Does the US meddle in the Russian political process?

[Rumred]

Of course we do but that doesn't mean we are to be alright with it being done to us. I also don't expect Russians to be alright with us doing it to them because they do it to us. Its a dirty world and this is like the spy game. Everyone does it but likes to keep it hush hush.

[Skroe]

For once, I'd rather you war ideologues focus on the long term consequences.

Long term consequences are exactly what I'm focused on. A world without Russia as we know it is better for the US and the West than a world with a revanichst state in a protacted decline.

Let's face it, short term, as we have witnessed in the past 15 years (we could say 50 but let's leave it at that) didn't really work well.

The Iraq War intervention was a disaster but the war against Al Qaeda has been a success. Also our conflict with Russia would look nothing like neither.

It did for your defense spending, that for sure,

Hardly. If you knew what you were talking about, you wouldn't make this comment. Yes, the US had super-budgets for the war effort. Do you know what it was buying though? Gasoline. Tires. Body armor. Mind resistant armored vehicles. Small arms. You know what they weren't buying? F-22s. Aircraft Carriers. Destroyers.

The Iraq War wiped out an entire upgrade cycle of the US military. And now here we are in the mid-late 2010s, and the 1980s/1990s vintage equipment that provides the backbone of our military power is wearing out, and we have to spend a trillion dollars to replace that. F-16s and Los Agenles class Attack subs, for example, will be largely gone in a decade.

Had the Iraq War never happened, that would not have been the case. But it cost $4 billion - $6 billion per month just to sustain the war in Iraq, and the part of the budget that ravaged the most was modernization. The Army's future combat system? Wiped out. The Army will use upgraded versions of 90s equipment through the 2020s because of that.

Not all defense dollars are equal. The mega-budgets of the war went to unconventional things, not the big contractors. And moreoever, then, as now, the budget as a percentage of GDP was a third to half what it was during the Cold War.

And once again, I don't work on any military programs.

and that's a perfect example of how you can't claim to care about everyone and at the same time willing to engage in something so huge and potentially so catastrophic that in comparison invading Iraq was a wise choice.

A cold war style campaign against Russia is nothing like the Iraq War and you'll never make a case the two are comparable.

Look at the consequences of "short term foreign policies" the whole middle east in trouble, thousands of americans dead or affected somehow, nations collapsing, people escaping...

All the more reason to break up Russia sooner rather than later.

Do you learn from your mistakes?

Do you?

Peace is the absence of rational for conflict that's true. This doesn't justify you working hard to find one at all costs.
The US should calm down a little and work on educating its citizens.

The way to deal with thugs is through punching them really hard, not talking them. Violence is the only language Russia understands.

[Shalcker]

The way to deal with thugs is through punching them really hard, not talking them. Violence is the only language Russia understands.

As do you; you just happen to be insulated from most available threats.

[Skroe]

As do you; you just happen to be insulated from most available threats.

Your country interefered directly in my country's election.

Russia will be paying for that as long as there are Americans alive who remember what you did. Forget Trump. 2,4, 8 years, he'll be gone. Beyond him, Russia will never know peace and safety because of what it did in 2016. You get your lulz in Trump, but Democrats will never forgive the interference and Republicans are anti-Russian in their DNA. Together, American hostility will never relent.

And it all might have blown up in Putin's face already.

[Deleted]

Long term consequences are exactly what I'm focused on. A world without Russia as we know it is better for the US and the West than a world with a revanichst state in a protacted decline.



The Iraq War intervention was a disaster but the war against Al Qaeda has been a success. Also our conflict with Russia would look nothing like neither.



Hardly. If you knew what you were talking about, you wouldn't make this comment. Yes, the US had super-budgets for the war effort. Do you know what it was buying though? Gasoline. Tires. Body armor. Mind resistant armored vehicles. Small arms. You know what they weren't buying? F-22s. Aircraft Carriers. Destroyers.

The Iraq War wiped out an entire upgrade cycle of the US military. And now here we are in the mid-late 2010s, and the 1980s/1990s vintage equipment that provides the backbone of our military power is wearing out, and we have to spend a trillion dollars to replace that. F-16s and Los Agenles class Attack subs, for example, will be largely gone in a decade.

Had the Iraq War never happened, that would not have been the case. But it cost $4 billion - $6 billion per month just to sustain the war in Iraq, and the part of the budget that ravaged the most was modernization. The Army's future combat system? Wiped out. The Army will use upgraded versions of 90s equipment through the 2020s because of that.

Not all defense dollars are equal. The mega-budgets of the war went to unconventional things, not the big contractors. And moreoever, then, as now, the budget as a percentage of GDP was a third to half what it was during the Cold War.

And once again, I don't work on any military programs.



A cold war style campaign against Russia is nothing like the Iraq War and you'll never make a case the two are comparable.

All the more reason to break up Russia sooner rather than later.


Do you?


The way to deal with thugs is through punching them really hard, not talking them. Violence is the only language Russia understands.

I do learn from my mistakes. Thankfully, I wasn't entertaining the thought of open war and invasion in the past, so that's good for me I guess.
You dont really focus on long term consequences. The potential catastrophic scenario of having a former nuclear giant split into warring factions is pretty clear for everyone to see. Only someone completely uninterested about the fate of his own people and the ones close to him would seriously argue that is a better outcome.

That is some achievement. Basically, after 15 years of guerrilla warfare, Al Qaeda might go back to what it was before some other "short term thinker" decided to start financing that sort of warfare. Not bad. Al Qaeda might be suffering. Islamic terrorism is at its peak now.

I care little about where the money went. Some people made money with it and that's what I was referring to. How you decide to waste your own money is not a concern of mine. It really wasn't a point to focus on in that post.

A cold war would sparkle other proxy wars like the ones we are witnessing in Syria, or to make an example of the time, Afghanistan, where funding Islamic guerrilla groups suddenly became a good choice, but there's hundreds of other examples on both sides of the field, about how devastating the cold war really was. Saddam, Egypt, Israel, south America.

There is absolutely no reason to engage in that kind of thinking, unless you benefit yourself from the consequences. My guess is you don't. You were told you do, or maybe you want to feel part of a group, I don't know what leads you to think a renewed cold war is the way to go but please stop being selfish and think about the rest of the world and if you really can't, at least think of your own fellow Americans.

Your last sentence is total nonsense. Who's telling you these things?

- - - Updated - - -

Your country interefered directly in my country's election.

Russia will be paying for that as long as there are Americans alive who remember what you did. Forget Trump. 2,4, 8 years, he'll be gone. Beyond him, Russia will never know peace and safety because of what it did in 2016. You get your lulz in Trump, but Democrats will never forgive the interference and Republicans are anti-Russian in their DNA. Together, American hostility will never relent.

And it all might have blown up in Putin's face already.

Quoting so that it doesn't go away.
Your ideology is terrorism and you really are failing modern society by thinking that way.
Calm down.

[Easo]

If Russia is engaging in aggression against us (they are), we must retaliate using whatever means at our disposal.

Russia's strategic weakness is its geographic size vs population and the independent streaks of some of it's more far flung regions.. We'be be crazy not to exploit that.

I don't care about Russians. I care about Americans, our allies and Westerners. Russia is outside the circle, so to speak.

Using whatever means? So having Russians kill Chechens and vice versa, AGAIN, is what is acceptable for you? Because fuck them, as long as Russia get's hurt?
You are sociopath. Thankfully NATO has way cooler heads leading it than some random anon on WoW forum with a hardon for US military tech. Nor it is in the USA's policy to hurt civilians.
And I truly don't believe you care about allies.

[Theodarzna]

He's from US, he doesn't care. US is would not be affected unless its a nuclear war.

Also don't forget that in WW2 US got massive economic boost from war, it was THE biggest profiteer. Now that US military machine is bigger than ever, it might be that some people in US actually want war. They could make trillions, while actual war would happen on territory far away.

Eastern Europe would get screwed the most, as usual. But its not US concern.

Americans are very good at ignoring their own sins.

- - - Updated - - -

Your country interefered directly in my country's election.

Russia will be paying for that as long as there are Americans alive who remember what you did. Forget Trump. 2,4, 8 years, he'll be gone. Beyond him, Russia will never know peace and safety because of what it did in 2016. You get your lulz in Trump, but Democrats will never forgive the interference and Republicans are anti-Russian in their DNA. Together, American hostility will never relent.

And it all might have blown up in Putin's face already.

America interfered directly in theirs, America seems to be the first aggressor here and the agitator of hostilities.

- - - Updated - - -

Using whatever means? So having Russians kill Chechens and vice versa, AGAIN, is what is acceptable for you? Because fuck them, as long as Russia get's hurt?
You are sociopath. Thankfully NATO has way cooler heads leading it than some random anon on WoW forum with a hardon for US military tech. Nor it is in the USA's policy to hurt civilians.
And I truly don't believe you care about allies.

Skroe is unfortunately the kind of person that makes one sympathize with someone who might aspire to conquer, dispossess, and pillage the United States.

[alexkeren]

Who cares? That's not the point. Putin can be just as upset over American meddling in his nation as we can be over Russian meddling in ours. These are not mutually exclusive positions, nor are they hypocritical. Hypocrisy is being upset over Russian meddling in our country, and doing nothing about it.

I'm really not surprised you're buying the Putin line of "It's not bad because America does bad things too." I mean that's literally what comes out of his mouth.

Your use of hypocrisy makes me want to quote The Princess Bride.

[Independent voter]

Well, we did reveal the $2 billion Putin had in the offshore Panamanian bank, showing that he is a mafia king. The Russians meddling in our democratic process was just payback for that.

[Skroe]

Americans are very good at ignoring their own sins.

- - - Updated - - -

America interfered directly in theirs, America seems to be the first aggressor here and the agitator of hostilities.

No. The situation is entirely different. In the 1990s Russia (and indeed, the whole of the former Soviet Union was being integrated economically, diplomatically and politically into the Western-constructed framework. They lost the Cold War, and losing wars has consequences. The relationship between the US and Russia wasn't one of equals (except in name). It was one between victor and vanquished. The Warsaw Pact broke up... NATO integrated most of it's countries. Russia was brought into the G7/G8, WTO negotiation opened, international trade was normalized.

The US interfered to the extent that it, as the world's only superpower, leader of the west, and victor in the Cold War, was required to integrate Russia into the international system we constructed over the course of the Cold War era, that existed in opposition to the alternative the USSR built that disintegrated in the 1980s and 1990s.

The alternative was a humanitarian and strategic catastrophe, especially with 20,000 nuclear weapons, many of which were unsecured. The next time Russia goes through that - and it will - we should just focus on securing their nuclear arsenal. If they revert to an agrarian society with the standard of living below 1940s levels, that's their problem. We were far to merciful in the 1990s and we shouldn't have been.

The Russians can never be trusted. They have 300 years of opportunism, deceit, and imperialism. There is no reason to think we or anyone else can ever make them change. So the solution seems obvious to me: wrap up the continent spanning accident of history and cut it down to size, Yugoslavia style. After all, that is exactly what happened in 1991/1992.

After Putin it will continue, because Putin is already making the classic and historic Russian leadership mistake: preparing for the future. When he dies, his successors will fight among themselves, none of them able to consolidate control int he way Putin has. And boy, will they fight.

The US must be ready to exploit that. Putin is 64. He is not a young man. We may have another decade with him. We must be ready.

[Theodarzna]

No. The situation is entirely different. In the 1990s Russia (and indeed, the whole of the former Soviet Union was being integrated economically, diplomatically and politically into the Western-constructed framework. They lost the Cold War, and losing wars has consequences. The relationship between the US and Russia wasn't one of equals (except in name). It was one between victor and vanquished. The Warsaw Pact broke up... NATO integrated most of it's countries. Russia was brought into the G7/G8, WTO negotiation opened, international trade was normalized.

The US interfered to the extent that it, as the world's only superpower, leader of the west, and victor in the Cold War, was required to integrate Russia into the international system we constructed over the course of the Cold War era, that existed in opposition to the alternative the USSR built that disintegrated in the 1980s and 1990s.

The alternative was a humanitarian and strategic catastrophe, especially with 20,000 nuclear weapons, many of which were unsecured. The next time Russia goes through that - and it will - we should just focus on securing their nuclear arsenal. If they revert to an agrarian society with the standard of living below 1940s levels, that's their problem. We were far to merciful in the 1990s and we shouldn't have been.

The Russians can never be trusted. They have 300 years of opportunism, deceit, and imperialism. There is no reason to think we or anyone else can ever make them change. So the solution seems obvious to me: wrap up the continent spanning accident of history and cut it down to size, Yugoslavia style. After all, that is exactly what happened in 1991/1992.

After Putin it will continue, because Putin is already making the classic and historic Russian leadership mistake: preparing for the future. When he dies, his successors will fight among themselves, none of them able to consolidate control int he way Putin has. And boy, will they fight.

The US must be ready to exploit that. Putin is 64. He is not a young man. We may have another decade with him. We must be ready.

So you took advantage of a moment of weakness to rape and pillage a country and abuse its political process and expected all things to be hunky dory? Yeah, I cannot imagine why Russia might meddle in the US election *eyeroll* completely unprovoked aggression /s

[Skroe]

Well, we did reveal the $2 billion Putin had in the offshore Panamanian bank, showing that he is a mafia king. The Russians meddling in our democratic process was just payback for that.

It was absolutely in partial retaliation for that. That was part of the intelligence consensus released to the public.

Vladmir Putin is likely the richest man in Europe, maybe the world. He may be so wealthy as to not have an easily assignable valuation.

The Panama Papers got very close bringing daylight to the regime. But really, that would be mostly of interest to the West. As Putin's vassals like Shalcker have shown on repeated occasions, they don't care the magnitude of corruption of their leaders so long as the state is ultimately bettered by it.

The problem with Russia, ultimately, is Russians. They hold liberty, human rights, freedom, justice, and good governance, even for THEMSELVES, in very low regard compared to other priorities. If it was just them believing that form themselves, it would be a sad curiosity more than anything. The problem is their expansionist government that wants to normalize that in their near abroad, and maybe into the Western world, in a way to legitimize themselves. That makes it the US's problem, and that makes Russia a mortal threat that must be nullified somehow, someway, at some point.

[Deleted]

Is there no moderation on this forum?

[starlord]

So you took advantage of a moment of weakness to rape and pillage a country and abuse its political process and expected all things to be hunky dory? Yeah, I cannot imagine why Russia might meddle in the US election *eyeroll* completely unprovoked aggression /s

not sure if serious.

[Skroe]

So you took advantage of a moment of weakness to rape and pillage a country and abuse its political process and expected all things to be hunky dory? Yeah, I cannot imagine why Russia might meddle in the US election *eyeroll* completely unprovoked aggression /s

A moment of weakness? Are you fucking for real?

This wasn't some dude that came down with flu. This was a country that conquered quarter of the planet and for 70 years spread a totalitarian ideology dressed up as liberation around the world. Billions of lives were destroyed by it. And if that wasn't enough, it build up a nuclear arsenal to aim at it's chief opponent, the liberal Western World.

They fought a war... a could one, not a hot one... with the goal of conquering the world and remaking it in their image, and they lost. Badly.

Losing wars has consequences. Russia losing the historic ability to decide what kind of world they lived in - one that was Western constructed according to Western norms - was the consequence of losing theirs.

Frankly, I don't blame the Russians for doing what they did to a degree. I certainly understand it. That doesnt' mean I don't think we should spend decades creating new types of misery for them... because I do. Understanding and wanting retaliation are mutually exclusive. I blame the West for deluding itself into ever thinking that Russia could be normalized and turned into a larger Germany or something. We were fools to believe that and foolish to ever try.

Next time, we must not. Russia is teetering towards a precipitous decline in the decade ahead. Even if the west did nothing, it's demographic, economic, industrial and political lifelines are rapidly drying up. Even if Russia grew at 8% per year for the next decade, it would only then, just recover from it's fall the past few years. And it will not be doing that.

So when Russia breaks itself... either as a political construct or in every way EXCEPT that... we must next time make sure that we're there to twist the knife, not to offer help.

We're not their friends. We shouldn't try to be their friends. And they will not ever be, and truly will never be ours.

[Theodarzna]

not sure if serious.

Serious as Skroe probably is. How were the Russians to view being taken advantage of after the end of the Cold War and American election manipulation?

Then again considering this countries history it is suitable, kind of like Russia's inherent paranoia.

[Skroe]

Is there no moderation on this forum?

I'm not nation bashing. After all...

Once you stop clogging our pipes and providing safe havens for oligarchs fleeing with stolen money.

We know liberty just fine; we just don't value it above everything else.

I'm just paraphrasing Russians.

[Theodarzna]

A moment of weakness? Are you fucking for real?

This wasn't some dude that came down with flu. This was a country that conquered quarter of the planet and for 70 years spread a totalitarian ideology dressed up as liberation around the world. Billions of lives were destroyed by it. And if that wasn't enough, it build up a nuclear arsenal to aim at it's chief opponent, the liberal Western World.

They fought a war... a could one, not a hot one... with the goal of conquering the world and remaking it in their image, and they lost. Badly.

Losing wars has consequences. Russia losing the historic ability to decide what kind of world they lived in - one that was Western constructed according to Western norms - was the consequence of losing theirs.

Frankly, I don't blame the Russians for doing what they did to a degree. I certainly understand it. That doesnt' mean I don't think we should spend decades creating new types of misery for them... because I do. Understanding and wanting retaliation are mutually exclusive. I blame the West for deluding itself into ever thinking that Russia could be normalized and turned into a larger Germany or something. We were fools to believe that and foolish to ever try.

Next time, we must not. Russia is teetering towards a precipitous decline in the decade ahead. Even if the west did nothing, it's demographic, economic, industrial and political lifelines are rapidly drying up. Even if Russia grew at 8% per year for the next decade, it would only then, just recover from it's fall the past few years. And it will not be doing that.

So when Russia breaks itself... either as a political construct or in every way EXCEPT that... we must next time make sure that we're there to twist the knife, not to offer help.

We're not their friends. We shouldn't try to be their friends. And they will not ever be, and truly will never be ours.

And you do not seek to conquer the world and remake it in your image? As for remaking the world, How do I know that was their goal? They deny it and your faction stands to gain political by that belief. And what of the lives that your faction killed in pursuit of its own power? Is that forgiven because "Good intentions"?

[starlord]

Serious as Skroe probably is. How were the Russians to view being taken advantage of after the end of the Cold War and American election manipulation?

Then again considering this countries history it is suitable, kind of like Russia's inherent paranoia.

skroe is saying they were lucky to even have a country or elections.
clearly the message didnt get through the first time.

[Deleted]

I'm not nation bashing. After all...




I'm just paraphrasing Russians.

Are you joking? You're being extremely toxic.
"The problem with Russia, ultimately, is Russians. They hold liberty, human rights, freedom, justice, and good governance, even for THEMSELVES, in very low regard compared to other priorities."

I don't think I've ever seen such a clear example of instability in any forum poster ever.