https://bank.gov.ua/en/news/all/natsionalniy-bank-vidkriv-sp...

The ruling class in Moscow isn’t just attacking some other ruling class. They’re attacking _my_ Europe.

I don’t care about any military-industrial complex, or even the military in general. But the moment that some misguided person decides to launch rockets at Europe, I’m not willing to just sit back and let that happen.

Which Americans did. In World War II.

With donations, war bonds and by accepting massive sacrifices to their quality of life through rations, price controls and more. We did this when we felt threatened. Last I checked, the Canadians weren’t rolling tanks into Syracuse.

This is an inchoate line of argument. You ask for precedent and then object to it being in the past.

WWII was the last time America was attacked by a foreign state. Ukraine is being attacked by a foreign state. The analogy shouldn’t be lofty enough to go over one’s head. If Russia rolls tanks into the Baltics we’ll have a new analogy for the ensuing half century. For the time being, I’m fine letting the precedent age.

Please do not try and take an immensely complex topic and boil it down to the point it has no meaning.

Yes, the Soviets defeated the Nazi's with some distraction, tech and assistance from the Allies. China did a whole ton of work against Japan, they fought the longest and hardest.

Also, without the Marshall Plan (of which the Soviets were fearful of and denied themselves participation), Europe would not be Europe right now. Maybe Russia wouldn't be an economic wasteland today, forcing their gangster gov't to use an invasion of a sovereign country to prop up their oligarchy.

Don’t worry about our level of education. We’re fine, thanks.

Mine doesn’t involve the United States at all. Try putting yourself in the shoes of a citizen of Europe who wants to live in peace, but feels their community is under attack by a nostalgic Russian dictator with an inferiority complex.

Not resisting and not getting involved is what my grandparents did when the Nazis were rising to power. I’m not going to make the same mistake.

9 Eastern European countries in the former Soviet sphere joined NATO and the EU and are currently going through one of their longest periods of growth and peace in their history.

There can be no long term prosperity with Russia.

However, being US/EU vassals is better for us. I personally think that's mainly because the so called west has all the money in the world. That's the root cause. Not culture, values, etc. Those are all secondary to having money for so long.

While I understand the stated reasons for the invasion, and they are much more valid then America's struggle to steal as much resources as possible from all over the world under the guise of "democracy" and "WMDs", I fear we'll be next. I don't want to be under their boots. My family has suffered enough under the Soviets

It fucking sucks to be on the outskirts

Your country could look like Austria by now if you wouldn't be so corrupt.

Look in the mirror first.

How do you explain Slovenia or Estonia or Poland with your world outlook?

Corruption does not happen in a vacuum. Ultimately, the responsibility lies to those with power. What I am saying is geopolitics are not decided by the common person. You seem to disagree and that's fine

I think society is a slow, lumbering beast that's hard to turn around, and very unpredictable.

I think that elites generally control things and the average person can't do much.

But if <<only>> elites control <<always>> things and only in <<their>> favor, then we can't explain how developed countries happened.

Long story short: the common person can't do much in general, but sometimes they can. Otherwise we can't explain stuff like Taiwan or South Korea or Estonia or Czechia or Slovenia or Ireland or whatever. So that means that the common person has a super low chance of changing anything, but that's their only hope. Giving up means that you have <<no>> chance, <<ever>>. And that's how you end up with Ukraine pre-2008 or Moldova pre-2014.

See Solidarnosc in Poland for a great example.

For example in Poland they managed to raise their economy enough that people just stopped leaving.

So even the demographic part is self inflicted. Corruption -> poverty -> people leaving the country.

The problem is local. Corruption.

And I'd take Western elites over Russian ones any day of the week. There are 0 (ZERO!) developed countries in the Russian sphere of influence.

So at the moment, I could suggest most trustful for me organization and person, who are ready, and please be patient, I believe, after Monday hot phase will end, and people will answer faster. Also I will give more info as will got news.

Serhiy Prytula https://www.facebook.com/serhiyprytula/posts/505236280960977

Back and alive https://www.facebook.com/backandalive/posts/2231987336958691

For others, either I think they are ineffective (like official government organizations, which accumulated huge money, but don't have spent them), or they have not created reliable system organization, or I just don't know them good enough.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Come_Back_Alive

https://savelife.in.ua/en/

They might not care? Significant casualties might be part of the calculation, if it's an all-or-nothing move by their leaders. The existence of their mobile crematoriums suggest something like it.

It is impossible.

I know Russians very deep, they are not demons. Russian outlook, as I know, is very close to just ordinary beggars, some are criminal, but not many.

So most of them have not strong moral values, but they don't want to be wounded or die. So they will not care too much, if they just need to press button or "just attach box to pipe in concentration camp".

And we also know, that Russian army is in reality not high tech army, most their weapons are based on 1960th technologies, no electronic computers at all, paper maps, old analogue radio, etc, so their technologies cannot work without people (US have large number of modern automatic weapons).

And even before invasion, we know about very low morale in Russian army, but if Russian soldiers will conclude, that nobody will care wounded, they will surrender just after see Ukrainians without any shoot.

Without Ukraine's Crimean peninsula, Russia loses sea access to the Black Sea and thus the Mediterranean for their navy (and also for trade), which historically has been a primary determinant of Russian military influence in Europe. Otherwise, they only have northern ports which are frozen and easily choked off (and ports way over on the Pacific - imagine having to sail your navy around Eurasia in order to attack or defend).

More importantly, Ukraine's geography is easy to move large forces across, in that respect a major battlefield (with due respect to Ukrainians). Napoleon and the Nazis both crossed through that region on their way to Russia, and when Russia attacks West, they go through Ukraine. Russian wants to control it and to prevent others from controlling it.

By controlling Ukraine, Russia can put more pressure on, have more influence over, Ukraine's neighbors, including Poland, and further cut off Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia from their NATO allies.

Finally, Putin wants glory - don't underestimate the personal characteristics, such as ego, of unaccountable dictators - and to recreate the Soviet empire and the illusion of power. An independent, democratic Ukraine both undermines that appearance (and perception is everything for dictators) and embarasses Putin's claim to power as an authoritarian dictator.

That's untrue. Sevastopol is the main port and naval base in the Black Sea, but Russia has plenty of others, and some are even undergoing expansion - Novorosiisk ( the backup one). Sevastopol is in Crimea, but was shared under an agreement between the Russian and Ukrainian navies. So in reality, Russia gained nothing there besides an extra front for their current invasion of Ukraine.

Romania, Bulgaria doesn't border Russia , Turkey is not on the land border and they have decent relations with them. But sure, they're likely not happy with that either - they just can't and will not do anything about it. With Crimea/Ukraine - they could.

I have never seen someone claim that Novorosiisk was a sufficient port. Maybe it's a capacity issue?

> Sevastopol is in Crimea, but was shared under an agreement between the Russian and Ukrainian navies.

It is in a foreign country, an unfriendly one. That greatly limits Russia's freedom of action.

Putin view Ukraine as a natural part of the Russian Empire - they are his vassals.

They can't have a free and prosperous Ukraine that has 'gone to the side of the west'.

The Crimean peninsula is just a bonus.

Hitler yes. Napoleon no. The French neither attacked nor retreated through what is now Ukraine.

That "Mystery of Russian Soul" lies among the lines of "Kiev - mother of Russian cities" (term of 12th century Primary Chronicle) and too many other historical facts. Like Wild Steppe (south of Ukraine) were fought for and liberated from Crimean Khanate by Russian Army. Modern Kherson, Nikolayev, Sevastopol, and Ekaterinoslav(Dnipro/Dnepropetrovsk), were established by Gregory Potemkin (Empress Catherine times) and populated by peasants from Russian heartlands - Tambov, Ryazan, Pskov, etc.

All that is well known and well remembered facts by Russian public. So we should not expect that Russian people will be so against all that. If in doubt then see the above.

Peter Zeihan predicted this in 2017. There is first of many wars to come.

The fact is that democratic countries with leaders elected yesterday are at a disadvantage to these perpetual dictators with low accountability and strong convictions.

Putin is a snake. I would say he’s the most dangerous man in the world. He absolutely cannot be trusted, and his agenda really does involve damaging and weakening other sovereign nations seemingly for the sake of it.

The only game he knows and when he sees a winning move he can get away with he can't not take it.

For one, Putin seems to want to reassemble the USSR as a vanity project. Further, this all started (years ago) when the Ukrainians removed out their Moscow friendly president. Putin doesn't like reminders that months of sustained protests can really effect change and remove leaders, especially so close to Russia.

Crimea is the only "warm water" port that Russia has access to to gain access for the end and the Atlantic.

The Ukraine has a ton of farmland. This may be more valuable soon because China imports a ton of food and if you're planning on a Sino-Russo alliance cut off from western powers, food is important.

Similarly, it shares a lot of the fresh water sources with the rest of Europe. I don't know if it's something he can attempt to monopolize, but controlling water into the region is at least as good as natural gas, and less seasonal with less ability to diversify like to green energy.

The USSR located some specialty heavy industry in Ukraine. If it still exists, it might be valuable. I read, but can not confirm, that it was part of the strategic goal of the USSR to make sure each constituent state wasn't self sufficient to encourage national unity. But that could just be BS. Reasoning like that is almost certainly why Crimea was given to the Ukraine.

This is bullshit propaganda, sorry. Russia has over 1000km of coast at the Black Sea, to the East of Crimea.

I will say, even if it were true, that wouldn't justify what Russia is doing. But I can see how it would be useful for domestic consumption.

Its straight out of Imperial Russia's propaganda book. Kind of proof that Russia since ~1600 has always been the same country, just with a different coat of paint (the one between 1917 and 1991 happening to be red paint).

Putin has almost exclusively bad things to say about the USSR, it is the Russian Empire he wants to restore.

But you contend that Putin doesn't want the western tip of Ukraine, but instead to reclaim Finland, Alaska and parts of Poland? Because that's the only difference in his territorial ambitions.

Very similar to what WW1 and WW2 causes.

- In approx 1900, Germany becomes one country (before, there where many small principalities, and no central power lasts long).

So appear new country, powerful country, and they look on world and see colonial system, where nearly ALL powerful countries has colonies. I mean whole world where divided between top countries.

First, Germany tried to reach an agreement with top countries, to cut some colonies from other countries and assign to Germany, but without fast success, because pre WW1 agreements system where extremely sophisticated, and they just cannot rebuild this system fast.

Than German powers conclude, that they could faster got wanted if make war, that's all.

To be more precise, Russia is large, but economically, it's position is worst in world, except Mongolia. - Russia have longest in world size of land borders, near no borders on mountains, very little number of possible sea ports; extremely large territory is just ice, nothing could grow there.

- Russia really have reliable access to sea only in few places - Baltic, Black sea/Azov, and on Pacific, this is extremely little, for so large number of citizens (approx half of US).

BTW, current Russia situation is much better, than for example 200 years ago, because that time they had neighbors, who demand very high fees for access to sea. To solve this, Russians occupied their neighbors - 300-200 years ago, Russians near constantly invade neighbors and assimilate them into their empire, so now they have another problem, google Belfast.

Now, Russians trying to work less crude, they trying to place puppet governments in all neighbors countries.

Ukraine have borders with three EU countries, and is one of the largest counties on Black sea, so Ukraine is extremely interest for logistics.

And unfortunately, current Ukraine don't have effective government system, as I said on another comment, current Ukraine officials are extremely corrupted and extremely illiterate.

So Russians concluded, that Ukraine could be easy target for occupation and/or to place puppet government, and prepared for invasion and invade.

I don's think, Russians really plan to assimilate Ukraine, most probably, planned scheme where similar to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warsaw_Pact

BTW exists excellent movie, very good show atmosphere in Warsaw Pact countries: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bridge_of_Spies_(film)

It's not 'what it has' it's 'what it is'.

Putin views the Ukraine as 'part of Russia' - that's it.

I don't understand why people have such a hard time with this.

Imagine if Mexico invaded Texas in 1950 and 'won'. A lot of Americans would want to 'take it back'.

Now I don't believe that this analogy is real in terms of the Ukraine situation (Imagine if those Mexicans wanted to be Mexicans and definitely did not want to be part of the USA...), but you can see how Putin + Co. propaganda would like you to see it.

I'm wary that there will be much of an insurgency in Ukraine - it's big, open, spread out, there are few places to hide.

We'll see.

A better analogy would be Australia and Canada. Both were part of Great Britain and both became independent after the British Empire collapsed.

Example of the Queen's representative interfering in local politics: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1975_Australian_constitutional...

Ironically it happened the other way round.

Didn't Biden explicitly say yesterday that they were preparing for the war and in fact built field hospitals, brought blood supplies, etc.?

Analytics said, Russian have TECHNICAL resources for war, but unknown in which condition those resources.

This remember me old anecdote, in 1960th, American analytics count overall area of all Russian secret enterprises, than compare it with American rocket enterprises, and give to Senate defense comitee prediction, how many rockets USSR already build, to suggest huge increase of defense spending.

Members look on this prediction, and asked one simple question: how they could been sure, that all those enterprises made just rockets? And where Soviets build cars, trains, other mechanics? Analytics could not answer to this, and where got out with shame.

Returning for technical resources, we have not before invasion know, what will be used.

And sure Biden insured for worst possible case, he thought, and we also thought, that Russia will attack with modern high precision weapons, but fortunately, this does not happen.

Now we know exactly, that Russian army mostly have extremely old machines, approximately 1970th if account from Western technical level, not Russian.

Thanks for sanctions on Russia, they have not modernized much machines for modern level.

And 1970th machines, are totally depend on people, they are not automatic at all, and to be exact, they are just support for infantry, which is extremely vulnerable for Ukrainian weapons.

Second question where, if Ukrainians will resist, or like in 2014 will drop weapons and surrender - we have Great answer for this question.

If Ukrainians where not resist, Russians would be used Ukrainian medical infrastructure.

So, kremlin mistaken. To be honest, all mistaken, underestimated Ukrainian forces and Ukrainian people, and overestimated Russians.

Because of these mistakes, I could talk to you from Kiev, and we still resist, and I believe, we will win, all world will win, with independent Ukraine.