Russia, US, Ukraine, and the Future

[conon394]

Its really baffling as what Putin thinks he gets out this ^. Battering cities to the ground, earns you a sullen population and a really big bill for fixing them back up. The latter is something Russia cannot afford.
Seems to me the smart move as soon as the lighting invasion failed, and the 'west' moved toward a lot of sanctions and aid to Ukraine would have to punt and just ask for some enlargement of the breakaway republics and recognition of the Crimea annexation.

[Bande Nere]

Your media is clearly lying to you. Are you willing to acknowledge that?

And risk 15 years in jail? @BH journos at La Stampa, one out of millions of western media covering the war, published the wrong picture. I guess such a horrible crime clearly warrants an immediate bombing of Turin by Putin and a planeload of VDV to capture and execute the vile nazis who work for that newspaper.

[reavertm]

We suppose these drones gonna minimize the civilian casualties in Ukraine ofc. Because Western people are very attentive to this. Or show must go on maybe?



https://www.ukrinform.net/rubric-ato...kaczynski.html

Kaczyński is moron who is satrap like Orban or Erdogan without affiliating himself with Putin.
He uses Putin way of controlling public media to fight against opposition, EU and get from one election to another. Russian invasion made him tone down on anti-EU propaganda a bit but in Poland we don't forget who he is.
His delusions do not represent sentiment of Poland as nation.

[Sar1n]

Its really baffling as what Putin thinks he gets out this ^. Battering cities to the ground, earns you a sullen population and a really big bill for fixing them back up. The latter is something Russia cannot afford.
Seems to me the smart move as soon as the lighting invasion failed, and the 'west' moved toward a lot of sanctions and aid to Ukraine would have to punt and just ask for some enlargement of the breakaway republics and recognition of the Crimea annexation.

Although his goals were different in the beginning of the invasion, I believe that now he wants to take control of the Ukrainian coastline, or at least create land connection between Crimea and Russia, and to alienate and isolate the Russian people from the world.

Because the latter, turning Russia into a bigger North Korea, is the only way he can possibly stay in his position after this fiasco. Russians might tolerate successful autocrats, that's how he gained so much power after all, but they won't tolerate failures. Isolating them and playing the "Russia against the world" card is his way of keeping his throne and neck.

[Bande Nere]

It's real that it's well known to all of you Azov (zillion+2) there. Destroying evidence of what they done for 8 years there. Infamous "Library" and so on.

Lol, Azov is the new allmighty ZOG, apparently.

Might I remind you russian troops and their gangster militia had already occupied Mariupol(and then eventually beaten back) during those famous 8 years? Or is this something else your media forgot to mention?

[nhytgbvfeco2]

Let me guess. Maybe that media violated some Russian law? It's not banned worldwide I suppose, only in Russia?

Only in Russia.
What rule does it violate?

So what's the deal? You say banning Britney is ok because it's private media. So banning Israel media because of Russian law violation is ok too.

Instagram is a private company. Russia is a state, although I suppose you could argue that the RF at this point is the private property of Putin.
And, as noted by other users, Britney wasn't banned, nor did she make the post you claim she did.

[Mithradates]

For Crimea's case, regardless of the legalities, the 2014 takeover and annexation was met largely with muted acquiescence on the part of the (mostly ethnic Russian) population

Perhaps in the long term those passive Crimean citizens might come to regret their passivity as they see their fellow Russians north of the border in Ukraine doing better?

Yes, the annexation of Crimea in 2014 was a financially beneficial event for the Crimeans, Russian pensions, salaries, etc. were generally higher, and Russia was a richer country than Ukraine, so "muted acquiescence" was the better way.

If you were to ask them now whether they want to belong to a country that will be sanctioned to oblivion and will timetravel back to the 90's, or rather belong to Ukraine and move closer to the EU/West, they might want to chose that.

Who knows, perhaps in the future we will see "little green men" appear in Crimea again, but this time from Ukraine...

[Bande Nere]

Has anyone noticed how Sky News Australia made a huge U turn in their coverage of the war? THe first week of the conflict they sounded like RT on steroids and now they are basically asking for Putin's head.

[bitterhowl]

Lol, Azov is the new allmighty ZOG, apparently.

Might I remind you russian troops and their gangster militia had already occupied Mariupol(and then eventually beaten back) during those famous 8 years? Or is this something else your media forgot to mention?

You mean few days in 2014 before Ukrainian army entered the city? Any proofs of Russian troops presence? And yes, a lesser than a month and 8 years is the same things ofc.

If Azov is lol for you then it's not lol for Mariupol civilians. But soon it will end.

As for Britney I honestly asked if you mentioned is it a Russian fake, wanted to verify it here. You told it's a freedom, what can I do?


French expert speaking

The situation in Ukraine is assessed by a former NATO colonel, French military expert Jacques Bo.

“…What we need to know is that the Russian strategy is to avoid big cities. You studied the history of the Second World War, you should know about all great battles. Russians avoid city streets not because they are afraid of resistance, but because it is pointless and a waste of time. They move in that direction where they can go through.

Looking at the map, we see that the Russian army bypasses all big cities and continues to move. They move very fast. I have never seen such a rapid advance in history. For 4 days, they occupied the territory equal to Great Britain. We must remember that Ukraine is a large country (the largest in Europe in terms of area). In addition, there are other cities that they encircle. For example, Kharkov and Mariupol are not held by the Armed Forces of Ukraine, but by complete scumbags and extremists, such as militants of Azov Battalion. They are responsible for the massacres of civilians in Mariupol in 2014, they committed atrocities throughout the Donbass and in other regions of the South-East of Ukraine. But nobody talks about it!

In Mariupol and Kharkov, Nazi units such as Azov Battalion engage in unthinkable atrocities. They do such horrible things that you can't even imagine. There is such vivid evidence of these atrocities that I would not show them here. They are real brutes”.

[bitterhowl]

General prosecutor claimed to ban those media according to this
http://www.consultant.ru/document/co...3fd9ef64ebdd0/

[EmperorBatman999]

And risk 15 years in jail? @BH journos at La Stampa, one out of millions of western media covering the war, published the wrong picture. I guess such a horrible crime clearly warrants an immediate bombing of Turin by Putin and a planeload of VDV to capture and execute the vile nazis who work for that newspaper.

This happens a lot in the media. It's easy for an overworked and underpaid/unpaid intern to just simply pick an image they thought was relevant to the article only to find out that the picture wasn't taken in the place they thought it was taken.

Reductio ad Hitlerum is a type of association fallacy.

There are in fact, neo-Nazis in a significant proportion of countries. Including in Israel. And most are some form of localised nationalism - and as such, see themselves as defenders of their country. But it is logically lazy to make the case that any particular country has a Nazi problem based on the fact that there are neo-Nazi groups in a specific country. When most countries have this kind of extreme fringe. It is particularly lazy propaganda to blanket accuse a country you're attacking of being full of Nazis.

I tend to view this kind of accusation as an indictment on the lazy accuser, rather than the accused.

*shrug*

To be fair and balanced... we're also seeing significant laziness in the Stalin comparisons for Putin too. Putin hasn't yet shipped off millions of people into forced labour and death. He's just your garden variety despot at this point.

Right, personally I think the neo-Nazi connection in Ukraine is overstated and has no serious legitimacy, and if it does have any sort of legitimacy at all, Russia's answer is disproportionate to the "problem." Neo-Nazis tend to have a strong flair for dramatics and just look like they are more prominent/popular than they actually are.

I was making my post to speak that for those who are still somehow convinced that Ukraine is a den for Nazis, the problem will be solved the democratic and European way through legally justified means. The EU will see to it that Ukraine is ready and politically adjusted for its integration, and it currently doesn't matter that there are some far-right kooks serving in the Ukrainian army.

[bitterhowl]

[Ludicus]

Will the West's Russia sanctions do anything to damage or anything to damage or deter Putin?

Putin’s not thinking about the stock market next week in Russia..."He doesn’t even care about the oligarchs that are going to be hurt by these sanctions”.

Does McFaul knows he is wrong? The people will be hurt by these sanctions. Kleptocracy not so much.

March 15, Confronting war, rethinking sanctions

(...) The Western response to this dramatic situation has so far been totally insufficient. In particular, European countries have the means to immediately stop Russian gas and oil supplies. A German academic study has just demonstrated that an immediate halt to imports would cost a maximum of between 2% and 3% of German GDP.

(...) This implies not only an immediate end to the financing of the Russian state through hydrocarbon purchases, but also a complete rethink of the functioning of economic sanctions, which today have a far greater impact on millions of ordinary Russians than on the small oligarchic and kleptocratic class on which the regime relies.

It is claimed that the sanctions are aimed at the oligarchs, but the truth is that only a few hundred people are affected, without systematic control and with multiple loopholes, whereas tens of thousands of Russian fortunes invested in Western financial and real estate circuits should be targeted.

The stakes are high, not only to bring the Putin regime to its knees, but also to convince Russian and international opinion that the great speeches on justice and democracy are not empty words. In both Africa and Asia, more than half of the countries (and three quarters of the world’s population and GDP by 2100) have abstained at the UN. Western countries are suspected of forgetting all their past invasions and thinking as always only of defending their interests and domination. The problem is that the legal and financial system put in place by the West for several decades is primarily aimed at protecting the wealthy, wherever they come from, at the expense of others.

If an ordinary Russian loses half of his pension or salary because of the fall in the ruble and inflation caused by the sanctions, then there is no recourse, no court where he can complain. On the other hand, if you want to deprive an oligarch with 100 million euros of half his fortune, then there are multiple procedures to challenge the decision, and very often you don’t pay anything. We are so used to this that we don’t pay attention to it any more, but it is actually a totally biased and asymmetric rule of law. It is by going much further in law and justice that Western countries will be able to contribute to building a post-militaristic and post-colonial world.

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I ask, what if the European Union set up a unit to uncover oligarchs' assets? There are more than 600 Russians targeted by sanctions, many others have money in offshores. EU Tax Observatory

This offshore wealth of Russian nationals amounted in 2015 to roughly 85% of national income; that is, 85% of what Russian residents earn in an entire year.
Recent sanctions, which aim at isolating the Russian economy, have a large impact on the general population. In contrast, part of the wealth of rich Russian nationals is hidden in tax havens.
Hiding wealth is more pervasive in Russia due to the high concentration of wealth, but by no means does it constitute a Russian-specific phenomenon.

The Pandora Papers' offshore accounts aren't for evading They’re for evading laws altogether.

World leaders who don’t even owe taxes still use hidden trusts...This explains why the Pandora Papers — the new data trove on the private financial affairs of high-net-worth individuals — includes so many cases of shell companies, trusts and foundations that are not being used for tax avoidance. Several prominent world leaders in the leak, such as King Abdullah II of Jordan and Dubai ruler Mohammed bin Rashid al-Maktoum, are not subject to taxation in their countries, so they have no reason to shelter their wealth or income from tax authorities. Other heads of state who are required to pay tax, like Russian President Vladimir Putin, Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babis and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, seem to have used their offshore structures for purposes unrelated to those obligations.

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A religious, curious aspect of war.

Our Lady of Fátima - Wikipedia

(...) Amid the turmoil of Russia's 2022 "special military operation" in Ukraine, sanctions against Russia, and fears of nuclear war, the Latin Rite Catholic bishops of the Episcopate of Ukraine requested Pope Francis to "... publicly perform the act of consecration to the Sacred Immaculate Heart of Mary of Ukraine and Russia, as requested by the Blessed Virgin in Fatima.
Pope Francis announced he would consecrate Russia and Ukraine to the Immaculate Heart of Mary on 25 March 2022 at Saint Peter’s Basilica in Rome. A consecration ceremony is also scheduled in Fatima, Portugal, by the Papal almoner, Cardinal Konrad Krajewski.^[100] The Pope also announced the event via Twitter on 15 Mar 2022. ^[101] It is unknown whether the consecration will involve all the world's bishops on the same day or how it will fulfill the specific conditions of the Virgin's requests.

Vatican news The Pilgrim Virgin of Fatima travels to the city of Lviv in Ukraine

As the Church prepares for the consecration of Russia and Ukraine to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, on March 25, the Pilgrim Virgin Statue of Our Lady of Fatima arrived in the Ukrainian city of Lviv on Wednesday,where it will remain for a month.

Everything points to the agreement being signed on March 25th.
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Stop imagining Putin will be deposed, fantasies don't help Ukraine.The President of Russia is unlikely to leave the scene in the near future, either by an uprising of the people, internal pressure, or by a betrayal by his closest. We cannot expect punishing sanctions to wake people up. Remember that previous generations of Russians were behind an iron curtain and suffered hardship for decades.Many Russians are more idealists than materialists, and willing to suffer rather than accept humiliation or defeat.

Putin stopped caring about a world and a Europe in which Russia participated. About the 50th anniversary of the EU, Putin expressed the following: “While pondering the 50th anniversary of the European Union one is involuntarily prompted to think about history... It was Europe that formulated the noble ideas of Humanism and Enlightenment which formed the foundation of European civilization...In his famous Pushkin speech, Fyodor Dostoevsky gave what I would call a political and philosophical definition of Russia’s European mission: ”Being a true Russian will ultimately mean bringing reconciliation to Europe’s contradictions.” The great writer sensed perfectly that Europe would never be itself in the world without Russia and, at the same time, that Russia would never cease its ‘longing for Europe’. I strongly believe the full unity of our continent can never be achieved until Russia, as the largest European state, becomes an integral part of the European process”. 50 Years of the European Integration and Russia March 25, 2007

Rereading these words, which also show the country's European insertion, the question arises: what went wrong?
in the same year, 2007, Putin’s attitude had radically changed, when he delivered a speech at the Munich Conference on Security Policy. In his address, Putin spoke directly about the implications to Russia of NATO enlargement:"I think it is obvious that NATO expansion does not have any relation with the modernization of the Alliance itself or with ensuring security in Europe. On the contrary, it represents a serious provocation that reduces the level of mutual trust. And we have the right to ask: against whom is this expansion intended? And what happened to the assurances our western partners made after the dissolution of the Warsaw Pact?". As we already know ad nausea, Mearsheimer traced Russia’s aggression in Ukraine back to the Clinton administration’s drive to enlarge NATO.

In 2018,Macron stated “I think that the mistake that was made in the last 20 years was that we in NATO failed to fully comply with all the obligations we had taken on, and this caused certain fears, quite reasonable ones. And we did not have the trust that Russia rightfully expected”

While nothing legitimizes Putin's war against sovereign Ukraine, responsibilities are shared.The definition of Russian national interest is a function of its negative sensitivities towards NATO,the pan-European ideal of a Europe less tied to the US and NATO was permanent. Putin stopped caring not only about Russia's international image, but also about building a world and a Europe in which Russia participated.
(As a side note- Macron still wants EU "sovereignty". But the question is- for whom, in an Europe and a world where corporations seem to enjoy more than citizens)

[EmperorBatman999]

Then Serbia should not have committed a genocide against their Muslim cousins, the Bosniaks, and they should not have threatened the Kosovars with the same.

NATO and the UN tried to play things the nice way with Peacekeepers, but that was completely ignored, leading to Sbrenica. The repeated blaming NATO for bombing Belgrade shows an immature refusal to admit Serbia's responsibility for killing innocent people over ancient notions of nation and empire.

[bitterhowl]

Ofc, old news about bombing for peace.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

I suppose Biden just forget about those his words, senile dementia is not a thing to joke with. No surprise for a man who mismatch Ukrainians to Iranians.

As for Yugoslavia - they also asked UN court to stop bombings. What's the results?

Serbia's responsibility for killing innocent people over ancient notions of nation and empire.

How about Ukraine responsibility about killing people on Donbass?

[ioannis76]

Then Serbia should not have committed a genocide against their Muslim cousins, the Bosniaks, and they should not have threatened the Kosovars with the same.

NATO and the UN tried to play things the nice way with Peacekeepers, but that was completely ignored, leading to Sbrenica. The repeated blaming NATO for bombing Belgrade shows an immature refusal to admit Serbia's responsibility for killing innocent people over ancient notions of nation and empire.

You do know that Milosevic was (posthumously, of course) proven innocent.
But that was after that his country was bombed to bits, without, of course any approval from the UN, thus setting a legal precedent (that is for people who claim that this is whataboutism).

It was events such as the bombing of Serbia, the occupation of Iraq, the attack on Syria's sovereign government, that have set the precedents that Russia is using.

[nhytgbvfeco2]

And yet Serbia condemned Russia's invasion of Ukraine. It turns out that two wrongs don't make a right.

[ioannis76]

And yet Serbia condemned Russia's invasion of Ukraine. It turns out that two wrongs don't make a right.

Can you blame them? Western economic sanctions would easily cripple Serbia.
Not to mention that the West might discover "weapons of mass destruction" in Belgrade.

[ioannis76]

https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/russia...aine-1.6386960
""Any people, and especially the Russian people, will always be able to distinguish the true patriots from the scum and the traitors, and just to spit them out like a midge that accidentally flew into their mouths," Putin said."
""I am convinced that this natural and necessary self-cleansing of society will only strengthen our country, our solidarity, cohesion and readiness to meet any challenge.""

First he copies Hitler, now he copies Stalin. I think Putin read about ww2 and confused the villains for protagonists. Hopefully he copies Mussolini next and gets hung.

Nice (you could have used a spoiler, though, because it's quite a big image), but I think it's all about Azov and "azovoid" groups. If they weren't allowed free reign and if they weren't incorporated into the very fabric of the government, perhaps all this wouldn't have happened.
The West should be concerned about them, too. I mean it's not like they didn't receive a scare when the war in Afghanistan ended (Soviet occupation) and the Talibans were left with a number of Stinger missiles on their hands. The CIA was rushing to buy them off the Talibans, and apparently they made it.
Would they manage to do the same for the Azov and like minded groups? Arming nazi psychopaths with high tech, highly portable anti-aircraft and anti-vehicle weapons may not end too well.

[nhytgbvfeco2]

Can you blame them? Western economic sanctions would easily cripple Serbia.

I don't tend to blame countries that condemn fascism.

but I think it's all about Azov and "azovoid" groups. If they weren't allowed free reign and if they weren't incorporated into the very fabric of the government, perhaps all this wouldn't have happened.

You honestly think Putin wouldn't have invaded if Azov didn't exist? Please. It's an excuse, and a terrible one. There are plenty of neo-nazis in Russia, he gives them medals.

Would they manage to do the same for the Azov and like minded groups? Arming nazi psychopaths with high tech, highly portable anti-aircraft and anti-vehicle weapons may not end too well.

And yet Russia does that too.