Ukraine
- Thread starter Silvanus
- Start date
That's not really fair. Sean has never claimed he had any principles and his only principle is obvious: Hating the west.
Criticise overthrowing democratic government -> cheerlead for a dictator attempting to overthrow a democratic government;
Criticise escalation towards nuclear threat -> cheerlead for someone explicitly threatening nuclear war;
Condemn funding of far-right militias -> cheerlead for someone funding far-right militias;
Condemn the targeting of civilians and children in other conflicts -> could not care less in this conflict;
Condemn the imprisonment of reporters and the brutalisation of protesters in the US -> cheerlead for someone imprisoning reporters and brutalising protesters.
I could go on.
Yeah, I'm sure your imagination could go quite wild. But not a single one of those examples is actually true after the "->"
You just want to paint criticism of NATO and explanation of the Russian perspective beyond the blinkered propaganda of "Putin's just a crazy guy trying to remake the USSR" as "cheerleading".
I haven't said you've been cheerleading for Neo-Nazis, but... well, that's actually more accurate than anything you just posted up there.
Trying not to answer very simple questions are we?
You've got this wrong. Everyone wants sanction. We are ALLOWING the US to join us because it the right decision
Stop taking our decision away from us because your angry
Lastly, just because some people got to get away with a bunch of crimes, doesn't mean I'm going to allow other people get away with the same crime. That would be like exonerating Hitler for the Holocaust because Turkey was punished for the Armenian genocide
There is no 'So' here. If Russia didn't want sanctions, they shouldn't have invaded. They being punished for making the wrong move
I personally support sanctions (even though I don't think they will work). You know who didn't tell me to do it? NATO. OR the US. I'm pretty sure many people here will never put me into the 'US global hegemony' group. I didn't need them to decide what to do. Neither did most counties. Australia suggested taking Russia off SWIFT well before Biden started talk about it. Also, not part of NATO
You've got this wrong. Everyone wants sanction. We are ALLOWING the US to join us because it the right decision
Stop taking our decision away from us because your angry
Lastly, just because some people got to get away with a bunch of crimes, doesn't mean I'm going to allow other people get away with the same crime. That would be like exonerating Hitler for the Holocaust because Turkey was punished for the Armenian genocide
There is no 'So' here. If Russia didn't want sanctions, they shouldn't have invaded. They being punished for making the wrong move
The criticism of NATO and the criticism of Putin are TWO SEPERATE THINGS. One does not lead to the other. We just want you to treat us the same
They aren't mutually exclusive. They can both be bad. It's like the 2020 election. Neither Trump or Biden is a good choice. But you got to pick one, or someone will pick for you
How is that relevant?
You would dismiss this argument as irrelevant if it was applied in reverse. That's not consistency, is it.
That's not how sanctions work.
Sanctions have to be applied at the level of national politics. Even if they are applied at the international level by, for example, the UN security council, which they wouldn't be in either of these cases because both the USA and Russia have permanent seats on the security council, national governments still have to enforce the sanctions.
This comparison isn't saying what you think it says. It's actually distributing blame for US warmongering on the international community (including Russia) for not imposing sanctions on the US over the War on Terror (Russia, if you'll remember, was a US ally in the War on Terror). Again, the invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan were heavily funded by international capital. That's how the US government managed a huge military build-up without raising taxes. Any national government could have stepped in and imposed sanctions, they all chose not to.
I get that that it's not "fair", but who told you international politics was fair? The countries which are imposing sanctions on Russia now are US allies. Many of them rely on US hegemony for their own protection and don't have significant armed forces of their own. Expecting impartiality from those countries seems like a failure on your part to actually understand the situation they are in, or how their interests are distinct from those of the US government.
I have to say it again because it's really ironic, but only an American could come up with such an Americentric perspective of the world.
So what?
Are you saying it's immoral for people to overthrow their government?
Honestly, this is genuinely very funny on so many levels though. Like, whatever manipulation you think US intelligence has done in Ukraine absolutely pales in comparison to the extremely blatant and openly acknowledged manipulation of Ukraine's political process by Russia around the issue of EU association, which is actually what lead to the Maidan protests and eventual overthrow of the government.
Do you think people were going out into the streets to face riot police and snipers using live ammunition because the CIA paid them off or dosed them all with LSD? Hundreds of people died. Thousands were injured. Some people just straight up disappeared. Most of them will have been ordinary, working class people. The least you could do is recognize some degree of political agency on their part. These were people who believed strongly enough that their country's sovereignty was threatened that they were willing to risk death, and they were (at least to some degree) demonstrably correct in that belief. Russia was influencing Ukrainian politics in ways you have openly condemned the US influencing other countrys' politics. Much of this influence was completely out in the open.
It is impossible to take any point you try to make about "consistency" seriously when you are very openly inconsistent.
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You might also remember that when the US put sanctions on Iran the last time, most of its allies didn't join in because they disagreed. All those countries are not just US puppets, they make their own decisions.
If the Russian government didn't have a larger relationship with far-right militias and neo-Nazis than any other party in this conflict, this response might've had teeth.
I mean, it could just be that the Russian military *isn't* a near peer to the US military.
They like to project a lot of Look At Our Raw Masculinity Unlike All You Sissies propaganda, but like...how often have you actually seen somebody bragging about how Goddamned Manly they are actually be able to back that up? That's not a brag you make from a position of actual strength in the world of Drones and Javelins.
We've been hearing stories that the chain of command is shockingly corrupt, to the point that it's filtered down to the enlisted ranks stealing diesel fuel to sell on the black market because that's what their leadership is doing. Add to that launching a haphazard attack on neighbors based on vague potential alliance politics and the defenders having the sort of morale that you only get when defending your literal goddamned family and neighbors and it's not *that* shocking that this went all pear-shaped in a matter of days. Russian Command should've seen the writing on the wall as soon as that island outpost told them to go fuck themselves.
So. When he took office, Biden got rid of some sanctions against a group inside Yemen. They were placed there by Trump at the behest of Saudi Arabia. Trump calling them terrorist means that no money or aid can be sent to anyone in Yemen (Saudis not included)
Now that thus conflict is causing an oil crisis, guess what Biden did...
thehill.com
Because Yemen hasn't gone through enough already.
Now that thus conflict is causing an oil crisis, guess what Biden did...
Biden sanctions Yemen’s Houthi-financing network amid increase in terrorist attacks
The Biden administration on Wednesday issued sanctions targeting an international business network that funds Yemen’s Houthi rebels and their attacks on civilians in Yemen and the Persian Gulf,&nbs…
thehill.com
Because Yemen hasn't gone through enough already.
GOP Rep. Adam Kinzinger calls for U.S.-enforced no-fly zone over Ukraine
The latest Speed Read,/speed-reads,,speed-reads, breaking news, comment, reviews and features from the experts at The Week
theweek.com
Good, keep the pressure on Putin.
How so? The United States is involved in this conflict, is calling for sanctions, and so forth. And the US and UK are where you, Silvanus, and I are from. None of us are Russians.
You don't like that I have a different perspective on what I think is relevant for me to comment on that takes into account global power relations and the fact that I live in an imperial core and it's simply not particularly my business how other countries choose to react to the aggression of and manipulation by my country. That I leave that up to them is neither logically nor morally inconsistent. Different things, including but not limited to their relations to me, are different. I choose not to abide declamations from neo-conservative-sounding dweebs whose own governments regularly do worse than what they criticize overseas. What, you agree with everything the TV man is telling you? Oh, my, so brave and thoughtful! Your voice is so important.
My government could have acted differently to prevent this crisis-- mostly by not acting at all. It didn't. What the fuck should I care what Russia could have done better if we-- the United States-- had the power? We could have used (or not used) it in a better way. Alienating and backing into a corner the owners of the largest nuclear arsenal on the planet despite them going out of their way to be friendly and even participating in the American military adventurism after 9/11 after we had repeatedly manipulated their politics is profoundly stupid, inexcusably treacherous and gives the United States and its allies a large share of the blame for the current crisis. When before the war in Georgia did Russia do anything that warranted suspicion by NATO? The worst thing, and it happened after the first round of NATO expansion, is that they crushed an uprising by Chechnya. That also happened after the NATO bombing of Yugoslavia and flattening of Belgrade, which NATO justified by... recognizing a separatist group inside the borders of another country, wait, that sounds awfully familiar...
Anyway, we were supposed to have learned something after World War 2, right? That's what the Marshall plan was all about, right? We were supposed to have recognized that revanchism is a predictable result of treating a defeated adversary like shit, right? Well, what did we do? And now we have the gall to complain? Because we neglected one of the few worldwide lessons of history that even penetrated the thick skulls of both liberals and conservatives in 1945? Germany of all nations is going to complain about Russian revanchism? We're going to pretend that Russia has no point about NATO expansion because, well, they're acting in a way we would entirely expect them to act given how we have?
The United States treated Russia in a manner that it would not tolerate if Russia or any other country did the reverse and it did so at least in part because it sought to retain unchallenged supremacy over the entire world. There is your imperialism.
Ah, there it is. It's not about principle. It's about power. You admit it! What are we even arguing about?
It is distributing blame on the United States and its allies for doing the things they hypocritically think sanctions are a proper response to. In greater quantities. With impunity.
Our governments maneuvered Russia into a corner, emboldened Ukraine's political leadership to adopt a hard line against Russia and then act all surprised when Russia finally has enough of that. They're not even communist! They're around as much of a capitalist shithole as the United States, they'd be perfect friends! They tried to join NATO and the EU themselves! Failing that, they sought other ways to grow closer diplomatically. And they were ignored or dismissed each and every time.
It did so with deficit spending/printing money. You make it sound like Bill Gates and friends fronted the money; no, the United States offset spending with bonds. It doesn't actually have to do that. It's not actually terrifically different with respect to inflation to sell treasuries or not to "offset" spending; but international capital was able to take rents from that deficit spending, it's true. One of the reasons international capital likes war so much. It creates financial assets for them.
So, again, it's not about principle. It's about power. Specifically, the power the United States has because it is the country international capital decided it can trust to have a hegemonic military.
It's actually pretty funny that you would accuse me of having an "Americentric view" and then describe how all of these supposedly independent countries are beholden to the United States because they don't have their own significant military forces!
It is immoral to manipulate people in the way that the United States did in Ukraine, certainly.
Does it, actually? Or are you just more aware of one than the other because one is deemed relevant by Western warmongering press and the other inconvenient to certain narratives, downplayed, and possibly more sophisticated in its methods? Yanukovych turned toward Russia in large part because the IMF was offering terribly punishing terms. And instead of accepting that we had pushed him toward Russia, plans were set in motion to remove him from power.
Has the Wagner group been incorporated into the Russian armed forces? Do official Russian military twitter accounts brag about how their Nazi regiment is putting pig fat on bullets to fight Muslim "orcs"? Was it Russia that was the only other nation to join the United States in voting against a UN resolution to ban the glorification of Nazism and other forms of racism? Or am I thinking of somewhere else with a lot of Russians?
except that it's more like if Hitler had conquered Europe and then sanctioned the US for its occupation of Hawaii and the UK for its treatment of Ireland. And Australia for its treatment of the indigenous population of Australia. All while continuing the holocaust.
Oh, of course Australia has its own entirely independent foreign policy. My mistake! Mea culpa.
To be fair I don't take the Russian's at their word, but the Pentagon and CIA at theirs. Not that I don't think those groups aren't capable of exaggerating, but I do trust they have spy networks in place and get relatively accurate information. I mean they knew about the Ukrainian plans with the earliest indication I can find being August 2021. Unless its all a Potemkin army, there has to be SOMETHING to the Russian military.
That island outpost actually surrendered without a fight despite Zelensky eulogizing them on TV. There's lots of misinformation floating around out there; hard to tell how much progress the Russians have made, how serious are there casualties really, and so forth. Ukraine has an incentive to exaggerate Russian losses for morale purposes. And invent legends of heroic resistance where they didn't occur. Best not to take it at face value. Russia... as far as I know hasn't been saying much about their military progress or lack thereof, so that's not a good source of information either. Because it's not even a source of information.
It's clear Russian army was not expecting this much resistance, probably got complacent since they're last few expedition were against syrian rebel and various small scale skirmish against rebel in Africa. But they were hoping for a quick run and grab, which did not happen, now they'll switch to more conventional warfare and they'll do much better there but it'll be slower. It'll remain to be seen how much the international community will stand by when the report of starving civilian and bombed house start pouring in though.
Except, define "high quality" in terms of military units. Compared to which countries, what are their doctrines and mission, and in what circumstances are those units fighting? There's not many, if any really, objective markers by which the quality of a state's armed forces can be measured -- especially when one starts discussing the impact of state propaganda, namely how domestic forces are represented in media as opposed to foreign forces.
Case in point, guess which country has the most active duty personnel per capita. Not kidding. Stop reading, take a guess.
It's North Korea. Eritrea's #2, by the way.
Probably not what you expected, right? It's why I picked that specific metric -- raw size of military by country, money spent per capita or as percentage of GDP, those metrics are much more obvious...but neither are they accurate representing the overall quality, readiness, adherence to or relevance of doctrine, morale, or any other numbers of factors that go into analyses like these.
Case in point, US experiences in Iraq. The Iraqi Republican Guard really was as good as "they" say...at least, in symmetric conflicts against countries with which Iraq was most likely to get into an armed conflict (read, Iran). They still didn't stand a chance against the 900-pound global security gorilla that is the US armed forces spearheading a UN coalition...that was a foregone conclusion from the beginning.
The US and its coalition(s) being the 900-pound global security gorilla which toppled the Hussein regime in a month didn't stop them from getting their asses caved in for a decade, by insurgents. A lesson the US could have learned from Vietnam, but chose to not. Looping this back to Russia, the data doesn't match the arguments being made by many -- for all the ado made of the Spetsnaz, they've proven themselves really unworthy of the propaganda surrounding them, between Chechnya and Syria. A lesson Russia could have learned from Afghanistan, but chose to not.
To use another example, look at the IDF and its materiel. Supposedly one of the most elite fighting forces on the planet...except not so much. IDF doctrine and materiel are purpose-built to steamroll less organized, worse equipped, and worse trained fighting forces in asymmetric, defensive, wars while leaning heavily on special forces to disrupt opposition logistics and C4, entirely pursuant to Israeli siege mentality. Or to put it another way, those Merkava tanks the Israelis and Israel apologists love so much are fantastic at mass murder in Gaza and Golan turkey shoots, but if for some reason they had to cross the Sinai the Israelis would learn real fuckin' fast why it's important to have an MBT that can outrun a go-kart and actually get to its objective on a single tank of fuel, without having to stop to maintain the thing.
Which is where the impact of state propaganda comes in. Citizenry, at least in "the West", must be kept in a perpetual state of simultaneously believing their military is the best of the best to keep that nationalist furor strong, but at the same time always believe some other country is gaining some comparative advantage to keep the military-industrial complex chugging right along.