"We" tried talking, "we" didn't do the warmongering, where is that coming from?

Granted, the US did a lot of warmongering in the middle east; I get that they wanted to retaliate after 9/11, but instead of rooting out the ones responsible directly they made up a motive (WOMD in Iraq) and did a full scale invasion there; I'm not saying Iraq was a pleasant, peaceful country or that Hussein was a nice guy, but the US invaded it under false pretenses and dragged other countries into it, eventually leading to the rise of IS and a lot of other things that I only have a superficial knowledge of.

But Europe hasn't done any of that, as far as I'm aware they've held a "live and let live" line since the fall of the USSR.

Even when you're admitting that "US did a lot of warmongering in the middle east" you want to give them some excuses, "I get that they wanted to retaliate after 9/11" you say? "retaliate" you say. Against whom exactly? How the (oppressed) Iraqi people or even Saddam Hussein has to do anything with the 9/11? Do I really need to remind you that Saddam was US ally? or that Qaeda was the US ally in the "freedom" war against USSR? "But Europe hasn't done any of that" You say, but this is completely wrong, all or most of US wars were covered by European countries, even Ukraine sent 5000 Soldier to kill the Iraqi people. I get it this was in that weird mysterious place called "middle east" so who cares exactly.

Honestly, the middle east could have gotten better, there was a possibility that the dictatorships would get replaced by proper democracy, I think the US didn't realize how far down corruption and authoritarianism were rooted in those countries, it is like a Hydra, cut one head, many more grew.

For example, Panama, Chile, Germany, Japan, South Korea all turned out better after US intervention. But Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya got worse.

It is tough to choose the lesser of two evil, when you are in a democratically free country, you do wonder if the opportunity shows up, should you go help others overturn their dictator, and if so, will they then be able to establish a free democracy or will that just replace one dictator with a worse one? But what also happens is the fear, that if more and more countries lose freedom and democracy, and become dictatorships, then countries in free democracies get scared that they will be next, which tend to push them to act and try and overthrow other dictatorships when the opportunity shows up.

Look, long time ago I became aware that most people who use "democracy" or "freedom" like it's a new kind of religion are permanently brainwashed, you can't even know what's trolling anymore. Anyway, I won't go deep into why certain countries are doing well economically (hint, try to think of the current world order as an empire, some people are punished some are rewarded and most of it is controlled by the empire capital, Japan & S.Korea are useful to surround China so they get to play certain role, when Japan do better than expected/allowed it get punished for that with sanctions, etc). The point is even if we accepted "democracy" and "freedom" as the new religion, US is the most anti-new-religion country here, US supported the worst dictatorships and still doing that (Saddam, KSA, UAE, South Africa, Sadat & Mubarak Egypt, Jordan, Israel....) and it attempted uncountable number of successful or failed coups around the world since at least 1940's (Syria). All or most US actions can be clearly explained by some geopolitical / Economical reasons. we really can't know if the "middle east" can do better or not until USA leave it alone and stop stealing/controlling it's oil or orchestrating a war there every few years. It might happened that you were born in some rich country that got benefited from the current world order, enjoy that before it ends (it's changing a bit right now actually) but don't assume that you have the higher moral ground to tell how other people should live, because you don't.

> South Korea

Just so you know, there used to be a single Korea. One of them is doing OK now, although it took like 35 years after the US invaded before SK transformed itself into a democratic country, which Koreans did IN SPITE of American support for their dictator. The other one is possibly the worst regime currently active on Earth.

South Korea is really not an American FP win.

And look what a coincidence, shithole Korea is the one the Communists "defended", not the one on America's side.

Korea kind of is a huge long-term win for the non-Communists; the more complicated foreign policy case would be Vietnam.

He was a US ally in the 80s. Later he wasn't.

I never said he was US ally during 2003! The point is, Saddam was the same during 80s and 90s the difference is that during 80's he was doing well against the enemies of the US (aka the CAPITAL of the free world).

European countries were pretty heavily involved in the NATO bombing of Serbia. You can debate the justification, but it's certainly not "live and let live".

Absolutely right. Bombs and all, NATO baaad. On the flip side, I'll leave this here, to bring back a bit of perspective. Especially on the "let live" part: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Srebrenica_massacre

One atrocity justifies another type of logic?

Genocidal atrocities justify defense, type of logic. HTH!

(FWIW, Srebrenica is not in Kosovo and has nothing to do with the Kosovo conflict: it's just a straw man to vilify an entire nation in the context of this discussion: "Serbian soldiers committed atrocities in Srebrenica, so they must be guilty of whatever happened in Kosovo too")

Care to elaborate what's your definition of defense in this instance? Do you consider that Russia is "defending" East Ukraine population by attacking Kyiv? (like NATO was "defending" Kosovo people by bombing Northern and Central Serbia and even Montenegro)

"Defense" applies to Kosovo population (of course, official Serbian line is to dispute that too), but I don't see how NATO comes into the picture?

> the US did a lot of warmongering in the middle east

The US does a lot of warmongering everywhere. It mongers at China, it mongers at Russia. It's in fact a big bully, all the more dangerous because of the knowledge that they are slowly becoming obsolete. The EU in a lot of ways acts as a sock puppet for the US, so this is definitely the result of a shared responsibility. Collectively, we should have been better. We were not. Now Ukraine is suffering.

You need a reality check I'm afraid. EU has actively supported the wars.. mostly under false pretense for oil and expansion of "capitalism as an end goal"-ideology.

Sorry but please dive a bit into non-western news reports to get a real world view

You do realize that only thing EU and US have done about Russia escalating situations all over the place (Crimea, North Caucasus, Georgia, South Ossetia, Chechnya, Dagestan etc) is talk, talk, talk. Has it helped? Nope. Russia seems to be immune to talking.

I would add that the unspecifity of the threat was what kept Putin going.

Consider what would have happened if "The West" handed Putin a detailed list of the sanctions that are in effect now A WEEK AGO.

Lower costs and lower risks. That's why far-sighted politics are so important.

This is a good point but: (1) what happened was considered unthinkable by many, (2) the wold has changed which allowed those sanctions and (3) the idea was not to 'rock the boat' and saying if you do this we will do that could have allowed for the Russian side to plan better playing into their hands and might have encouraged them to start a war.

So this is easy to say now, but I don't think there would have been any takers for this three weeks ago when for instance Germany was still firmly in the mistaken mindset that all of this is so unlikely that they don't need to prepare for it at all.

He wouldn't have believed the list. Just like a lot of Europeans didn't believe he would invade Ukraine.

> Consider what would have happened if "The West" handed Putin a detailed list of the sanctions that are in effect now A WEEK AGO.

Putin would say that is why he attacked Ukraine. His cheerleads would then blame Biden, claiming Putin had no choice.

Doesn't make sense to me. It's a simple If-This-Then-That logic. The sanctions only take place once he invades. If there's no invasion of course there are no sanctions.

Consider that he has own logic of: if they present us with possible sanctions, it's considered aggression, so we attack, else they are weak, so we attack.

Putin had already been setting up the Russian economy in a way so as to minimize the impact of sanctions.

We talked, but what concessions did we make?

You mean concessions like giving up security guarantees for all Eastern European NATO countries and completely giving up any support for the sovereignty of Ukraine, allowing Russia to dictate to Ukraine which alliances they can choose?

Because these were literally Russia's ridiculous "demands".

From the start, if we think in realpolitical terms, we let him effectively keep Crimea and Donbas/Luhansk without giving the Ukraine material support to take them back, out of the fear of pouring fuel into the fire.

Putin had demands that were de facto impossible to fulfill, they read as if the US/European governments had power over e.g. the desires of the inhabitants of the Baltic states. They all wanted into the EU/NATO after the Cold War for reasons that aren't hard to empathize with.

In a security-political sense, making concessions that impact your weakest allies is a surefire way to destabilize your own alliance.

Also, why do we have to make concessions in terms of Ukraine and guaranteeing that Ukraine won't join EU/NATO? Putin should have been talking to Ukraine about that and giving concessions to Ukraine in exchange for staving off any alliance memberships - but it's now clear why he didn't.

Are you seriously suggesting that the problem with Western policy towards Russia is that we didn’t appease Putin enough? That is, to say the least, a weird take.

I mean, it's exactly the take of the Russian government and it's various Western propaganda repeaters, so it's rather common.

Common, sure, but that doesn't make the "take" itself any less weird.

The only weird thing is that so many Westerners thoughtlessly regurgitate it.

From the list of Putin's demands, what should the West has conceded on??

Not necessarily Putin's demands, but there's talk of Russia asking to join NATO way-back-when: not sure if those are trustworthy, but I am pretty confident Russia would have no fear of NATO if it was not sent off, and was instead part of it.

Also, recognizing independence for Russian-controlled areas of Ukraine would have helped with the current situation too.

> Not necessarily Putin's demands, but there's talk of Russia asking to join NATO way-back-when

Putin wanted to skip the readiness steps applied to aspiring members and just be jumped in. Readiness is quite important, because NATO doesn't work by voting but consensus/unanimity.

> but I am pretty confident Russia would have no fear of NATO if it was not sent off

They weren't sent off, they were admitted to the Partnership for Peace (the onboarding path for membership) before Putin even came into office, and never formally pursued anything farther, Putin specifically indicating that he found applying the accession process used for aspiring members to Russia rather than a direct invitation for full membership improper.

> Also, recognizing independence for Russian-controlled areas of Ukraine would have helped with the current situation too.

Would it? How? Would it stopped Putin from escalating attacks from those areas and then claiming that attacks on them, combined with the historical “fact” that Ukraine was an unjustly created entity ripped from Russian territory, justified the invasion of the rest? How does that work?

Yeah. I've seen a decent article recently (it's in Russian though) about Russia/NATO talks in the 90s. The felling from 'our' side seems to go like this: we tried to get into NATO or at least prevent them from moving close to our borders, but the NATO paper pushers were afraid of losing their jobs and knocked up a threat when there were none.

https://novayagazeta.ru/articles/2022/02/02/natokatstvo

Edit: actually, I think the google translate version is plenty readable.

https://novayagazeta-ru.translate.goog/articles/2022/02/02/n...

This is of the main guys who did the talking in the 90s, so you might want to have a gander at it.

> recognizing independence for Russian-controlled areas of Ukraine would have helped with the current situation too.

So what you're saying is that these states in question don't deserve the right to self-sovereignity. The people in the independent states wanted in NATO and not the other way around.

"Russia has no fear of NATO" => "Putin takes Baltic states".

Well, Russia being part of NATO and what the consequences are... I guess we'll never know.

What would happen if NATO seriously offered to take both Ukraine and Russia as members TODAY?

NATO would have become a dysfunctional organization. It is not about the Russian fear of NATO. Russian political system cannot get over its loss of an empire, despite us living in the XXI century. It's entirely different root of the problem..

Eastern and Western Europe would have been crazy to gamble everything on the hope that admitting Russia to NATO somehow neutralizes Russia, not NATO.

NATO exists because of Russia/USSR's bad behavior.

What exactly did we have figured out? Perhaps I see things differently as someone in my mid-30's but we've been at war almost my entire life.

Iraq and Syria were obliterated. Afghanistan didn't fare much better and was the longest war in U.S history.

Russia has been killing people in its so-called "sphere of influence" my entire life as well. Chechnya, Georgia, Ukraine.

Parts of Africa, such as the Congo and Somalia, have been de-facto war zones for decades.

I don't mean to sound harsh but your comment about humanity, or even certain cross-sections of it, having somehow transcended war, strikes me as naive and in denial of what the "post war" (as in post-WWII) era has actually been like.

You missed the whole period of months of diplomatic communications between EU, China, US, Ukraine and Russia before Russian started the attack.

In all those months it seems that only China and the Winter Olympics really did delay the attack.

I heard Russia violated a treaty that prohibited any acts of war for a month or so after the end of the special olympics with this. I don't know the consequences to that, but it's probably trivial compared to international sanctions.

Russia is targeting cities and civil targets, employing bombs that have been banned (cluster bombs), and committing war crimes, I don't think they currently give a damn about the Olympic Truce.

Just to correct a minor mistake: cluster bombs are not "banned", there's a treaty signed by some countries which prohibits them, but many countries are not part of that treaty, incl. Russia, Ukraine, Poland and USA for that matter.

But you're right that their use against cities full of civilians is wrong, very likely a war crime.

While Russia is committing war crimes, they have not used cluster bombs. AFAIK this claim is based on a report that they were deploying cluster bombs against a civilian mall in Kharkiv. The video shows rapid explosions falling on the mall, but not as rapidly as one would expect to see if cluster bombs were used. Most likely it was Grad (MRLS) missiles. Still likely to be a war crime, but not cluster bombs.

There are many, many pictures of unexploded submunitions lying around and plenty of videos of their use.

Your comment inspired me to search harder, and I found what I believe to be credible evidence that some of the MRLS missiles targeted at Kharkiv contained cluster munitions. I would retract my above comment.

NP, there is so much information flowing right now that this sort of thing is very easy to miss.

Zero trolling with reply: You mention China is a list of countries that negotiated with Russia, presumably to avoid an invasion of Ukraine. Honestly, I have not heard anything about this before your post. I tried Googling, but I could not find anything. Can you help to provide at least one good news source to get me started? I am curious to learn more.

I also agree that it seems like Putin delayed the invasion after the Winter Olympics. And damn you Putin for invading during the Winter Paralympic Games (Fri 4 Mar to Sun 13 Mar). What a shame. (Side note: I am happy to see each Olympics brings the Paralympic Games more and more into the spotlight. I look forward to the day that events are rightfully held in parallel.)

No. The leaders should have done less talking and more warmongering. This is something that the West consistently fails to get, but it's very simple: the only thing that counts is what's done, and not what's been told. Talk is cheap.

You don't need to fire a single shot, you only need to move the units closer to the border, so aggresor needs to keep some of his units on his own territory "just in case".

Yeah, it would be nice if we lived in a world, where we can solve problems without involving the army at all, but it's not here yet.

I don't know. I think you may not have seen much yet. Depending on what happens under climate change, there may be some pretty big and unsolvable conflicts ahead when entire regions are affected.

Overall, assuming the universe has some arrow towards something we arbitrarily defined as "progress" has no rational scientific basis, AFAIK? "Adaptation" we have proven, but that has nothing to do with what we see as progress. Adaptation may very well be less brain, less culture, less humans.

I think if you want to have only certain types of developments and behavior you need to continuously and forever fight against the randomness of the universe, whose forces, have no purpose or direction.

War and aggression never was off the table - it became more organized and carried out by large-group actors. Individual violence is down, it cannot compete with organized humans. Then the nuclear deterrent may have prevented a few invasions. The post WWII peace period in the countries most here (including myself) care about was not that long, and we still had wars even so (Yugoslavia, and at the edges of "Europe" in former Soviet areas).

You think that talking to Hitler is going to stop a war?

They did, yes.

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

> An agreement was quickly reached on Hitler's terms

> Shortly afterwards, Hitler reneged on his solemn promises to respect the integrity of Czechoslovakia

> Today, the Munich Agreement is widely regarded as a failed act of appeasement, and the term has become "a byword for the futility of appeasing expansionist totalitarian states".

Giving in to the demands of the aggressor may "stop" the war for the time being, yes. It doesn't actually solve the problem.

Surely it's obvious in talking about the second world war that it didn't work? I'm not holding it up as some sort of exemplary negotiation. I was just saying Actually yes, they did try.

Agreed, but your original comment didn't really provide that context.

For 11 months. Wow.

My point is (surely obviously? I do know the war happened!) not that it worked out greatly, just that yes, they did think they might talk Hitler down.

If you really get into it, there's an argument that it bought valuable time; that maybe it was only ever supposed to be a delay, but I think that might be giving too much credit - a positive sure, just perhaps not the intention: Chamberlain returned to London declaring 'peace for our time'.

> If you really get into it, there's an argument that it bought valuable time;

To whom? To Hitler? Because the Allies didn’t prepare for what was coming.

Saying "Ukraine will remain neutral and will not join NATO" would have stopped this war.

It's an unpopular fact but it's still true.

And then what? Everybody would be happy ever after? No, Russia wants a pro-Russia government in Ukraine, and they didn't like that Ukraine instead moved away from Russia and Russian influence via things like promoting the Ukranian language instead of Russian.

It's a bullying tactic and infringes on a country's sovereignty.

Is peace not the highest priority?

I dont want Ukraine to be pro Russian but I dont want Kyiv to be shelled more. I dont want a nuclear war more.

It absolutely is a bullying tactic, but it's also the desperate act of a country that is trying to protect the integrity of its most exposed border from an explicitly hostile power (NATO).

This is dishonesty. There is no “protection” story. There is no credible threat and Russia has nukes.

You cant accept every argument someone makes. Because they’ll realize it in short order and then make stupid arguments to manipulate you.

“Russia needs to protect itself from Ukraine” is a dishonest, stupid argument.

Russia doesnt need to protect itself from Ukraine. It does need to protect itself from NATO.

NATO does want to threaten it. NATO does want Ukraine to join and Ukraine wants to join it.

NATO's ability to threaten Russia from Ukraine's border would jump considerably.

You are delusional. NATO doesn't want anybody to join. It's all eastern Europeans who actively lobbied and had to sweat convincing NATO leaders to accept them. It was voluntary choice of those nations. Why did they choose to join? Because Russia has been threatening and interfering with their way of life, with the desire to be free. Russian invasion of Ukraine just reinforced the desire to be in NATO.

>You are delusional. NATO doesn't want anybody to join.

They stated very clearly at the Bucharest conference in 2008 and again in Brussels in 2021 that Ukraine will join.

I'm frankly appalled at the number of times I have had people tell me that Ukraine "would never have joined NATO". It was well on its way to membership.

Im also terrified at the number of people willing to be dragged down on a path to nuclear war by NATO trying to secure a strategic advantage on Russia's border.

Why is NATO fucking with a nuclear power?? Russia isnt Libya. Russia can destroy us.

>>You are delusional. NATO doesn't want anybody to join.

> They stated very clearly at the Bucharest conference in 2008 and again in Brussels in 2021 that Ukraine will join.

Are you truly so stupid that you don't understand what you're replying to, or do you just think everyone else here is, so they'll buy your pro-Putin talking points?

The point was that if Ukraine joins NATO, that's not because of NATO actively trying to expand eastwards but because Ukraine themselves have been begging to be admitted. You know, almost as if they were an independent nation that decides for itself which alliances it will (try to) join, not someone else's "border", satellite, puppet, or general plaything... Oh well, I take back the "you know" bit, because this concept of sovereignty for any country near Russia seems as impossible to grasp for you as it is for Putin.

> ...dragged down on a path to nuclear war by NATO...

Keep trying to shift the blame. Only Putler's Russia is dragging the world down that path.

Seems to have already succeeded in dragging you down the garden path.

> Russia doesnt need to protect itself from Ukraine.

And what does Ukraine need? Ukraine needs to protect itself from Russia.

Russia ... does need to protect itself from NATO.

Can't you stop echoing Putler's lies, please? Thank you.

When you say Russia, do you mean Putin's authoritarian regime?

I'm failing to see the threat of NATO to Russia otherwise. NATO only ever goes against dictators and acts of ethnic or religious cleansing and such things as territorial conquest, etc.

But even given Putin, his regime having access to Nuclear Weapons, I still doubt NATO is a threat. Look at North Korea, even though US has military bases in South Korea, no one is touching North Korea.

So in my opinion, it's pretty clear to me the whole NATO thing is false pretense and justification hiding an ulterior motive, very similar to the weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.

Let me know if there's something I don't know otherwise.

>NATO only ever goes against dictators and acts of ethnic or religious cleansing

NATO invaded Libya after promising to leave it alone after stopping their nuclear weapons program.

NATO supports Saudi Arabia's war of aggression against Yemen. I shouldnt have to remind you that Saudi Arabia is run by a brutal dictator.

NATO was set up with the singular purpose to oppose Russia.

It's has always threatened Russia. It will always threaten Russia. Putin is staking everything on this war in a desperate attempt to push back that threat with one hand on the nuclear button, making it abundantly clear that all we have to do is back off.

> making it abundantly clear that all we have to do is back off

We're not the ones doing the invading.

NATO was setup foremost as a defensive pact, with Article 5 being key.

> NATO was set up with the singular purpose to oppose Russia.

Only to the extent of defending against Russian aggression.

> It's has always threatened Russia.

How can it, when it provides a path for Russia to join them? A path which Russia never seriously pursued.

Russia demanding Ukraine to never join amounts to demanding that Ukraine must remain relatively defenseless against Russian attack.

Belarus went pro Russian, so Kyiv is shelled instead of Minsk. I do not see the improvement.

Blood has been spilled earning freedom from tyrany ever since people have existed. Because it was worth it. Because it was cheaper than continuing to pay the price in blood of tolerating tyrany. Blood will continue to be spilled in the name of freedom for as long as people continue to tyranize each other, because it will continue to, at some point, be worth it.

It might be cheaper over the long run to keep freedom than to constantly abandon it - and then only later, when it is much more difficult to effect change, to attempt to reclaim it. But even that may not be an option, for many are too stubborn or ignorant to learn from the mistakes of history or others - no, they must make the mistake themselves, and leave it to their children to pay the price.

If this were about freedom and democracy NATO would be toppling the Saudi Arabian Monarchy not helping it invade Yemen.

If it were about democracy NATO would respect the results of the crimean referendum (if pew research says thats what 90% of crimeans want and it does im inclined to believe them).

We are not the good guys bringing peace, freedom and democracy to the world. We are an empire threatening another empire along its most exposed border at the exact point where it was almost defeated by the Nazis.

Belief that our leaders are the bringers of peace, freedom and democracy is going to end very, very badly. Our leaders want power.

> thats what 90% of crimeans want

Sure. For some carefully chosen definition of "Crimeans".

Was that poll held before (which I doubt) or after (like the infamous "referendum") Russia had invaded, transported out hundreds of thousands of Crimean Tartars, and shipped in as many Russian national(ist)s to replace them?

Listen, man: I suppose it's possible that you somehow are neither intentionally peddling Putin's propaganda, nor a dimwitted dupe who has hook-line-and-sinker fallen for it. But as you must have noticed by now, quite a lot of us here think you come off very much as if you belong to at least one of those categories. Maybe you ought to have a good long think about why that is, and whether perhaps it's you who should open your eyes and rethink your values?

Probably if you apply the same polls some folks in Texas they would also want to become independent from the US.

The west's intentions are certainly far from pure. But you won't tell me with a straight face that Putin's intentions here are purer - or that he comes in peace, bringing freedom or democracy.

> Is peace not the highest priority?

No it’s not. Not if being at peace means being subjugated by a despot.

You’re a fool.

Neutrality doesnt mean subjugation.

I have friends and family who are suffering because of this. I dont use my words lightly.

Hearing westerners cheerlead for this war is painful, most especially when it could have been prevented just by saying NATO ends at the western Ukrainian border.

Shortly after Putin said he wouldn't invade Ukraine if NATO ruled out Ukraine ever joining, he lied about withdrawing his troops, lied about Ukraine's history to argue it was always an integral part of Russia and lied about atrocities in Eastern Ukraine needing a military response.

What is it about Putin's lie about being willing to stop an invasion if NATO ruled out Ukraine ever joining that makes it any more convincing than the others?

Attitudes like yours are far, far more responsible for the suffering of your friends and family than anything NATO ever did, and not because NATO members haven't done a lot wrong in other theatres of war.

>What is it about Putin's lie about being willing to stop an invasion if NATO ruled out Ukraine ever joining that makes it any more convincing than the others?

* The sheer overwhelming strategic significance of the Ukrainian border. It is where Russia almost lost to the Nazis.

* His willingness for Russia to endure such an extreme cost. Russia will pay dearly for this invasion and we have watched him for 20 years enough to know that minimizing cost and acting in a rational, measured and brutal manner is the norm.

* The fact that if this goes badly he could very well have his head on a stake. Russia paying dearly very much puts his personal safety at stake.

I wouldnt believe a deadbeat liar telling me that he'll have my money by Friday, but if he's telling me to back off or he'll punch me I will.

What if the deadbeat liar breaks a previous promise to steal some of your stuff, spends the next few years accusing you of starting hostilities, waits for all your friends to look uninterested then turns up with his henchmen on the doorstep and says "honestly, all we want is your friends to promise never to help you?"

The extreme stakes make it far more likely that he wants the expansion he made the declaration of war speech about (and even more to crushing the idea of a potential successful large democracy full of Russian speakers), not an empty promise concerning something that wasn't likely to happen anyway and is of little interest except in ensuring ease of invading Ukraine. The Ukraine border is of zero strategic value to NATO since they're not remotely interested in or capable of mounting a ground invasion against a nuclear power whose terrain is where world conquerors go to die (and pretty much the only conceivable circumstance where they might have done it is in response to Russia invading Ukraine... the thing he actually did). They don't exactly have happy memories of fighting in Finland either, which is where their border with a newly galvanised NATO will end up instead.

It's even more transparently bullshit version of the preemptive defence doctrine than WMDs in Iraq, to the extent he had to manufacture a secondary excuse for domestic consumption because even a public that buys the idea he's shelling Kiev to defending the Donbas from atrocities won't believe he had to do it to save the country from NATO invasion.

> Neutrality doesnt mean subjugation.

It does though. Latest Putin demands involve complete demilitarization of Ukraine. For what purpose? Invading it better afterwards?

Breaking it such that it becomes useless to NATO.

Well, such approach to foreign policy (if destroying a nation just to mess with a third party can be called that) certainly backfired, as now historically neutral nations want to join NATO.

Ukraine's position and the geostrategic significance of its border makes it joining NATO an existential threat to Russia.

Sweden and Finland do not pose such a threat. Finland is on the border too but a much less exposed portion.

The costs of this invasion were clear from the outset. Russia isnt going into this thinking it will come out stronger and ready to conquer the world. It's a fairly desperate and high stakes ploy to shield their jugular.

How does NATO pose an existential threat to Russia? There would only be a conflict between them if Russia attacked a NATO country. Is existential for Russia to invade and attack neighbors? We might be upon a r/SelfAwareWolves moment.

This is more a nationalist Russkiy Mir/Russkaya Zemlya kind of mental jerk, as evidenced by that article that RIA Novosti published (and then pulled)[0]: if they don't take now what they consider theirs(Ukraine), then they never will if they join NATO. To have one people split in two (though Ukrainians largely disagree) is unacceptable to them.

https://web.archive.org/web/20220226224717/https://ria.ru/20...

> Sweden and Finland do not pose such a threat. Finland is on the border too but a much less exposed portion.

Ah, good to hear you know more about how Russia sees these things than they do themselves.

Because Stalin sure didn't seem to see it your way in the winter of 1939.

Aren't you beginning to sound ludicrous even to yourself by now?

> Is peace not the highest priority?

No, not necessarily.

It depends on the alternative.

> a country that is trying to protect the integrity of its most exposed border from an explicitly hostile power (NATO).

A) Ukraine is its own country, not Russia's border.

B) Only one actor in this drama is being explicitly hostile: Putler's Russia.

Sadly it’s been proven. Peace cannot be the highest priority.

Based on the Paradox of Tolerance it would be “Peace is the highest priority amongst the peaceful, except against a non-peaceful entity.”

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradox_of_tolerance

>Saying "Ukraine will remain neutral and will not join NATO" would have stopped this war.

>It's an unpopular fact but it's still true.

absolutely not. The events of the last few days show exactly why Ukraine was right to want to join NATO. Ukraine knows Russia probably better than anybody else in the world.

If anything Ukraine's refusal to promise neutrality is just a convenient - in Russian view - excuse for the invasion. Blaming Ukraine like you do is just a victim blaming.

Ukraine was not going to join NATO, given that it's having an ongoing territorial dispute with Russia.

But also, Russia's belief that it's entitled to decide for another sovereign country which clubs it can and cannot join reveals what Russia's actual intentions were. [EDIT: The relevant club for Ukraine is actually the European Union.]

The so-called "anti-Imperialists" on the far left like George Galloway who have always seen NATO as the enemy, and have always supported anti-NATO countries like Russia, Iran, Venezuela and China with 95% of their throats, have a really odd understanding of what imperialism is. Is this war the most blatant, non-galaxy-brained instance of "imperialism" that we've seen in many of our lifetimes?

Are you naive enough in the thinking that US is not doing the same or even worse than Russia (because US reach is much bigger)? Influencing, blackmailing and toppling governments they deem not cooperative enough.

Who the fuck cares what US did/does, its completely separate matter.

Just because US is warmongering doesn't mean russia can too.

"Who the fuck cares what US did/does" that is the exact mentality that get us in this kind of situations. I did not say Russia can, nobody should be able to do that. I'm just saying that the next time US warmongers and plans to destroy another country, that we in the "west" should sound the same outcry we are doing now.

The next time around people like you will be complaining about 'how come russia invaded ukraine and it was ok' so how come conflict x is suddenly not ok.

This kind of argument only derails conversations and doesn't achieve anything.

Either you believe in democracy, or you do not. If the Ukrainian people want to join the EU or NATO, and our people want them to join us as well, they have the right to make that choice as free sovereign people, and we should back them up. Any other response is itself subjugation, and capitulation to terror.

I do believe in democracy. It doesnt change anything about what I just said.

Rolling over and giving in to threats sometimes means those threats aren't carried out. Sometimes. Other times it simply emboldens and encourages the ones making the threats to threaten even more.

The fact that Putin is using Ukraine's possibly joining NATO as an excuse to invade does not mean he would not have invaded anyway. It's entirely likely he would have seen that as a further sign of weakness and simply found another excuse. So no, I don't agree that what you said is true and I don't understand how you can be so sure of it.

It's possible but I dont think it's at all likely given the immense cost of invasion and the sheer impossibility of occupying.

Putin is not unaware that Russia will come out of this bloody and bruised and nearly broken (potentially completely) and he's not irrational either.

He may be aware of that now, but I don't think he was at all aware of it a week ago. I think he was expecting an easy takeover just like Crimea.

That's absurd.

We have two examples of Russian tanks rolling into an east European territory and taking it over almost bloodlessly. Czechoslovakia in 1968 and Crimea in 2014. I don't think it's at all absurd to think he was trying for a third.

> I do believe in democracy.

No, you quite obviously don't.

That was around 2000. At the time Russia was fighting a brutal, dirty war in Dagestan and Chechnya and trying to destabilise Georgia, was supplying and providing intelligence to Saddam Hussain, was propping up the Assad regime and were helping the Iranians set up their nuclear technology program. Then there are the apartment bombings and Ryazan incident. The Kursk nuclear accident. Russian foreign relations, internal conflicts and military security operations at that time were as much of a dumpster fire as ever.

It's hard to see how those activities could be compatible with NATO membership. It would simply have provided Russia with security guarantees while providing cover for it to cause as much trouble as it wanted.

WAT? Do you have any proofs with real appliance to NATO from Russia? I don't remember that, apart from some usual russian rhetorics how they ask USA (for some reason) to allow them into the NATO and for some reason USA (not nato) didn't answer them.

But ok, lets imaging you are right. So you are saying that, it is NATO fault that Russian invades Ukraine simply because they didn't take Russia into NATO? Right?

Russia did want to be part of NATO. That's why they joined NATO Partnership for Peace [1] and cooperated the other ways.

Of course, the formal application doesn't exist, since countries of that size and importance usually don't apply officially to something unless they already have an agreement that it's just a formality. They would just look silly if the applied and got rejection.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Partnership_for_Peace

Russia and NATO together doesn't make sense to me. Who would they defend against? What common threats do they have?

NATO is made to promote democratic values, Putin runs a dictatorship, how does that work?

In a world where Russia also sought to promote free democracies and started with itself, then Russia being in NATO would make sense.

> Russia and NATO together doesn't make sense to me. Who would they defend against?

Central Asian Islamic extremists?

> NATO is made to promote democratic values, Putin runs a dictatorship, how does that work?

Russia wasn't clearly a dictatorship when it was admitted to the Partnership for Peace, or when Putin wanted direct admission to NATO without the usual accession process, though, yeah, it is now.

Someone who was unreasonably optimistic might think NATO membership would have mellowed Putin rather than just letting him jam up the alliances consensus-based processes.

Or, alternatively that once in NATO that he could take over the Baltics without opposition having already stationed troops there as part of the NATO taskforce. There were plenty of really good reasons not to want Russia in NATO at the time.

NATO as a "defensive" alliance sure did start a lot of wars in far away countries.

If Russia had joined NATO then there would be nothing to stop Putin taking the Baltic states right now.

That is pure speculation.

Even if you're right, Eastern European countries would be stupid to put their trust in Russian dictators staying benevolent. They were smart and joined NATO.

We ban accounts that post like this. Commenters here need to follow the site guidelines, regardless of how strongly they feel. The need for that goes up, not down, in times of conflict.

Since you have a history of breaking the site guidelines, I was going to ban you for this post, but decided not to because emotions and pressure are so high right now. Please don't break the guidelines again, though.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Thank you. I appreciate the decision.

> Fuck you

Triggered? Is this the kind of discussion we want here on HN?

Extremely triggered. You are applying Russian propaganda tactics No, this is exactly not the discussion we want. 'This discussion' meaning blaming anything other than Russia for invading. Russia got what it wanted. A war.

I don't defend Russia here, I don't have stakes in this war. Just trying to point that it's not black and white, and history matters. There are many subltleties to discuss.

But yes, if you forget what happened from 1939 to 1943, you can look in horror how evil Soviet Union invades Germany. Or you, an example closer to you, you forget Pearl Harbor and look now USA invades Japan and kill innocent Japanese soldiers and civilians.

> Russia got what it wanted. A war.

I don't know if Russia wanted a war. But for the moment, just take a break and take a look who profits and who is a loser of this war.

The biggest loser is the people of Ukraine, followed by the people of Russia. The second-biggest loser is the EU. The winner is clearly the USA and its military and oil industry, followed by the China, which will profit from the trade with both sides.

Now, that we know who benefits from the war, let's think about again who really wanted the war.

> I don't defend Russia here,

Yes, that is exactly what you are doing.

> Just trying to point that it's not black and white,

Exactly. That's called relativism or whataboutism, and is a typical tactic in the defence of evil.

> There are many subltleties to discuss.

Only if one is trying to defend evil by focusing on irrelevant "subtleties" so as to distract from the actual issue.

> But yes, if you forget what happened from 1939

You mean when the Soviet Union unprovokedly invaded Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and Poland?

> to 1943, you can look in horror how evil Soviet Union invades Germany.

Just because the Nazis were even better than Russia at being evil doesn't make Russia good.

No, this is exactly not the discussion we want. 'This discussion' meaning blaming anything other than Russia for invading. Russia got what it wanted. A war.

Ukraine hadn't even applied to join NATO.

There's a big difference between Ukraine saying it won't join (that's up to them) and NATO acknowledging Russia "sphere of influence" arguments by preventivly saying they won't be allowed to.

If your partner wants to break up with you and date other people because you're an ass and offer nothing they want, who are you to stop them?

If Ukraine wants to break up with Russia and join other alliances because it's an ass and offers nothing Ukraine wants, who is Russia to stop it?

Also nato not expanding towards russian borders even after promising it wouldn't by james baker, 1990[1]

[1] https://ibb.co/xgqRWG3

32 years ago some guy thought he could make this decision for half of Europe. I'm so shocked! NATO seems a real threat! Look at how the NATO oppresses their people, bring no economic growth and just made the countries so much worse to live in!

Unpopular opinion.

Russia agreed to respect Ukrainian territory if they give up their nuclear arsenal.

Maybe before russia starts demanding something they should first keep their promises first

> It's an unpopular fact but it's still true.

This is not a fact. It is at best an educated and optimistic opinion.

> It is at best an educated and optimistic opinion.

Not even that. It is at best an uneducated and wildly optimistic opinion.

It's impopular because it isn't true. And yet you keep repeating it in thread after thread.

You must be insane to believe that. Would saying Gdańsk will be neutral and Germany can transport troops between East Prussia and rest of country stop Hitler? No, those are just pretexts. He'd just go further and further and attack while you'd be way way worse position.

Hitler didnt sit publicly on a border with troops threatening to invade for 3 months with one single demand.

Putin isnt Hitler. He's a monster hes just not that specific monster.

that choice between giving in to "small" russian demands vs. fighting has played of in history multiple times and even specifically with Russia. For example after signing MRP with Germany to divide up europe between them, Russia amassed huge army on the borders of baltic states and Finland and demanded allowing Russian military bases in these countries and establishment of russian friendly governments.

Finland went to war over it, took huge losses but managed to fight back well enough to stay independent even though some territory was lost.

Countries that gave in to these demands without much resistance to avoid huge bloodshed were occupied shortly and lost their independence for 50 years. Multiple rounds of deportation to siberia and executions of anyone who had military, police or government background were done over the next years so in the end it's not clear if the loss of life was any smaller for these countries if it would have been if they fought back.

So in hindsight it seems better choice was to fight back and have a chance of freedom.

PS. it's not single demand at all, you should read more of Putins speeches and writings, especially those meant for Russian audiences. For example the one televised on 21.02.2022 where he goes on and on about some mystical "west" that has tried to destroy the russian for over a century and how ukraine has no right to exist anyway etc. That NATO talk is mostly for western audiences, internally the message seems to be more about re-establishing the russian empire (which he seems to think is god given right) and talk about superiority of the russian civilization (ruskiy mir). So everything indeed sounds eerily similar to sittuation and delusions that led to WW2.

Oh, but he did. And when he got it, then he moved to other country with other demand.

Do you really believe this would end at Ukraine?

> Putin isnt Hitler.

I agree. He wants to be like Stalin. He wants to be greater than Stalin.

Pardon my French but this is bullshit. Putin’s perverted logic goes like this - Ukrainian joins NATO, it establish missiles, Moscow in danger. The problem is Ukraine does not have to join NATO to have US missiles on its territory. Basic military agreement would allow that. Such an agreement technically was possible as early as 1992. The fact of life - there is no such agreement, hence whole idea of NATO or US threat to Russia is a propaganda construct.

PS: I’m Russian and I want this war to stop immediately.

also - in 2022 you don't really need to have basis with nuclear missiles at the doorstep to be a threat (so much that Putin also escalated on this topic too). You have submarines that can launch an attack with nuclear missiles, you have intercontinental vectors to deliver nukes.

Putin is just trying to restore the idea of Russian Empire and/or Soviet Union. Same as Hitler trying to restore the German Empire.

Also, if Russia annexes Ukraine, it now has 4 more NATO members on its borders.

Also, Russia already has NATO states on its borders, and there aren't nukes stationed there.

Tiny point of order: you don't actually know that.

Maybe only America truly knows, but CND (via Wikipedia) agrees with me. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_sharing https://cnduk.org/resources/united-states-nuclear-weapons-eu...

Can we take this offline for reasons that will become clear in a moment: [email protected]

Maybe, maybe not, but who do you think has the right or power to declare that Ukraine will remain neutral?

Laughable to think that NATO expansion alone would’ve been sufficient for the cost-benefit calculation here.

Putin wants his name in history books.

It pains me to admit that I agree with you. This is naturally "realpolitik", but makes many people uncomfortable.

To large extend, because this is international forum. While some Americans don't mind to sacrifice others, other nato members in fact mind being sacrificed. For them "realpolitik" is not "sacrifice me", no matter how much it makes you uncomfortable.

It is not true. There was zero chance that Ukraine was going to join NATO. It wasn’t on the table.

Putin has explicitly told us why he went to war, and it is to do with reversing Russia’s territorial losses since 1991 or even 1917.

No-one seriously believed Ukraine was going to join NATO, it wasn't even on the cards. This is just a false excuse trumped up by Putin's apologists.

Listen to what he says: he claims Ukraine is a fake state and that it is really part of Russia. In 2005 he claimed that the collapse of the USSR was a geopolitical tragedy and a further tragedy because it meant that many "fellow citizens" were now outside of Russia's borders. I.e. Putin wants to re-establish Muscovite control over vast swathes of territory he believes are Russia's right to control.

That's basically the same as saying if Puting wasn't president, the war wouldn't happened. True but meaningless. A country should decide what it does and should not rely on another country's approval.

If you think that promises never to join NATO would satisfy Putin, then you are brainwashed by Putin! Ukraine has already offered that peace offering of NATO neutrality. Putin has as also demanded that all Soviet / Warsaw pact countries become undefended so they will be naked tó Russian aggression!

Putin wants to expand his dominance in northern Asia. 140m citizens is not enough; he wants to add 45m Ukrainians to have 185m! He is a colonial dictator in his homeland and does as he pleases!

In this particular case talking to Putin makes no sense, he only understands force. Talking makes sense much earlier but even then actions are more important.

Take for example the Middle East: there is no way you could solve the problem by talking, especially now. Palestinians believe this is their soil, the Israeli think otherwise, the former send rockets, the latter shoot these rockets and send their pilots, the pilots see the attackers tied to children on the roofs... This has gone too far over the years.

Again I feel like anything I say is just some dude talking from a safe place far from the front lines. But I think the west could have acknowledged the fear of the NATO, the EU could have told Biden that we prefer a good relation with Russia and that if we think our culture is in fact more free, it will leak into Russia via the internet. This discussion can and will take very long. I just wanted to say I’m disappointed in almost all aspects of the situation and humanity is suffering and it hurts. Us against them is not constructive. Much hate will be created and we know what hate leads to from yet another popular franchise. It takes a long time to extinguish.

> if we think our culture is in fact more free, it will leak into Russia via the internet.

Do you think Russian leaders should allow this to happen?

That's exactly the strategy we've been trying with both Russia and China for several decades now - playing soft and hoping they mellow with time. Obama tried a 'reset' of relations with Russia to improve relations in 2009, the result was the invasion of Crimea.

Democratisation through osmosis has utterly failed. The result has been the subjugation of Hong Kong, genocide in Xinjiang and the invasion of Ukraine. Taiwan is next unless we wake up and make it perfectly clear to these people we absolutely will meet force with force and that we have plenty of hard power to use alongside our soft power. It may be too late for Ukraine, we failed them miserably by playing nice too long, but it's not too late for Taiwan.

Ukraine is both bad and good lesson for Chinese: bad, because nobody intervenes with an army. Good, because it shows what the consequences for the economy of the invader are. And the West should buckle up and prepare for retaliation - this is especially important in essential areas such as drug production. If China attacks Taiwan, it will set the clock back two decades or more, for everybody.

Taiwan is not Ukraine. Biden has clearly stated that the US will go to war to defend Taiwan, while he had made it entirely clear that he will not go to war over Ukraine.

The fact that Taiwan has been a us ally for decades and the US has strongly implied in the past and now clearly stated that they will defend them matters. The US had never even implied they would defend Ukraine and had no treaty obligation to do so.

Also China is not Russia, while it's building a formidable navy, air-force and ground force and may be more capable than their Russian conventional counterparts, their nuclear deterrent may not be enough to deter an American intervention in Taiwan. Their nuclear force is small, and though rapidly growing, currently not enough to reliably threaten the US, the destruction is not so mutually assured in the China US equation.