And the US is waiting on the EU to stop sending billions of dollars to Russia.
Funny show shit like that works, isn't it.
Of course Russia needs containment.[
And if you think that an organization created to counter you is not seen as a threat, especially by a paranoid state like Russia.
It just invaded a neighboring country.
And what other sovereign countries do, willingly, within their own borders and the treaties they make isn't up for Russia to decide or, frankly, have any input in.
That Russia's understanding of the geopolitical situation is misinformed and paranoid is nobody's fault but Russia.
The "deescalation" for Russia is to get the fuck out of Ukraine. Its first step of not escalating things was to not invade Ukraine.You are in a for a disillusion. And the US did all they could to pour more fuel on the fire, and did nothing to deescalate the situation. Obviously, Russia is the most to blame in all this, but the US had a part to play in all that as well.
The US had no role in either of those things happening.
“Do not lose time on daily trivialities. Do not dwell on petty detail. For all of these things melt away and drift apart within the obscure traffic of time. Live well and live broadly. You are alive and living now. Now is the envy of all of the dead.” ~ Emily3, World of Tomorrow
Words to live by.
It is little wonder that Trumpers and Russians get along so well, given how they are both believers in crazy conspiracies.
Just the other day, a 64 year old Russian women set on fire the BMW owned by the Deputy Chief of the Russian Armed Forces. In Moscow. Nice and toasty. Russian state TV came out with a completely insane conspiracy about it - apparently Ukrainian special forces kidnapped her, hypnotised her and taught her how to set fires to cars. If you believe that you'd believe the election was stolen.
They have to downplay the increasing danger that the average Russian faces and try and upkeep the supposed notion of "Russian solidarity against Ukraine."
The likely actual story of "Russian woman who has grown discontent with the war destroys Russian military head's car in protest" both 1) makes Russians afraid for their own personal property, knowing that anyone around them might be like this and 2) lets them know that others within Russia might share their discontent with the war.
So instead they had to pivot to "Random woman kidnapped and forced by Ukrainians" which instead 1) makes this seem like a one-off fluke and 2) this was someone acting alone, against what the Russian people want and believe.
Of course they're also implying that 3) Ukraine possesses the ability to reach into Russia, kidnap people, and brainwash them.
It's like when they claimed that ship sunk in a "storm" rather than because it was attacked by Ukraine. Even the lie makes either Russia look incompetent or Ukraine look powerful.
“Do not lose time on daily trivialities. Do not dwell on petty detail. For all of these things melt away and drift apart within the obscure traffic of time. Live well and live broadly. You are alive and living now. Now is the envy of all of the dead.” ~ Emily3, World of Tomorrow
Words to live by.
So instead of buddying up to your neighbors to use as a buffer or a dissenting voice amongst the enemy if they do join the "enemy" you try invading and taking it over thereby expanding your boarder and moving nato/whatever closer to your border? That doesn't make any sense. Putin saw the world didn't give a shit before and thought he could get some free shit. He doesn't actually believe that black magic drugged up super soldiers, natural disasters, master mentalists, nazis, and secret US labs are actually the problem its just shit he says as an excuse just like Nato is an excuse.
Standard fascism - the enemy is both strong and weak at the same time.
Not sure how making the Russian security services look even more inept helps though. Here you have Ukrainian agents allegedly wandering free through Moscow with their swastika flags and copies of Sims 3, kidnapping people or blowing them up and the Russians cant stop them.
Do try to keep up with the news if you're going to post about world events will you?
Sweden and Finland are already effectively under the NATO umbrella in any time frame relevant to Russia's ability (or inability at present, rather, with how they're currently bogged down in a near-peer war) to attack the Nordic region, with the accession protocols already having been voted on and approved by the member states nearly 2 months ago now, and then having been ratified by 23 out of 30 member states already as bureaucracy does it's thing.
Precisely. I doubt he even wanted all of Ukraine initially. He thought he'd do some shock and awe foray into Ukraine, they'd balk, the EU would want to keep their precious energy flowing, and that his monkeying around with Trump and other right-wing US politicians would have made the issue of Ukraine's support in the US such a divisive issue that the US would stay out of it, and Ukraine would very swiftly give up some chunk of land for a promise of "peace" that Russia would then break a few years down the line. Again, for another chunk of land. And Finland and Sweden and other concerned nations around Russia would look at the EU and US' tepid response and think to themselves "boy, Putin just dunked on Ukraine and NATO/US/EU did nothing to help them... maybe we should be friendlier to Russia, and really stop thinking these other guys are gonna help us."
Happily, things did not go to Putin's plan. So now, six months later, stalled out, economy crumbling, supply lines shot, and running out of troops to conscript without declaring all-out war, Putin is basically stuck in a sunk-cost fallacy of his own making.
“Do not lose time on daily trivialities. Do not dwell on petty detail. For all of these things melt away and drift apart within the obscure traffic of time. Live well and live broadly. You are alive and living now. Now is the envy of all of the dead.” ~ Emily3, World of Tomorrow
Words to live by.
I do not. It's been far too evident by now Russia's plan were to bring all of Ukraine "back into the fold" as they were during soviet times and earlier with a surgical lightning campaign against Kyiv and it's government, and to then present the west with a fait accompli backed up by nuclear threats against a direct NATO intervention, before they had time to organise their response.
I mean, I don't doubt they wanted all of Ukraine... eventually. But like I said, I think this was an initial "shock and awe, EU and US sit on their hands so Ukraine sues for peace, everybody's in and out in a week tops, and Russia is plus another chunk of land" that they'd do once or twice more until Ukraine was no more.
It's obvious that Putin misjudged just about every single variable in this scenario. But if his intent was to whole-cloth take over Ukraine from the jump, then this wasn't just a misjudgement, it was a plan that straight up was just not going to work.
The EU and US might have sat on the sidelines and tossed a few slap-on-the-wrist sanctions like they did for Crimea had Putin simply just excised another chunk of land. But what would essentially be a colossal shift in global politics in the dissolution of Ukraine into Russia? There's no way they'd sit that out. Moreover, buildup of troops on the border or not, it's clear that the logistics for taking Kyiv were never there, and unless someone seriously, seriously lied to Putin about such I don't know how Russia could have thought it was actually possible. And while I don't doubt that Putin did not understand Russia's lack of military ability, the utter and abysmal failure of the Russian military forces seems beyond something that could even be lied about, were they supposedly equipped for a full-scale invasion into the Ukrainian heartland and seizure of the capital.
- - - Updated - - -
The story being stupidly implausible wont stop said staunch supporters from believing it.
It's the same reason people think Trump won the 2020 election.
It's the same reason people think vaccines cause autism.
It's the same reason people think the moon landing was faked.
It's because they want to believe it.
Last edited by Kaleredar; 2022-08-29 at 05:40 AM.
“Do not lose time on daily trivialities. Do not dwell on petty detail. For all of these things melt away and drift apart within the obscure traffic of time. Live well and live broadly. You are alive and living now. Now is the envy of all of the dead.” ~ Emily3, World of Tomorrow
Words to live by.
Russia also deliberately and outrageously lies about everything, even when it contradicts other lies they come out with, for the exact purpose of making it so their populace believes nothing. It keeps them confused and stops them talking about or even caring about the truth.
Last edited by Corvus; 2022-08-29 at 05:40 AM.
It seems my argument was just peachy, considering your only retort was:
The US did not invade Iraq with the intent of taking it over and turning it into the 51st state. But nice topical reference from... almost 20 years ago.Or the USA should be contained as well ? Since they invaded Irak on false pretense ?
Meanwhile, Russia invaded Ukraine... six months ago.
Hell, we'd better start putting up fences around the UK as well; they stayed in India until 1947. Who knows when they'll want to try again. They even controlled Hong Kong until 1997; that's closer to the invasion of Iraq than said invasion is to today. Belgium only left the Congo 62 years ago and they committed numerous atrocities there. France controlled Djibouti until 1977; my parents are older than that. South Africa violently controlled Namibia through apartheid rule until 1990, which it didn't end within its own borders until 1994. I'm older than that.
Who knows when these duplicitous empires will act again in hostility? Clearly, if we can't contain all of them, then how are we to ever speak ill of those attempting to expand their borders through warfare in the current day, no matter how brutally and actively they're trying to do so? How are we to ever know if these other countries are acting in the right if they did bad things decades ago?
blah, blah, blah.
But to return to something actually on topic, I'll reiterate: Russia's actions are exclusively its own. It isn't up to any country but Russia to "deescalate" the situation because they're the fucking country doing the invading. Period.
And like it or not, the US is the primary country giving military aid to Ukraine to blow those Russian soldiers back to hell. By like, a long shot. And I'm sure the Ukrainians enjoy the artillery they're being given today in the here and now to defend their homes, family and country than they enjoy the EU promises of eventually stopping giving Russia billions of dollars to fund the war they're currently waging against them.
Last edited by Kaleredar; 2022-08-29 at 06:44 AM.
“Do not lose time on daily trivialities. Do not dwell on petty detail. For all of these things melt away and drift apart within the obscure traffic of time. Live well and live broadly. You are alive and living now. Now is the envy of all of the dead.” ~ Emily3, World of Tomorrow
Words to live by.
Find better argument than "but USA!!!". Also whataboutism was forbidden already several times, I guess that's all you RuSSia fans have left.
Sure is comfy to be a "vassal" to USA as per your words, complete freedom of having national identity, political democracy and quality of life to the extreme here in Finland.
Is it so bad in your country that you'd prefer to be under russian rule?
Obviously they are the one giving the most aid to Ukraine. Beside Russia, there are the most to blame for this mess.
With your simple reasoning, I guess you would say that the attack on Pearl Harbor is only the Japan to blame for to make an analogy. And by deescalate, I meant before the invasion. I thought that much was clear, I was clearly wrong.
His initial... argument, I guess, seemed to be that, in the fight against Russia, Ukraine and the EU are the "good guys" but the US couldn't be called a good guy because obviously they tricked Russia into invading Ukraine as part of their evil NATO plan, his evidence being that 1) the US invaded Iraq almost two decades ago and 2) obviously the US did nothing to stop Russia from invading and they were talking to countries on Russia's border so Russia just couldn't help itself but invade Ukraine... which I guess also extends to when Russia invaded Ukraine 8 years ago, too.
“Do not lose time on daily trivialities. Do not dwell on petty detail. For all of these things melt away and drift apart within the obscure traffic of time. Live well and live broadly. You are alive and living now. Now is the envy of all of the dead.” ~ Emily3, World of Tomorrow
Words to live by.