OT: Russia-Ukraine War

[KnicksGadfly]

I think what really annoys me is people using WWII as a parallel. The parallel is the Cold War. If the US had the ability to beat Russia with military might, they would have done so then. Now, many years later, with both countries having more developed nukes and technology, they think we can use that tactic?

[thebuzzardman]

I don't want this to come across as pro Russian, but historically, Russia never tolerates a Ukraine that isn't either part of it or a vassal state.

The Ukraine leads to its only warm weather port. That alone is a huge deal.
Secondly, there is an uninterrupted plain through the Ukraine right into the Russian heartland and, with a quick hook to the right, it's oil producing region.

Note the two "breakaway" republics.
They are right astride this high speed avenue of approach.
Putin made sure to secure them after taking the Crimea and guaranteeing access to all year use of the Russian navy.

A little geography can go a long way to explaining things.

[HarthorneWingo]

I think what really annoys me is people using WWII as a parallel. The parallel is the Cold War. If the US had the ability to beat Russia with military might, they would have done so then. Now, many years later, with both countries having more developed nukes and technology, they think we can use that tactic?

We were too busy fighting other wars during the Cops War.

[evevale]

it's so hot watching you guys talk about war

[DOT]

I want the people who are blaming this on Biden to tell me exactly what Trump would've done so much better

Harsher sanctions?

Put soldiers on the ground in Ukraine?

No president would've gone to war with Russia over this. Nobody in America wants us to go to war with them over it, getting us involved in another war in a different continent would be one of the most unpopular things a president could do

And remember, Trump is the one who tried to extort Ukraine by witholding military supplies for them for dirt on Biden which didn't even exist. Ukraine's independence as a country clearly does not matter to him

What he would've done is likely try to appease Putin by backing Putin's push to get the Eastern Bloc out of NATO. Which would have been extremely short sighted, at best. Appeasement doesn't work

I mean, also just listen to him talk about it. You can hear what he thinks, all he's doing is talking about how smart Putin is, and how we should be invading Mexico under the same pretenses

The only thing we can do is sanction them, unfortunately. Unless you want to actually start WWIII.

[HarthorneWingo]

I don't want this to come across as pro Russian, but historically, Russia never tolerates a Ukraine that isn't either part of it or a vassal state.

The Ukraine leads to its only warm weather port. That alone is a huge deal.

Secondly, there is an uninterrupted plain through the Ukraine right into the Russian heartland and, with a quick hook to the right, it's oil producing region.

Note the two "breakaway" republics.
They are right astride this high speed avenue of approach.

Putin made sure to secure them after taking the Crimea and guaranteeing access to all year use of the Russian navy.

A little geography can go a long way to explaining things.

I can understand Putin’s desire to annex Crimea. I don’t understand what the plain from Ukraine to Russia has to do with his motivation.

In any event, why can’t he simply negotiate an amicable and mutually beneficial arrangement for the use of the Crimea ports?

My understanding is that this is all NATO driven and goes back to 1996 when we made a heavy push for Ukraine to join.

https://www.vox.com/platform/amp/22900113/nato-ukraine-russia-crisis-clinton-expansion

The open-door policy is the one that maximizes friction with Russia, which has culminated in the crisis we have now,” said Mary Sarotte, a historian of international relations at Johns Hopkins University. “I don’t think Vladimir Putin is primarily interested in historical accuracy, but I believe he is genuinely aggrieved at the way the post–Cold War order includes no stake for Russia.”

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/02/21/opinion/putin-ukraine-nato.html

This Is Putin’s War. But America and NATO Aren’t Innocent Bystanders.

In my view, there are two huge logs fueling this fire. The first log was the ill-considered decision by the U.S. in the 1990s to expand NATO after — indeed, despite — the collapse of the Soviet Union.

And the second and far bigger log is how Putin cynically exploited NATO’s expansion closer to Russia’s borders to rally Russians to his side to cover for his huge failure of leadership. Putin has utterly failed to build Russia into an economic model that would actually attract its neighbors, not repel them, and inspire its most talented people to want to stay, not get in line for visas to the West.

We need to look at both of these logs. Most Americans paid scant attention to the expansion of NATO in the late 1990s and early 2000s to countries in Eastern and Central Europe like Poland, Hungary, the Czech Republic, Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia, all of which had been part of the former Soviet Union or its sphere of influence. It was no mystery why these nations would want to be part of an alliance that obligated the U.S. to come to their defense in the event of an attack by Russia, the rump successor to the Soviet Union.

The mystery was why the U.S. — which throughout the Cold War dreamed that Russia might one day have a democratic revolution and a leader who, however haltingly, would try to make Russia into a democracy and join the West — would choose to quickly push NATO into Russia’s face when it was weak.
A very small group of officials and policy wonks at that time, myself included, asked that same question, but we were drowned out.

*****

The most important, and sole, voice at the top of the Clinton administration asking that question was none other than the defense secretary, Bill Perry. Recalling that moment years later, Perry in 2016 told a conference of The Guardian newspaper:

“In the last few years, most of the blame can be pointed at the actions that Putin has taken. But in the early years I have to say that the United States deserves much of the blame. Our first action that really set us off in a bad direction was when NATO started to expand, bringing in Eastern European nations, some of them bordering Russia.

“At that time, we were working closely with Russia and they were beginning to get used to the idea that NATO could be a friend rather than an enemy … but they were very uncomfortable about having NATO right up on their border and they made a strong appeal for us not to go ahead with that.”

On May 2, 1998, immediately after the Senate ratified NATO expansion, I called George Kennan, the architect of America’s successful containment of the Soviet Union. Having joined the State Department in 1926 and served as U.S. ambassador to Moscow in 1952, Kennan was arguably America’s greatest expert on Russia. Though 94 at the time and frail of voice, he was sharp of mind when I asked for his opinion of NATO expansion.

I am going to share Kennan’s whole answer:

“I think it is the beginning of a new cold war. I think the Russians will gradually react quite adversely and it will affect their policies. I think it is a tragic mistake. There was no reason for this whatsoever. No one was threatening anybody else. This expansion would make the founding fathers of this country turn over in their graves.

“We have signed up to protect a whole series of countries, even though we have neither the resources nor the intention to do so in any serious way. [NATO expansion] was simply a lighthearted action by a Senate that has no real interest in foreign affairs. What bothers me is how superficial and ill informed the whole Senate debate was. I was particularly bothered by the references to Russia as a country dying to attack Western Europe.

“Don’t people understand? Our differences in the Cold War were with the Soviet Communist regime. And now we are turning our backs on the very people who mounted the greatest bloodless revolution in history to remove that Soviet regime. And Russia’s democracy is as far advanced, if not farther, as any of these countries we’ve just signed up to defend from Russia. Of course there is going to be a bad reaction from Russia, and then [the NATO expanders] will say that we always told you that is how the Russians are — but this is just wrong.”

It’s EXACTLY what has happened.

-more-

[dakomish23]

I want the people who are blaming this on Biden to tell me exactly what Trump would've done so much better

Harsher sanctions?

Put soldiers on the ground in Ukraine?

No president would've gone to war with Russia over this. Nobody in America wants us to go to war with them over it, getting us involved in another war in a different continent would be one of the most unpopular things a president could do

And remember, Trump is the one who tried to extort Ukraine by witholding military supplies for them for dirt on Biden which didn't even exist. Ukraine's independence as a country clearly does not matter to him

What he would've done is likely try to appease Putin by backing Putin's push to get the Eastern Bloc out of NATO. Which would have been extremely short sighted, at best. Appeasement doesn't work

I mean, also just listen to him talk about it. You can hear what he thinks, all he's doing is talking about how smart Putin is, and how we should be invading Mexico under the same pretenses

The only thing we can do is sanction them, unfortunately. Unless you want to actually start WWIII.

If he has a tougher stance, they’ll blame Biden for dragging us into another war.

If he doesn’t, they’ll blame Biden for Putin choosing to attack.

All while rooting for Putin.

Nothing the cult does nowadays makes any sense unless you recognize they’re a cult that’s still upset that their king got his ass kicked. Anything bad that can happen, they want to happen.

[Zenzibar]

I don't want this to come across as pro Russian, but historically, Russia never tolerates a Ukraine that isn't either part of it or a vassal state.

The Ukraine leads to its only warm weather port. That alone is a huge deal.
Secondly, there is an uninterrupted plain through the Ukraine right into the Russian heartland and, with a quick hook to the right, it's oil producing region.

Note the two "breakaway" republics.
They are right astride this high speed avenue of approach.
Putin made sure to secure them after taking the Crimea and guaranteeing access to all year use of the Russian navy.

A little geography can go a long way to explaining things.

I don't think you're pro-Russian at all, it's just the facts. For the last year NATO has been flanking Russia's west with a never before military build up. While Ukraine has been negotiating behind the scenes to join NATO and if it's application approved would put Russia in a perilous position of having a "enemy" military base to it's southern west. As you mentioned a mere 100 kilometers from it's vital regions.

That's not happening. It's like Russia putting a NYC size military base in Tajuana, Mexico. Not happening. We saw what almost happen with the Cuban Missile crisis, the closest to a WW3 ever. Why? Because the US' move to place missiles in Poland and Russian in Cuba. Very, very similar circumstances.

The other is that the US was not going to let the Nord stram pipeline deal go through. The fact that Russia was ready to supply Europe with inexpensive natural gas and was going to take money out of the super wealthy's wallet. The sanctions were ready and waiting for years and to be applied whenever.

What sucks is that the sufferers are the civilians, whether in Iraq, Yemen, Syria, common folk in Venezuela or where ever a countries' economic meltdown would allow for a change of government and confiscation of a countries natural wealth.

We're all just pawns, I mean not just the poor Ukrainians or others, but we as regular Americans as well.

[Zenzibar]

Read on Twitter

Seems like a military depot or oil refinery was struck.

[Governor Dudley]

Read on Twitter

Seems like a military depot or oil refinery was struck.

This isn't a recent vid.

Sent from my SM-G973F using Tapatalk

[E-Balla]

This has nothing to do with America. Let the Ukrainian Nazis and Putin go to war, any actions intervening over **** oil is useless.

Y'all falling for it again. Bad economy, bad approval ratings, time to send young men to their deaths for that good ol war economy.

Also to anyone saying Biden didn't contribute to this didn't we support the Ukrainian Nazi's (fyi I'm not calling them this to side with Putin - **** him and his GOP puppets too - I'm calling them Nazis because they're literally neo-nazis) when they had a coup in 2014 under the Obama administration?

Can we stop politicizing this? Both sides of the aisle are terrible when it comes to war mongering. Trump was terrible, Obama was terrible, Biden is about to get us into war so we don't have a R supermajority in 2024.

[Zenzibar]

I don't want this to come across as pro Russian, but historically, Russia never tolerates a Ukraine that isn't either part of it or a vassal state.

The Ukraine leads to its only warm weather port. That alone is a huge deal.

Secondly, there is an uninterrupted plain through the Ukraine right into the Russian heartland and, with a quick hook to the right, it's oil producing region.

Note the two "breakaway" republics.
They are right astride this high speed avenue of approach.

Putin made sure to secure them after taking the Crimea and guaranteeing access to all year use of the Russian navy.

A little geography can go a long way to explaining things.

I can understand Putin’s desire to annex Crimea. I don’t understand what the plain from Ukraine to Russia has to do with his motivation.

In any event, why can’t he simply negotiate an amicable and mutually beneficial arrangement for the use of the Crimea ports?

My understanding is that this is all NATO driven and goes back to 1996 when we made a heavy push for Ukraine to join.

https://www.vox.com/platform/amp/22900113/nato-ukraine-russia-crisis-clinton-expansion

The open-door policy is the one that maximizes friction with Russia, which has culminated in the crisis we have now,” said Mary Sarotte, a historian of international relations at Johns Hopkins University. “I don’t think Vladimir Putin is primarily interested in historical accuracy, but I believe he is genuinely aggrieved at the way the post–Cold War order includes no stake for Russia.”

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/02/21/opinion/putin-ukraine-nato.html

This Is Putin’s War. But America and NATO Aren’t Innocent Bystanders.

In my view, there are two huge logs fueling this fire. The first log was the ill-considered decision by the U.S. in the 1990s to expand NATO after — indeed, despite — the collapse of the Soviet Union.

And the second and far bigger log is how Putin cynically exploited NATO’s expansion closer to Russia’s borders to rally Russians to his side to cover for his huge failure of leadership. Putin has utterly failed to build Russia into an economic model that would actually attract its neighbors, not repel them, and inspire its most talented people to want to stay, not get in line for visas to the West.

We need to look at both of these logs. Most Americans paid scant attention to the expansion of NATO in the late 1990s and early 2000s to countries in Eastern and Central Europe like Poland, Hungary, the Czech Republic, Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia, all of which had been part of the former Soviet Union or its sphere of influence. It was no mystery why these nations would want to be part of an alliance that obligated the U.S. to come to their defense in the event of an attack by Russia, the rump successor to the Soviet Union.

The mystery was why the U.S. — which throughout the Cold War dreamed that Russia might one day have a democratic revolution and a leader who, however haltingly, would try to make Russia into a democracy and join the West — would choose to quickly push NATO into Russia’s face when it was weak.
A very small group of officials and policy wonks at that time, myself included, asked that same question, but we were drowned out.

*****

The most important, and sole, voice at the top of the Clinton administration asking that question was none other than the defense secretary, Bill Perry. Recalling that moment years later, Perry in 2016 told a conference of The Guardian newspaper:

“In the last few years, most of the blame can be pointed at the actions that Putin has taken. But in the early years I have to say that the United States deserves much of the blame. Our first action that really set us off in a bad direction was when NATO started to expand, bringing in Eastern European nations, some of them bordering Russia.

“At that time, we were working closely with Russia and they were beginning to get used to the idea that NATO could be a friend rather than an enemy … but they were very uncomfortable about having NATO right up on their border and they made a strong appeal for us not to go ahead with that.”

On May 2, 1998, immediately after the Senate ratified NATO expansion, I called George Kennan, the architect of America’s successful containment of the Soviet Union. Having joined the State Department in 1926 and served as U.S. ambassador to Moscow in 1952, Kennan was arguably America’s greatest expert on Russia. Though 94 at the time and frail of voice, he was sharp of mind when I asked for his opinion of NATO expansion.

I am going to share Kennan’s whole answer:

“I think it is the beginning of a new cold war. I think the Russians will gradually react quite adversely and it will affect their policies. I think it is a tragic mistake. There was no reason for this whatsoever. No one was threatening anybody else. This expansion would make the founding fathers of this country turn over in their graves.

“We have signed up to protect a whole series of countries, even though we have neither the resources nor the intention to do so in any serious way. [NATO expansion] was simply a lighthearted action by a Senate that has no real interest in foreign affairs. What bothers me is how superficial and ill informed the whole Senate debate was. I was particularly bothered by the references to Russia as a country dying to attack Western Europe.

“Don’t people understand? Our differences in the Cold War were with the Soviet Communist regime. And now we are turning our backs on the very people who mounted the greatest bloodless revolution in history to remove that Soviet regime. And Russia’s democracy is as far advanced, if not farther, as any of these countries we’ve just signed up to defend from Russia. Of course there is going to be a bad reaction from Russia, and then [the NATO expanders] will say that we always told you that is how the Russians are — but this is just wrong.”

It’s EXACTLY what has happened.

-more-

Excellent.

[Zenzibar]

Read on Twitter

[Zenzibar]

Read on Twitter

[robillionaire]

I would prefer the US stay out of it. There’s more immediate threats to safety and democracy and our livelihood all around us here within our own citizenry and our own economic system, I don’t want to spend any money trying to arm Azov Regimen or whatever ukranian neo-Nazi militias to fight against them either. Not one bullet not one missile not one more dollar and not one boot on the ground. Hope it’s over quick. Also putin bad. Someone’s prolly gonna be mad about this but whatever

[thebuzzardman]

I don't want this to come across as pro Russian, but historically, Russia never tolerates a Ukraine that isn't either part of it or a vassal state.

The Ukraine leads to its only warm weather port. That alone is a huge deal.

Secondly, there is an uninterrupted plain through the Ukraine right into the Russian heartland and, with a quick hook to the right, it's oil producing region.

Note the two "breakaway" republics.
They are right astride this high speed avenue of approach.

Putin made sure to secure them after taking the Crimea and guaranteeing access to all year use of the Russian navy.

A little geography can go a long way to explaining things.

I can understand Putin’s desire to annex Crimea. I don’t understand what the plain from Ukraine to Russia has to do with his motivation.

In any event, why can’t he simply negotiate an amicable and mutually beneficial arrangement for the use of the Crimea ports?

My understanding is that this is all NATO driven and goes back to 1996 when we made a heavy push for Ukraine to join.

https://www.vox.com/platform/amp/22900113/nato-ukraine-russia-crisis-clinton-expansion

The open-door policy is the one that maximizes friction with Russia, which has culminated in the crisis we have now,” said Mary Sarotte, a historian of international relations at Johns Hopkins University. “I don’t think Vladimir Putin is primarily interested in historical accuracy, but I believe he is genuinely aggrieved at the way the post–Cold War order includes no stake for Russia.”

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/02/21/opinion/putin-ukraine-nato.html

This Is Putin’s War. But America and NATO Aren’t Innocent Bystanders.

In my view, there are two huge logs fueling this fire. The first log was the ill-considered decision by the U.S. in the 1990s to expand NATO after — indeed, despite — the collapse of the Soviet Union.

And the second and far bigger log is how Putin cynically exploited NATO’s expansion closer to Russia’s borders to rally Russians to his side to cover for his huge failure of leadership. Putin has utterly failed to build Russia into an economic model that would actually attract its neighbors, not repel them, and inspire its most talented people to want to stay, not get in line for visas to the West.

We need to look at both of these logs. Most Americans paid scant attention to the expansion of NATO in the late 1990s and early 2000s to countries in Eastern and Central Europe like Poland, Hungary, the Czech Republic, Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia, all of which had been part of the former Soviet Union or its sphere of influence. It was no mystery why these nations would want to be part of an alliance that obligated the U.S. to come to their defense in the event of an attack by Russia, the rump successor to the Soviet Union.

The mystery was why the U.S. — which throughout the Cold War dreamed that Russia might one day have a democratic revolution and a leader who, however haltingly, would try to make Russia into a democracy and join the West — would choose to quickly push NATO into Russia’s face when it was weak.
A very small group of officials and policy wonks at that time, myself included, asked that same question, but we were drowned out.

*****

The most important, and sole, voice at the top of the Clinton administration asking that question was none other than the defense secretary, Bill Perry. Recalling that moment years later, Perry in 2016 told a conference of The Guardian newspaper:

“In the last few years, most of the blame can be pointed at the actions that Putin has taken. But in the early years I have to say that the United States deserves much of the blame. Our first action that really set us off in a bad direction was when NATO started to expand, bringing in Eastern European nations, some of them bordering Russia.

“At that time, we were working closely with Russia and they were beginning to get used to the idea that NATO could be a friend rather than an enemy … but they were very uncomfortable about having NATO right up on their border and they made a strong appeal for us not to go ahead with that.”

On May 2, 1998, immediately after the Senate ratified NATO expansion, I called George Kennan, the architect of America’s successful containment of the Soviet Union. Having joined the State Department in 1926 and served as U.S. ambassador to Moscow in 1952, Kennan was arguably America’s greatest expert on Russia. Though 94 at the time and frail of voice, he was sharp of mind when I asked for his opinion of NATO expansion.

I am going to share Kennan’s whole answer:

“I think it is the beginning of a new cold war. I think the Russians will gradually react quite adversely and it will affect their policies. I think it is a tragic mistake. There was no reason for this whatsoever. No one was threatening anybody else. This expansion would make the founding fathers of this country turn over in their graves.

“We have signed up to protect a whole series of countries, even though we have neither the resources nor the intention to do so in any serious way. [NATO expansion] was simply a lighthearted action by a Senate that has no real interest in foreign affairs. What bothers me is how superficial and ill informed the whole Senate debate was. I was particularly bothered by the references to Russia as a country dying to attack Western Europe.

“Don’t people understand? Our differences in the Cold War were with the Soviet Communist regime. And now we are turning our backs on the very people who mounted the greatest bloodless revolution in history to remove that Soviet regime. And Russia’s democracy is as far advanced, if not farther, as any of these countries we’ve just signed up to defend from Russia. Of course there is going to be a bad reaction from Russia, and then [the NATO expanders] will say that we always told you that is how the Russians are — but this is just wrong.”

It’s EXACTLY what has happened.

-more-

If you want to move a conventional army into Russia and do it without a ton of River crossing and mountains in the way,

As large as "Russia" is, 80% of the population is crowded towards eastern Europe in it's "heartland"

The European plain extends from Netherlands to Urals.
Within that there the volgograd gap, If an army closes that gap, it blocks access to the Crimea. The two breakaway republics are at the front of the gap.

I'm a little less sure on the oil fields so disregard.

[thebuzzardman]

I can get the USA looking to consolidate gains and solidify eastern european membership in NATO, actually. As a vehicle against future Russian expansion - as a long game. It was pretty provocative though and Ukraine definitely pushing it too far. Should have tried to support their fledgling democracy but not raised NATO membership.

[Spree2Houston]

This is going to get big. I think by 2024, Russia and China will invade the US

[DOT]

I can get the USA looking to consolidate gains and solidify eastern european membership in NATO, actually. As a vehicle against future Russian expansion - as a long game. It was pretty provocative though and Ukraine definitely pushing it too far. Should have tried to support their fledgling democracy but not raised NATO membership.

I feel like no matter how far down the road we kicked the can though, Russia would never have tolerated Ukraine joining NATO

It would be much the same situation as now, as soon as the issue was raised, so long as nobody is willing to commit troops to stop Russia (which nobody is, and I don't want us to either), they'd invade Ukraine to at best install a puppet regime to create a buffer state at worst fully annex them

It's very much a no-win scenario for the US and NATO.

[thebuzzardman]

I can get the USA looking to consolidate gains and solidify eastern european membership in NATO, actually. As a vehicle against future Russian expansion - as a long game. It was pretty provocative though and Ukraine definitely pushing it too far. Should have tried to support their fledgling democracy but not raised NATO membership.

I feel like no matter how far down the road we kicked the can though, Russia would never have tolerated Ukraine joining NATO

It would be much the same situation as now, as soon as the issue was raised, so long as nobody is willing to commit troops to stop Russia (which nobody is, and I don't want us to either), they'd invade Ukraine to at best install a puppet regime to create a buffer state at worst fully annex them

It's very much a no-win scenario for the US and NATO.

Yeah. I mean, maybe they'd tolerate Poland, the Baltics...but not Ukraine.