lisasays

Yes, the Iraq invasion thoroughly evil and insane and stupid, and probably illegal. And yes, it was driven by preposterous, bald-faced lies from the start. Including lies about WMD and bioweapons and such.

Fast-forward 20 years: the Russians are telling the exact same kind of lies with regard to its (no less evil, insane, stupid and illegal) invasion of Ukraine; including lies about bioweapons and WMD -- yet even more cheaply and transparently so (using photoshopped slides no less) -- and you're just eating it up, like it's a box o' chocolates.

You're really very naive.

Just because you didn't hear about it on CNN

I never watch CNN. And if you think that anyone who doesn't buy into your narratives, therefore, does -- then you're definitely living in a bubble.

Of course he's also hedging, and talking out of both side of his mouth. It's a classic innuendo technique, and you fell for it.

You have this information from where, exactly?

And yet, in his taped comments he said exactly that:

    “There is an argument that it is ethnically targeted. Covid-19 attacks certain races disproportionately,” Mr. Kennedy said at a private gathering in New York that was captured on videotape by The New York Post. “Covid-19 is targeted to attack Caucasians and Black people. The people who are most immune are Ashkenazi Jews and Chinese.”

But there's no wiggling out of it. Try as he may to do so.

Why is the West helping them do this?

To bring an end to this insanity. As soon as humanely possible.

But you keep talking around it.

You still can't bring yourself to say who these people were. Or what happened to their descendants.

What's this supposed to mean?

Certainly it's not referring to the portion of native speakers.

Since "Western" Europe now includes Poland, the Baltics, Moldova and Finland - perhaps you can answer that question for us.

Probably because you keep neglecting to mention, for some strange reason, the ethnic group that made up some 90 percent of the population the peninsula at the time of the (not so peaceful) 1783 annexation. Let alone what, specifically, happened to them in the summer of '44.

And how obscenely ridiculous it is, as a result -- to say that the peninsula was "Russian for 200 years" prior to the 1955 transfer.

ABM

Except the US didn't just thumb their noses at, and start violating willy-nilly (like Russia did with the 1994 treaty you are so hesitant to name). Rather - it had an opt-out clause which Bush chose to enact, giving the required 6 months notice.

Kalibr is $6.5M

I knew you were going to come back with that number. It derives from a purchase of a batch sea-enabled Kalibrs by India -- an entirely different class, requiring additional support, and with the usual export / corruption charges on top. Real production costs per land-based missile are around $1M.

I cited the numbers, but not the source

The verb "to cite" literally means to refer to a source of authority. If there's no source, it's not a citation.

You can look them up on Wikipedia ... and the page on Lancet casualty estimates.

There was no Lancet study for Afghanistan. The WP page for the Afghan conflict provides a number you didn't like (an upper bound of 46,319 civilians via the Brown study), so you replaced with a number 10x that because, well, it felt good to do so I guess. That page also cites a UN study which provides another fact you don't like:

According to The United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA), the majority of civilian casualties were attributed to the Taliban and other anti-government elements each year, with the figure ranging from 61% to 80% depending on the year.

There's a bunch of other stuff you're conflating as well. Like the Afghan war - most of the other conflicts (after WW2) had large components of internecine / insurgent warfare, with large-scale massacres (not related to combat). And the Lancet study refers not only to "casualties" but to other kinds of deaths (e.g. due to lack of healthcare) - which while certainly significant, are not the same deaths due to airstrikes and such.

I'd go on with you on this, but really -- you're a mess, man. You just can't seem to get any of the basic numbers you're reporting straight.

Meanwhile Russia razes entire cities to the ground - and you question "if" they are targeting civilians.

You didn't "cite" anything. You just threw a number down, with no attribution.

So who did you get it from - the Taliban?

Why send a $10M missile at some random apartment complex instead of the nearby military target?

Since when do Kalibrs cost $10M per? Again, you're just making stuff up.

What happened to its original inhabitants?

Tell us more, please.

"So instead I just assume they're 10x what US sources say. Or whatever number suits my fancy. No need to cite sources."

If Russia is trying to target Ukrainians,

As if this is even a question.

Seems you've found yourself a pretty nifty one:

Bait, bait. Evade, evade. Troll, troll, troll.

Right - it would be impolitic to say this directly.

What you are doing instead - is calling for the cessation of all military aid. Which would inevitably force the Ukrainians to do just that, shortly enough thereafter.

So at the end of the day - that's exactly the outcome you're lobbying for.

It was very much not the intention of Russia to get into such a fight, they made that clear.

One would have to be absolutely deluded to believe this.

О боже, нет. Not all of them. Just those few thousand or soon the "kill or capture" lists that were carefully prepared before the invasion. Along with anyone who refused to dig trenches, or to answer in Russian when spoken to, or otherwise showed anything less than the highest respect for the liberating forces during the special operation.

The rest were meant for eternal subjugation: annexed to the Motherland and forcibly Russified, if they lived in predominantly Russian-speaking regions (and most likely a few buffer regions for good measure, and Kyiv itself). Those living in the Western regions would have to contend with living either in an outright vassal state, and/or one with limited sovereignty -- i.e. Finlandization but with much stronger "security guarantees" to Moscow.

Per all the things the current Tsar and his helpers have been saying, in the years leading up to the invasion.

Suffering would have ended a long time ago.

Suffering for the so-called victim would have ended long ago - if she would just lay back and yield to her suitor's perfectly natural and understandable wishes.

For the vast majority of Ukrainians life would have resumed its normal course.

Indeed - she might as well just relax, sit back - and enjoy the ride.

But in name only, you meant to say.

Because it was populated by a very solid majority of Crimean Tatars (and very few Russians) up until 1860 or so, you mean to say. That is, until shortly after the end of that war that didn't work out so well for Russia.

And then by a solid majority of non-Russians -- mostly Crimean Tatars, along with a whole host of other folks, (including Germans, Jews, Greeks, Armenians, Bulgarians, Poles - and of course, Ukrainians) until the summer of 1944, you meant to say.

At which time a magical event happened which would finally give the peninsula a majority Russian population.

Perhaps you would like to tell us what that event was?

The Ukraine lost any moral right to govern Crimea after cutting water and electricity supply to the citizens of the peninsula.

The moment the mafia-like entities which run the Peninsula decided to throw their lot with a foreign power that was, at that time, conducting a war of aggression against Ukraine in its eastern regions -- they naturally lost any right to the benefits of the North Crimean Canal.

To disinform as only CleverBot 2.0 can -- its very helpful indeed.

Russia has lost a fifth of the territory it once controlled in Ukraine.

By comparing ISW maps -- it has easily lost more than 50 percent of the territory it has attempted to seize since February 24, 2022.

If we roll the start date back to 2014 - then we're at something like 45 percent.

The death toll from the war in Ukraine has reached an estimated 14,400 people.

Also way off base. This is getting too easy, so I'll stop now.

Local soil dynamics are changing, due to human activity. So "(localized) climate change" is a perfectly reasonable description of what's happening, to a first order approximation.

The rest is just fluff and bother. I can see someone having a "meh" reaction to this choice of language. But to be "really, really fucking annoyed" by it?

I submit there are other, much bigger and genuinely sinister things at loose in the world you might want to direct your precious capacities to be "really, really fucking annoyed" at.

My suspicion is that scientists would use the term "underground climate change" [to get more press]"

More likely they were just trying to put the matter in a terms the lay person would understand.

First let's have Russia pull its troops out of Ukraine, re-affirm the binding agreements it has already signed to permanently respect its sovereignty (and amend these for additional guarantees as needed), and commit to a timetable for reparations -- with a substantial downpayment. At that point, we can have a discussion about such matters.

Until that happens - Russia has no "legitimate" security needs whatsoever.

Not that this means NATO should start putting missiles in Ukraine willy-nilly. But really, until the above happens -- one needs to just drop the word "legitimate" from one's vocabulary, as it applies to current regime's wants or needs for anything.

But can you elaborate or provide some examples, please? I'd like to know more about this angle.