That's what sanctions do. That's what military responses do. There's no real way out of the box. If a country responds forcefully to an aggressor's actions, the aggressor's civilians will pay a large part of the price.
Wrong question. Whether they "should" in any moral sense is not a useful way to think about things because geopolitics isn't a morality play. Clearly effective sanctions against USA were a non-starter because it is too big and rich a country and does a lot of trade with the outside world.
> Realize that our next Iraq or Vietnam this new standard could be applied to us or any other country.
Nope. Effective sanctions won't happen against big powerful countries (or coalitions of countries, e.g. EU, NATO).
While I personally agree with this Realpolitik view, I don't believe it's actually universal among leaders. Many things that have happened historically did because leaders felt some grand moral imperative (national unification, stopping an atrocity, helping one's close ethnic allies in a defensive war, offensive "defences" when the momentum felt like it was being lost -- take your pick).
A moral imperative (although one rather out of place in the 21st century) seems to be behind Putin's actions, IMO. Restore the glory of the Russian empire, practical barriers to that will be ignored. It just must be done, for the sake of itself. Righteous causes eventually sort themselves out, right?
Which brings me to the sanctions. I've not actually seen much discussion on whether sanctions against Russia will achieve Western geopolitical goals. Much of the discussion is presently framed as a moral imperative. We must act to punish Putin.
I agree, actually. For example, the original Islamic expansion, and later the crusades that were a response to it, were both explained in moral terms. (these demonstrate how manipulating consensus reality is a core competency for rulers). And the people who fought in these wars genuinely honestly believed they were acting morally and serving a higher purpose.
Or, a more recent example: part of the reason NATO intervened in Kosovo in 1999 was that they were ashamed they hadn't done so in Bosnia a few years earlier.
Right now Zelinskyy and Ukraine are covering themselves in a lot more glory than Putin and Russia.
> Righteous causes eventually sort themselves out, right?
I think Putin psyched himself up into believing his own propaganda. He's probably surrounded by yes-men who tell him what he wants to hear, too. Oops.
> Much of the discussion is presently framed as a moral imperative. We must act to punish Putin.
Sure. Morality is intuitive game theory, after all.
The Saudis have been waging an offensive war for years in Yemen. Yet there hasn't been a single peep about cutting them off SWIFT, sanctioning their royal oligarchs, freezing their western assets, etc, etc.
It seems to send a message that yes, repressive petrostate dictatorships can get away with waging offensive wars... Well, at least some of them can.
A head-and-shoulders decapitation of a regime change in Russia, Chinese irredentism over outer Manchuria, a Han-supremacist lebensraum movement targeting Asia east of the Urals…
> On February 15 [2003, before the invasion started], millions of people protested, in approximately 800 cities around the world. Listed by the 2004 Guinness Book of Records as the largest protest in human history, protests occurred among others in the United Kingdom, Italy, Spain, Germany, Switzerland, Republic of Ireland, the United States, Canada, Australia, South Africa, Syria, India, Russia, South Korea, Japan, and even McMurdo Station in Antarctica.
I don't think "the largest protest in human history" qualifies as "mostly shrugs and silence" ;)
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protests_against_the_Iraq_War
Lack of actual policy making to me is more that the US empire was at the peak of its power. Being punished by America at the time would be worse than trying to maintain a rules based.
The US is applying sanctions to China. The US doesn't see any limits to the target of their sanctions, as you seem to believe.
Your complete inability to be a fair global hegemon is the reason nobody respects or trusts your government. Cuba is still needing to ask Uncle Sam for permission to import syringes during a global health crisis, we're still backing a genocide in Yemen, doing all of these terrible things while acting like global arbitrage. USA isn't the global police. If you're going to undercut the WHO, the UN, etc. then you don't get to act like it's about freedom and democracy or the rule of law.
Might makes right is an inane policy for Machiavellian wonks. Just because you can do whatever you want doesn't mean you should. The US imports a lot of things too, and a concerted global effort would at the very least require an isolationist USA. Where are you going to get your silicon chips from if the Republic of China reunifies with the People's Republic of China?
US wants to play by different rules than everyone else, not sure that works long term. Either invasions are globally kosher or they aren't, over a million dead and 38 million displaced over a "war on terror" that didn't do shit is a war crime. If we're not going to call an invasion on false pretexts that killed and displaced millions of civilians a war crime the word has no meaning and the discussion is moot.
And if the US can do war crimes but only China/Russia/Iran face consequences for them because we're a "big powerful country" I hope you're ready for the era of multiple US-hostile nuclear powers. Almost ruined the Earth when only two nuclear powers were butting heads in the 20th century and now we've got several to pick from :)
If they want to, that's up to them. It wouldn't surprise me if China did do something like this.
> Your complete inability to be a fair global hegemon
Hey, (1) I personally am not a global hegemon. (2) I was describing the way things are not how they ought to be. You should work on distinguishing is from ought; if you can't you'll never understand anything.
FWIW I personaslly think a fair bit of US policy is both immoral and self defeating. But, again, that's irrelevant, because as I said, geopolitics isn't a morality play.
> Where are you going to get your silicon chips from if the Republic of China reunifies with the People's Republic of China?
I'm European and I think the EU should be self-sufficient in chips. This is because any polity that isn't won't in the long term be fully independent.
> US wants to play by different rules than everyone else, not sure that works long term.
"The strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must" is a rule thast's worked so for for all 5000 years of recorded history (with a few counterexamples). Is that lnog term enough for you? Is that just? No. Does it matter (i.e. affect the course of events)? Not usually.
> I hope you're ready for the era of multiple US-hostile nuclear powers.
A world with lots more nuclear powers may well happen, depending on the result of the present Russia-Ukraine war.
That isn't always true. Obviously, if the actions of the government are bad enough, it sometimes becomes necessary to kill many of its citizens. Since that's morally justifiable, lesser economic damage is morally justifiable.
It sucks. They're innocent. If damage can be avoided, great. But if it's necessary, the blame falls on the aggressor nation.
I'm guessing the word "complicit" is not in your moral vocabulary. Or for some reason you don't feel it applies to doing business and helping to enrich a society that is murdering their neighboors.
Apparently refusing to be complicit with Russian aggression is "punishment".
Let's just same I'm less than impressed with this moral argument.
(Arguably, 9/11 indeed backfired badly for the perpetrators.)
Its already accepted that non violent means that nevertheless still negatively impact civilians are appropriate measures to apply political pressure. That's what economic sanctions are. I don't see how that can be considered acceptable yet cutting off digital communications is a bridge too far. I consider economic sanctions more severe than blocking the Russians from the global internet. One means you lose access to information. The other means your economy may collapse and you might not be able to afford food.
As for the 9/11 attacks, they were deliberate attacks on civilian targets which are traditionally considered war crimes when carried out by state actors and terrorist attacks when not. They are definitely far worse than softer measures like sanctions and not directly comparable.
And there is nothing arguable about it. They definitely backfired. Bin Laden did not hide his intentions or feelings. In fact he wrote extensively and publicly on it. He expected that the American public, who were broadly ignorant to US foreign policy at the time would empathize with him and blame their government. The opposite happened.
Since it wasn't I see your response as pretty irrelevant.
(On that matter, the last major instance of another country confiscating Western assets I'm aware of was the https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anglo-Persian_Oil_Company, which was answered with a CIA-instigated coup.)
Another completely irrelevant non sequetor.
Maybe it's true of Americans for the war in Iraq or whatever but my objection is specifically to the weird (to me) use of the word "punishment" in the post I replied to.
I'd say don't talk about "punishment" as if your position has a moral high ground. Let's talk about being complicit.
The post above argues we should help fund the war efforts to kill Ukrainians through profitable business relations with the Russians, and the poster apparently thinks they have the moral high ground given the use of the word "punishment" to describe the the idea we shouldn't help the Russians continue to fund their efforts to kill people.
Yes. If anything people in democracies are more culpable for the misdeeds of their government than the people of autocratic states.
btw, I was and remain anti-Iraq war but your equivocation is clearly wrong.
Do you really think you were the first person to come up with the idea of assassinating a head of state as a means to end a war? It doesn't really work that way.
It wasn't 1M, it was about 1/5 of that. I'm not of course justifying the loss of life, however it behooves us to speak precisely instead of hyperbolically. [1]
> I did hear a rumor that it was all about the oil anyway LoLz.
That rumor makes no sense if you actually dig in. 72% of America's foreign oil imports come from Canada and Mexico. Only about 3% from Iraq. And Iraq was exporting oil before the war, too. [2] 2T was spent in the Middle East. That buys you a heck of a lot of market-rate oil.
[1] https://watson.brown.edu/costsofwar/files/cow/imce/papers/20...
[2] https://www.eia.gov/energyexplained/oil-and-petroleum-produc...
Oil is sold at a global price. The US has an incentive to keeping prices low so Americans have cheap gas. Plus it strips away power from oil financed nations which is in the US interest.
> If you dig in a little more you realize control of the oil and contracts went to US and British firms after the war where previously other nations had those contracts.
And that return is pennies on the dollar compared to the two trillion spent on the war. $2T buys you a whole whack of oil you can subsidize for your people.
The economic arguments just don't hold up.
The 2T doesn't disappear it goes into jobs and new technology. Those oil contracts employ many in the US.
More important is the US gains control.
Yeh? Source pls.
> So what if it was based on a lie?
Jeez, it's that easy for you to say that eh. Say that to a person who lost his family in that invasion.
You could make the argument that the world could have stood up and sanctioned the US - but likely they did not because they probably agreed with the action, whether they could say so directly or not. 'Should' is not the bar. The fact it took a lie to convince folks to go in is neither here nor there, IMO. Again, I was against the war.
> Jeez, it's that easy for you to say that eh. Say that to a person who lost his family in that invasion.
Say that to someone in Kurdistan who suffered life-long debilitating injuries due to the sarin and VX gas attacks that were then followed by a Napalm run. [1] Saddam launched some of the worst chemical attacks in history against his own citizens. We can go back and forth on this all day.
It was life frozen. Life had stopped, like watching a film and suddenly it hangs on one frame. It was a new kind of death to me. (…) The aftermath was worse. Victims were still being brought in. Some villagers came to our chopper. They had 15 or 16 beautiful children, begging us to take them to hospital. So all the press sat there and we were each handed a child to carry. As we took off, fluid came out of my little girl's mouth and she died in my arms.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halabja_massacre#Chemical_atta...
We supported him when he did that. And during the 90s, we instituted sanctions that killed half a million Iraqi children. That's 100 children for every single person who died in Halabja. If the question is would you rather be a modern country ruled by the iron will of a belligerent despot, or bombed into medieval times with every cultural institution shattered and orders of magnitude more body count than your dictator ever generated, spawning ISIS...
https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2001/10/are-1-million-ch...
And that's irrelevant to whether taking him down was a good decision. Either before or after. Once again, I didn't support the war at the time, and I think the casualties are horrifying. However, it's not even close to the same thing.
> And during the 90s, we instituted sanctions that killed half a million Iraqi children. That's 100 children for every single person who died in Halabja.
You don't really weigh moral wars this way. For instance, the Nazis killed 6 million in the concentration camps. However, an estimated total of 70–85 million people perished in World War 2, or about 3% of the 1940 world population. However, nobody frames World War 2 as "costing 10 lives for everyone who died in the camps" and therefore a bad idea.
Your framework allows for invasions over fake WMDs and fake Nazis alike. Russia didn't sanction the US over Iraq, in the spirit of peace and cooperation between nuclear states the US could afford them the same courtesy.
If you can justify Iraq you can justify Ukraine. Personally I don't agree with invasions anywhere for any reason not do I believe in the concept of "world police". That's just forcing one people's will upon another and denying them the right to destroy their own tyrants and seize their own destiny.
Absolutely, unequivocally not.
My framework does no such thing.
Also it's pretty apparent that you view a white life is greater than a brown life and you view invading middle eastern countries as something that's okay and are going to justify no matter what, so there really is no point in this discussion.
Re: your source, go do some more digging, it was the CIA that helped Saddam deploy those chemical weapons.
You have no idea what my positions are, and you're doing a bunch of wild finger pointing.
US invasion: For Democracy, Freedom and Kumbaya!, Millions died for the Greater Good. (hugs & kisses)
This is not realistic due to the fact that the US is at least an order of magnitude more powerful than Russia, both economically and militarily. We also made it look less sketchy by bribing/begging Britain (and others) to join the Iraq invasion and invoking Article 5 for Afghanistan. Sanctions against the US were not tenable.
I wish people would realize that this is what most of our sanctions do as well.
Except in the case of sanctions, you aren't even actively engaging in violence (which some moral systems would take issue with). You're simply choosing to not cooperate.
They can of course go much further than any of this, but we need to make it clear how we feel about their regime and it's actions. We need to provide a motivation to resist. Yes it sucks, the Russian people are not our enemies, I know and work with Russians, including close colleagues. Sanctioning the Russian state, and struggling against it from within are two sides of the same coin. It sucks that anyone has to do any of it, but that's the fight we're in whether we chose it or not.
The suffering of Russian civilians is nothing compared to what is happening to civilians in Ukraine.
Some brave Russian people are now suffering in Putin's prisons for speaking out against war. Some mothers will never know how or where their children died. Some African students in Ukraine are suffering from racism perpetrated by other war victims.
It's all bad and they all deserve compassion.
Is that a bad thing?
For the wealthy and powerful who make the decisions? No.
Assuming we haven’t all been convinced via propaganda that this is all a conspiracy to weaken us and we need to band together under $glorious_leader anyway.
I disagree. This is war - it's not meant to be comfortable - and a government does represent the people. Putin's approval rating over the years has been really high, in the mid-high 70s [1]. The only way this ends with minimal bloodshed is if the populace exerts sufficient pressure against leadership. That means protests, that means civil disobedience.
If the populace doesn't feel the impact of the war, then there's no pressure for the administration to end it.
Think of it more like less-lethal weapons. Yah you don't want to get hit by a rubber bullet but you certainly don't want to get hit by a real bullet. If things escalate then the people may get hit by real bullets metaphorically and literally.
[edit] > Punishing civilians for the actions of its government is absolutely insane and will backfire badly.
This is an interesting argument, especially for a representative government.
"You can't blame me for what the people I pick do!"
[1] https://www.statista.com/statistics/896181/putin-approval-ra...
And ‘punishing civilians’ when they are part of a society (yes, society) who is allowing a dictator to hungrily invade a neighbor is about the only way anyone can do anything here.
Sanctions CAN impact the economy enough that it starved the ability of the nation to make war - but if the country keeps doubling down, that is going to require extreme measures and produce extreme misery. It would be a blockade essentially.
Russia has experience switching to a war time economy, and if anything it makes a ‘strong dictator’ more appealing. Stalin did quite well during this time, despite making massive mistakes that cost an insane number of Russian lives.
In the west we seem to be under the impression some relatively cheap to us financial sanctions will solve this, but don’t bet on it.
The equivalent post WW1 in Germany just stoked WW2. Not the same scenario, but there are similarities.
That doesn't sound like a country that is rallying behind the flag in support of an offensive war against Ukraine.
At this point, I also doubt anyone (including Putin) has reliable data - from what I do know, it’s common place for all the low level folks (equivalent of mayors, low level bureaucrats, city police departments) to fudge numbers the way it’s expected to look.
Even opposition politicians, independent reporters (even those that have fled the country), and folks I know with family there have been pretty straightforward in saying he has historically been very popular however.
The 60-70% polled support number has seemed quite legit to them. Propaganda is powerful, and most of the base of support he needs to keep the country running isn’t (ever) going to hang out on Twitter, post on Reddit, etc.
And the propaganda for a long time has been how the west is trying to bring otherwise strong Russia down. Which is, rather explicitly what the west is doing now (albeit for legit imo reasons).
If the opposition can muster enough support to meaningfully impact things, then that’s awesome!
That he does seem to be sweating means maybe it will work, I hope it does.
I’m just hoping to make the dynamic more visible, and caution against the same kind of thinking that had everyone seemingly convinced that Trump wouldn’t get elected in 2016.
... first? Why first? Which western country is actively invading anyone right now? Which western country started a land-war in Europe last week? Why would I cut off someone not doing anything for something that happened 20 years ago when there's a land-war in the Ukraine now?
> You've US who voted to invade Iraq based on a lie (along with UK).
On bad pretenses sure, but to overturn a despot who used chemical weapons against his own people. He wasn't a threat to the US, and the pretenses were wrong - and I didn't support the war at the time. But is it the same thing? Not even close.
> Or are you implying that Russian invasion of Ukraine matter more than all these examples, and if you do so, I wonder why that is? (fyi, it's a rhetorical question, I know why that is)
Yeah because the Russians launched an un-provoked land war in Europe to re-create the Soviet Union - on the premise of "de-Nazifying" a country run by a Jewish PM.
Save your whataboutism for once this is resolved.
> On bad pretenses sure, but to overturn a despot who used chemical weapons against his own people. He wasn't a threat to the US, and the pretenses were wrong - and I didn't support the war at the time.
Yeah, looks like US actively knew and helped him gas his own people though because Iran would've been too powerful otherwise, and US can't have that.
https://foreignpolicy.com/2013/08/26/exclusive-cia-files-pro...
> But is it the same thing? Not even close.
Yeah it isn't, while the world looks to sanction Russia (which they should btw), US blackmailed other countries into invading Iraq and no country got sanctioned. But like you said, US only got pretenses wrong, s who whore cares that millions of lives were lost as a result and a country has been destabilized and destroyed.
> Save your whataboutism for once this is resolved.
Reddit's favourite term to use when you point out double standards. I don't support this invasion either, it's just the hypocrisy in the outrage that is astonishing. But hey I guess, as the media puts it, world cares more when it's white people with blonde hair and blue eyes that are dying and not brown people you've in middle east, so it's different this time.
I can oppose Yemen, I can support Palestine, I can oppose the coup in Guatemala - all while I reject the actions of the Russians in Ukraine. These are not mutually exclusive positions and there is nothing hypocritical about it.
Having Russia missile a few steps away frim Germany has caused them to bring back their military.
People act in their own self interest. What other lives do you think did not get their due?
i know and understand that governments are supposed to be acting in their own interests. This does not surprise me one bit.
What bothers me ( again I understand this is selfish), is that the same people that preach about democracy/human rights/freedom know their governments are guilty of egregious crimes like Russia’s and arguably worse. I find it hypocritical when they started lecturing and posturing about respecting a country’s independence.
I hope this explains my pov better.
It can absolutely be a moral good/evil situation. As would such a war on the other side of Russia even if folks reacted differently.
> I find it hypocritical when they started lecturing and posturing about respecting a country’s independence.
They can be right this time, and wrong other times. I do think supporting them when they're right and opposing them when they're wrong is the play.
Iraq? Evil dictator. Libya? Evil dictator. Syria? Gruesome terrorists/evil dictator.
Israel/Palestine? Messed up and the world still doesn't like it, but not on the same scale and certainly more complicated.
You’re wildly out of touch if you actually believe if those dictators didn’t do everything with blessings from the US..
yemen is also 100 times worse off than ukraine its not even close
Look at what Iraq and Libya is right now. Libya has literal slaves right now, I'm sure US feels pretty good about themselves. Heck Obama won a noble peace price for it.
US supported Pakistan in 1971 when Pakistan was committing mass genocide in East Pakistan (Bangladesh now). They overthrew a government that people wanted in Iran because that govt. was going to nationalize oil and take it away from western oil companies. These things have been happening forever in the third world, but because it's brown people dying, people didn't care as much.
Anyways my enitre point is again, it's dumb to blame an average Russian person for the actions of Putin like how it would be equally dumb to blame american person for the actions of US govt. and military industrial complex.
That's not the fault of civilians. That goes even more so for those under authoritarian regimes. That's Russia. The people are under the thumb of a dictator and bathed in propaganda 24/7. And who the hell knows how many actually support him or do so out of fear.
How about North Korea? Should we punish their citizens too for not rising against their dictator? I think it's clear that we shouldn't.
Yes, it is, in the specific case of Iraq. The debunkings of the propaganda (and even the internal documentation of the propaganda effort) were widely published in US/UK media prior to the war.
The war was able to be sold not because the truth was concealed, but because enough people didn't want to hear the truth, they wanted a story which provided an easy outlet for their racist bloodlust.
Was that average pro-war citizens as guilty as the people actively marketing the war? No. But they weren't innocent, either.
Citizenship comes with responsibility.
No, it's not, because most terrorism is, as was the thing for which the name was coined, state terrorism directed at citizens of the state (states who engage in such terrorism tend to prefer to put the focus on other terrorism, of course.) But, even for the kinds of terrorism for which it is true, this part of the rationale is not the problem with terrorism, in the same way that “people are responsible for their own actions” is central to the justification for cruel and unusual punishment for crimes, but is not the problem with that punishment.
To quote the New York Times' ombudsman (a position that doesn't exist any more) [0]:
> To anyone who read the paper between September 2002 and June 2003, the impression that Saddam Hussein possessed, or was acquiring, a frightening arsenal of W.M.D. seemed unmistakable.
This was the message that the US government, the New York Times, and countless other media organizations were pushing. People who objected were viewed as eccentric, naive, or possibly even cowards who were doing the bidding of a dictator.
0. http://www.nytimes.com/2004/05/30/weekinreview/the-public-ed...
If this is what you want then cutting Russians out of the Internet is a terrible idea: consider that most are just now learning that they are actually at war and not in a freedom military operation (as the state media is making them believe).
I agree. I don't think they should be cut off from the Internet. But I do wholeheartedly support economic sanctions.
If you're in any country but Ukraine think about WHY you're picking sides and who told you to do that.
The countries near Russia expect to be next. Part of Germany was under Russian control prior Fall of USSR. Which is why European countries care. NATO has multiple members that are members for this reason. EU has multiple members that see this as an active threat to them.
The USA should care, because they promised protection to Ukraine in exchange of Ukraine getting rid of nuclear arsenal back in nineties. Not that USA would be reliable, but they should not be completely unreliable.
And that USA is member of nato for own interests and that first time there is actual threat to nato they should not ignore it entirely is also fascinatingly ignored argument.
And they surrounding countries taking in refugees is not not particular oddity since surrounding countries always have to take refugees when aggressor goes in is also ignored argument.
Is this about the chemical weapons, that were confirmed to exist by the NYT itself, as well as the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons?
https://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/24/world/middleeast/question...
https://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/23/world/middleeast/thousand...
https://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/16/world/cia-is-said-to-have...
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2014/12/03/world/middlee...
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2014/10/14/world/middlee...
This would not set up a precedent, it's almost the entirety of US foreign policy.
Fuck yes they should have. Absolutely
Americans were complicit because it didn't (immediately and viscerally) effect them, just like Russians have been so far. If it effects them enough they'll stop working.
> Punishing civilians for the actions of its government
With few exceptions, governments serve the people under them. Pray tell, How popular is Putin in Russia right now?
I mean, yes?
America is a functioning democracy. The leaders have been elected, and stay in power based on the mercy of the electorate. Some recent challenges in that respect notwithstanding, I feel it's almost a tautology that America and Americans should be held responsible for things that America and Americans do - even MORE than in authoritarian countries. Same for Canada and UK et cetera et cetera.
I don't know what viable alternative to sanctions affecting citizenry anybody is proposing - targeted assassination of heads of state one disagrees with? Mlitary response? Just ignoring it? Yelling loudly? How else do we propose to send a message to a state "Please don't DO that" without involving the electorate that either demanded, participated, or allowed such actions?
..in Russia
The "West" response need to be carefully thoughtout to not trigger an escalation while protecting our borders like a knife wielding psycho that somehow still tolerates "mistakes".
Todays western politicians are acting in an insane way. Look how India and China instinctively stay out of this.
Putin will be dead or out of power in 10 years. There is a tomorrow without him too.
Because money, not cooler heads.
I donno how instinctive it is given the hard lessons they have been learning.
The countries have stationed tens of thousands of soldiers backed by artillery, tanks and fighter jets along their de facto border, called the Line of Actual Control. In 2020, 20 Indian troops were killed in a clash with Chinese soldiers involving clubs, stones and fists. China said it lost four soldiers.
So, as the planet, shall we let him be? Or what's the right course of action?
The important part is to give the Russian state a fake victory. They know it is fake. We know it. But it is still a victory.
Prepare for a post-Putin Russia and prevent chaos when he dies by economic support and a hug. We don't want those nukes in the hand of a regional warchief ...
This clearly doesn't work if you look at the history, both with Russia and other similar states.
They are power hungry and will try to take more land after a few years, all the while engaging in psypops and propaganda to destabilize their enemy and its allies
I feel many people think this happening is Hitler invading Checkoslovakia were he should have been stopped with the benefit of hindsight. There is no reason to believe history has to be repeating it self. A fair warning, yes. A profetia, no.
I don't know what we should do, but take it chill and cold is one of those things.
You shouldn’t censor yourself because of meaningless internet points. Getting downvoted doesn’t hurt, I promise.
Seems like the initial anger is being replaced with fear among people, which gives room for cold reasoning. A good thing I guess ...
That is what I meant with I was glad I was not downvoted.
I'm also to really sure why should it be different when Russia decides it wants to invade, say, Estonia? Obviously, they'e in NATO, but so what? Why shouldn't we throw them to the wolves as well? Better that than to risk nuclear war, yeah?
Regarding second paragraph, would existence of NATO even make sense if it won't defend one of its members?
They’re crazy/brave enough to defend their democracy and organize militias to bolster their armed forces and have already taken out a Chechen special forces unit and a Spetznaz Maj Gen.
I’ll let you explain your plan to them.
Ukraine is not a vital interest to the West nor NATO, but it is to Russia, and short of WWIII which generates a very real risk of a nuclear exchange in Europe the situation in Ukraine is not changing. This is the same opinion Barack Obama held in 2014. People need to think about this on a timeline longer than their emotional attachment to this issue demands.
Recall when prominent American leaders, Hillary Clinton among them, demanded a NATO enforced no-fly zone over Syria as an addendum to arming Islamists in the country. This absolutely would’ve resulted in NATO and Russian direct combat, and with it war. Cooler heads prevailed then and I pray they do so now.
IMO the best reasonable outcome I see for this war is for Russia to annex the Donbas, and possibly the Azov coast. Ukraine will commit to neutrality from NATO and no missiles, but leave open the possibility to join the EU as an economic partner.
Ukraine is shattered right now. There is no good reason to further seal their fate by handing Zelenskyy to that short arsed madman on a silver platter and turning them into a shithole like Russia.
This looks "nice" on paper, but how would this neutrality be actually enforced? I'd imagine that a situation where Ukraine has a relatively small army and commits to not hosting either NATO or Russian military bases would be a) quite uncomfortable for Ukrainians and b) highly unstable, with the balance bound to tip to one of the sides sooner or later. Are there any historical precedents of a similar arrangement that worked?
Their analysis does not have to be correct for them acting on it. Was Iraq a significant security threat to the US? Or, did the war decrease it?
I agree on your best outcome.
Biden and Putin are the only players with agency here.
Furthermore, RemarkEon's answer is excellent.
Somebody already told that, but when one looks to Russia's history, they'll see that, the goal is to get bigger and bigger for centuries. They want access to warmer waters (i.e. Mediterranean waters) for at least two centuries now.
So, there's no fake victory, and there's no stopping for them. Also, this is not related to Putin only. Russia is one of the countries which have a stable strategy for at least a century, and they just want to make their goals a reality.
This reads like a personal take on things. Russia doesn't have a strategy lasting much longer than the life of its current leader. It is as chaotic as any other large organization.
Except neither the cabinet nor the oligarchs are the one doing the killing, it's the grunts at the bottom.
If every Russian deposed arms, there would be no war.
I don't think it's fair to compare the democratically elected government of an European country to a blood thirsty middle eastern dictatorship. At least, they certainly didn't garner the same sympathy from people.
As for Vietnam, it’s interesting to see that the loosing side was where people desperately fled, often risking their lives in makeshift rafts. That the people would risk their lives for a shot at maybe getting refugee status in America rather than live in a communist nation should tell us a lot. Same goes for failed states like Venezuela and Cuba.
America is a democracy, so influencing the citizens is effective. Cooler heads still need to prevail - you can't use all your non-war tools, or you'll only be left with going to war
Who realistically could have done this, keeping in mind the Coalition of the Willing [0]? The global "community" was clearly not of one mind about this. Sanctions are working against Russia because most of the richest countries are behind the sanctions.
Other commenters have alluded to sanctioning US/UK over Yemen, which sounds reasonable, however, in that the case, too, why would European countries impose sanctions for conflicts they're taking part in themselves [1]?
Also, the Russian invasion of Ukraine is merely the (very large) straw that broke the camel's back with regards to these sanctions. Russia went it alone. Let's not pretend that Russia was on good terms with NA/EU or that Putin had any built up good will, either. The situations are vastly different. I'm not sure the precedent being set is what you think it is.
0 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coalition_of_the_willing
1 - https://www.adhrb.org/2021/01/european-involvement-in-the-hu...
Of course the Russian people are morally responsible for their culture and its products (including the war in Ukraine). That culture has produced the conquest obsessed Russian state (including Putin, he is a product of that culture). The Russian people have reveled in the atmosphere of power, greatness, empire, return to glory, and all that bullshit propaganda that Putin has been feeding them for two decades. They cheerily rode the highs with him during the good oil years, applauding as he stripped away human rights one after another, refusing to go against him en masse. They now bear the moral responsibility for tolerating him from the very beginning (dictators quite often only get more difficult to remove with time). Oh now you can't get rid of him? No kidding. Oh now a lot of people would have to die to remove him from power? No kidding - like the people being killed in the name of the Russian people in Ukraine.
The Russian people are responsible for what ideas they hold, what they believe, who they follow, what propaganda they accept or reject (and they've been willingly drinking the propaganda by the liter for a very long time). They tolerated Putin's power grab and abuses for many years early on and did next to nothing to try to stop him. They have celebrated him often, he has been widely popular for most of his reign. How many more centuries of authoritarianism need to go by before people figure out that the Russian people are responsible for their culture and their culture is producing the authoritarianism. It's not bad luck producing those repeat results. Raise your hand if you think the Nazi ideology magically, spontaneously appeared - no, it was an assembled mash of ideas that were popular at the time, prevalent in the culture of the German region, commonly held by the people there. Putin's authoritarianism, his obsession with the Russian ethnic superstate (which is quite similar to Hitler's obsession with the German ethnic superstate), also did not appear out of nowhere, it's directly from their culture.
And - speaking as an American - of course the American people are morally responsible if their government does something similarly horrible as what Russia is doing in Ukraine. That very obviously also goes for what happened in Vietnam. The US Government and its presidents are the product of the American culture, which the American people are responsible for.
If the other empires of Europe changed (Germany, Spain, Britain, France, etc) - their people changed those empire, conquest obsessed cultures - then Russia too can and must change. Russia is the last major power in Europe still clinging to those decrepit, backwards ways. Russia must give up the notion of empire culturally and that means its people must fully abandon all the related ideas that propel and sustain that ideology (which endlessly spawns monsters like Putin (who is just another Russian Tsar type)). Until the people of Russia change their beliefs, the authoritarianism will just keep repeating.
It's not an 'if'. The US did a lot of stuff on par with what Putin is doing now in Ukraine. The people and government of the US never were held responsible. Yes, they went through the motions of getting the UN approval, etc., but that does not make the actions morally justifiable. And this is what Russian propaganda uses to justify its actions.
I don't like pinning Putins actions on ordinary citizens. Putin is a dictator. In 2012 there was a big rally against him, and it was suppressed pretty violently, and since then there were no attempts on the same scale. Look at how Belorussians tried to topple Lukashenko. They made a much stronger attempt, but sill it did not work out. Are they morally responsible for the Belarus participation in this war? Are the people like me who moved out are responsible? When does that moral responsibility start? 2000s or 2010s?
Sure, there is a large chunk of population that supports Putin. They maybe are morally responsible for supporting the war. But I don't think they will actually be swayed by economic sanctions. Their culture won't change. They will be happy to severe ties with 'rotten West' -- they will feel like they are soldiers of the economic war. What will happen, I am afraid, is Russia turning into a second North Korea (or Venezuela).
> If the other empires of Europe changed (Germany, Spain, Britain, France, etc) - their people changed those empire, conquest obsessed cultures - then Russia too can and must change. Russia is the last major power in Europe still clinging to those decrepit, backwards ways. Russia must give up the notion of empire culturally and that means its people must fully abandon all the related ideas that propel and sustain that ideology (which endlessly spawns monsters like Putin (who is just another Russian Tsar type)). Until the people of Russia change their beliefs, the authoritarianism will just keep repeating.
In my rather uneducated opinion, the culture did not go away. The US is an empire. It is built differently, but it effectively is. China is or is becoming one. European culture is dominating the world in many subtile and not so subtile ways. Russia wants to be an empire, but it fails to recognize that empires are being built differently now, and tries to build a 19-th/20-th century one.
Disclaimer: I am from Russia, and live in the US. Have extended family in Russia. Unfortunately, some of them are brainwashed by the propaganda. Some are unable to leave as their whole life is to work in government-funded research (thankfully not military in any way). Fuck Putin and fuck the war. My best wishes to Ukrain and its people -- you will will regardless of how this war turns out.
PS. Apologies for the long rant...
Putin is an evil authoritarian dictator who commits far worse atrocities than removing people's internet access. That should be obvious, but apparently has to be pointed out with a disclaimer before any remotely nuanced statement? I didn't realize this was Twitter!
Your comment is a bit funny since you are forectly contradicting yourself. When you (wrongfully) thought that russians couldn't access twitter anymore, the russian bots just seemed to have... disappeared for you. But in reality, nothing changed, so maybe they weren't there to begin with, and this is a weird example of a placebo effect, lol.
Or it could be the collapse of western democracy from the inside. After all, the alternative is a bunch of people genuinely believe for 3 weeks that Trudeau was Hitler because he waited 3 weeks, asked people nicely to stop unlawfully occupying the capital and stopping international commerce, then had the police move in and as peacefully and quietly as humanly possible, removed them. Last I checked, this is not the behavior our mustachioed friend was known for. So that would leave politics in a sad state indeed.
Your so-called take-down isn't the victory you think it is haha. Either I'm right, and we lost recently, you're right, and we lost a long time ago.
Sadly I think I agree with the last part of your comment. It's actually why I really dislike the "russian bots are everywhere" narrative, because it distracts or obscures from the real problems we actually have. I think it's a cop out to blame foreign interference for very real tensions and disagreements we have in our society. My point wasn't to attempt a take down or to win an argument, it was mostly to drive home the point that it's all maybe deeper than just russian trolls after all ;)
The restrictions in place were lawful and in keeping with the charter. Canada is a rule of law jurisdiction and judicial avenues existed for the resolution of these grievances. As did normal protests. I welcome normal protests, and I welcome the truckers to return to Ottawa and picket - without their trucks. Their goal though was to overturn the results of the last election - of a minority government they only have to wait an average of less than a year to see fall on its own.
I didn't vote for Trudeau last time, I won't vote for him next time, and I completely agree with his use.
> My point wasn't to attempt a take down or to win an argument, it was mostly to drive home the point that it's all maybe deeper than just russian trolls after all ;)
It might be, but it could also be normal disagreements that are having a wedge placed in them by foreign adversaries.
Or it could be completely unrelated. I am very open to that.
Sure. This time it really was the Russians. Because in the middle of the largest military intervention Russia had since the fall of the USSR they would devote resources and care about what happens in Ottawa.
It all makes sense.
I guess my question to you is: do you think a 16 year veteran of the KGB - a warmonger with a lust for the Soviet Union - and a vendetta against the west for brining it down, with total control over an enemy state is more likely to or not to be conducting destabilization campaigns in enemy states? I think a study would be interesting and I would be happy to hear either outcome. However, I strongly suspect there's nothing anyone would tell you that would change your mind one way or the other.
Before you answer, remember, he is currently trying to set fire to Europe's largest nuclear reactor.
Further, you seem to be alluding to American politics, I am not talking about America at all.
I'm sure it was the KGB behind the thousands small amount donations from verifiable United States and Canadian citizens.
The Spetnaz are probably behind the bouncy castle and hot tub the protester brought! Look at these dangerous criminals! [0] [1]
> Further, you seem to be alluding to American politics, I am not talking about America at all.
And yet it’s the same tactics and media spin across the borders. "but this time it really is the Russians! Just trust us..."
[0] https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2022/02/07/14/53878649-10480717...
[1] https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2022/02/07/17/53885525-10480717...
These are exactly the kinds of operations the KGB carried out during the cold war, and is a core part of Russian military doctrine to this day. [1] The fact is, if you refuse to accept that it's a possibility (even as I accept it may not have been) then the system works doesn't it.
The thing is, when it works, people don't realize they have been influenced and they flat out refuse to believe it could have been by a state actor. The only politicians people complain about at work are bad politicians - the good ones already convinced you their idea was right. Ditto here.
> And yet it’s the same tactics and media spin across the borders. "but this time it really is the Russians! Just trust us..."
What do you mean "this time?" The Russians have never come up in the context of Canadian politics in my recent memory. Not as far as I can recall. Can you, or are you projecting American politics again?
You know for all the pictures of bouncy castles, they also built a shack downtown and filled it with diesel and propane [2], were arrested with significant quantities of weapons [3] and also the leadership has ties with white supremacist organizations and white nationalists [4]. They pissed all over national monuments. [5] They stole food from homeless shelters. [6] And they fought people inside the Rideau Centre mall forcing it to close to protect workers. [7] All while blocking international commerce. This is just a choice few selections. Good riddance I say.
For the record, 2/3 of Canadians support the Trudeau government's use of the Act, and only 1/3 voted for him - so I'd say that's a heck of a broad base of support.
But go on. Tell me more about my people. You're not Canadian, are you?
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disinformation#Russian_disinfo...
[2] https://ottawa.ctvnews.ca/protesters-build-wooden-structure-...
[3] https://www.newsweek.com/canadian-police-arrest-11-batch-wea...
[4] https://globalnews.ca/news/8543281/covid-trucker-convoy-orga...
[5] https://www.blogto.com/city/2022/01/trucker-convoy-protest-u...
[6] https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/convoy-tru...
[7] https://ottawacitizen.com/news/local-news/egan-trucker-right...
The Canadians feds were also notorious for planting bombs back in the 70’s and try to pin it down on political opponents.
> The Russians have never come up in the context of Canadian politics in my recent memory. Not as far as I can recall. Can you, or are you projecting American politics again?
Absolutely. 4 years of “the Russians have to be behind this” and nothing happening here in America. And then suddenly we start hearing the same thing from the (liberal) media over there. What a coincidence. Almost as if they tried everything to see what would stick!
> You know for all the pictures of bouncy castles, they also built a shack downtown and filled it with diesel and propane
How else were they supposed to fuel their trucks? The city could have offered to hook them to the power grid but they preferred the trucker bring fuel apparently.
> were arrested with significant quantities of weapons
Second amendment & Legal weapons. Notice no crimes were committed using said weapon and they refrained from answering the question whether these were legally owned.
> and also the leadership has ties with white supremacist organizations and white nationalists.
Are those organizations illegal? Or just not liked by the government and state media?
> For the record, 2/3 of Canadians support the Trudeau government's use of the Act
They had a vote on it?
> But go on. Tell me more about my people. You're not Canadian, are you?
No.
Or how about aggression on Yugoslavia?
Should the global community have targeted all Americans for the actions of the Bush Presidency invading Iraq under false pretenses? Or how about Vietnam?
Realize that our next Iraq or Vietnam this new standard could be applied to us or any other country. Will bloodthirsty Twitter be cheering on the digital and economic destruction of civilians then? Cooler heads need to start prevailing.