So your solution is to just let empires do as they wish without any intervention. I guess that'll teach them a lesson!
Ukraine
- Thread starter Silvanus
- Start date
I would say there is a lot of doomsaying so I understand someone's need to take things positively
I also don't like people pretending that just because things definitely HAVE improved, that means it's good.
Pretty much that quote stated in my words
Or we could just... respect international legal agreement.
If all you have are justifications to break such agreements on the basis of the other parties not being very nice, then... well its not inspiring much faith.
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As someone who has half an hour commute back, and to my college every Tuesday, and Thursday, and who drives a lot, I could care less about increased gas prices, Biden, and the Department of Energy should give lower-income people vouchers and suffer the polititcal heat for banning Russian fossil fuels. If Fox News complains call them out.
Indeed we don't. At least, not unless Russia invades a NATO country, in which case NATO is absolutely obliged to get in a conflict with Russia.
If our leaders are paid to do anything, it's to take the risk of a war that could go nuclear very, very, seriously indeed. The risks are small (I don't think the Russian elites have been embezzling all that money and getting drunk on totalitarian power just to piss it away by causing the total destruction of their country), but the consequences so catastrophic that NATO's objective necessarily must be to not introduce direct military force to Ukraine that could cause a critical escalation. That sucks for Ukraine, but it's probably the right thing to do.
I think that was why Putin very pointedly made that comment about his nuclear armament to be on high alert.
Man, fucking go for it. You seem to have the assumption that I think other countries shouldn't be sanctioning the shit out of the US and I don't know why?
The best thing world institutions can do right now is seize every single megayacht, and check which belong to russian oligarchs
What does this have to do with that particular conversation thread..?
Well, it's not up to you and it's not going to happen. So maybe calibrate your thoughts to reality and check whether sanctions aren't in practice just a tool of hegemonic discipline.
This is the schadenfreude I was looking for.
www.businessinsider.com.au
I now viscerally understand the term 'doom-scrolling'.
https://www.reddit.com/r/worldnews/new/
Fuck.
Kremlin staff didn't expect Putin to invade Ukraine and were shocked by the severity of Western sanctions, report says
Kremlin staff told Russian outlet Agency they only prepared for sanctions over recognizing Luhansk and Donetsk, not a full invasion into Ukraine.
www.businessinsider.com.au
I now viscerally understand the term 'doom-scrolling'.
https://www.reddit.com/r/worldnews/new/
Fuck.
That's a fancy sounding phrase. Wtf does it mean?
Okay how many people besides Putin actually knew this was going to be an invasion?This is the schadenfreude I was looking for.
Kremlin staff didn't expect Putin to invade Ukraine and were shocked by the severity of Western sanctions, report says
Kremlin staff told Russian outlet Agency they only prepared for sanctions over recognizing Luhansk and Donetsk, not a full invasion into Ukraine.
At this point I'm starting to believe Putin was the only person who actually knew the plan.
Bah, that's mainstream media. You can't trust anyone who doesn't post on Twitter.
I think it's very clear hardly anyone knew outside a circle of those over close to Putin. I thought China knew Russia was going to attack Ukraine, and I'd probably still maintain that, but I'd temper it that China probably had no idea it would be on the scale of a full invasion.
It's been reported that China cautioned Russia not to invade until after the Winter Olympics. So yes, China knew an invasion was coming. Whether it forsaw what that invasion would become is another matter.
Yes, that's what I read about the caution. There's always an argument that China merely suspected Russia could invade and sent Putin a warning not to spoil their party, but I think it much more likely that they had a solid indication of military action.
I was I think perhaps most impressed by the responses of Kenya and Ghana in the UN when the invasion occurred, as their denunciation of imperialism from their perspective of being ex-colonies (and thus, we must feel, recognising some affinity with Ukraine) was perhaps particularly powerful. I wonder whether that was not a significant influence on China, because it's invested a lot into Africa with some element of being an alternative to the old imperial powers, and it definitely does not want the reputational damage of being seen in the same imperialistic light by condoning Russia.
Putin would continue with his agenda, regardless of Lindsey Graham's comments on the situation though.
We can all agree that Graham is a fuck-knuckle, but his comments aren't really gas on this particular fire.
Honestly, i find it most likely that Putin did not share his invasion plans with China (considering how secret he even kept it from his own people and how much the whole plan relied on a surprise and speed) but very much indicated that he believed new sanctions would come and tried to prepare for them. So they probably knew he planned something that would seriously tick off the west.
tool (a device or implement, especially one held in the hand, used to carry out a particular function) of hegemonic (ruling or dominant in a political or social context) discipline (the practice of training people to obey rules or a code of behavior, using punishment to correct disobedience).
Sanctions are primarily a device used to enforce obedience to the dominant geopolitical entity, the complex of the United States and its ruling economic class.
When I said we shouldn't allow imperialists to divide up countries, you bizarrely inferred that somehow meant we would end up funding a neo-Nazi insurgency (ignoring the fact that Russia is the only party in the Ukrainian conflict to be sponsoring & arming an insurgency, which you're fine with).
It's a relevant response to say that inference is nonsense, and we could just observe international legal agreements instead. Regional powers (which Russia has also threatened) form defensive treaties with Ukraine, NATO doesn't get involved, no counter-factual insurgencies required. There are legal and proportionate methods of fighting imperialist invasions like this.
Love it. Can also apply directly to the Russian war machine, the difference being that the war machine kills a massively larger number of people.