Hypothetically, if the west actually wanted to give up sanctions in return for clearing the blockade.. why, in what universe, could they possibly expect Russia to stand by its word?

Russia said for six months they were simply conducting exercises and had no intention of invading whatsoever. Why should anyone believe they would clear the blockade if sanctions lift?

If they don't stand by their word then they can re-impose the sanctions, it's as simple as that.

> Why should anyone believe they would clear the blockade if sanctions lift

Because at some point the West will have to sit at the negotiating table with Russia.

> If they don't stand by their word then they can re-impose the sanctions, it's as simple as that.

That does not work with the current Russian regime. The only thing removing sanctions will do is allow them time to come up with solutions to mitigate future sanctions. They are not good-faith actors, and only use good-faith solutions to improve their leverage in future deals

For everyone who wants to downvote, go and look how well the sanctions after the 2014 invasion worked. The primary reason why the invasion of 2022 went forward was due to their confidence that they could mitigate the same style of sanctions that went into effect then

> Because at some point the West will have to sit at the negotiating table with Russia.

Do they? What does Russia have that will force them to the negotiating table? The damage to this years harvest is already done and the supply chains will likely have figured themselves out by next year

If the US accrues enough "Oh, we don't talk to _those people_, we only sanction them" world states, they will encompass enough of the world's population to make it unreasonable for third parties to obey US sanctions, which they currently tend to (because the US sanctions transitively); and enough of the world's population to do things like replace SWIFT and/or drop the USD as their main reserve currency.

(Also, there's the question of the fate of the Ukranians, but I guess you're right in that the US doesn't care enough about that to negotiate with Russia.)

I mean yea, but arguing that the US has hit that point is different than arguing that Russia in particular will have to be negotiated with. The US could always lower sanctions on other nations than Russian

this seems like nebulous FUD that attempts to downplay that one of the actors here is literally engaging in a genocide

will the world (NOT the U.S., as the opposition to Russia's genocidal war is global) accrue enough countries out of 200 or so which engage in genocidal invasions of conquest of their neighbors in the 21st century? sounds implausible

> is literally engaging in a genocide

You know, the US (and people who drink its kool-aid) has been leveling several such false accusations lately, another one being about the Chinese treatment of the Uyghurs. As a person whose family was decimated by genocide I'll tell you that it's quite insulting on the personal level; but beyond this - that kind of rhetoric has a "boy who cried wolf effect", and that's really bad.

You do not need the fabricated accusations to condemn Russia for war crimes and the killing of civilians in its invasion of the Ukraine.

Russia intentionally targets civilians in Ukraine, because they are Ukrainian, how does that not meet the definition of genocide? which is.

`Genocide is the intentional destruction of a people — usually defined as an ethnic, national, racial, or religious group — in whole or in part`.

When USA nuked Japanese civilians we didn't call it genocide. Targeting civilians is not the definition of genocide.

But the targeting of a specific ethnic group, because they are that ethnic group is, isn't it?.

I think this is a pretty good article on the topic, https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-61017352 and presents both perspectives.

Killing people who support an opposing faction isn't genocide either, that is just regular dictatorship terror tactics. The fact that Putin argues that Ukranians don't exist and that they all are Russians just supports that it isn't a genocide, as he doesn't intend to kill all Russians, just the "Russians" who refuse to be Russians.

Instead of calling it a genocide, call it a massacre. Russia is massacring Ukranians, nobody is arguing against that, and the world stopped accepting such behavior even in wars a long time ago. Prematurely calling it a genocide just makes people stop listening to you.

>The fact that Putin argues that Ukranians don't exist and that they all are Russians just supports that it isn't a genocide

as it turns out, the exact opposite is true. attempting to erase a people (as in "the Ukrainian people") is a pretty common aspect of genocide, and includes forcibly destroying their identity as a unique people

>Prematurely calling it a genocide just makes people stop listening to you.

then it is good that nobody has done so prematurely, as people have not stopped listening (unless you personally constitute "people" ;)

for more examples of the genocide you're denying, a non-comprehensive list of genocidal policies russia employs in Ukraine is at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31447187

per the definition of genocide that I found on the UN's website, they are easily committing at least one of the points that defines a genocide. That is

- Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.

https://www.un.org/en/genocideprevention/genocide.shtml

> he doesn't intend to kill all Russians, just the "Russians" who refuse to be Russians.

Given the slaughter of civilians in the majority pro Russian regions of Ukraine i'd argue that is easily false.

Are you implying the Uyghur situation isn't real?

I prefer to let the dronies and tankies argue their pro NATO talking points vs pro China talking points without my involvement. Most of us will have too much trouble wading through multiple state propaganda outlets to arrive at a reliable conclusion on that one.

> Because at some point the West will have to sit at the negotiating table with Russia.

The whole point is that you can't negotiate with Russia. Ukraine gave away it's nukes by negotiations and Russia isn't keeping its end of the bargain. Russia has to be defeated like the Japanese did or collapse like it tends to do from time to time.

> Because at some point the West will have to sit at the negotiating table with Russia.

I hope not. I've really taken to the idea that China should manage their connections to the West and hopefully take a lot off the top until Putin is dead.

China not being a democracy doesn't seem to be a problem when it comes to institutional stabilities for managing NK. The US has done a lot worse with some of its dictator client states.

Sure if the Russians want to have another revolution and run new elections or something that's great but trying to get Russia to do something is like pushing against a horse. Lets let China push Russia and see what happens.

> Because at some point the West will have to sit at the negotiating table with Russia.

We can suffer for longer than they can stay solvent.

I wouldn't bet the US economy on that.

There is no "negotiating table with Russia".

There is a "negotiating table with Putin" but it's far from sure if they'll really have to sit on that table or how long that table will even exist.

What is "the west" exactly? Japan? New Zealand? Finland? Tunisia? A better term would be liberal democracies, but that wouldn't have quite the same "both sides are the same" ring to it, would it?

Russia isn't waging an economic war against anyone. A dictator tried to invade his democratic neighbour, he failed, and now the other democraties are cutting him out of their club

The Economist is cagey about the definition, but by context it works out to "America and its allies" (where "America" is "The United States of America".

See e.g., "How the West should respond to China’s search for foreign outposts" (https://www.economist.com/leaders/2022/05/07/how-the-west-sh...), which uses the phrase "America and its allies" three times.

The US, NATO, NORAD, ANZUS, SEATO, and specific alliances such as the US-Japan alliance, Mutual Defense Treaty between the United States and the Republic of Korea, and the like, would likely be included. In the context of Ukraine and this article, probably the Common Security and Defence Policy (CDSP) of the EU as well.

Tunisia is a) dependent on Russian and Ukrainian wheat b) about to strike itself off the democracy list

As a friend of mine told NPR: “It’s not that Tunisia’s democracy is threatened. Tunisia’s democracy has been shot in the head.”

The West ~= the "Liberal International Order"

Mostly the US, with some UK mixed in.

> A better term would be liberal democracies

If you think "liberal democracies" still carries the same positive vibe across the world that it used to some years ago you are in for a big surprise.

> "both sides are the same" ring to it

They are definitely not the same, they have obviously different values. Again, Putin has said as much, he's the one fighting for a multi-polar world with multi-polar values, so to speak. I think the same holds for Xi, in China.

> If you think "liberal democracies" still carries the same positive vibe across the world that it used to some years ago you are in for a big surprise.

I mean, I agree that it doesn't carry the same positive vibes that it used to, but it still carries much better vibes than "corrupt authoritarian semi-dictatorships".

To those who might try going "muh western propaganda" on this, save your time. I am speaking as someone who grew up in one of those "corrupt authoritarian semi-dictatorships" and eventually immigrated to a "liberal democracy".

Yeah, the gaslighting cracks me up. I too escaped a former Soviet bloc country that Russia invaded in exactly the same way it is invading Ukraine right now.

I now live in one of those “horrible” western democracies where I can tell the Prime Minister that he’s an idiot to his face and the worst that’ll happen is that he’ll laugh at me in a dismissive way.

But these countries are “all the same”, right? Right?

I live in one of those two. Six million are prevented from traveling by plane in mine at the moment.

"Two cheers for democracy", as usual, to borrow Forster's words.

As he noted, it doesn't merit three cheers. Two, though? Maybe two.

> Mostly the US, with some UK mixed in.

That's the opposition to Russia? Hardly, Ukraine's neighbours are doing far more than anyone in London or Washington.

> They are definitely not the same, they have obviously different values

Yes one of them is democracy, the other is dictatorships. One is good, the other is bad. Refreshingly, some things in life are simple.

> he's the one fighting for a multi-polar world with multi-polar values

if he wanted a multi-polar world he'd have let ukraine be a pole. no, he wants a russian world, with himself at the top of it

Again, the Russians have said as much what they want. What they understand by "multi-polar world" is the US (and its allies), Russia, China, maybe India, maybe some other regional thingie, like South America/Mercosur maybe (I think by this point they're already branding the EU under "US and its allies", that wasn't always the case, especially around 2003-2005 when Germany and France were against the US intervention in Iraq).

Yes, they would want Ukraine under their sphere of influence, that one has been also made pretty clear by them ever since the USSR was broken up.

that sounds like both a bad idea, and an unrealistic idea, most of all because in that presentation russia considers itself an equal to the others in the list, which it most certainly is not, in nearly all respects

in a more generalized sense, russia actually doesn't care about any of the countries listed but itself, except insofar as it can convince those countries to support russia

the world is already multipolar, as was pointed out – look to the UN for an example of how multiple poles interact with each other in a civilized fashion – nearly 200 of them!

russia doesn't want this, all they want is domination, and the disintegration of the multipolar world that is civilized diplomacy which might unite and thus present a united front against russian domination and genocide

>”the world is already multipolar, as was pointed out – look to the UN for an example of how multiple poles interact with each other in a civilized fashion – nearly 200 of them!”

This isn’t what polarity refers to. The nations of the UN are not at all equal in terms of power and influence.

While no one would question that the United States, Russia, and China are the “poles” in this system, no one would regard any of the 190ish other nations which are far smaller and less powerful as poles.

In the UN the nations are more equal than anywhere else.

At tha General Assembly all nations are equal. And after all of the abuses of veto powers discussions to eliminate the permanent Security Council positions are once again picking up steam.

> If you think "liberal democracies" still carries the same positive vibe across the world that it used to some years ago you are in for a big surprise.

Agree, I would state it as "liberal" "democracies" - this is an opinion of course, but I think if one was to fairly but critically perform an in-depth evaluation, things are not as lovely as they are described to the masses.

> Again, Putin has said as much, he's the one fighting for a multi-polar world with multi-polar values, so to speak. I think the same holds for Xi, in China.

Great pole there! /s The West may have it's problems, but Putin is trying to resurrect the same pole that was led at one point or another by Hitler, Stalin, Mao. The world doesn't need that again.

I agree Putin is some kind of dictator, but are you really calling Ukraine democracy? Then you can also call North Korea democracy.

Uhm, yes? They elected a comedian with no political experience or ties for f's sake. But I suppose that was some sort of rigged election or he's just a figurehead or something?

Uh, he's banned all opposition parties. Where's the democracy? He was a direct employee of a Ukrainian billionaire oligarch, plenty of ties, just check the Pandora Papers...

What are you talking about? He didn't ban opposition, only pro-russian (and that is just small part of opposition).

Yeah? One of those parties had nearly 10% of the seats in the Ukrainian parliament. That's not a democratic move.

are you backpedaling from "banned ALL opposition parties"? it's unclear whether or not you still believe this is the case

Election where major opposition parties were banned? A democratic society where 40+% of population is not allowed to use their own language? When opposition leaders get arrested? Where almost a 100 people were publicly burned alive, and still no one is punished? Where right wing extremists / neonazi paramilitaries are incorporated in an official army and given a licence to kill, as documented by OSCE multiple times in eastern part of the country? And all that happened before this war. Just that they now fight Russians doesn't mean they are democracy, they are just a useful enemy of an enemy.

And the list goes on and on, although only one of the mentioned things would be enough to consider such a country as non-democratic at least.

I think corruption and a rule of oligarch is the least problem in a country like that.

>are you really calling Ukraine democracy

Isn't it strange how Russian money kept trying to prevent it from becoming so and yet, it kept becoming one?

There is some speculation that the liberal democratic rumblings from Zelenski are what forced Putin to act. I have no illusions that a country with deeply rooted corruption issues like Ukraine can turn on a dime, but he was at least voicing support for the idea. If he managed to root out some of the corruption then Putin would lose the ability to puppet the state entirely, and that's a slippery slope to becoming part of Europe and being lost to Russia forever.

Another option for #4 is supplying enough long range anti-ship rockets to sink whole russian fleet in black sea. They can't bring in more ships, because turkey is blocking the entrance.

Triggering world war 3 would also help reduce the population which could reduce co2 emissions and food requirements. Killing a few birds with one stone.

That's not much different than supplying other kinds of weapons (and anti-ship missiles are on the list anyway, if not from US then from UK).

Also everybody is mostly over nuclear threat I think. When a nuclear country keeps annexing land and threatens you with nukes if you object, you have two options -- keep giving up or call the bluff (or assassinate the leadership I guess).

This doesn't really make any sense though. It changes nothing about the geopolitical reality of what's going on.

If the US sends a merchant ship and a cruiser, what is russia going to do exactly? Try to bomb the ships? They will lose, and get shot down.

Why would it suddenly be WWIII? Is russia really going to say "Well, they shot down our plane so its global thermonuclear war time".

"Is russia really going to say "Well, they shot down our plane so its global thermonuclear war time"."

That is what they have been threatening...

They threaten everyone and change their mind all the time. It's mostly irrelevant to what they actually do.

The question was would they really "say" it.

It felt pretty clear to me the intention was saying it "to themselves" and following up with actual action. Nobody cares if they say things aloud.

in that case, it would be russia starting ww3, and I don't think they will.

I agree, but they will spin it from their prospective to say Han, I mean we, shot first.

But there is no spin. There's either global thermonuclear war or there's nothing. If NATO isn't invading Russia, and Russia isn't invading NATO, then nothing has changed.

Does Russia want to start global thermonuclear war because they can argue a technicality that it's not their fault? No, I don't think so. They could start the war and the outcome would be the same at any time they want.

Excusing the edge case of a pathetic attempt of a land invasion of Finland or Poland or something crazy.

Russia might respond with conventional cruise missile strikes against US forces in the region.

Shrug. We're shipping $40B of shit to ukraine. It really doesn't matter.

Unlikely. That would give all of NATO casus belli.

> Why would it suddenly be WWIII? Is russia really going to say "Well, they shot down our plane so its global thermonuclear war time".

Because Vladimir Putin is currently very very defective.

He's also very very scared to do anything of consequence. Look, the Ukrainian invasion was the only reckless thing he's ever done and look how it turned out.

More like incompetent

I suspect he's about as far down the vascular dementia pathway as Trump is, despite being five years younger.

We are talking about a country that can’t even supply proper boots to its troops. Why believe that the nuclear weapons they inherited from USSR still work?

I really wish the last few years didn't make me desensitized to the notion.

I‘d rather die trying, than live in a non-free world.

And fyi, whatever arrangement of characters your reply to this statement will consist of, it will not change my stance, so do not bother.

>"I‘d rather die trying, than live in a non-free world."

Well many people went to Ukraine to fight on their side. If that is what you do why would anyone bother "changing your stance". Just go and do it.

But if you expect other people to perish in WWIII for the sake your stance they might hold a different opinion about that part.

those other people choose to, as they would rather vaporize than give an inch of their land to russia

if you expect them to surrender or accept less, well, you'll have to make your case to them

>"those other people choose to, as they would rather vaporize than give an inch of their land to russia"

If that was the case we would have active war in Crimea in 2014.

>"if you expect them to surrender or accept less, well, you'll have to make your case to them"

Why would I make any case? I do not expect anything. It is their choice. Also I do not think the talking was about Ukraine in particular. The statement was generic.

> If that was the case we would have active war in Crimea in 2014.

Nobody believed it was happening, i.e. Ukrainians never expected having to fight Russians. Now it's completely different; Ukraine has been preparing for an escalation of the war for 8 years.

>"as they would rather vaporize than give an inch of their land to russia"

That was the statement. I replied to. By taking Crimea Putin had taken a great deal more than "an inch"

>"Nobody believed it was happening,"

Nobody believed the Crimea was taken?

> Nobody believed the Crimea was taken?

Nobody in Crimea believed it was being taken, until it was. By that time, the Ukranian government was beheaded, whatever left of the army was demoralized. There was literally a few thousand dollars in the state's coffers. Insurgency in the east was ramping up; a few volunteer battalions were formed overnight, financed by neighborhood donations, and sent off to fight the (covert) invasion in the east. It's actually a miracle Ukraine survived in 2014, so fighting the Russian regular army (with a big Naval base) in Crimea was not on top of the list.

It's been 8 years since and no fight for Crimea. This still contradicts the original statement: "as they would rather vaporize than give an inch of their land to russia".

And I am far from blaming Ukrainians. Their government luckily had enough brain cells and had voted not to attack what Russia considers their territory and not to vaporize their nation for the sake of some hot heads's stance.

Had they decided to do so on their own before Russia's invasion then there would be no support from the West. The chance of them succeeding militarily in Crimea in that case I think would have been big fat zero.

So no, in general I do not think want people to get vaporized en masse just because somebody believes they should.

Also we might just have a case of keyboard warriors here. It is easy to be brave / stupid sitting in a safe place in front of computer screen.

>It's been 8 years since and no fight for Crimea. This still contradicts the original statement: "as they would rather vaporize than give an inch of their land to russia".

only if you believe that viewpoints and opinions and attitudes of humans never change, a ridiculous notion

>It is easy to be brave / stupid sitting in a safe place in front of computer screen.

if you don't like that that's their attitude, feel free to complain to them about it, don't attack me, the messenger, telling you how it is. after all, it is easy for you to doubt their resolve in a safe place in front of a computer screen

I’ll drink to that!

And then you have Russian aviation attacking and sinking Ukrainian merchant ships, plus a couple of submarines.

Ukraine doesn't have much of a merchant fleet. Most of their exports travel on foreign bottoms. And foreign ship owners are unwilling to risk entering an active conflict zone, especially because they can't obtain affordable insurance.

for a short while, while said aviation exists

we can play this game all day long, but the past 2 months have clearly shown that russian conventional forces are not even close to a match for NATO combined forces*

* as long as the goal isn't to slaughter as many civilians as possible, which for russia is a strong assumption

The Russian government has demonstrated beyond any reasonable doubt that it is not a good faith interlocutor. Nobody should take anything they say seriously.

> Nobody should take anything they say seriously

It's almost amazing that the newspapers reprint what Putin says, as if it was something to take seriously. Without explaining to the readers that Putin is trying to manipulate them. -- They're sometimes letting themselves be a megaphone he can use, I think.

It took years for the media to reach that point with a recent would-be tyrant.

Though Putin's been headed that way for far longer.

Would-be tyrant -- I'm guessing you have in mind the president in the US who didn't want to leave, after having lost the elections? (Could have made him a dictator at least, eventually, if he had succeeded. A tyrant? Hmm it means "a cruel and oppressive ruler" -- so yes, then, I'd guess it would have turned out that way. Cliffhanger ... soon 2024.) Or am I'm bad at guessing :-)

> It probably won't happen because the West doesn't like to see itself as being involved in the war (in a way similar to what Russia thinks about itself)

Ridiculous equivalency. Your boogeyman "the West" didn't attack Russia and doesn't have troops in Russia.

Running the blockade doesn't necessarily require Russian cooperation in advance. All that's required is a minesweeper, and some commanders and captains with giant balls.

Run some ships under a NATO flag to Odessa, fill them up and run them back. Russia will bluster and threaten, but I doubt they'll actually do anything. Russia is not in a strong enough position to be able to escalate. I'm not anywhere close to sure of that, Putin is definitely not completely rational. I do think it's a risk worth taking.