UKRAINE WAR - 1 YEAR AND GOING.

[Elfdart]

Is 6 million+ sizable enough for you? That's how many have fled the country so far.

If the war is already lost, or at least unwinnable, I'd rather see every soul left in Ukraine fleeing into the EU. Better a life in exile than death by shell or bullet. I don't think a long deadly stalemate is ever worth fighting for and I simply can't see this war going any other way.

Italy went fascist and France is about to just because a few million Africans fled from the Al Qaeda regime NATO imposed on Libya. The same goes for the Syrians and Iraqis trying to find refuge in other parts of Europe. Forty million Ukrainian refugees rushing into western Europe would cause a Fourth Reich in a matter of weeks.

Morally, I agree that those nations who make it impossible for people to live in their own countries should have to take in the refugees and/or foot the bill for them to live elsewhere.

[3-Body Problem]

Italy went fascist and France is about to just because a few million Africans fled from the Al Qaeda regime NATO imposed on Libya. The same goes for the Syrians and Iraqis trying to find refuge in other parts of Europe. Forty million Ukrainian refugees rushing into western Europe would cause a Fourth Reich in a matter of weeks.

Morally, I agree that those nations who make it impossible for people to live in their own countries should have to take in the refugees and/or foot the bill for them to live elsewhere.

I'll take a few years of right-wing support in Europe over millions of corpses.

[Vympel]

Part III

BECKER: Yaroslav, before the break we were talking about help from the West. And we've heard a lot about this throughout the war. And your new book is about pretty much the first year of the war between Russia and Ukraine. And there's been a lot of piecemeal help from the West, particularly the U.S., in part because I think no one really understood that the war was going to go on this long, and people did think it was going to be over quickly.

But I'm wondering what you think about the comments that have been made since, particularly recent comments by Russian President Putin, that the reason this war has gone on so long is because of help from the West and without it perhaps there would've been some type of negotiated deal to end the fighting. What do you think of that?

TROFIMOV: Well, obviously if there hadn't been this help from the West, the war would've ended with the Russian flag raised over Kyiv. There is also a possibility and that's clearly what President Putin wants.

I think if we look at it historically the very first few month of resistance really occurred without much Western help in terms of weapons. The Ukrainians repelled the Russian armies from Kyiv using their own Soviet vintage weapons and ammunition. American artillery only started to arrive around July 2022. And then it was really piecemeal.

It was piecemeal for various reasons. One of them was this fear of Russian red lines, fear of provoking a possible nuclear response. And Moscow kept threatening. And, but every time these capabilities arrived, you know, there was no Russian red line, as it turned out. You know, Ukrainians compared this to extinguishing a fire. There was a fire and Ukraine needed a bucket of water, and it got a bucket of water, but in, you know, 20 little glasses. And so over time, the fire kept raging. If all of this help had arrived early on, the fire could have been extinguished.

BECKER: You think so? You think it could have been completely extinguished? This war would've been over, Ukraine would've been in control of its borders had the U.S. and other Western nations provided more military support from the get-go?

TROFIMOV: I think Ukraine would've been in a much better position. And the pivotal moment that I talk about a lot in the book was in September, October 2022, when Russia only had about 100,000 combat troops left in Ukraine. Its elite units were decimated. President Putin was refusing a call-up of reservists to the mobilization because doing so would've meant acknowledging that his so-called special military operation was not going to plan.

And Ukraine was asking for tanks, armored personnel carriers, fighting vehicles, more artillery, aircraft, battery missiles, and was turned down. Told it's impossible. We cannot possibly have American or German tanks in the fields of Ukraine. That's too provocative. And so when the Ukrainian troops attacked in the Kharkiv region and routed the Russian army and broke through the Russian lines and kept pressing into Kherson, into Lyman, that offensive eventually ran out of steam because Ukraine didn't have all this ammunition and all this equipment.

Then there was a long process of, you know, reconsidering. And the following year, last year, 2023, the so-called mountain of steel did arrive. So Ukraine got its Abrams and Leopard tanks and strikers and Bradleys and battery missiles and is getting F-16s now. But you know, by then Russia had mobilized hundreds of thousands of troops, spent the winter building fortifications, laying out minefields. And when the Ukrainian counter-offensive was finally launched with all this mountain of steel last year, it didn't achieve success because Russia was ready and prepared and strong in the way that it wasn't during that pivotal moment in September, October the previous year.

Earlier in this interview this guy uncritically repeats the absurd Zelensky fable about Russian troops having their parade uniforms with them because they intended to have a victory parade in Kyiv when it was over so I hardly expect him to be objective, but all of this is basically nonsense.

Ukraine got immense levels of assistance from the outset of the war. The provision of HIMARS + GMLRS backed up by US/NATO ISR to guide them alone was a massive commitment. It was fully intended that this would permit Ukraine to win. The Ukrainian complaint that the US/NATO slow-walked assistance - its mostly just Ukrainians deeply ensconsed in the idea that doing a US/NATO LARP would allow them to win - that if only they had gotten the (very small batches) of Bradleys and Leopard 2s that they got for the counteroffensive in 2023 earlier, somehow they would've fulfilled the promise of the wunderwaffe and swept all before them.

At the level of a massive conflict like this, a tank is a tank is a tank (you know unless you're talking about like an army with T-54s vs an army with Leopard 2A7s). It doesn't matter what the difference between an M1 Abrams and a T-72B3 is. All that matters is how many they are and how easily they can be sustained and replaced.

It's the same with "the F-16s" which people wave around as a totem, even when people like Milley are openly pointing out - quite rightly - that there are no magic weapons in war.

[Broomstick]

As for "not touching people not in the country anymore" - you might want to ask Zelimkhan Khangoshvili, Ruslan Israpilov, Abdulvahid Edelgiriev, Umar Israilov, Alexander Litvinenko, or Maksim Kuzminov about that. Except you can't, because all of them were killed by Russian agents while outside of Russia (or Ukraine for that matter). You see, that's another flaw with "run away" - the Russians follow. They kill people years after they leave and they don't care about damage to innocent bystanders.

Not everyone wants to spend the rest of their lives looking over the shoulder or having to pick up and flee again and again.

Well, their two options are to slowly die fighting in Ukraine, or to die quickly someday with a quick ice-pick to the temple. Of course no one wants to be in that position. It's absolutely fucking disgusting that they are. But what is realistically the third option?

The difficulty of making such choices is why I prefer to leave the decision up to the individual(s) involved. Just because you would make one choice does not mean someone else would prefer your choice.

For all that many have fled Ukraine, many others have chosen to go and fight there, even some that have no connection to Ukraine. Free choice is kinda important to me for several reasons.

If Ukraine somehow does turn this around and win at this point, what will be left? So many men are dead, millions have fled the country, what's not in Russian hands is being bombed to pieces.

That argument could have been made of much of Europe towards the end of WWII (with various other nations subbed in for "Russia") And yet people kept fighting. Based on history, people don't give up easily even if "logically" they should.

As discussed by Elfdart earlier, at this point the only reason to keep it going is to scoop up the remainder for cheap and make Ukraine a western-owned entity completely.

They can either be completely owned by Russia or completely owned by the West, are those the choices they're being presented with? Wonder what the Ukrainians would prefer - does anyone even bother to ask them? I'd say based on their actions the past few years they prefer to be Western-owned than Russian owned (actually, they'd prefer to be self-owned, of course, but that may not be a fit with reality).

Where are the remaining Ukrainians going to evacuate to? Which country on the map is willing to take in millions of people?

They're going to have to go somewhere. The ones capable of fighting have already decided to GTFO of dodge, so this isn't even an academic question. If you don't count Russia then the current winners in the 'Who Can Take the Most Fighting Age Men From Ukraine' contest are Poland and Germany, respectively. They've already taken in a million or more people, each. (unsure what percentage is fighting age/conscription age men, but I'm sure it's not low, either). Poland's at 1.6 as of 2023 Yes Yes Yes, Wikipedia...

Just because Poland and Germany have already taken in a million or more each doesn't mean they have the ability to absorb more.

Among the many groups piling up along the Mexico-US border are a number of Ukrainian refugees who are going nowhere. Tolerance for migrants is dropping world-wide because there are just so damn many of them.

No, they actually don't have to go "somewhere". Pre/during WWII numerous refugees attempted to flee Europe yet found no safe harbor and wound up dying. One of the more famous cases was the M. S. St. Louis but it was far from the only one. The world is once again moving towards a situation where there are more refugees than welcome for them and people might once again die by the thousands in ships, in "camps", sometimes literally stack up against border fences.

Right now there are desperate people dying in improvised or shoddy boats in the Mediterranean Sea. Nobody seems to give a fuck. Never assume that groups fleeing conflict will be able to find a safe haven.

Being a descendant of refugees who were lucky enough to find a place to survive I have pondered this problem from time to time. There are good reasons that a substantial number of people attempt to survive where they are, or chose to go down fighting, rather than flee elsewhere because, frankly, drowning at sea, the ship going down and people fighting to climb to the highest point for just those extra moments of life, really sucks. Or, in other circumstances, dying in a desert crossing in the Southwest of North America or parts of Africa, overheated and desperate for water you don't have, is pretty terrible, too. Or tearing your flesh on barbed wire marking national borders, or slicing your limbs open when trying to cross a river because you can't see the razor wire beneath the surface. Dying in the Darien Gap between North and South America, your corpse lost as it's churned in the mud by the passing feet of thousands of other desperate people also sucks. For women, having to "pay" for passage by being raped at every checkpoint and by every human smuggler and everyone else waiting to have a quick fuck and who cares about the effect on the dirty whore, right? She should be happy to get past this roadblock - If she doesn't enjoy it, too, she's just an ungrateful bitch with a bad attitude. [/sarcasm] I think that's what you don't quite get - death by a Russian gun or bomb might actually be quicker and more merciful than what a refugee could face.

I get the sense that you haven't studied this sort of history very closely. Which, if you're young and in school to obtain a degree or career training isn't entirely surprising, earlier schooling for children doesn't cover the really awful and dark parts of history. But you might want to look into what, historically, has happened to people attempting to flee war. Finding a safe haven is arguably the exception and not the rule.

I'm stupendously awful at math - my handlers have to count my Rubles. Is there even a way to calculate how much of the country is likely to flee after this is over?

There is a serious question of whether or not they'll be able to flee. Based on actions in this current war the Russians seemed inclined to murder, torture, and transport Ukrainians they gain control of, and attempt to kill any trying to flee. Fleeing on foot or vehicle requires that surrounding nations allow them through borders, which is by no means guaranteed.

If you are trapped and can't leave "go down fighting" is a choice a lot of people have made in the past.

Capitulation? Are you serious?

Kapitulerin?! Gegen Bolschewismus?! DAS GEHT NICHT!

English please - board policy. I don't read German and here translation is on the person posting, not the reader.

The irony of decrying war crimes while supporting a far-right government that venerates the Nazis, oh man. It's impossible to make up this shit.

Don't bring that straw-manning bullshit here - condemning the actions of one side does not mean the speaker is in any way in favor of the other side. It is entirely possible for all sides of a conflict to be reprehensible and disgusting.

War crimes are war crimes regardless of who is committing them and who is the victim.

As for your cites - what happened in Ukraine in WWII may or may not have any relevance to what's happening there now. Were/are there neo-Nazi types in Ukraine? Sure. They're every fucking where, every country you care to name has those scum. The US has had more than one official Nazi Party, in fact, we currently have two: The American Nazi Party and the New Order. The presence of such, or any organized, fascist, far right fuckhead thugs, does not mean that position is held by the entire nation, or everyone in that nation. For all that such human cockroaches (with apologies to actual cockroaches) were a factor in Ukraine before this war, Ukraine had also elected a man of Jewish background to be president and, when the war broke out, those same far-right fascist thugs fought ferociously for Ukraine under Zelenskyy's government. So... I really do discount Russian propaganda that Ukraine was full of rabid Nazis. It was a classic case of taking a nugget of information out of context (Ukraine, like any nation, has a certain number of fascist members) and blowing it way, way out of proportion for propaganda purposes.

You might as well argue that the US is a Nazi nation because a recent former governor of California is the son of a man who was a member of the actual Nazi party in Austria in WWII - it takes a fact out of context and completely ignores the subsequent decades of history and change, not to mention that the people currently running the show are NOT the same individuals who were in control in the 1940's.

[Broomstick]

Millions have already fled Ukraine.

The problem with encouraging even more to do so is that those people need somewhere to go. Who is going to take them in? Borders are closing all around the world, immigration is getting more and more difficult. Telling people to leave is useless if there is nowhere for them to go.

Refugee status gives zero fucks about normal border restrictions.

By and large, most people give "zero fucks" about refuge status.

What country is in a position to easily turn away thousands of people desperate to enter their nation? Beyond this crisis, the rich powerful nations who are used to picking and choosing who they let in are in for a rude awakening when climate change forces ever more migration.

You are extremely naive to think that nations can't prevent people from crossing the border. Over the past few years the US/Mexico border has seen groups of people squatting on the border in excess of 12,000 people strong. If many gets through it's because at present no one wants to simply shoot and bomb those trying to cross - that Western soft-heartedness that supposedly makes us "weak". That can change quite rapidly given the right circumstances.

The ONLY thing that allows thousands to move across international borders is the notion that it's not nice to kill people. That can change. If it does, the carnage will be very real and brutal.

And the "rich, powerful nations" are already seeing more and more pressure from those fleeing climate change. Don't know how you miss that.

Russia will, potentially, kill some dozen particularly hated individuals the war will kill thousands. Should ordinary citizens who are beneath Russia's notice die for the security of powerful men who might be assassinated if they flee?

It's pretty well documented that early in the Ukraine war the Russians set up "humanitarian corridors" for civilians to flee then systematically bombed those same fleeing civilians. Yeah, I'm pretty confident the Russians will obliterate thousands of people. They already have.

A settled peace with UN peacekeepers and neutral observes will hardly be ideal for anybody stuck in Ukraine and certainly the military heads and political figures will have it even worse, but the current war is worse than that will be.

What the FUCK makes you think the current Russia government would have ANY tolerance for "UN peacekeepers" and "neutral observers"? What have you been smoking these past few years?

If my options were a slow grinding death under a steel rain or a risk of mistreatment at the hands of a conquering nation until I have the means to flee, I'd take the chance to live and see freedom elsewhere.

Those are YOUR options. YOU do not have a right to make that decision for someone else, particularly not when that someone else will be the person experiencing the actual suffering.

[Broomstick]

Italy went fascist and France is about to just because a few million Africans fled from the Al Qaeda regime NATO imposed on Libya. The same goes for the Syrians and Iraqis trying to find refuge in other parts of Europe. Forty million Ukrainian refugees rushing into western Europe would cause a Fourth Reich in a matter of weeks.

Morally, I agree that those nations who make it impossible for people to live in their own countries should have to take in the refugees and/or foot the bill for them to live elsewhere.

I'll take a few years of right-wing support in Europe over millions of corpses.

Yeah. That's been done. And it wasn't "millions" of corpses, it was tens of millions. See WWII. If it happened once it could happen again.

[LadyTevar]

FYI FOLKS

Both Vympel and I are no longer considered Unbiased enough to moderate this thread.

If you feel you need to Report Someone in this thread, go to Private Messages and EMAIL Dalton to make sure he sees the problem. He is the only Moderator NOT involved in this thread and thus the only UNBIASED Moderator.

[Lictuel]

Capitulation? Are you serious?

Kapitulerin?! Gegen Bolschewismus?! DAS GEHT NICHT!

English please - board policy. I don't read German and here translation is on the person posting, not the reader.

I'm not Siko but what he wrote in (slightly wrong) German is: capitulate?! to bolsheviks?! THAT DOESN'T WORK.
Not sure if that is meant to be a reference to something.

[EnterpriseSovereign]

Also, we have rules about using sources that are behind a paywall that require you to cut and paste the relevant info, something that you have not done for that Wall Street Journal article.

Funny that you suddenly care about academic rigor or following the board's debate rules, but noted. I legitimately tried to get around the paywall, but had little success. Consider it an invalid citation.

Try it sometime, even the valid ones don't support your assertions the way you think they do

Moving on:
No other way to help Ukraine: Sullivan addressed Congress

Jake Sullivan has appealed to Congress to provide funding for Ukraine, according to the White House.

Sullivan told members of Congress that they must fulfill their constitutional obligations and help protect the freedom and independence of Ukraine.

"It’s not like we have a piggy bank where we just keep cash lying around that we can provide to Ukraine. We need the Congress to discharge its constitutional obligation to appropriate and obligate funds that the President can then put to use to send American-made weapons, made by American workers and American states, to Ukraine to help defend the freedom and independence of that country," Sullivan said.

According to Sullivan, the situation is non-alternative, and therefore Congress must fulfill this obligation for the sake of American security.
"There’s not another avenue to it that — and because of that, I think the Congress, and especially the Speaker, need to stare their responsibility square in the face and then meet that responsibility, meet that obligation to their voters and to the American people and to the American national security interest," Sullivan said.

The US plans to allocate over $60 billion in new aid to Ukraine. Bridget Brink, the US ambassador to Ukraine, stated that the new aid for Ukraine includes two important parts.

Additionally, the US Senate has supported a package that provides this new funding for Ukraine.

Ukraine, German manufacturer cooperate on air defence systems

(Reuters) - Ukraine's state arms producer has entered into cooperation with Germany's MBDA Deutschland, part of a missiles joint venture owned by Airbus, BAE Systems and Leonardo.

Ukroboronprom, the producer, said the companies signed a document that envisages a joint study of opportunities for cooperation in air defence systems.

A spokesperson for MBDA Deutschland said that countering unmanned aircraft systems (UAS) was in focus.

Kyiv has been accelerating its efforts to boost domestic and joint arms production amid partners' depleting warehouses, failed delivery schedules, and political wrangling on allocating further military support as the war with Russia enters its third year.

"Potential areas of partnership include research, development, production, and investment," Ukroboronprom said.
Ukraine desperately needs advanced air defence systems as Russia continues to carry out massive combined attacks on Ukrainian cities, using missiles and drones of different types.

Kyiv's air defence capabilities totally depend on allied aid at the moment.

Herman Smetanin, Ukroboronprom's CEO, said the agreement with MBDA Deutschland laid "a solid foundation" for Ukraine's defence industry development and helped its integration into the NATO defence industry.

"This agreement marks a milestone between the defence industries in our countries," Thomas Gottschild, MBDA Deutschland managing director, was quoted as saying by Ukroboronprom.

Ukraine has a joint venture with the German Rheinmetall to service and repair Western weapons sent to help Kyiv fend off Russia. The company also plans to open an ammunition factory in the country.

[Gandalf]

Ukraine has a joint venture with the German Rheinmetall to service and repair Western weapons sent to help Kyiv fend off Russia. The company also plans to open an ammunition factory in the country.

At some point in this thread, aerius went through the massive input requirements for an ammo plant. They take time, and cost a lot.

So is Rheinmetall going to open this before the conflict is functionally over? Ukraine's issue seems not to be one of equipment, but people to push all of the buttons on it.

[Broomstick]

Well, their two options are to slowly die fighting in Ukraine, or to die quickly someday with a quick ice-pick to the temple. Of course no one wants to be in that position.

I didn't quite pick up on this the first time round, but...

Oh, my sweet summer child, if only Putin's assassins were that merciful. Alexander Litvinenko took 22 days to die. It started the first night with vomiting and bloody diarrhea and only got worse from there. But maybe if you're "lucky" they'll use ricin, like for Georgi Markow who only took four days to die instead of three agonized weeks.

You're delusional if you think Putin's thugs are in any way merciful whether their target is an individual or a city.

[EnterpriseSovereign]

Ukraine has a joint venture with the German Rheinmetall to service and repair Western weapons sent to help Kyiv fend off Russia. The company also plans to open an ammunition factory in the country.

At some point in this thread, aerius went through the massive input requirements for an ammo plant. They take time, and cost a lot.

So is Rheinmetall going to open this before the conflict is functionally over? Ukraine's issue seems not to be one of equipment, but people to push all of the buttons on it.

I noticed that, placing such a facility in Ukraine itself is just going to become a target. It would make more sense to place it on the Polish side of their border with Ukraine. Hopefully this will be clarified in the future. Looking at maps, southeast Poland has a railway crossing into Ukraine, any of the cities and towns that it runs through would be a good site.

[Gandalf]

I noticed that, placing such a facility in Ukraine itself is just going to become a target. It would make more sense to place it on the Polish side of their border with Ukraine. Hopefully this will be clarified in the future. Looking at maps, southeast Poland has a railway crossing into Ukraine, any of the cities and towns that it runs through would be a good site.

I wager Ukraine is offering an excellent deal to set up such an enterprise in their borders, and Rheinmetall is looking past this conflict to the rearmament bonanza.

[3-Body Problem]

By and large, most people give "zero fucks" about refuge status.

Then we rip the veil off of any attempts to pretend that humanity and the west is civilized and figure out what we do from there.

You are extremely naive to think that nations can't prevent people from crossing the border. Over the past few years the US/Mexico border has seen groups of people squatting on the border in excess of 12,000 people strong. If many gets through it's because at present no one wants to simply shoot and bomb those trying to cross - that Western soft-heartedness that supposedly makes us "weak". That can change quite rapidly given the right circumstances.

If we get to the point where international law is being ignored and refugees are being killed en mass that means either there has been a major war in Africa or India or that climate change is worse than we anticipated. In short, if nations start to feel threatened to the point of abandoning all pretext of civility we're all fucked.

And the "rich, powerful nations" are already seeing more and more pressure from those fleeing climate change. Don't know how you miss that.

Shit hasn't even started yet. We haven't fully lost any island nations, desertification hasn't rapidly started to spread year over year, and breadbaskets aren't failing completely. It will get worse, figuring out what to do with millions of refugees moving at your borders in a wave is something that will need to be figured out.

It's pretty well documented that early in the Ukraine war the Russians set up "humanitarian corridors" for civilians to flee then systematically bombed those same fleeing civilians. Yeah, I'm pretty confident the Russians will obliterate thousands of people. They already have.

The risk of fleeing is still likely to be less than the risk of staying.

What the FUCK makes you think the current Russia government would have ANY tolerance for "UN peacekeepers" and "neutral observers"? What have you been smoking these past few years?

What makes you think they won't agree to a loosening of sanctions in exchange for such monitoring once the war ends?

Those are YOUR options. YOU do not have a right to make that decision for someone else, particularly not when that someone else will be the person experiencing the actual suffering.

As stated above, which you seem to have ignored, I don't have the power to make these decisions for anybody else. If I did this war would already be over and a fair few politicians would be marching their asses to a war crimes tribunal to confess to their crimes.

I'm doing the same as you are and stating my opinion on a message board. Maybe take a chill pill and avoid the thread for a while if people posting opinions upsets you so much.

Yeah. That's been done. And it wasn't "millions" of corpses, it was tens of millions. See WWII. If it happened once it could happen again.

Yes, let's worry about what might happen because fretting and wringing hands is easier than dealing with the fucked up reality of what losing a modern war looks like.

[Rogue 9]

What the FUCK makes you think the current Russia government would have ANY tolerance for "UN peacekeepers" and "neutral observers"? What have you been smoking these past few years?

What makes you think they won't agree to a loosening of sanctions in exchange for such monitoring once the war ends?

It's worth observing that Russia agreed to respect Ukraine's security in exchange for Ukraine giving Russia all their nuclear weapons. We see what that was worth.

[EnterpriseSovereign]

Missile Strike on Russian Training Camp Claims 60 Lives

A missile strike by Ukrainian forces on a Russian military training facility in the central Donetsk region of eastern Ukraine has resulted in the deaths of at least 60 Russian soldiers, as reported by BBC News Russian late Tuesday.

The targeted training ground, located near the village of Trudivske, lies between the regional capital of Donetsk and the coastal city of Mariupol.

The soldiers were identified as members of the 36th Guards Motorised Rifle Brigade, originally from Siberia.

Reports suggest that at the time of the attack, soldiers from three companies were assembled at the training range in anticipation of the arrival of Oleg Moiseyev, the commander of the 29th Army of the Eastern Military District.
BBC News has disclosed possession of photographs and video footage taken shortly after the missile strike, showing numerous casualties and confirming the death toll to be at least 60.

This incident has been independently verified by several sources following the attack.

[3-Body Problem]

It's worth observing that Russia agreed to respect Ukraine's security in exchange for Ukraine giving Russia all their nuclear weapons. We see what that was worth.

Yeah, I don't know that Ukraine made the right call there.

Even if Russia intends to do terrible things to a surrendered Ukraine unless we expect Putin to go full Nazi and start gassing Ukrainians capitulation is likely the course of action that ends up saving the most lives. I'd rather Ukraine win this war but if that isn't possible, and I don't think it is, I want to see as many of them survive to rebuild as possible. You can't try again for independence if you're rotting in a field somewhere.

[EnterpriseSovereign]

It's worth observing that Russia agreed to respect Ukraine's security in exchange for Ukraine giving Russia all their nuclear weapons. We see what that was worth.

Yeah, I don't know that Ukraine made the right call there.

Even if Russia intends to do terrible things to a surrendered Ukraine unless we expect Putin to go full Nazi and start gassing Ukrainians capitulation is likely the course of action that ends up saving the most lives. I'd rather Ukraine win this war but if that isn't possible, and I don't think it is, I want to see as many of them survive to rebuild as possible. You can't try again for independence if you're rotting in a field somewhere.

Save Russian lives, Putin doesn't give a fuck about saving Ukrainians. We can expect him to have their children stolen and the adults mutilated, tortured, strangled and shot. That's the "fucked-up reality" the Ukrainians are fighting against. Because who the fuck is going to stop him?

[Solauren]

If that's your criteria for warlordism, then we've been there a long time. Hence the massive size of countries like the USA, Canada, and Australia.

I was thinking more 'post World War 2'

So are we going to have multi-year-long threads about every US use of force or is the destruction wrought by Western nations somehow different than when Russia does it?

Russia is attempting to conquer and annex territory, while at the same time committing genocide.
While not much of a difference, it's enough that Russia is doing worse then anything the US has done.

Please note: I also did not support the second US Invasion of Iraq.

[Gandalf]

Russia is attempting to conquer and annex territory, while at the same time committing genocide.
While not much of a difference, it's enough that Russia is doing worse then anything the US has done.

No, they just fund allies who annex territory and commit genocide while advancing US interests. It's a miracle of outsourcing.

That's even keeping with the "since 1945" line you put on for some reason.

[Solauren]

That's even keeping with the "since 1945" line you put on for some reason.

United Nations, International law agreements.

[Ralin]

Russia is attempting to conquer and annex territory, while at the same time committing genocide.
While not much of a difference, it's enough that Russia is doing worse then anything the US has done.

No, they just fund allies who annex territory and commit genocide while advancing US interests. It's a miracle of outsourcing.

That's even keeping with the "since 1945" line you put on for some reason.

Hey Gandalf, I think we're all aware at this point that you believe it's really hypocritical to be against this war unless you were exactly as against every war the US and its allies have started so unless you're going to take the next step and actually say that's why Russia should be able to Iraq a few of their neighbors to make things fair I don't think you're really contributing anything here.

[Solauren]

Besides providing aid to the Ukraine, I don't see what the fuck anyone else has done in the past unless they have boots on the ground in this war. (Ukraine, Russia).

Anyone bringing it up is pretty much using 'move the goal post' tactics.

We used to ban people for that kind of shit.

Damn it, where is Lord Wong when we need him to come down on this kind of shit?

[Gandalf]

Hey Gandalf, I think we're all aware at this point that you believe it's really hypocritical to be against this war unless you were exactly as against every war the US and its allies have started so unless you're going to take the next step and actually say that's why Russia should be able to Iraq a few of their neighbors to make things fair I don't think you're really contributing anything here.

Actually, I'm more annoyed at the ridiculous "new age of warlords" nonsense. Iraq (I or II) is a nice example of it happening recently, but there's a whole Cold War of it I could cite too.

As for the second half of that gargantuan sentence, that's just bamboozling. I don't agree with violent conquest under nearly any circumstances.

Besides providing aid to the Ukraine, I don't see what the fuck anyone else has done in the past unless they have boots on the ground in this war. (Ukraine, Russia).

Anyone bringing it up is pretty much using 'move the goal post' tactics.

[Gandalf]

Also, as it is now 24/02, the conflict is now entering its third year.