. There are also standard conscripted soldiers as part of the country’s required service. Allegedly the conscripts are kept away from front lines since the death of conscripted young men in Afghanistan was part of the political death knell that led to the fall of the Soviet Union.
Unfortunately Ukraine is having to rely more on involuntary conscription to fill the ranks as volunteer numbers have dwindled. There are many documented cases of TASS “kidnapping” military age men.
I don’t see the parent poster blaming anybody. Maybe you can say they provided a one-sided view but what they wrote was factual.
As the other person responded. You are not correct.
The west started this. They couped in Ukraine in 2014. They accelerated tensions with the DPR and LDR. This reminds me of people who say Oct 7 is when things began in Palestine.
It is barbarism within the context of elites in Ukraine sitting around taking money of cowards in Europe and the Five Eyes funneling money and weapons in. A war that could not be won. It was wrong to not cease fire in 202. A proxy war is not the same as most situations
Funny Europeans and westerners don’t care when existential threats are around for so much of the world because of the west. No one cares when my parents country existence is screwed and we lose democracy because of the west. The victim mentality of westerners is quite something.
Putin can say what he wants. He is a politician. Russia has no ability to do all of that.
“Free world”. westerners always try to push their capitalist “freedom” onto the world as the one “free” way. When it isn’t freedom. Also another point of western chauvinism to refer to the primary colonizers and exploiters of the world as the “free world”
It doesn't seem to bother Trump when it comes to arming Israel, there no competition but more civilians died there than in Ukraine so far in absolute number, and the ratio of civilian to military deaths isn't even close.
If you want to play that card you have to be somewhat consistent. I don't think Trump can play the human rights card, and it's been a looong time
"Free world" my ass. As a European, the US has always been my favorite country and I've been basically universally pro-US all my life. The Recent US decisions managed to turn it 180 degrees for me, in a matter of basically a couple of months. As I consider myself to be a more or less statistical normie, I assume theres many, many more people like me. So: fuck US & eat shit, go suck Putins dick while the EU & the rest of the true free world should focus our efforts on getting nukes, investing in military and intelligence, and leveraging new drone & radar technologies. Theres honestly never been a better time, geopolitically and technologically, to wane off of US-dependence.
I don’t think this thought would have crossed my mind a few years ago, but I think more European countries need Nukes. Sad, but seems like the US can’t be trusted anymore.
With all due respect to your experience and with sincerity, I must ask: did you miss Trump's first presidency? Surely that was the time to become disillusioned with the USA, if not before?
Speaking from my own experience... I was hoping Trump was an anomaly. That the US would have the good sense of NOT voting the guy that directly tried to subvert the electoral process. That somehow the American public still had a moral compass and that the many Americans I admired were representative for their country. I was obviously a fool.
Otherwise, I kept saying to anyone who had ears around me what a grave danger Trump is. I've been doing this for more than 10 years. I saw him as a corrupt asshole since reading his book "The art of the deal" more than 20 years ago. He came highly recommended in the sphere of the then emerging "manosphere"/ PUA culture of the 2000's (I cringe at my own stupidity and shallowness now).
too bad it only took you a few moments to take on this mentality after a lifetime of goodwill. America's been hijacked you should continue to stand with it
> America's been hijacked you should continue to stand with it
I'd say you had a fair chance of not allowing this to happen again. He could have been impeached, arrested, or shot. Either way would have been fine from Europe's perspective (and in fact, it seems like all of those almost happened). Instead the carrot was re-elected.
Relying on them now would be a mistake of the highest order, though I don't doubt that a lot of the political elite in Europe would very much like for things to return to sanity.
>while the EU & the rest of the true free world should focus our efforts on getting nukes, investing in military and intelligence, and leveraging new drone & radar technologies.
You do realize all of that requires massive investment? Where is the EU going to get that money? Raise taxes on a population that is already struggling in a stagnant economy? An economy that is stagnant partly due to the loss of the dirt-cheap energy that European heavy industry was importing from Russia.
As an American (and not one of European decent, so I don't hold the romantic attachment to Europe that many have), I'm perfectly happy with the salty, delusional Europeans agreeing with severing trans-Atlantic relations. Europe has spawned two World Wars and seems intent on flirting with a third. The sooner we disconnect from you guys, and pivot back to a mix of the Pacific Rim + the Americas, the better.
I don't know how much the US sent to Israel to fight in Gaza lately but palestinians in Gaza aren't exactly on the same level as the russian military, so the needs of Israel aren't even close to the military aid that went to Ukraine.
But what I know and for a reality check: the amount of military aid the US sent to Israel since Israel exists is less than the amount of money sent by the US to Zelensky.
In addition to that, although I don't doubt warcrimes were committed by russia, I haven't seen videos of russian soldiers parading with the naked bodies of women they just raped nor vids of russian soldiers calling their parents saying: "I just strangled an entire ukrainian family with my hand mom!".
I also haven't heard of many russian civilians keeping ukrainian hostages, including babies, in their homes [1].
Had russians behaved like that relations between the US and Russia may have been worse than they are now.
This is about Ukraine and Russia. Leave your disgusting comparisons outside this thread.
[1] which some here consider is justified resistance btw
Every time I ask rhetorically what a known, paid Russian asset would do differently as President of the US than Trump is doing, I get crickets from Trump supporters.
Self-reply: Jeff Merkley asked the same thing to Trump's deputy Sec of State nominee! Others are asking!
Now I'm sure I'll be told by my parents that I must have gotten the line from "that reddit site", and I will get to say that no, it's because a lot of people are asking the question.
> March 3 (Reuters) - The United States is drawing up a plan to potentially give Russia sanctions relief as President Donald Trump seeks to restore ties with Moscow and stop the war in Ukraine, a U.S. official and another person familiar with the matter told Reuters.
> The White House has asked the State and Treasury departments to draft a list of sanctions that could be eased for U.S. officials to discuss with Russian representatives in the coming days as part of the administration's broad talks with Moscow on improving diplomatic and economic relations, the sources said.
I hear this a lot, but nobody can explain: why? What good are they to Russia? Ukraine is obvious to anyone who's studied history: as a buffer. What good are the Baltics to Russia, to justify the military expense of capturing them?
I'm sure that's untrue and it's been explained to you many times, but: because they're border states, just like Belarus and, yes, Ukraine. A "buffer" if you prefer.
The "Russian population" in Ukraine was enough to be used as a pretense for an attack by Putin, who believes a large Russian minority somehow makes the territory his. The ethnically Russian populations in Latvia and Estonia are, percentage-wise, larger than that of Ukraine.
Putin's an avowed fan of Alexandr Dugin, so you could look at his writings for some hints, but I'm not sure Putin draws the lines in precisely the same way. It helps to remember that Putin's also a psychopath.
Putin has not been able to conquer the whole of Ukraine after 3 years, but somehow, suddenly, he will be able to conquer all of the Baltic states without breaking a sweat?
So which is it? Is the Russian army fighting with shovels or are they a ferocious horde that is unstoppable? Those two things cannot be true at the same time.
I am getting tired of people parroting this narrative. If Putin could conquer Ukraine, he would have done so by now. Yet according to you this means is able to conquer more countries when his army can't even hold on to a full one.
Russians could invade and while it is most likely that after a long war they'd be pushed back, they'd still leave ruins.
Also, we don't have unified army. So as painful as it is, it is most likely Baltic states would have to fend of with their military (and due to population, well, they can't - even if they are bringing conscription back), maybe Poland and Finland. Maybe.
And then you'd have to coordinate what to do next between all national militaries.
And what would stop a Frenchman or Portuguese to say Why die for Vilnius?
Estonia has had conscription for our whole independence from russia, and we don't intend to go back to russia.
Lithuania also has conscription and Latvia started it again last year.
Estonia also has the Defence League, a voluntary organisation which offers trainings and will support our defence forces.
Russia hasn’t been able to conquer Ukraine in three years primarily due to US support. Now that US support is falling away, Europe can only compensate for a minor portion of it. One important part that Europe can’t replace anytime soon is military intelligence, including satellite reconnaissance, but also advanced air defense systems and fighter jets. It would or will take many years for Europe to be able to provide anywhere near the previous level of US support.
So you believe Trump when he said that the US has given more support than Europe? He was corrected several times but continues saying it, and I see several comments about it here as well. I agree about satellite reconnaissance and such systems though. Several countries wants to give fighter jets, and Sweden wanted to give Gripens but someone convinced them to pause those plans.
I was talking about technological, military, and intelligence capabilities, not about financing. Regarding support budgets, it does appear to me that Trump is misrepresenting things, see for example this tracker: https://www.ifw-kiel.de/publications/news/ukraine-support-af...
I nevertheless agree that Europe needs to invest more both in their capabilities and in Ukraine support.
However, I don’t know how useful it is to compare it like that 1:1. The problem with Trump is that apparently he doesn’t believe that the US has strong (or even any) interests in containing Russia’s imperialist drive and geopolitical gains, and to the contrary is needlessly giving up a lot of bargaining power to Russia.
Russia has zero interest in stopping the war, except to their own conditions, which includes installing a Russia-friendly government in Kiev (what they call “denazification”). They have expressed that many times.
Baltics could very well be on the menu, but it will not be this year. Not next year. Not the year after that.
Right now, Russia needs to rebuild their military as much as they can, and get their real economy back in shape.
My prediction is that IF Ukraine is being forced into a shitty peace agreement, Russia will spend the next 3-4 years rebuilding everything they can, and then when Trump has 6 months left, they'll go all-inn on Ukraine. Trump is effectively in his lame duck period, no republicans want to campaign on entering a huge war, and while democrats might campaign on defending Ukraine - it will not be a popular issue among regular voters.
Then, if Russia manages to do that, other countries will be on the chopping block years later.
I simply do not believe Russia has the manpower, or political backing to do a mobilization required to invade the Baltics. Even if this would be the right moment to do it, with a completely neutered USA.
I agree, I just think the estimation is on the order of 2 years. But, yes, Putin might wait it a bit more in order to see the maximum damage that Trump can do to the US. Same as last time.
As someone living in the Baltics, most people here are fully aware that when Putin chooses to attack we would have trouble holding the mythical 72 hours for full NATO help to arrive.
If NATO help is not coming it is over quite quickly.
You have to remember that Ukraine has/had 40 million population, Baltics has about 7 million.
We also do not have the miles of mined out defenses that Ukraine has had since 2014.
We do have 2000 strong NATO brigades on rotation, a few rotating F-35 from western Europe, some Himars I think.
If unthinkable happens and NATO chooses not to defend the Baltics it is over.
Look at your situation from a different perspective: the Baltics have ~3 times the population of Gaza, and at the very least something resembling air defenses. Gaza was bombed into rubble but the governing body still exists. Or you have roughly the same population as Lebanon, where Hezbollah completely stymied the IDF ground offensive (they wanted to force Hezbollah north of the Litani) even after paralyzing Hezbollah C2 with the pager attack.
Why are the Baltics not fortified as well as Gaza? Why haven't you spent the past 3 years mining the ever-living fuck out of your border with Russia? Why can't 7 million Baltic citizens hold your territory for 72 hours, when 7 million Lebanese are able to bog down the heavily-mechanized IDF for weeks? Now I will admit that terrain is a HUGE factor, but the seeming total unpreparedness of Europeans to invest in the defense of their own homeland communicates a ton to me....none of it positive.
If it's any consolation, the buildup of the invasion preceding the war in Ukraine was visible well before the actual invasion, so probably EU would have time to act.
And, Russia would give you a breather of 1-2 years after the fall of Ukraine in order to build up their stocks.
> We also do not have the miles of mined out defenses that Ukraine has had since 2014.
I'd say you guys should have started building yesterday. Like what the heck to wait for? This isn't some temporary blip but permanent course of direction.
Want to avoid having thousands of sleeper agents with double citizenship causing mayhem before invasion? Revoke it all for dual citizens that won't revoke their russian one, its time to pick side.
> Putin has not been able to conquer the whole of Ukraine after 3 years, but somehow, suddenly, he will be able to conquer all of the Baltic states without breaking a sweat?
Putin will find it much easier to wage war in Europe if Trump pulls out and takes the USA into isolationism (so abandoning the western democracies).
And he will find it much easier to do this if he starts before Europe has a chance to re-arm.
> Putin will find it much easier to wage war in Europe if Trump pulls out and takes the USA into isolationism (so abandoning the western democracies). And he will find it much easier to do this if he starts before Europe has a chance to re-arm.
It still does not explain how he is supposed to do that while he is bogged down in Ukraine.
You answer doe not provide any shred of evidence that is what his plans are. You are just speculating.
Opening multiple fronts in a war when you are not making progress does not make any sense. Putin is probably not the sharpest tool in the shed but I am pretty sure that even he knows that.
Finally, France and the UK both have nukes and are the allies of the Baltic states so an attack is highly unlikely unless the MAD doctrine is broken.
Nobody is going to wage a first strike nuclear war! Nuclear powers and MAD are irrelevant. It is conventional arms in Europe that are lacking, and Europe is re-arming as rapidly as possible for such a defence.
One must have their head in the sand to think otherwise.
>Putin has not been able to conquer the whole of Ukraine after 3 years...
And with whose weapons and support do you think they managed to do that? Not to mention the US had been helping to train the Ukrainian army since 2014.
Anyone who has paid attention to the Ukraine war this far already understands what past, present, and future assurances of military support mean for deterrence.
Your comment suggests a level of ignorance or naivety either on the part of the author or the reader.
Your comment is exactly the kind of high-ended attitude that is turning off people from having healthy debates with other people who might disagree with them.
I am asking a legitimate question.
Your contention is that even though the war is at best a stalemate and has revealed that Russia is at best a paper tiger, we should now believe that somehow it has the strength to invade all the Baltic states?
I am sorry to say but this is a fantasy that is not supported by the facts of the situation that we have seen in the last 3 years.
Now, you are free to disagree and that is fine but that should not stop us to ask questions about these matters.
At best your question was uninformed to the point that it constitutes provocation, at worst it was deliberate disinformation.
I’ll repeat: Russia appears weak because the Ukrainians have received so much military backing from the US and the rest of Europe. It’s a stalemate because others stepped in to stop them.
And furthermore, Russia’s rate of ammo production is higher than Europe’s, their army is larger than Ukraine’s, and their leaders have no limits on how many people they throw into the meat grinder.
Regarding Putin’s attempted restoration of the USSR, even if they’re unable to hold other Balkan countries, that process will result in horrific bloodshed. The US stepping away from defending NATO countries only emboldens Russia to try.
If my attitude puts you off from dialog, then might I politely suggest you educate yourself more on these topics before engaging? You seem more than eager to jump into dialog with others about this topic to push your singular viewpoint, so I’m sure you can direct some of that energy toward broadening your understanding of recent world events.
> If my attitude puts you off from dialog, then might I politely suggest you educate yourself more on these topics before engaging?
Here we go again with the condescending attitude.
> your singular viewpoint
I don't push a singular viewpoint. I asked a question which other people have answered. Some people agreed and others disagreed. Each to their own. This is how a healthy debate works.
> At best your question was uninformed to the point that it constitutes provocation, at worst it was deliberate disinformation.
Asking a question about a major event and having a debate with other people is now considered a provocation? May I suggest you take a step back and rethink how you interact with other people if you think truly that this is the case.
Questioning things is good. Asking questions when we don't know the answer about something should be encouraged. That's how we learn and that is how we grow.
You have decided that you are right and that I am wrong. That's your right but that shouldn't stop people from asking questions that you deem to be provocative.
I have had many debates with plenty of people on this forum, some heated debates even, but I can say that you are definitely not someone I am interested in engaging with anymore.
The current situation is a stalemate. The US suddently flipping sides will shift the balance and it's hard to predict how far Trump will go in supporting Putin.
There is a demographic deficit in the Baltics, but it is only visible in rural areas and third-tier cities. Tallinn, Riga, Vilnius, Kaunas and Klaipeda are absolutely lively and prosperous cities full of people, including youngsters (no surprise, because both the jobs and the universities are there).
There's also been a population growth, albeit small, but it's happening. Thanks to migration and to the economies actually being HEALTHY people start to have more babies. The IT and innovation that comes from there as well. It's not much but it's extremely effective.
Yep, I agree that the Baltics punch above their weight.
They are also more laissez-faire in the good sense, not overburdening their economies with endless paper pushing (a French and German disease so to say), while keeping the environment reasonably protected.
The rest of Europe could do worse than emulate their approach.
There's also a great social net, free education + student allowances, and plenty of work. I have got no clue what the original poster of the main comment meant by broken economy.
Absolute lies and disinformation coming from the ex-allies of ours.
People can do a lot of amazing stuff if their hands aren't bound.
I remember reading a German's enterpreneurs lament about wanting to lay a single electrical cable between his two nearby buildings. The paperwork demanded by German authorities dragged for half a year. He said that a similar work in Poland was papered through in two weeks.
Or, as a friend of mine in Prague quipped: "We want to build traffic lights. We need 28 stamps, including one from a forest management service. The closest forest is 5 km away (3 miles) from said intersection, but they still need to confirm their approval."
The Baltics are comparatively lean in this regard and it shows.
Agree. The reforms of regulations are needed as much as ever right now. Let's hope for the best that our people will wake up to this and we will be able to withstand the oncoming crisis.
Yea, Latvia is actually doing quite alright culturally for it's small size. We have multiple NBA players, Oscar winning producer ( movie Flow ) and bronze in hockey world championship in 2023. All that for a population bit below 2 million is not bad, sadly none of that will matter if we get invaded.
Alternate interpretation, Russia has been giving Trump money for a long time, ergo Trump supports Russia and everyone around him who has seen his rise as an opportunity to gain power goes along with it, even if 18 months ago they were on the record repeatedly making seemingly heartfelt statements exactly to the contrary. Whatever other explanations they give are rationalizations after the fact.
I remember when I was much younger many evangelical Christians absolutely losing their mind over the Lewinsky scandal, and both in public and private going on and on for years about what a disgrace it was that a man who would break his marriage vows was leading the country and that God was going to punish the nation for it, using the most hyperbolic language you can imagine. Now turns out they are supporting this guy for whom marriage is a joke and I guess infidelity is no longer a big deal, having the highest support of any demographic. Literally every single individual I knew who spoke out about this during the 90s is now a MAGA.
There are no principles at play at all, only a lust for power, a desire to enrich themselves, and most of all unquenchable egos that they now, with most of these people nearing the ends of their lives and having little else to lose, are willing to make enormous sacrifices to stoke.
The current administration aren't really isolationists. Hell, they've threatened buying/invading Greenland and the Panama Canal.
They're opportunists, protectionists, and authoritarians. I mean, Trump himself has praised Xi for ruling with an iron fist, and extending tenure 'for life', remarking he'd like to do the same. Musk would pretend to support democratic views if they were the dominant view of the current administration, or somehow thought it would benefit him. But like I said, they're opportunists - people who exploit current circumstances to gain immediate advantage rather than being guided by consistent principles or plans. They're not really isolationists...
> Neoconservatives were hawkish members of the old Anti-USSR Left who were disillusioned by the Post Vietnam Democratic Party and travelled away from the Democratic Party to the Republican Party.
This is the same talking point parroted by another prominent right-wing commentator here, that implies that some neocons were... so far right that they were actually left?
> Supported by former Democratic intellectuals like Glenn Greenwald.
Glenn Greenwald is not and has never been a Democrat or member of the party or anything resembling that.
Elon Musk was a "Democrat" in the sense that as long as Democrat administrations handed his businesses grants and funding and tax breaks, he didn't shit-talk them. When he saw there was an opportunity to milk these things from Republican administrations, all of a sudden he became "Republican".
It's really tiring seeing the HN enlightened conservatives talking as if there is a coherent policy here. Withdrawing military support for Ukraine alone might be reasonable, I disagree with it but I can see the sense in it.
But Trump is absolutely wrecking every relationship we have in the world, trading or otherwise, except with Russia, where he wants to remove sanctions and increase trade.
Even if you disregard all "moral" foreign policy objectives, like deterring wars of territorial expansion, it makes zero sense in economic terms. We're abandoning >>50% of world markets in exchange for access to... Russia's market? What do they even have to offer that we want? Oil or gas? We already produce more than we consume! Trading more with Russia will only kill domestic oil and gas producers and accomplish almost nothing else.
It makes zero sense, it will never make sense, stop trying to make it make sense.
It's clear as day and I'm incredibly skeptical of anyone that wants to claim otherwise and try and defend an emotional overgrown child's actions as rational.
Is it really that difficult to believe? When you see a crazy person on the street yelling into the air, do you think that there must be someone there that he can see that you cannot?
There is a plan. Don't try to make him look like an idiot who has no clue. This is dangerous. It's calculated and everybody around him has to start understat his motivations to defend themselves.
Interesting analysis. The shadow of the Iraq & Afghan wars looms large over current events and shouldn't be underestimated. And of course, those wouldn't have happened without 9/11. That one event seems to have led the US to begin to self destruct.
The "new party" shift began at least as far back as 2016. People generally don't seem to know when Bernie Sanders dropped out, a lot of his supporters switched to Trump, not another Democrat. Both were viewed as outsiders, an "anything is better than the establishment" candidate.
(Wanted to put this as a reply to GP but it's currently [flagged][dead] so this seems to be the most relevant reply...)
Elon Musk was never a democrat. In the first book which was written a decade ago, he proudly state that he will do on media whatever necessary to push his companies forward.
Every company needs a long-term marketing strategy, and using climate change as a growth vehicle in early days was needed.
He endorsed Trump and was his advisor in his previous presidency a decade ago.
JD Vance did 180 on Trump as well.
So we are talking about people, who will say whatever they need to say to get the results they want. They don't have any principles or political values.
Comparing the war in Iraq to the war in Ukraine is ridiculous on so many levels that I will not even start.
> What? Greenwald was never a Democrat. Anti-Bush isn't the same thing as Democrat.
Greenwald is a liberal, he was kicked out of liberal circles after the Hunter Biden's laptop story, the liberal elite wanted to suppress during the elections.
Bary Weiss is also a liberal, now hated by the liberal press for blasphemy on a certain subject.
Same with Matt Taibbi, he showed up on MSNBC regularly even on Maddow, now the left calls him a right winger...
Greenwald was never a liberal and never would have described himself as such.
Anyhow you haven't really even scratched the surface of all the lefty people who went right. And it's not even a new phenomenon. Heck even woodie guthrie swerved right during the red scare. One could say that the pastures are greener on the right side of the commentariat.
We are all, in all our information streams, rolling more dice than ever more times a day than ever, and you only need one or two snake eyes to start the process of going down an unfortunate path.
Greenwald was libertarian/right leaning. Went from supporting the Iraq War to being a Ron Paul fanboy to a useful Tankie idiot for the Silicon Valley right. Now a grievance grifter and an apologist for Putin and Assad.
Bari Weiss is not a liberal. She's a culture war grievance grifter.
Matt Taibbi got mad he got called out for his shitty sexist behavior in Russia in the 90s when MeToo happened and made a hard right turn. Now a grievance grifter.
That is another pressure tactic so the EU can sell increased arms spending to its citizens.
The EU leaders, who are naive to the extreme, comply. They make peace plans that Russia is known not to accept. Once that is done, they'll keep the conflict on a low flame until the US feels getting involved again.
Which can happen at any moment, including under Trump within the next two months.
Trump has been deliberately provoking the EU's nationalistic feelings, starting with Greenland and ending with the Zelensky fallout theater.
If the EU had any pride, it would negotiate with Russia directly, skipping the US. Reopen Nordstream and see if the purportedly Russia-friendly Trump agrees.
Regarding Trump being a Russian asset: It has happened before, with Hillary Clinton and Sergey Lavrov initiating a "reset" in US/Russia relations:
While I find the Russian invasion of Ukraine appalling, as a counterpoint to all the "Trump is destroying the US' reputation" mono-point that I've read so far (although I agree with that, too): John Maersheimer [1] gave a great explanation and prediction (~10 years prior) of why the whole thing happened. The US saw Russian weakness, decided to expand NATO to Ukraine, and the Russians said "no way will we let NATO be on our border, we'll destroy Ukraine first". We ignored them because they were weak, and they did what they said they would do. So I'm a little torn, because the situation is unwinnable without a major commitment, which nobody wants to do, and is not even in our interests, since we have a peer-competitor conflict shaping up with China. But our hubris caused the whole situation.
No. Countries with their own free choice asked to be part of NATO. The US did not push this on them. NATO expansion happened exactly because none of those countries trusted their neighbor Russia, who had previously invaded them and kept them under its thumb for 50 years. Russia is both to blame for the expansion of NATO and Russia's subsequent invasions of Georgia and Ukraine.
>No. Countries with their own free choice asked to be part of NATO. The US did not push this on them.
I've seen this stated frequently on HN. Here's a quote from President Clinton in February 1999[1]:That is why I have pushed hard for NATO's enlargement and why we must keep NATO's doors open to new democratic members...
NATO would add 12 nations in the decade after those remarks, with the first 3 formally joining 2 weeks later.
Also look at Clinton's remarks from October 1999[2]:NATO must also take in new members, including those from among its former adversaries. It must reach out to all the new democracies in Central Europe, the Baltics and the New Independent States of the former Soviet Union. At the first NATO summit I attended in January of 1994, I proposed that NATO should enlarge steadily, deliberately, openly.
>Russia is both to blame for the expansion of NATO and Russia's subsequent invasions of Georgia and Ukraine.
I used to have a link to a really good interview with a former US ambassador or special advisor to Sakashvilli. In it, he basically says that Sakashvilli is a risk-taker and gambler much like Putin, and in 2008 he gambled and lost. He basically laid the blame for what happened at the Georgian President's feet. Which is also the conclusion of the EU-backed investigation.[3]
I think you are confusing support for expansion—which was necessary for it to happen—with somehow forcing the hand of other nations to join. Yes the above all shows that America thought it was in its strategic interest, that Clinton supported it. That does not eliminate the fact that much of Eastern Europe wanted to join for exactly the reasons I mentioned. And nobody made them do it.
Furthermore, if you read the articles you cited, you’ll find that you are starting mid conflict. By the point when Georgia engaged with Russia in 2008, Russia had already stirred up separatist groups, armed them, supported their violent takeover, and sent Russian advisors to support them in occupying Georgian territory. You can’t start at the middle.
>Yes the above all shows that America thought it was in its strategic interest, that Clinton supported it. That does not eliminate the fact that much of Eastern Europe wanted to join for exactly the reasons I mentioned. And nobody made them do it.
To prove that we'd probably need a FOIA request or a large CIA/USAID/NED document leak. Saying "nobody forced them" while the US operated probably the most effective coercive soft power institutions the world has ever seen, by subsidizing NGOs and "pro-democracy movements", strikes me as incredibly naive. I recommend reading some articles at the New Eastern Outlook by Brian Berletic (or watching his YT channel "The New Atlas"), he has some well-sourced deep dives on US soft power.
> By the point when Georgia engaged with Russia in 2008, Russia had already stirred up separatist groups, armed them, supported their violent takeover, and sent Russian advisors to support them in occupying Georgian territory. You can’t start at the middle.
1. The Reuters article reads" Saakashvili had said Georgia was responding to an invasion by Russian forces when it attacked breakaway South Ossetia, but the report found no evidence of this. It said Russia's counter-strike was initially legal.."
This sounds contrary to your point that Russia stirring up separatists to occupy Georgian territory was considered an acceptable casus belli.
2. Do you have references for WHEN the Russians initiated support for anti-Georgian separatism? If it was after the major NATO expansions of 1999 and 2004 it's kinda a moot point. I focused on the information around the timeframe of the 2008 invasion specifically because it was what you directly called out in your post. Re-reading it, I suppose you were thinking of all Russian grey-zone warfare in Eastern Europe but that context isn't clear.
3. Is your position that subsidizing armed rebel factions is not moral / not justified? Is it wrong for the US to support the MEK organization which actively works towards violent overthrow in Iran? At one point the Pentagon and CIA were funding two different separatist groups in Syria that were also fighting each other. This is what is missed by my most Americans and Europeans: to the rest of the world, complaining about Russia looks like blatant hypocrisy when the US has spent the post-Cold War period doing the exact same shit. Which would be fine, realpolitik and all that....if we didn't constantly posture as if we hold the moral high ground.
To prove that we'd probably need a FOIA request or a large CIA/USAID/NED document leak. Saying "nobody forced them" while the US operated probably the most effective coercive soft power institutions the world has ever seen, by subsidizing NGOs and "pro-democracy movements", strikes me as incredibly naive.
You have no idea what you are talking about and are clearly trying to spin a narrative out of nowhere. I, like many others in my country, voted for decades for governments that supported entry into NATO because we universally saw cooperation with other European countries as vital to our security. Our diplomats and politicians went to extreme lengths to achieve this goal, and it is considered one of the crowning achievements of the post-USSR era, alongside EU membership. These are universally recognized as the two most important foreign policy achievements since the end of the Cold War.
This builds upon past experience: Hitler and Stalin were able to divide and conquer Europe in large part due to the Wilsonian belief in international law and neutrality by other countries. In the end, neutrality meant Hitler and Stalin could invade other European countries one by one at their convenience without triggering a wider backlash. That was a catastrophic failure of pre-WWII diplomacy, and we have no intention of repeating the mistake.
I don't need an American NGO to convince me that simply hoping we're not the next item on the menu is not a sound national security policy.
Do you have references for WHEN the Russians initiated support for anti-Georgian separatism? If it was after the major NATO expansions of 1999 and 2004 it's kinda a moot point.
There is a wider history behind it, like the April 9 tragedy from 1989, when Soviet soldiers killed 21 Georgians who demonstrated in favor of Georgian independence from the USSR. Most of the killed were women, their faces were smashed in with sapper shovels so badly that they became unrecognizable: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/April_9_tragedy It was one of the pivotal moments of USSR's collapse. Georgia was much further away from the spotlight of international press than, say, Poland, and that allowed the Russians to adopt a much more violent approach there to prevent Georgia from seceding from the USSR. If this is all news to you, then you need to pick up a book on USSR's history to gain a frame of reference. And not some sterile study of diplomatic telegrams, but history as people experienced it.
>You have no idea what you are talking about and are clearly trying to spin a narrative out of nowhere.
I have no regional experience with the tiny backwater corner of the world known as "the Baltics"....but I absolutely understand how my country exerts influence in numerous larger, more important places, with even more significant risks.....and it's by heavily using the tools that I mentioned. I'm not willing to give our government the benefit of the doubt, given our extensive list of malevolent priors. If you are saying there was overwhelming domestic support for NATO, okay, but I'd consider that an exception, not a norm.
>I don't need an American NGO to convince me that simply hoping we're not the next item on the menu is not a sound national security policy.
Every nation that isn't at least a major regional power (Turkey as an example) is on somebody's menu. Maybe you guys have been punched in the face so many times by your local Great Powers that reaching for anyone else, even from across the ocean, seemed sound....but as we are witnessing now in real-time, you are also finding out that America's benevolence is neither infinite nor eternal.
Re: 1991 South Ossetia War. Why is it ok for the Georgians to secede from the Soviet Union but not ok for the South Ossetians to secede from Georgia? Why is it morally good for the US to arm the Ukrainians, who feel aggrieved, but not moral for Russia to arm the South Ossetians, who feel aggrieved?
I have no regional experience with the tiny backwater corner of the world known as "the Baltics"....but I absolutely understand how my country exerts influence in numerous larger, more important places, with even more significant risks.....and it's by heavily using the tools that I mentioned. I'm not willing to give our government the benefit of the doubt, given our extensive list of malevolent priors. If you are saying there was overwhelming domestic support for NATO, okay, but I'd consider that an exception, not a norm.
Yes, I can see that you have no regional experience, and pinning everything on the US is an obvious attempt to fill the gap with what you have. But you're wrong. These attitudes were the norm, not an exception. Hungary, for example, held a referendum in 1997 and 85.33% of voters expressed support for joining NATO. The 1956 Hungarian revolution and its violent suppression by Soviet soldiers, who killed 3000 civilians, did far more to shape the desire to join NATO than anything the US ever did. It is extremely provincial and backwaterish to fall back on US-centric explanations for everything that has happened in Europe.
Re: 1991 South Ossetia War. Why is it ok for the Georgians to secede from the Soviet Union but not ok for the South Ossetians to secede from Georgia? Why is it morally good for the US to arm the Ukrainians, who feel aggrieved, but not moral for Russia to arm the South Ossetians, who feel aggrieved?
As the USSR collapsed, the Soviet central government employed a strategy of inflaming ethnic divisions to weaken independence movements. Their strategy aimed not to support the separatist groups, but to create instability in Soviet republics and disrupt their ability to form independent states by creating frozen conflicts: ongoing, unresolved issues that would drain the resources and attention of the newly independent states and prevent them from fully consolidating their sovereignty. This strategy saw its widest successes in Transnistria, Abkhazia, South Ossetia, and Nagorno-Karabakh, but attempts that ultimately failed were made in many other places too. We saw exactly the same strategy again in Ukraine, when unmarked Russian forces pretended to be local separatists and declared the Donetsk and Luhansk People's Republics.
Transnistria, South Ossetia, etc remain internationally unrecognized - even by Russian allies like Belarus - because they represent manufactured conflicts rather than genuine independence movements.
Mearsheimer is on the Russian payroll through the Valdai Club, which was set up to influence Western thinkers. He omits facts or twists them to fit his narrative. So it's no wonder that Russians have paid to have his books published. If you are listening to anything he says, you are ingesting Russian propaganda. It's like trying to learn about Germany from revisionist Neo-Nazi literature paid by a "friends of the SS" type of organization. Not a good idea unless you are an expert who can spot the distortions.
Mearsheimer's manipulations become very obvious when he faces a knowledgeable person who is not easily fooled by him. Such as Radoslaw Sikorski, the foreign minister of Poland. Sikorski and Mearsheimer held a public debate over Ukraine, and Mearsheimer was utterly humiliated when he tried to argue against Sikorski about events he has only read about, but where Sikorski was a direct participant.
Maersheimer has basically destroyed his reputation with his nonsense on hubris on Ukraine. Not only is he wrong be he refuses to admit he's wrong even when his contortions make him sound like an idiot. Example claiming Putin is not an imperialist
Actual history shows NATO bent over backwards to appease Russia (hint how many non local troops did nato have near russian borders before 2022? Almost none)and that Ukraine was not about to join NATO in 2022 or 2014 and that everyone including Putin knew this. Hell after the revolution of dignity but before the Russian invasion of Ukraine/local coups(Crimea in the south and parts of eastern Ukraine) Ukraine wasn't even seeking to join NATO, it was seeking to join the EU (which was also at best a difficult goal tha5 would take a long time).
It seems like Ukraine is insisting on a “security guarantee.” Can someone explain how the U.S. providing a security guarantee wouldn’t increase the risk of american boots on the ground in Ukraine?
An actual lasting peace deal requires some sort of security guarantee, else it's not really a "peace deal", but rather something more like a capitulation. If US political leadership didn't have at least some solution for security in mind to begin with, then they wouldn't have been negotiating in good faith.
That said, Security Guarantees don't necessarily directly mean boots on the ground, certainly not straight away.
It could mean a deterrence framework where there a clear commitments that certain actions would mean certain responses, which itself reduces the chance those responses are necessary. Security guarantees can specify escalating measures before reaching an actual troop deployment. And European nations have already promised to provide the initial boots on the ground, though they really would like an American backstop.
The deterrence aspect is crucial - formal security frameworks often prevent conflict precisely because they make aggression too costly, reducing the likelihood they'd ever need to be activated.
I’m not concern trolling. I don’t want a single U.S. soldier on Ukraine soil. It’s a red line. I’m asking whether a security guarantee increases the risk of that happening.
I don’t want the U.S. to bear the cost (in money and lives) of a war that doesn’t directly relate to protecting the american homeland. I think U.S. foreign policy has been a failure since the 1950s—we shouldn’t have gone to war in Korea, Vietnam, Kuwait, Iraq, etc. The only justifiable war in that time, in my opinion, was Afghanistan, where the Taliban harbored terrorists that had attacked the U.S.
I think the premise of a “rules based international order” and democracy promotion hurts Americans. In Iraq and Syria it led us to overthrow dictators who were brutal to their own people and threatened their neighbors, but who suppressed terrorists that could attack the U.S. It also causes tremendous collateral damage (millions of dead civilians). While I acknowledge that Ukraine presents less risk of those things, to me it’s a test case. If we can’t resist involvement in Ukraine, there is little hope of turning the ship around on American imperialism generally. The next Iraq War will also be billed as a just war.
I acknowledge that a security guarantee wouldn’t start with boots on the ground. But there is a historical pattern of deepening involvement where we start out with something like a security guarantee, and that becomes the rope around our ankle that drags us into putting boots on the ground.
You know, fair enough, boy who cries wolf, and then when they go "but this time it's an actual wolf!"; no one listens.
I can sort of get that. I mean it sucks, I think it's wrong this time, mostly because for me it's a bit closer to home and debatably existential; but at least I get where you're coming from.
Some people are worried that this means that Americans also oppose NATO in general and article 5 in particular. Is that the case, or is that like a known pre-existing alliance and a known quantity?
> I don’t want the U.S. to bear the cost (in money and lives) of a war that doesn’t directly relate to protecting the american homeland. I think U.S. foreign policy has been a failure since the 1950s—we shouldn’t have gone to war in Korea, Vietnam, Kuwait, Iraq, etc.
Why don't you run for office on a platform that "Pax Americana was a huge mistake!"
By the time I was growing up in the 1990s, Korea and Vietnam were widely regarded as mistakes. And then I saw the US make a $6 trillion mistake with the Iraq War. So when Trump called out America’s latest “big fat mistake,” that’s basically what he was running on: https://youtu.be/H4ThZcq1oJQ?si=9Vlf81O3FxQXVoAU
What I find a bit incongruous about this view, is that if we accept it, then we're also accepting the narrative (which may well be true) that the US was the primary cause of the push for Ukraine to join NATO and come under the US sphere of influence. This is basically Putin's claim, and their given reason for the invasion of Ukraine.
So how do you marry that up with the lack of culpability the US is now demonstrating? If you accept it, then surely it is also the primary responsibility of the US to resolve the situation peacefully, which pacifies Russia but also leaves Ukraine in a reasonable position. From everything I understand about Trumps "deal" for Ukraine it does nothing of the sort.
Agreed 100%. No way should any American soldier be sent to fight in that war. It will be a never ending quagmire - both people and money. Full stop.
<rant>
And, good luck getting any real discussion from anyone here. Most of the Redditors are here now and have brought their "hate on America" flag to HN. Regardless of how much our President does or how much the US gives, it will never be enough. And, the ironic thing is, many of these "intellectuals" on HN routinely put down our "uneducated" voter population while at the same time pleading for their tax dollars to fund a never ending war. Oh, the hypocrisy! As if their countries are any better.
At best, this war is at a stalemate unless the EU really steps up to the plate to save their neighbor. Imagine, your neighbor's house is burning down all around you, and the best you can do is give a cup of water while shouting at your distant relative across the ocean to send truck loads of water. If anything, they should be ashamed they let their countries fall so behind they have to rely on someone else to help defend their own property. Crazy!
Here's a hint for our EU friends: Step up and help your neighbor! Send all your money to fight the war (that is what you are asking the US tax payers for, right?). Drain your savings accounts, send them your retirement money, send everything you have - until it hurts. Next, go to your closet, put on your fighting boots, and head out to the front lines. The time for taking real action is now. Don't rely on foreign money, governments, boots, equipment, etc. to defend your own property. Rely on _yourselves_ to solve this problem.
It's worth considering that Europe's military dependence wasn't accidental - it was partly a deliberate outcome of post-WWII American policy. The U.S. has historically benefited from being the primary security provider for Europe, giving it significant influence and strategic advantages. A fully independent European military capability might create a very different geopolitical dynamic.
> No way should any American soldier be sent to fight in that war. It will be a never ending quagmire - both people and money.
You have done that for quite literally the past 20 years in a places where no win condition could be established, and now that you have an 'easy' war, with an actual nation-state adversary that you can defeat both militarily and politically, without a need for guerilla warfare and millions of civilian casualties, suddenly you have issues?
I suspect rtp4me has the same view as Rayiner in this same subthread. These past interventions often didn't work out so well, so why would this one, is what they're asking. And I mean, fair point. I partially disagree, but it's a fair point.
I mean, that was kind of my point. Now that they finally have a 'war' to fight, instead of a dispersed terrorist operation, suddenly it's less appealing, when this is basically a textbook example of a 'winnable' war.
There were no policy objectives in Afghanistan or Iraq, or they were very hard to achieve without decades of sustained presence. Meanwhile they're fairly clear for Ukraine, and arguably easier to achieve, if the Russian military is degraded enough that they pose no threat to Ukraine then the war is won.
Of course that leaves the pesky issue of those nuclear weapons, but I'd find that a much better argument than 'all our previous special military operations were a disaster'.
Yeah, personally, I mostly agree with your assessment as well.
The United States' view on strategy has always had a tension between the maritime power view and the continental power view.
For a maritime power (the US approach we've seen most of recently since WWII ), it's practically a no-brainer to invest heavily in the Ukraine conflict. It allows the US to degrade a rival's military abilities at low cost; it maintains the balance of power in Europe without direct US troop involvement; and it upholds the norms against territorial conquest that benefit maritime powers.
If the US is seeing a resurgence of isolationist/continental thinking, then you get different arguments: The conflict is distant from US territorial interests; border security and domestic concerns become more pressing; and regional conflicts elsewhere become mostly just distractions.
I don’t know if you’ve been following American politics. But the guy who is currently President captured the GOP by basically beheading the next-in-line of the Bush dynasty that was responsible for those “past 20 years.” https://youtu.be/H4ThZcq1oJQ?si=B5JoZGwU6umVjbbu
The criticism of decades of American foreign policy was finally vindicated. So there is very little appetite to give up that achievement by getting embroiled in yet another war that’s billed as “easy” and “just” this time (they all were—remember, “we will be greeted as liberators?”)
It is a stalemate because US government wants it to be a stalemate. They never wanted Ukraine to win. Because it can embarrass putin. That's why they send some old equipment, barely enough to slow down Russian troops.
Sending weapons with restrictions to use them against Russians - Ukrainians are fighting with tied hands.
When Germany reoccupied the Rhineland in 1936, British and French forces could easily have rolled to Berlin and deposed Hitler. They didn't, for domestic political reasons that were no less catastrophic for being understandable (war-weary citizenry, plus wishful thinking about Hitler).
The best time to have stood up to Putin was 2014. The next best time is right [expletive] now.
Whats the base rate of dictators being Hitler, and what’s the false positive rate of that approach? That thinking seems like it would’ve gotten us into every late 20th and early 21st war that are widely regarded as mistakes.
Only one dictator ever was literally Adolf Hitler but that's a meaningless comparison. Saddam and Assad both tried to do holocausts so in my view that makes them Hitlers. I think that is a much more useful practical definition of "a Hitler" than, you know, being named Adolf and being born in the middle of Europe.
That makes it seem like a security guarantee would risk deeper US involvement, as eventually happened with Korea, Vietnam, and Iraq I.
It seems to me that your logic would make the Iraq War quite defensible. Iraq had already invaded Kuwait. We had already guaranteed Kuwait’s security, so we would’ve had to send troops if Saddam invaded again. So if the CIA was correct that Saddam was rearming, there was a logic to deposing him now and resolving the situation on terms favorable to us, instead of reactively getting involved at a future date. Without the benefit of hindsight—knowing Saddam didn’t have WMDs—it seems like the only basis for opposing the Iraq War under your logic would have been to quibble about how much of an affirmative step Saddam had to take before our obligation to put boots on the ground kicked in.
You're right, it really depends on what the security guarantees are, how they're stated, and whether they're credible.
As an example of a case that has worked, the mutual security guarantees within NATO have prevented WWIII so far. (knock on wood)
Obviously, we should be trying to go for something more like the latter.
Alternately, of course, no security guarantees, and both sides continue to fight.
China is already closely watching how the west responds to Ukraine, with potential implications for Taiwan. This increases the likelihood that American security commitments/requirements will eventually be tested more directly.
> though they really would like an American backstop.
It's not a really would like. In all of their speeches by key politicians, European boots on the ground is conditional on US backstop. So it's not happening without US support.
Does "nuclear weapons" attach to the first half of the or in section 4? Seems they wrote it poorly...
"victim of an act of aggression or an object of a threat of aggression in which nuclear weapons are used"
You are also engaged in some sophistry, where you are acting as if the hypothetical obligation you are discussing is the only possible obligation. Selling aging weapons stock is pretty clearly assistance, and it isn't exactly boots on the ground.
Don’t randomly accuse people of “sophistry.” Zelensky is publicly demanding a security guarantee, and sprung that on Trump at the meeting. I didn’t say there couldn’t be other support, but the security guarantee is what I’m talking about because that seems to be critical.
Macron (president of France) visited the White House on Feb 24 and pointed out that security guarantees would be important and that the US could play an important role providing those guarantees. This discussion ended amicably. [1]
Starmer (Prime Minister of the UK) visited Trump on Feb 27 , and besides handing over an invitation from King Charles, also discussed the fact that there would need to be security guarantees in any particular Ukraine deal. This discussion also ended amicably. [2]
Zelensky (President of Ukraine) then visited on Feb 28 and reiterated the points his colleagues had made. This time something went wrong. [3]
What went wrong is assuming there were good faith talks in the first two instances with Macron and Starmer.
It isn't by chance that even after the talks with Macron, Trump tried to lie in front of him only to be corrected by Macron in the oval office.
Even after being correct, and continues to spin the same lie during the Zelensky talks and after.
The only thing that went wrong was assuming that Trump ever had Ukraine interest in sight, and not Russia interests.
What we witnessed isn't anything new or shocking to anyone who has been following this event.
This had been a recurring behavior from this administration, where there's a theatrical display to show that there might be some understanding, with leaders putting their credibility in the to say there's some alignment, only to have Trump the next day stating the opposite or something completely unaligned with previous statements.
Let's hope this was the the final straw, and just accept that Russia managed to capture the US. Now it's about protecting this from happening elsewhere - Twitter, and other platforms, including alternative media should start to be banned in Europe ASAP.
Here comes the Russian propaganda... The nukes belonged to Ukraine. Just like Belarus nukes belonged to them.
What is said by Russian propagandists is that Ukraine didn't have the launch codes - like it was some magical barrier that would prevent Ukraine from deploying the nukes if they wanted to.
Like Ukrainian scientists didn't play a major a role in USSR nuclear development, and didn't have the know how to just use other system to deploy the nukes.
It's part of the Russian propaganda to make Ukrainians into incompetent inferior ethnic group - why do you think they address them by derogatory ethnic slurs like "little Russians"?
You're in the wrong place to spread Russia propaganda, here we go:
> After its dissolution in 1991, Ukraine became the third largest nuclear power in the world and held about one third of the former Soviet nuclear weapons, delivery system, and significant knowledge of its design and production. Ukraine inherited about 130 UR-100N intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBM) with six warheads each, 46 RT-23 Molodets ICBMs with ten warheads apiece, as well as 33 heavy bombers, totaling approximately 1,700 nuclear warheads that remained on Ukrainian territory.[0]
And the magical Russian propaganda launch codes that required Russia and USA to request Ukraine to decommission nukes, because Ukraine couldn't use any of those nukes.
By the way, what are the launch codes for nukes deployed by bombers lmao the bombers won't take off if Russia didn't insert the launch codes?
Lol using wikipedia as a source. Either way, the fact remains that there was no set of events in which Ukraine would have been allowed to have nukes. If Ukraine has said no, either the new government would be replaced or Ukraine would have gotten invaded by US and Russia simultaneously.
It's nice that people say Ukraine and the other countries owned the nukes or whatever and have them sign an agreement to "hand over" something they didn't own, but that's just optics. Reality is Ukraine never could use those nukes and didn't have a military force or access to the nukes to keep them.
Of course Wikipedia, or any other source, wouldn't be enough. By the way, what is your source?
Here's the man himself, Bill Clinton, stating it was not only a possibility for Ukraine to keep their nukes, but also that it was a mistake he regrets making: https://youtu.be/nKoba5GvNsc?si=3T1W6BvrqEqvkpNE
So not only you're spreading propaganda, and lies, without sources to support your claims, you're even doubling down on more fantasy.
The fact is that Ukraine could use those nukes, both the ICBM ones that would require the "magical codes", also the ones deployed by the bombers, they also had the technical know how to further develop their nuclear arsenal, as well as having the fuel to produce more.
If you think Clinton wouldn't spread lies and propaganda while supporting a proxy war against Russia, I don't know what to tell someone as naive as you. Have at least a little bit of critical thinking please. He said this last year!
Ukraine simply did not have the infrastructure, supporting military, or supporting scientists for what you are saying. If they did, they would be a much more developed country right now.
What proxy war? Russia invaded Ukraine, Ukraine is fighting back with some help.
Please exercise some critical thinking. Ukraine had the nukes and physical possession is most of the work. Its not hard to imagine that they could have made them workable again after inhering much of the army, spies and military of the soviet union.
If north Korea can make nukes from scratch Ukraine could have easily made nukes. Of course the economy was collapsing and people were starving in both russia and Ukraine in the 90s. They needed western aid. If they had ignored pressure from Clinton to give up nukes it would have resulted in them becoming an even poorer pariah not unlike NK. But if Clinton had not pressured them. Or more importantly if they knew that Russia would otherwise invade and start the deadliest European war in decades they would have kept the nukes and easily made them serviceable to prevent that.
There it is in full display, full blown fantasy, with zero facts or sources typical Russian propaganda that works only in people with very poor levels of education lmao
Unlike with Turkey, Ukraine could have easily taken complete possession of the nukes existing on its territory and they had enough resources to also take complete control, by replacing the control parts of the nukes, perhaps in at most a few months of work.
The only way in which the Russians could have stopped this would have been to nuke Ukraine before they would have been able to modify the captured nukes, but it is unlikely that this would have been permitted by the other nuclear powers.
Why is nobody being open about that? Because I suspect the appetite for that is low. Germany is about closer to Russia than we are—how many Germans are willing to go die in Ukraine?
A recent poll suggests Germans are currently marginally in favor of sending peacekeepers.
The point of a peacekeeping mission is -of course- to prevent further war by means of deterrence (though there's always still a small risk, of course), so hopefully no one goes to die there.
Currently Germany just had elections, so a clear unified statement from the new-government-in-formation is not yet available.
How this works is pretty common knowledge. The world has been using peacekeepers for quite a while. But you know that and you know you are just concern trolling.
The pro-Ukraine people I know have been pitching our support as “just sending them old weapons we don’t use anyway.” Even the risk of U.S. soldiers on the ground would be a massive escalation of our commitment.
Wow what a slimy tactic. Those people are taking in regards to 'the amount of dollars sent'. You know you are misrepresenting that in your above statement. Completely disingenuous just like I said about your previously. You are a concern troll.
In the near term, Ukraine wants continued delivery of military equipment. In the end game, they want any sort of peace treaty ending this war to include NATO/EU/US support. Ideally, in the form of NATO membership. This is crucial to ensure that any peace deal would be lasting. Putin has repeatedly stated that he does not believe a Ukrainian state has a right to exist, and has engaged in military operations against them for over a decade at this point. There is no chance a peace deal will endure without some sort of security guarantee from another power.
Trump is insisting on Ukraine paying for donations already freely given for the war (ie, they were gifts from the USA). They proposed they be paid for with mineral rights, and give nothing back in return. The minerals they asking for are worth far more then the USA's donations top date. Ukraine's initial reaction was a flat "no".
Then the Ukraine changed their minds and said, well actually you can have the mineral rights for free - because we desperately want this war to end. So you can have them if you give us a security guarantee that prevents Russia from overrunning the place. Otherwise we must continue to fight for our homeland.
Trump has responded "no", because he's only interested in peace.
I guess it makes about as much sense as anything else he's done.
People would say Budapest Memorandum give Ukraine the rights to its 2,000 Soviet nuclear weapons. That's not what it said.
People would say that the same memorandum says Ukraine security is absolute. Not that either.
People would say in 2014, US installed new Ukraine government via propaganda. Looks dubious too.
People would say Ukraine shut down 11+ political parties who opposed current Ukraine government; some parties were funded by Russia. That part remains true.
Newspaper and TV in Ukraine were nationalized partially with money by USAID, that was uncovered by US DOGE.
Elections were "suspended" in Ukraine. Last May 2024 was supposed to have a nationwide election. Definitely true.
Seems like Ukraine is following US foreign policy that led to demise of dictators like Mossadegh, Árbenz, Diệm, Noriega, Qadaffi, Saddam.
Well that's right, but only the currently elected parliament is allowed to stay during war times, not the president. So you cannot have elections, but the president cannot simply stay in power without them.
How do you intend to conduct an election during an active war when 20% of the country, over 3 million Ukrainians, are under Russian occupation? Do they just not get to vote?
American journalist Gonzalo Lira killed while imprisoned by Zelensky. He made the mistake of being critical of Zelensky.
Declared martial law Feb 2022 and has banned elections since then, suspending Ukraine's constitution.
Starting in 2022, he's banned 12 political parties so far and used his "Department of Justice" to seize many of their assets.
He's also banned TV channels associated with his political opponents.
Banned a Christian Church.
Passed a law in 2022 to censor journalists and combined all news into 1 gov’t station.
Journalists investigating his corruption get conscripted and thrown on the front lines to die.
Who knew that the old WWII adage of being threaten to being "sent to the Eastern Front" to die is still a thing to this very day. If that doesn't speaks volumes of the Soviet^H^H^H^H^HHRussian, I don't know what else is.
Sadly, US Rep. Chuck Schumer (D-CA) calls Zelensky "the leader of the free world".
Plenty of countries have held elections during war, including war in their country. The US (civil war), Iraq and Afghanistan during the US occupation, Japan (WW2), etc.
I know it can be a challenge, but it has been done.
Why does it have to be done? I haven't read the Constitution, but if what the other poster says is true about it saying that elections cannot be held during war, then isn't that the end of it?
The Ukrainian constitution does not allow elections during war, but that is not what I was responding to. The post I was replying to was asking how an election could be held during a war. I was just pointing out that it has been done in the 1800s, 1900s, and 2000s.
My question wasn't rhetorical, I wasn't doubting that it was possible. I am genuinely asking how OP believes these elections should be conducted. We've got over 3 million Ukrainians living under Russian occupation, I don't see a way to feasibly give them a vote. 6 million Ukrainians are refugees living in other countries. You could try some sort of remote voting for them, but there would be logistical difficulties. That might be possible for the national voting, but what about local election? Would they vote for candidates in their last known address? Or just not get a vote on that? 8 million are refugees living within Ukraine. Same question for them about local elections.
My point is that, ironically, insisting on elections now, DEPENDING ON HOW IT IS IMPLEMENTED, may actually not be the most democratic thing to do. So before I take can take a position on the matter, I would need to know the implementation details.
Isn't the first question how to amend the Constitution though? If the Constitution says elections cannot be held, that's the end of it until it's amended to say otherwise. How would anyone elected under unconstitutional elections have any authority whatsoever?
What, no. I guess he would rather do something else than be a wartime president.
trump should call putin a dictator, because.. he obviously is, but for some reason he chose to attack Zelensky instead.
How can there be elections when there are millions of people displaced, there are large parts of the country occupied and huge part of the population is on the front defending the country.
This "dictator" stuff is just straight russian propaganda, that americans have been swallowing up because someone told trump it was true.
> 1) Zelensky sat quietly while Democrats tried to impeach Trump the first time. Zelensky alone could have put an end to that sham impeachment.
Trump didn't deny the conduct, and it was proven during impeachment. His defense wasn't that he didn't do it, it was that he had the right to do it. Zelensky couldn't have cleared anything up because the facts were not under dispute.
Time to pick up the slack Europe. You spent decades shit talking the US, laughing at how much the US spends on defense, calling the US the "world police", demanding they close military bases, etc.
Now that the US is packing up and going home, the same people are screaming for the US to stay and continue being the exact thing they shit talked the US for.
You don't know if it's the same people. I highly doubt many of them are. It's true that "Anti-Americanism", or at least Anti-Jingoism, was en vogue for a while in Europe, but I never felt like it was more than a fringe opinion, and a lot of people spouted it to seem edgy.
Also, it's been a few decades. Things change and people are allowed to learn and adapt. I used to be a pacifist and proponent of demilitarisation until a few years ago. The world has changed since.
During the cuban missile crisis back in 1960ish, R̶u̶s̶s̶i̶a̶n̶ Soviets actually had reached the point where they had launch-ready, on-ramp nuclear missiles.
We learned some 20 years later that the US had deployed nuclear missiles of their own in Turkey, and the agreement was to remove those missiles in return.
Back in those days, we had no "nuclear suitcase" for approving a nuclear launch,
and we had US warships surrounding Cuba ("quarantine", brilliant Pres. Kennedy!), themselves encircled by Soviet nuclear-equipped submarines.
I'm glad these men knew what is war like, and didn't get humanity dragged into a MAD, like all of these civilians today are trying to do.
Let's just do a cease-fire, whatever the reason, let's just stop firing, and let's talk.
The enemy is the enemy, this is what it is, but let's not forget, quoting Hemingway, that they are the enemy just because we were born on this side of the mountain, and them on the other side.
If we dehumanize the enemy, what are we then?
There is absolutely no talking to russia because russia will not respect any talks or agreements. Talking to russia will only buy time for russia to rearm and attack again. Here is the proof:
"Zelensky sent Trump list of all 'ceasefires' violated by Russia"
russia respects nothing except getting punched back. They will break every single agreement. No amount of talking will make a situation any better, only worse, because it will give time to russia to rearm. The center cannot hold, it's too late, he comes.
Anybody who suggests "talking to russia" have absolutely no clue what they are talking about. Anybody who suggests "talking to russia" is either slow or works for russia.
Well-respected American leaders thought it wise and worthwhile to maintain backchannels with the USSR throughout the cold war. Presumably, then, the Soviets were a lesser threat, materially and ideologically, to the American project than Russia is today? Is that correct?
