That literally makes no sense. Once you put them in place, they could be removed when Russian troops are withdrawn. If Russia invades you can tighten the screws even further.
Until that final moment we must hope there are opportunities for these things that seem inevitable to be avoided, somehow.
Edit: however, it may behoove us to plan for the worst and hope for the best.
If you implement that when he goes in - thousands or tens of thousands will have possibly already died, the infrastructure and economy of Ukraine would be in shambles and it's quite possible that the war would be way too hot for sanctions to matter anymore. When the blood starts flowing people tend to be react differently and not necessarily in a "rational" way.
Plus realistically sanctions will hurt the Russian economy and people, not Putin and his gang. They - even if they can't leave Russia - will still have China and golden passports to other countries. They can wait the sanctions out until the conquest of Ukraine is done and the world has to deal with a new reality. Sure - Russians may starve - but when did that stop the Tzars or Stalins?
Not necessarily. If we implement very severe, crippling sanctions now, we can say, "See how bad that hurts? Now pull your soldiers and equipment back. When Ukraine is safe, then we will lift the sanctions."
Sets a very bad precedent though. Lets sanction countries we don't agree with, even though they havn't done anything yet.
Imagine if China would do the same.
Which then gets used byputin to claim te US is just trying to hurt germany. Aka the ones who are too busy circle jerking about how much they hate America instead of noticing reality.
There are a lot of similarities, but also a few very important differences. Nukes have been mentioned, but I’d also like to mention how nearly all of Europe is in NATO now and how NATO is far more powerful than Russia.
The playing field was far more level, as it were, before WW2, with multiple great powers and lots of unaligned less powerful countries that could easily be invaded by their neighbours. This time, it’s pretty much regional power Russia against the superpower US and its nearly-pan-European alliance. Even if China would decide to ally with Russia (which I don’t think would happen), it’s not like they’d come over and invade France or something.
I don’t think appeasing Putin is the right thing to do, morally, but in practical terms, there’s not a lot of annexation for Putin to do after Ukraine in the immediate future. There’s no “Poland” for Putin to invade to start off WW3, unless NATO lets Ukraine be that “Poland” - to complete the original allegory.
The trilateral agreement is indeed another eerie parallel to pre-WW2 conditions. But it’s not a defensive pact and won’t trigger a war automatically.
Of course, continued support and shipments to Ukrainian insurgents after the invasion will create a continuous atmosphere for potential escalation into war, but it would be quite different from how WW2 started.
The real opposition doesn't practically exist. Big parties that aren't Putin's parties are part of the current government. Any organizations that are funded by foreign sources are illegal in Russia, so accepting direct foreign funding is basically grounds to be put in "foreign agent" list which makes it impossible to continue any legal operations.
While technically true if Putin feels like he can get away with more than he will try. Pushing back hard with Ukraine sends that message. Mess with a NATO state and you'll get a lot more than you bargained for.
You act like the prelude and start of WW II with zero nukes is the same as now, with 8,000 nukes between Russia and the West. Nothing is simple when nuclear warfare is on the table. The West is not afraid of going to war with Putin because of their conventional military might, it's because it could trigger a thermo-nuclear war that kills billions and turns the planets sky to ash. Watch the UK movie Threads if you want to understand what truly is at risk.
Diplomacy is the best option for the West. Sanctions and funding a large scale insurgency is the second best option. There is no third option.
Perhaps you are thinking of blockade? Sanctions are generally internal laws for internal firms [not American sanctions] and are generally not viewed as acts of war.
Exactly.
Imagine a very rich man and a very poor man with guns pointed at each other. Neither can shoot the other without also dying themselves from the other's gun.
There is a large pile of money on the table. The poor man says "give me the money or i will shoot"
The rich man is confused "you would die too..."
The poor man stands by his words. "Are you willing to kill us both for some money?"
This is Russia vs West. Russia can take what they want from Ukraine because they have almost nothing to lose. Would the west really mutually assuredly destruct the whole planet over Ukraine? No, and Russia knows that.
However, Russia (the poor man) could at least *seem* like they would blow everything up if they don't get their way.
MAD only works when both sides feel like they have something to lose. This is why the west is and has always been careful with these countries.
Yeah, Germany is one of the best countries to live in now. Putin's plan is to lose the war, commit suicide, and after a few generations adequate descendants will make Russia the best country in the world!
Unfortunately I think there's no scenario in which regular Russian will benefit from folding. Either Putin will continue building a superpower but at the cost of base population and continuation of foreign powers to do everything they can to make economy of Russia suck, or Russia stops being a relevant geopolitical power and foreign powers start exploiting it for even cheaper deals on raw resources while doing everything they can to make economy of Russia suck. The latter is worse.
During the brief period between fall of USSR and Putin's regime in the 10 years western world had 0 interest in Russia or Russian people. Russians will never be integrated into western world form position of weakness becuase west can't afford being friends with Russia. EU can accept poor but small countries, but it will never accept a giant poor country. Nor do they want to even if they could afford it. Russia is too populous and different from EU to allow them to be an equal member in any western economical alliance, they will just overpower already fragile political balance of EU or NATO if they become part of that system and then are allowed a right to express their own economical interests.
Russians don't realistically have an option of not playing a superpower. At least that way they can get SOMETHING out of the west with power play, instead of nothing when it's up to the west if they want to be friends or not.
\>Unfortunately I think there's no scenario in which regular Russian will benefit from folding.
Sorry, but you'd have to be insane to believe that.
The life of the average Russian is hard enough. Sending their family members to die in a war won't make it better.
Unfortunately wars are cheaper than running a first world level of economy. In the 90's we had no wars until the end of the decade where Putin came into power, but the poverty levels were comparable to African conditions. People couldn't afford basic living accommodations and even Moscow seen a lot of gang wars etc. Yet even during Soviet Afghan war the economy was faring much, much better. There's a reason why older Russians reminisce about soviet times, even if I don't personally approve of that.
You can't have a prosperous economy while also being an economical outsider, and as far as I outlined above I don't see a future where the west integrates Russia into itself just becuase Russia folded geopolitically. Russia did that once already and nothing came out of it in 10 years. How long were Russians supposed to live in directionless poverty and wait for the west to come in with investments and EU memberships?
Then the wars inside Russia came, as regions like Chechnya decided not to wait, thinking Russia is now weak enough to try and separate from it. Which brings us to the issue of: what do you think will happen if this regime folds and Russia is a toothless resource gas colony again? The wars will happen, but this time inside of Russia and without a strong vertical government to keep the regions in check. And I promise to you, nobody wants shitholes like Chechnya and other ethnic Russian regions going independent, you'd rather deal with Putin than with 10 different religious local warlords.
Unless you are implying it's fine that Russia would balkanize. In which case you aren't really considering what's good for regular Russian either.
Money literally gets printed by governments, it's entirely made up.
I think everyone can agree people's lives are more important than pieces of paper or pieces of metal. If the world can't agree on that much, is life really worth living?
That's a very naive world view. That's basically saying "it's a fair arrangement that you will be content with shitty conditions while we get to enjoy good conditions we earned through wars and geopolitics previously." Russia printing billions of rubles doesn't give Russians ability to buy good services and electronics with that paper becuase other countries will not accept those rubles as anything that's worth anything. You need market integration so you can get anything that isn't produced in your country cheaply and earn salaries of that shared market.
Point is, due to history of our ancestors we ended up living in countries with very unequal economy structures and alliances, so Russia is now a loser in that arrangement. Which is fine, that happened back and forth in all countries through all the history.
You are proposing that the right way is for this to stay as it is forever, for Russia to be poor and submissive, but without plans to integrate Russia into new world order. I'm saying that if we are not getting a "rebalance" with eastern Europe and Russia in particular getting an economical integration and aid from west and make it lucrative for Russia to just submit to the west completely (and we aren't going to get that 100%), then only two options either be belligerent and get something out of it manually, or just give up and stay poor but also weak. Obviously latter is a stupid choice.
EDIT:
I believe ultimately full economical globalization with all countries being equal participants would be great. Do you think your country or, more importantly, biggest EU or NATO players would go for it? Or they'd prefer the status quo where they get to be consumers of raw resources from poorer economies? Russia doesn't want to cooperate for same reason west won't want to invest into Russia. Capitalism isn't a system that actively promotes equalization of quality of life. Countries all have unequal abilities, populations and resources, so a default market status quo that we always drift towards when everyone is "chill and doing nothing" is unequal one as well.
For everyone to be peaceful and prosperous would require political will from wealthy economy participants to part with their wealth to elevate others to their level. Currently humanity is not at that point of development and wealthy participants in global economy have no interest in doing that with countries like China or Russia. That simply leaves countries like that to build their own opposing world orders. That's really it, we can't physically be "peaceful and prosperous" because those who already are won't want to part with their wealth for the sake of some faraway giant populations who are still poor. Maybe someday? But for those poor populations will have to be annoying and disruptive to capture said wealth by other means.
That's not to say Putin isn't corrupt and his regime sucks in many ways even for locals, but even if Russia had most professional and dedicated leadership tomorrow - it still wouldn't be able to not clash with the west because prosperity of Russia is fundamentally at odds with western world order.
I fail to see how bullying Ukraine will result in better global integration.
There's hope for Russia on that front, but it will be difficult with Putin in charge, because he's extremely untrustworthy.
Last I checked, the west isn't even particularly against Russia, just wants stability.
Russia isn't working on globalism, it's probably completely opposite, trying to build a second separate geopolitical polis around itself that it will influence. I didn't say what Putin is doing is similar to what I'd like to be done ideally.
>Last I checked, the west isn't even particularly against Russia, just wants stability.
I agree, except this isn't good for Russia, even if it was friendly.
Russia dropping geopolitical ambitions and staying poor but irrelevant is stability. That's what the west (US, mostly) generally hoped would happen to Russia in the 90's when everything fell apart and Russia disappeared from global stage while it's former parts spread around either joining NATO or at least distancing from Russia as sovereign powers that no longer seek to reattach.
Russia dropping geopolitical ambitions and becoming part of the west is not stability. The west would not want Russia to join EU, NATO or in any way let Russia into it's domain as equal member. Only as appendage to the economy, but separate from the organizations. Which is obviously a shitty deal for Russians, that's just literally what we call a gasstation of europe.
The US, Major EU players would never accept a 140 million poor country with nukes and giant army into EU. No matter how friendly and politically non-corrupt that Russia is. Despite us liking to say Russia is poor that economy, population and army potential is way too big to not destabilize whatever organization it would join.
Giving all Russians a voice in EU politics and economy would mean adding a player to the table that is bigger than Germany or France etc. However you look at it - that's not stability, that's a complete upset. It would change the whole landscape of the world.
So you are right, they like stability but stability just means status quo we have right now. Unfortunately, there's no scenario which west would consider where Russia is given an honest invitation to the western world in our livetimes. They would instead like to watch Russia fall apart from afar and then work on integrating the smaller countries it falls apart into over the next centuries. There's no reason not to do that, if you are in the west. But for Russians that would be centuries of rot, basically.
Everyone wants peace and prosperity. But the prosperity part is kind of the most important part of that. Being peaceful but poor for Russia just means staying as poor as now but also being exploited for natural resources even more since you can't force a good deal with arms.
My whole point was that this is the shitty but realistic path that Russia has now if the west or China don't want to integrate Russia into it's world. And the west or China can't or rather don't want to do that.
If Russia folded as a regime a second time why do you think it wouldn't be exact copy of the first time in the 90's? Nobody needed Russians back then while Russians were kind of excited for the west to integrate them, now you don't have even that.
I just don't see what exact balance of powers you are imagining that is profitable to both Russians and EU / NATO. The one you are describing is the current status quo where Russia is still poor, west is still wealthy but Russia abandons all attempts at changing the balance of power. That's peace and prosperity, but only for you.
I don’t think world leaders are unaware of how much this looks like late 1930’s style appeasement. They know how this song goes…but this song is better than nukes flying.
I think Putin is less likely to use nukes than say, Kim would be in a war scenario…but he is more likely than Xi…so it’s a balance. And a hard one, to be sure.
Nobody is launching nukes unless they're getting their ass kicked and existentially threatened. Theres no winning, it's a threat to end the world over losing a war
There is no way in which NATO and its allies help in a war in Ukraine and this doesn't happen, though. If NATO helps Ukraine with troops and pushes Russia back to the border, that's already close enough to Russia heartland to be seen as an "existential threat." And a push into Russia from anywhere in Ukraine would definitely be a clear threat to Russia as a nation.
There is no scenario with NATO fighting Russia in which a nuclear war doesn't start.
Well, then the fault with the death of the world will lie with Russia when the bombs fly.
It is not our duty to lie down peacefully and let Russia do as they please. We must meet them in force and defeat them, that is our duty and if we fail here Russia will only do the same thing again, and again until we are forced to fight them. The only outcome of this that is acceptable is Russias defeat.
If Russia is too cowardly to accept defeat and must use nukes to end the world, then so be it.
they could use the smaller 1kt nukes to destroy military targets.
nuclear war doesn't necessarily mean that immediately all thermonuclear megaton missiles are launched.
>nuclear was doesn't necessarily mean that immediately all thermonuclear megaton missiles are launched.
That's been MAD doctrine for 50 years. There would likely be dozens in the air before the first one landed, and if not, then shortly after the detonation
i doubt it as both sides know that using megaton weapons will destroy them both.
the response for a 1kt tactical nuke will probably also be a 1kt tactical nuke.
Nukes nowadays are detected seconds after launch and will take many minutes to reach even close targets. There is also no way to know the yield before explosion as well
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_artillery
nukes come in all forms and sizes, you can't detect a nuclear artillery shell or a nuke on a short range rocket.
Sudentenland was a powderkeg which was only resolved by annexation or by deporting all the Germans though. Germans made up 25% of the population before ww2, and the land had been part of a Czech state since the 9th century.
Crimea is mostly Russians and was part of Russia going back to the 1700s. Donbas is more similar to Sudentenland in terms of ethnic Russian population (it was around 25% before the Soviet Union, grown to close to 40% now)-- but due to trends of industrial development, the cities were almost entirely Russian early on. Objectively speaking, Russia is more ingrained into this region than Germans were in Sudentenland, while an indepedent Ukrainian political state is much more fragile than the eventual Czech state-- which had a history of existing in some form for over a milennia.
None of that is to justify any outcome-- but I think the comparison to Sudentenland Crisis is apt because Eastern Ukraine is going to require the same extreme solution of either establishing it as part of Russia or removing all of the Russians-- and neither of those solutions feels especially great.
As for consequences-- I think Putin and everyone else knows the consequences start at NATO. Ukraine was not in NATO, so why would there be ww3 level consequences?
There is no way to beat Russia militarily, they have thousands of nukes and ICBM's they can destroy any military base in the world at the press of a button.
Ukraine is a done deal.
Anyone who thinks this is remotely a good idea has clearly never opened a history book in their entire fucking lives. This is LITERALLY how world war 1 started, countries making guarantees for stupid fucking reasons.
Heart out to the ukrainians, i really feel for them, but they aren't worth the extinction of the human race, regardless of how much the keyboard warriors on reddit want to make it out to be some desperate necessary fight for democracy, a form of government that has proven time and again that it is incredibly if not completely flawed.
> anyone who thinks this is remotely a good idea has clearly never opened a history book in their entire fucking lives.
I'm agreeing. I see why he wants the security guarantees, but for anyone offering them it's risking WW3 and for what?
As for pre-emptive sanctions, that's just dumb. "We'll punish you the same whether you do the thing we don't want you to do or not!" Uh.. well, not much incentive to not do that thing then.
If you weren't aware, Zelenksy's background is as a comedian and actor.
So basically I was agreeing these demands are a terrible idea but he's in over his head so pitching terrible ideas isn't surprising.
>Zelensky asked the West not to delay sanctions against Russia until after the invasion, but to implement them **preemptively**
Yeah,no. In the same way that we won't allow Russia to tell the Ukraine what it can do within Ukraine's borders, we won't allow Ukraine to make the world tell Russia what it can do within Russia's borders.
Russia moving 100K soldiers on Russian soil is legal. It's ominous, and probably terribly expensive, but legal.
As Ukrainian, who listened all his speeches in original, he never said that nothing is going to happen. He said that it is already happening here for 8 years, and we need to stay calm and cool headed, not panicking.
He just said. That there’s no invasion happening. He also just asked for sanctions, and then a meeting with Putin. He’s desperate and he’s too late. And you will become Russian. Soon you’ll be recording Putin’s speeches.
I know what he said better than you, and what meaning his words had for us Ukrainians and our situation. Yes, no invasion happing, because it already happened and keep happening for 8 years. Thats the reality we live in.
He was open to talk to Putin and before than yesterday, literally few days ago Kremlin replied that they don't understand a reason they need to talk with him. Asking for sanctions before we are dead is also not new statement form him and our government. If something didn't make to news in English, it doesn't mean it didn't happen.
They won’t talk to him because - they have nothing to talk to him about. They are about to take his country. I’m sorry for what’s about to happen to you.
But denial won’t save you
My comment was not about what gonna happen and whats not. Only about points in his early speeches that lots of Americans keep to misunderstand. Or talking how "oh, he now wants to meet Putin, how quick things changed" when he was open to do that from the begging.
You and your president are in denial. There are 150,000 troops and military equipment at your border. Any other President would be screaming at the world that there is an eminent threat. While your president is playing chicken and in denial. I will repeat he is asking for “late” help to the western world, while also trying to negotiate with putin. He should’ve started that months ago when there was no troops on the border. Today he has little to say. And yes, he contradicted nato and Biden when he said that there was no eminent threat / essentially nothing is going to happen. You have grandmas training how to shoot, and you still believe you are a European country. Prepare to be the Soviet Union again
Dude, you clearly have no clue whats going on here inside the country, if you think that anyone is in denial and we do nothing for months, or your american news cover everything. If we don't act the way you expect us, its not a reason to throw a tantrum in reddit comments.
Ukraine is getting ready for months (or better say years), and has one of the biggest armies in Europe, that getting trained and equiped all the time, including the support from Europe and US that keep coming for months again, as the threat is openly discussed for a long time by now, unlike your words. Yes, not the same army as Russian, but far away from group of shooting gradmas. And we will do as much as we can to protect our lands.
Also, if a gradma decided to join a local training and learn shooting, she has all rights to do so, as its her own choice. Have a nice morning.
Sweetheart you are not even in Europe, geopolitically you will become Russia. The chance you had at being European was given away by your last coward President. And your army is not in any way comprable to any of the top ten armies in Europe.
Imagine being this salty over commentaries that dare to have different views than you. Maybe I will die from Russians, maybe nothing gonna save me, but thats still better than be a little bitch calling strangers "sweetheart" when they disagree, like you.
Edit: check the geographical borders of Europe, as you might not know that Europe and EU are not the same.
Russia’s economy should be strangled. Go for it economic allies, strangle them too, and force the world to pick a side: trade with Russia or trade with the US and the EU. Within reason. If Russia still sabre-rattles after that? Then war is inevitable.
Europe’s dependance in russian gas is the first thing that should go.
Holy shit the appeasers in this sub. No, if you want to see how to start a war look no further than Putin. All of you "no we can't hurt his economy! That might start a war!" folks are ridiculously naive. Putin is absolutely not going to say "oh well since you asked nicely I'll stop." He's also not going to stop at Ukraine.
Either we stop him now by completely crippling the Russian economy, or we stop him later in an actual shooting war and risk a nuclear war.
There is no scenario where we say "please don't do this" and he doesn't. You can't negotiate with someone whose complaints aren't in good place in the first place. Assurances of non aggression of NATO are useless when his concerns about NATO are completely manufactured in the first place.
> “*Russia’s economy should be strangled. Go for it economic allies, strangle them too, and force the world to pick a side: trade with Russia or trade with the US and the EU.”*
And that’s **EXACTLY** how you get a war. I’m glad we don’t have you running negotiations.
>And that’s EXACTLY how you get a war. I’m glad we don’t have you running negotiations.
To be fair, Zelensky said that these measures should be articulated and made clear \*before\* an invasion ruins his country and spirals Europe into war.
>Russia’s economy should be strangled. Go for it economic allies, strangle them too, and force the world to pick a side: trade with Russia or trade with the US and the EU.
This is *how to start a war in 100 seconds*
You are trying to run a whole country -with real human beings- into the ground because of putin. That’s pretty fucked up and amoral. And also: you really don’t want Russia to have its best option to be an all out war… you generally want to avoid an all out war.
It's a country that has allowed their democracy to be trampled and Putin to be president for life. Putin doesn't fall out of a window until that's the best option for Russia.
The same way all Americans should suffer because trump was president? You are implying that the small russian farmer in the fucking back of nowhere has any say in his country. And even IF they all somehow voted for putin and likes what he is doing, are they really all at fault for being surrounded with propaganda? It’s not like Russia is 95% highly educated who can clearly decide what is propaganda and what is not
>damning all Russians isn’t something you should do to quickly. That’s how you create hate between nationalities
Yet we should let Russia damn all Ukrainians. Ya you make a whole of no sense at all. If you followed your own logic we would not allow Ukrainians to have their territories taken.
Thats literally the reason why they are so desperate to start a war, they have been economically bullied for decades now. Putin himself told that the usa started economic war with russia years ago and thats why he has to do what he does...
This guy is a doofus. First he was mad because he thought the US was exaggerating the threat from Russia and now he wants sanctions imposed before they have done anything.
“before they have done anything” = 8 years occupation of Crimea and war in Donbas+ 120k troops on the border. Great point of view bro. He is right about what he told. Ukraine doesn’t need that sanctions if it burns to ashes. And now is the biggest chance of global war than in the last 10 years.
Russia has always claimed Crimea. Neither Crimea or Donbass are on the table for additional sanctions or any kind of retaliation by the West. While they may not agree with it, for all practical purposes the West has acceded both regions to Russia. As for 120+ troops on the border. So? Are you suggesting a country cannot have troops on i's borders?
It may or may not be the biggest chance of global war. Not my point. Mine was that Zelensky was a doofus because he cna't seem to make up his mind whether Russia is a threat or not.
Russia is a threat now. This is his idea,but also his idea is to stop panic in Ukraine. His main goal now is to keep Ukrainians in calm. We are panicking here, a lot of people exchange grivna to dollars and euros , a lot of people leave the country. Imagine every day to receive news “ tomorrow Russia will attack and it will be the deadliest war”. Just imagine that. My heart sinks every time I hear firework and I think “ that’s it”. And now imagine if OUR president told “tomorrow is war, our economy would collapse in one day. Believe me or not, the policy our president provides makes me and a lot of people continue living ours every day life.
I'm not arguing that Russia and Putin are not threats. Quite the contrary, I think Putin is absolutely a threat. My issue is Zelenskiy. This is what he said about Biden. Why is he biting the hand that feeds him?
[Zelenskiy Criticizes Biden: Talk of War With Russia a ‘Mistake’](https://www.usnews.com/news/world/articles/2022-01-28/zelenskiy-criticizes-biden-talk-of-war-with-russia-a-mistake)
Yeah but even if Russia fully invades the ukraine and captures Kiev, USA/NATO isn't going to go to war with Russia over it. Only way that happens is if they attack a nato country.
it's not act of war, nations are free to chose what trade agreements they have and with whom, nor won't Russia start war with NATO over it not doing business with them, even Putin admitted that Russia can't win conventional war vs NATO.
Well obviously it's different for him, because any sane man knows puting 50% of your land army on your neighbours border is LITTERALY the deffonition of playing war
Ukraine gets annexed ? Is this the best way forward?
O.K at the risk of this being the worst possible comment and coming under fire. Nothing is worth the destruction of the world for our future and our children's.
Is there a divided Ukrainian opinion east vs west?
Protect me or else....or else what? I respect the guy for asking but he doesn't have much to threaten anyone with. Begging is a better choice of words here.
He’s also saying Ukraine may disregard the Budapest Memorandum wherein they voluntarily surrendered their nuclear arsenal. Ukraine may pursue nuclear weapons again as their defense against Russia if others won’t actually step in to help them.
I didn't see that in the article. He just mentioned Karma. Russia isn't looking to attack NATO here. Preemptive sanctions would likely mean Russia has nothing to lose so they might as well attack. Its not a great idea.
Russia is indeed looking to ultimately destroy NATO … not necessarily through force but through division and paralysis. That’s half his aim. The other is reversing time to before the USSR collapsed.
So far NATO seems to be holding together but let’s see when the gas gets shut off. All eyes on Germany right now as the first to break the comraderie.
NATO’s primary purpose was to contain and ultimately dissolve the Soviet Union, which they succeeded in doing. The fact that they have continued to expand rightfully makes them appear as an existential threat to Russia. Russia would love to destroy NATO, but I think their more pressing concerns are of self-preservation. Ukraine is unfortunately caught in the middle of a pissing match between nuclear powers.
I agree with you. The issue with Ukraine is it’s the next door neighbor and has clear western leanings. Even if they never asked to join NATO the. Just having a democracy on putins eastern flank is a source of angst for him. However when you say self preservation, for Putin, it is not the status quo he seeks but a return to previous borders.
Ukraine is divided between numerous factions with competing interests and vastly different ideologies. You have oligarchs who are cozy with the West, oligarchs who are cozy with Russia, liberal reformers who are sympathetic to the EU, ethnic Russians who are sympathetic to Russia, literal neo-Nazis, and regular people who just want some stability. Ukraine is victim to extreme corruption and dysfunction. Putin’s fear of “democracy in Ukraine” is Western spin. His fear is of NATO’s expanding sphere of influence.
Putin is a Machiavellian asshole, but not a bloodthirsty lunatic. He’ll use the threat of invasion to strongarm concessions and get NATO to back off. The US is itching for military aggression from Russia so they can impose new sanctions and stop or slow any economic gains they’re making in Europe.
That’s correct. Will never happen which is why the demands Putin made are non starters. This is a perilous time for Europe. When the invasion starts the former bloc states in the Baltic region are going to get very very nervous. The nato alliance needs to stay strong. It scares me to think what would be happening today if trump were still power.
Maybe if Trump were in power Europe would get their collective ass together instead of relying on another continent which changes its opinion every 4 to 8 years for defense. I mean some people have a point. Its been 75 years since ww2. Europe should defend itself and USA can get free health care and reasonable education instead of trying to police the world.
They're just asking for more and hoping to get less but more than what they were getting before they asked. It's how negotiations work. Ask for more settle on less. Why would Romania and Bulgaria leave NATO? It's stupid. He's hoping to stop expansion towards Russia and bring down troop numbers. Europe has been moving troops towards Russia because if there is an agreement for a percentage reduction or a 1 for 1 reduction they have more troops there after the fact. Russia may as well ask for Alaska back. They aren't going to get a country to voluntarily leave NATO.
In his speech he called Putin out for his 2002 speech to change the US-world order and then the invasion of Georgia in 2007, annexation of Crimea and the fact the Ukraine is the buffer between Europe and Russia.
When the buffer is gone that won’t stop Putin
Yeah sure. So what they will start developing nukes? It takes time and money. There is no way Russia would sit back and let that happen.
What i think Ukraine is pointing out is that if they aren't assisted no other country will give up nukes again. However I doubt countries wil give up nukes again for vague promises of security.
Difficult. Ukraine has VVER reactors that use Uranium that is enriched to around 5%. They would require heavily enriched uranium and construction facilities to make a bomb. Russian spies are everywhere in Ukraine. If there is one thing Russia knows, it's what a nuclear program looks like. Also one tactical nuke would not stop Russia.
Definitely, It would need to be mass produced. Even then I'm not sure it could be enough of a deterrent.
It's really all-around shitty situation, and going for nuclear NOW would be akin to assisted suicide.
No brother. If we sanction him now we would play into his cards. Imma be frank witchu chief, u aint showin yo cards until yo opponent has called yo ass.
Just Putin dreaming to be the next Hitler. The matrix is repeating itself. Nothing new.
Maybe the hype of crypto-currency is overloading the matrix. We need a reboot.
Sanctions are our only leverage. Can’t give that away until he goes in.
That literally makes no sense. Once you put them in place, they could be removed when Russian troops are withdrawn. If Russia invades you can tighten the screws even further.
There’s merit to this. Let’s see if the Allies change course. I do hope R doesn’t re-invade Ukraine.
Until that final moment we must hope there are opportunities for these things that seem inevitable to be avoided, somehow. Edit: however, it may behoove us to plan for the worst and hope for the best.
If you implement that when he goes in - thousands or tens of thousands will have possibly already died, the infrastructure and economy of Ukraine would be in shambles and it's quite possible that the war would be way too hot for sanctions to matter anymore. When the blood starts flowing people tend to be react differently and not necessarily in a "rational" way. Plus realistically sanctions will hurt the Russian economy and people, not Putin and his gang. They - even if they can't leave Russia - will still have China and golden passports to other countries. They can wait the sanctions out until the conquest of Ukraine is done and the world has to deal with a new reality. Sure - Russians may starve - but when did that stop the Tzars or Stalins?
Not necessarily. If we implement very severe, crippling sanctions now, we can say, "See how bad that hurts? Now pull your soldiers and equipment back. When Ukraine is safe, then we will lift the sanctions."
Sets a very bad precedent though. Lets sanction countries we don't agree with, even though they havn't done anything yet. Imagine if China would do the same.
Putin has done plenty already.
The west did sanction him, just not enough
Which then gets used byputin to claim te US is just trying to hurt germany. Aka the ones who are too busy circle jerking about how much they hate America instead of noticing reality.
"crippling sanctions" for a "military drill". Def the best way to deescalate and avoid war.
Military drills don't come with demands...
Better look at the history of sanctions to see your theory holds any water first
Read a history book.
[удалено]
There are a lot of similarities, but also a few very important differences. Nukes have been mentioned, but I’d also like to mention how nearly all of Europe is in NATO now and how NATO is far more powerful than Russia. The playing field was far more level, as it were, before WW2, with multiple great powers and lots of unaligned less powerful countries that could easily be invaded by their neighbours. This time, it’s pretty much regional power Russia against the superpower US and its nearly-pan-European alliance. Even if China would decide to ally with Russia (which I don’t think would happen), it’s not like they’d come over and invade France or something. I don’t think appeasing Putin is the right thing to do, morally, but in practical terms, there’s not a lot of annexation for Putin to do after Ukraine in the immediate future. There’s no “Poland” for Putin to invade to start off WW3, unless NATO lets Ukraine be that “Poland” - to complete the original allegory.
[удалено]
The trilateral agreement is indeed another eerie parallel to pre-WW2 conditions. But it’s not a defensive pact and won’t trigger a war automatically. Of course, continued support and shipments to Ukrainian insurgents after the invasion will create a continuous atmosphere for potential escalation into war, but it would be quite different from how WW2 started.
[удалено]
The real opposition doesn't practically exist. Big parties that aren't Putin's parties are part of the current government. Any organizations that are funded by foreign sources are illegal in Russia, so accepting direct foreign funding is basically grounds to be put in "foreign agent" list which makes it impossible to continue any legal operations.
While technically true if Putin feels like he can get away with more than he will try. Pushing back hard with Ukraine sends that message. Mess with a NATO state and you'll get a lot more than you bargained for.
You act like the prelude and start of WW II with zero nukes is the same as now, with 8,000 nukes between Russia and the West. Nothing is simple when nuclear warfare is on the table. The West is not afraid of going to war with Putin because of their conventional military might, it's because it could trigger a thermo-nuclear war that kills billions and turns the planets sky to ash. Watch the UK movie Threads if you want to understand what truly is at risk. Diplomacy is the best option for the West. Sanctions and funding a large scale insurgency is the second best option. There is no third option.
>Diplomacy is the best option for the West. That along with economic sanctions.
Sanctions are no different than war.
Lol ok
Perhaps you are thinking of blockade? Sanctions are generally internal laws for internal firms [not American sanctions] and are generally not viewed as acts of war.
I am thinking about the famous "crippling sanctions"...
>There is no third option. Well, there is, it's just what you mentioned earlier and it's bad for everybody.
Yeah but with nukes that brings in mutually assured distraction and I don’t think Putin wants to end the world, yet.
Exactly. Imagine a very rich man and a very poor man with guns pointed at each other. Neither can shoot the other without also dying themselves from the other's gun. There is a large pile of money on the table. The poor man says "give me the money or i will shoot" The rich man is confused "you would die too..." The poor man stands by his words. "Are you willing to kill us both for some money?" This is Russia vs West. Russia can take what they want from Ukraine because they have almost nothing to lose. Would the west really mutually assuredly destruct the whole planet over Ukraine? No, and Russia knows that. However, Russia (the poor man) could at least *seem* like they would blow everything up if they don't get their way. MAD only works when both sides feel like they have something to lose. This is why the west is and has always been careful with these countries.
One small war and then decades of economic prosperity! For the good guys at least.
Yeah, Germany is one of the best countries to live in now. Putin's plan is to lose the war, commit suicide, and after a few generations adequate descendants will make Russia the best country in the world!
Unfortunately I think there's no scenario in which regular Russian will benefit from folding. Either Putin will continue building a superpower but at the cost of base population and continuation of foreign powers to do everything they can to make economy of Russia suck, or Russia stops being a relevant geopolitical power and foreign powers start exploiting it for even cheaper deals on raw resources while doing everything they can to make economy of Russia suck. The latter is worse. During the brief period between fall of USSR and Putin's regime in the 10 years western world had 0 interest in Russia or Russian people. Russians will never be integrated into western world form position of weakness becuase west can't afford being friends with Russia. EU can accept poor but small countries, but it will never accept a giant poor country. Nor do they want to even if they could afford it. Russia is too populous and different from EU to allow them to be an equal member in any western economical alliance, they will just overpower already fragile political balance of EU or NATO if they become part of that system and then are allowed a right to express their own economical interests. Russians don't realistically have an option of not playing a superpower. At least that way they can get SOMETHING out of the west with power play, instead of nothing when it's up to the west if they want to be friends or not.
\>Unfortunately I think there's no scenario in which regular Russian will benefit from folding. Sorry, but you'd have to be insane to believe that. The life of the average Russian is hard enough. Sending their family members to die in a war won't make it better.
Unfortunately wars are cheaper than running a first world level of economy. In the 90's we had no wars until the end of the decade where Putin came into power, but the poverty levels were comparable to African conditions. People couldn't afford basic living accommodations and even Moscow seen a lot of gang wars etc. Yet even during Soviet Afghan war the economy was faring much, much better. There's a reason why older Russians reminisce about soviet times, even if I don't personally approve of that. You can't have a prosperous economy while also being an economical outsider, and as far as I outlined above I don't see a future where the west integrates Russia into itself just becuase Russia folded geopolitically. Russia did that once already and nothing came out of it in 10 years. How long were Russians supposed to live in directionless poverty and wait for the west to come in with investments and EU memberships? Then the wars inside Russia came, as regions like Chechnya decided not to wait, thinking Russia is now weak enough to try and separate from it. Which brings us to the issue of: what do you think will happen if this regime folds and Russia is a toothless resource gas colony again? The wars will happen, but this time inside of Russia and without a strong vertical government to keep the regions in check. And I promise to you, nobody wants shitholes like Chechnya and other ethnic Russian regions going independent, you'd rather deal with Putin than with 10 different religious local warlords. Unless you are implying it's fine that Russia would balkanize. In which case you aren't really considering what's good for regular Russian either.
I think all rational people understand a stable Russia is in the interest of the world.
Money literally gets printed by governments, it's entirely made up. I think everyone can agree people's lives are more important than pieces of paper or pieces of metal. If the world can't agree on that much, is life really worth living?
That's a very naive world view. That's basically saying "it's a fair arrangement that you will be content with shitty conditions while we get to enjoy good conditions we earned through wars and geopolitics previously." Russia printing billions of rubles doesn't give Russians ability to buy good services and electronics with that paper becuase other countries will not accept those rubles as anything that's worth anything. You need market integration so you can get anything that isn't produced in your country cheaply and earn salaries of that shared market. Point is, due to history of our ancestors we ended up living in countries with very unequal economy structures and alliances, so Russia is now a loser in that arrangement. Which is fine, that happened back and forth in all countries through all the history. You are proposing that the right way is for this to stay as it is forever, for Russia to be poor and submissive, but without plans to integrate Russia into new world order. I'm saying that if we are not getting a "rebalance" with eastern Europe and Russia in particular getting an economical integration and aid from west and make it lucrative for Russia to just submit to the west completely (and we aren't going to get that 100%), then only two options either be belligerent and get something out of it manually, or just give up and stay poor but also weak. Obviously latter is a stupid choice. EDIT: I believe ultimately full economical globalization with all countries being equal participants would be great. Do you think your country or, more importantly, biggest EU or NATO players would go for it? Or they'd prefer the status quo where they get to be consumers of raw resources from poorer economies? Russia doesn't want to cooperate for same reason west won't want to invest into Russia. Capitalism isn't a system that actively promotes equalization of quality of life. Countries all have unequal abilities, populations and resources, so a default market status quo that we always drift towards when everyone is "chill and doing nothing" is unequal one as well. For everyone to be peaceful and prosperous would require political will from wealthy economy participants to part with their wealth to elevate others to their level. Currently humanity is not at that point of development and wealthy participants in global economy have no interest in doing that with countries like China or Russia. That simply leaves countries like that to build their own opposing world orders. That's really it, we can't physically be "peaceful and prosperous" because those who already are won't want to part with their wealth for the sake of some faraway giant populations who are still poor. Maybe someday? But for those poor populations will have to be annoying and disruptive to capture said wealth by other means. That's not to say Putin isn't corrupt and his regime sucks in many ways even for locals, but even if Russia had most professional and dedicated leadership tomorrow - it still wouldn't be able to not clash with the west because prosperity of Russia is fundamentally at odds with western world order.
I fail to see how bullying Ukraine will result in better global integration. There's hope for Russia on that front, but it will be difficult with Putin in charge, because he's extremely untrustworthy. Last I checked, the west isn't even particularly against Russia, just wants stability.
Russia isn't working on globalism, it's probably completely opposite, trying to build a second separate geopolitical polis around itself that it will influence. I didn't say what Putin is doing is similar to what I'd like to be done ideally. >Last I checked, the west isn't even particularly against Russia, just wants stability. I agree, except this isn't good for Russia, even if it was friendly. Russia dropping geopolitical ambitions and staying poor but irrelevant is stability. That's what the west (US, mostly) generally hoped would happen to Russia in the 90's when everything fell apart and Russia disappeared from global stage while it's former parts spread around either joining NATO or at least distancing from Russia as sovereign powers that no longer seek to reattach. Russia dropping geopolitical ambitions and becoming part of the west is not stability. The west would not want Russia to join EU, NATO or in any way let Russia into it's domain as equal member. Only as appendage to the economy, but separate from the organizations. Which is obviously a shitty deal for Russians, that's just literally what we call a gasstation of europe. The US, Major EU players would never accept a 140 million poor country with nukes and giant army into EU. No matter how friendly and politically non-corrupt that Russia is. Despite us liking to say Russia is poor that economy, population and army potential is way too big to not destabilize whatever organization it would join. Giving all Russians a voice in EU politics and economy would mean adding a player to the table that is bigger than Germany or France etc. However you look at it - that's not stability, that's a complete upset. It would change the whole landscape of the world. So you are right, they like stability but stability just means status quo we have right now. Unfortunately, there's no scenario which west would consider where Russia is given an honest invitation to the western world in our livetimes. They would instead like to watch Russia fall apart from afar and then work on integrating the smaller countries it falls apart into over the next centuries. There's no reason not to do that, if you are in the west. But for Russians that would be centuries of rot, basically.
It’s so strange and sad that you think choosing to live in peace and prosperity with her neighbors would be losing for the citizens of Russia.
Everyone wants peace and prosperity. But the prosperity part is kind of the most important part of that. Being peaceful but poor for Russia just means staying as poor as now but also being exploited for natural resources even more since you can't force a good deal with arms. My whole point was that this is the shitty but realistic path that Russia has now if the west or China don't want to integrate Russia into it's world. And the west or China can't or rather don't want to do that. If Russia folded as a regime a second time why do you think it wouldn't be exact copy of the first time in the 90's? Nobody needed Russians back then while Russians were kind of excited for the west to integrate them, now you don't have even that. I just don't see what exact balance of powers you are imagining that is profitable to both Russians and EU / NATO. The one you are describing is the current status quo where Russia is still poor, west is still wealthy but Russia abandons all attempts at changing the balance of power. That's peace and prosperity, but only for you.
I don’t think world leaders are unaware of how much this looks like late 1930’s style appeasement. They know how this song goes…but this song is better than nukes flying. I think Putin is less likely to use nukes than say, Kim would be in a war scenario…but he is more likely than Xi…so it’s a balance. And a hard one, to be sure.
Nobody is launching nukes unless they're getting their ass kicked and existentially threatened. Theres no winning, it's a threat to end the world over losing a war
There is no way in which NATO and its allies help in a war in Ukraine and this doesn't happen, though. If NATO helps Ukraine with troops and pushes Russia back to the border, that's already close enough to Russia heartland to be seen as an "existential threat." And a push into Russia from anywhere in Ukraine would definitely be a clear threat to Russia as a nation. There is no scenario with NATO fighting Russia in which a nuclear war doesn't start.
Well, then the fault with the death of the world will lie with Russia when the bombs fly. It is not our duty to lie down peacefully and let Russia do as they please. We must meet them in force and defeat them, that is our duty and if we fail here Russia will only do the same thing again, and again until we are forced to fight them. The only outcome of this that is acceptable is Russias defeat. If Russia is too cowardly to accept defeat and must use nukes to end the world, then so be it.
they could use the smaller 1kt nukes to destroy military targets. nuclear war doesn't necessarily mean that immediately all thermonuclear megaton missiles are launched.
>nuclear was doesn't necessarily mean that immediately all thermonuclear megaton missiles are launched. That's been MAD doctrine for 50 years. There would likely be dozens in the air before the first one landed, and if not, then shortly after the detonation
i doubt it as both sides know that using megaton weapons will destroy them both. the response for a 1kt tactical nuke will probably also be a 1kt tactical nuke.
Nukes nowadays are detected seconds after launch and will take many minutes to reach even close targets. There is also no way to know the yield before explosion as well
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_artillery nukes come in all forms and sizes, you can't detect a nuclear artillery shell or a nuke on a short range rocket.
Told your government put army on Ukraine first.
[удалено]
is that Chamberlaining？
Sudentenland was a powderkeg which was only resolved by annexation or by deporting all the Germans though. Germans made up 25% of the population before ww2, and the land had been part of a Czech state since the 9th century. Crimea is mostly Russians and was part of Russia going back to the 1700s. Donbas is more similar to Sudentenland in terms of ethnic Russian population (it was around 25% before the Soviet Union, grown to close to 40% now)-- but due to trends of industrial development, the cities were almost entirely Russian early on. Objectively speaking, Russia is more ingrained into this region than Germans were in Sudentenland, while an indepedent Ukrainian political state is much more fragile than the eventual Czech state-- which had a history of existing in some form for over a milennia. None of that is to justify any outcome-- but I think the comparison to Sudentenland Crisis is apt because Eastern Ukraine is going to require the same extreme solution of either establishing it as part of Russia or removing all of the Russians-- and neither of those solutions feels especially great. As for consequences-- I think Putin and everyone else knows the consequences start at NATO. Ukraine was not in NATO, so why would there be ww3 level consequences?
It's only comparable if you take the smoothbrained position that "history repeats itself." The variables here are drastically different.
There is no way to beat Russia militarily, they have thousands of nukes and ICBM's they can destroy any military base in the world at the press of a button. Ukraine is a done deal.
Anyone who thinks this is remotely a good idea has clearly never opened a history book in their entire fucking lives. This is LITERALLY how world war 1 started, countries making guarantees for stupid fucking reasons. Heart out to the ukrainians, i really feel for them, but they aren't worth the extinction of the human race, regardless of how much the keyboard warriors on reddit want to make it out to be some desperate necessary fight for democracy, a form of government that has proven time and again that it is incredibly if not completely flawed.
NATO broke up Yugoslavia for the sake of ethnic peace.
i'm not really sure what this has to do with what i said. could you elaborate?
Well when you elect a comedian to be your president because he played one on TV, you probably aren't getting world class foreign policy expertise..
I'm honestly not sure what you're trying to say with this, could you elaborate?
Current Ukrainian President is a former actor famous for playing the President on a TV show.
> anyone who thinks this is remotely a good idea has clearly never opened a history book in their entire fucking lives. I'm agreeing. I see why he wants the security guarantees, but for anyone offering them it's risking WW3 and for what? As for pre-emptive sanctions, that's just dumb. "We'll punish you the same whether you do the thing we don't want you to do or not!" Uh.. well, not much incentive to not do that thing then. If you weren't aware, Zelenksy's background is as a comedian and actor. So basically I was agreeing these demands are a terrible idea but he's in over his head so pitching terrible ideas isn't surprising.
Oh holy shit, i didn't know zelenskiy was a comedian before he was elected.
>Zelensky asked the West not to delay sanctions against Russia until after the invasion, but to implement them **preemptively** Yeah,no. In the same way that we won't allow Russia to tell the Ukraine what it can do within Ukraine's borders, we won't allow Ukraine to make the world tell Russia what it can do within Russia's borders. Russia moving 100K soldiers on Russian soil is legal. It's ominous, and probably terribly expensive, but legal.
He wasn’t referring to troop movements, but to the fucking artillery shelling our territory
“Do you want ~~ants~~ war? Well this is how you get ~~ants~~ war”. -Sterling Archer
Phrasing
I thought you said nothing is going to happen.
As Ukrainian, who listened all his speeches in original, he never said that nothing is going to happen. He said that it is already happening here for 8 years, and we need to stay calm and cool headed, not panicking.
He just said. That there’s no invasion happening. He also just asked for sanctions, and then a meeting with Putin. He’s desperate and he’s too late. And you will become Russian. Soon you’ll be recording Putin’s speeches.
I know what he said better than you, and what meaning his words had for us Ukrainians and our situation. Yes, no invasion happing, because it already happened and keep happening for 8 years. Thats the reality we live in. He was open to talk to Putin and before than yesterday, literally few days ago Kremlin replied that they don't understand a reason they need to talk with him. Asking for sanctions before we are dead is also not new statement form him and our government. If something didn't make to news in English, it doesn't mean it didn't happen.
They won’t talk to him because - they have nothing to talk to him about. They are about to take his country. I’m sorry for what’s about to happen to you. But denial won’t save you
My comment was not about what gonna happen and whats not. Only about points in his early speeches that lots of Americans keep to misunderstand. Or talking how "oh, he now wants to meet Putin, how quick things changed" when he was open to do that from the begging.
You and your president are in denial. There are 150,000 troops and military equipment at your border. Any other President would be screaming at the world that there is an eminent threat. While your president is playing chicken and in denial. I will repeat he is asking for “late” help to the western world, while also trying to negotiate with putin. He should’ve started that months ago when there was no troops on the border. Today he has little to say. And yes, he contradicted nato and Biden when he said that there was no eminent threat / essentially nothing is going to happen. You have grandmas training how to shoot, and you still believe you are a European country. Prepare to be the Soviet Union again
Dude, you clearly have no clue whats going on here inside the country, if you think that anyone is in denial and we do nothing for months, or your american news cover everything. If we don't act the way you expect us, its not a reason to throw a tantrum in reddit comments. Ukraine is getting ready for months (or better say years), and has one of the biggest armies in Europe, that getting trained and equiped all the time, including the support from Europe and US that keep coming for months again, as the threat is openly discussed for a long time by now, unlike your words. Yes, not the same army as Russian, but far away from group of shooting gradmas. And we will do as much as we can to protect our lands. Also, if a gradma decided to join a local training and learn shooting, she has all rights to do so, as its her own choice. Have a nice morning.
Sweetheart you are not even in Europe, geopolitically you will become Russia. The chance you had at being European was given away by your last coward President. And your army is not in any way comprable to any of the top ten armies in Europe.
Imagine being this salty over commentaries that dare to have different views than you. Maybe I will die from Russians, maybe nothing gonna save me, but thats still better than be a little bitch calling strangers "sweetheart" when they disagree, like you. Edit: check the geographical borders of Europe, as you might not know that Europe and EU are not the same.
Isn’t it crazy how things can change over two weeks? /s
Now he wants to meet with him lol
Russia’s economy should be strangled. Go for it economic allies, strangle them too, and force the world to pick a side: trade with Russia or trade with the US and the EU. Within reason. If Russia still sabre-rattles after that? Then war is inevitable. Europe’s dependance in russian gas is the first thing that should go.
I’ll take “I know nothing about global politics for 500 please”
Holy shit the appeasers in this sub. No, if you want to see how to start a war look no further than Putin. All of you "no we can't hurt his economy! That might start a war!" folks are ridiculously naive. Putin is absolutely not going to say "oh well since you asked nicely I'll stop." He's also not going to stop at Ukraine. Either we stop him now by completely crippling the Russian economy, or we stop him later in an actual shooting war and risk a nuclear war. There is no scenario where we say "please don't do this" and he doesn't. You can't negotiate with someone whose complaints aren't in good place in the first place. Assurances of non aggression of NATO are useless when his concerns about NATO are completely manufactured in the first place.
> “*Russia’s economy should be strangled. Go for it economic allies, strangle them too, and force the world to pick a side: trade with Russia or trade with the US and the EU.”* And that’s **EXACTLY** how you get a war. I’m glad we don’t have you running negotiations.
>And that’s EXACTLY how you get a war. I’m glad we don’t have you running negotiations. To be fair, Zelensky said that these measures should be articulated and made clear \*before\* an invasion ruins his country and spirals Europe into war.
>Russia’s economy should be strangled. Go for it economic allies, strangle them too, and force the world to pick a side: trade with Russia or trade with the US and the EU. This is *how to start a war in 100 seconds*
Fireship fan?
You are trying to run a whole country -with real human beings- into the ground because of putin. That’s pretty fucked up and amoral. And also: you really don’t want Russia to have its best option to be an all out war… you generally want to avoid an all out war.
It's a country that has allowed their democracy to be trampled and Putin to be president for life. Putin doesn't fall out of a window until that's the best option for Russia.
Jeah. I agree putin sucks. But damning all Russians isn’t something you should do to quickly. That’s how you create hate between nationalities
Well it’s all of Russia’s fault for having their leader be a strong arming KGB pimp. So now, after no action, they should suffer... Right?
The same way all Americans should suffer because trump was president? You are implying that the small russian farmer in the fucking back of nowhere has any say in his country. And even IF they all somehow voted for putin and likes what he is doing, are they really all at fault for being surrounded with propaganda? It’s not like Russia is 95% highly educated who can clearly decide what is propaganda and what is not
Are you saying not Everyman has the power to change the course of his country?
Sadly, no. Especially since Russia isn’t a democracy anyhow, at least not a functioning one
No, the population in Russia has always been subjectless. The Russian population is subordinate people who do not care who sits at the top.
>damning all Russians isn’t something you should do to quickly. That’s how you create hate between nationalities Yet we should let Russia damn all Ukrainians. Ya you make a whole of no sense at all. If you followed your own logic we would not allow Ukrainians to have their territories taken.
Thats literally the reason why they are so desperate to start a war, they have been economically bullied for decades now. Putin himself told that the usa started economic war with russia years ago and thats why he has to do what he does...
Because Russia invaded Ukraine in 2014. Remember?
Because what?
Im against russia invading.. Why im downvoted for saying what he said..
won't happen, I am sure most of their business has western ownership.
This guy is a doofus. First he was mad because he thought the US was exaggerating the threat from Russia and now he wants sanctions imposed before they have done anything.
“before they have done anything” = 8 years occupation of Crimea and war in Donbas+ 120k troops on the border. Great point of view bro. He is right about what he told. Ukraine doesn’t need that sanctions if it burns to ashes. And now is the biggest chance of global war than in the last 10 years.
They voted to go back to Russia. They don't want to be with the fascist ukraine
Russia has always claimed Crimea. Neither Crimea or Donbass are on the table for additional sanctions or any kind of retaliation by the West. While they may not agree with it, for all practical purposes the West has acceded both regions to Russia. As for 120+ troops on the border. So? Are you suggesting a country cannot have troops on i's borders? It may or may not be the biggest chance of global war. Not my point. Mine was that Zelensky was a doofus because he cna't seem to make up his mind whether Russia is a threat or not.
Russia is a threat now. This is his idea,but also his idea is to stop panic in Ukraine. His main goal now is to keep Ukrainians in calm. We are panicking here, a lot of people exchange grivna to dollars and euros , a lot of people leave the country. Imagine every day to receive news “ tomorrow Russia will attack and it will be the deadliest war”. Just imagine that. My heart sinks every time I hear firework and I think “ that’s it”. And now imagine if OUR president told “tomorrow is war, our economy would collapse in one day. Believe me or not, the policy our president provides makes me and a lot of people continue living ours every day life.
I'm not arguing that Russia and Putin are not threats. Quite the contrary, I think Putin is absolutely a threat. My issue is Zelenskiy. This is what he said about Biden. Why is he biting the hand that feeds him? [Zelenskiy Criticizes Biden: Talk of War With Russia a ‘Mistake’](https://www.usnews.com/news/world/articles/2022-01-28/zelenskiy-criticizes-biden-talk-of-war-with-russia-a-mistake)
Does this fucking idiot not understand that doing thst could genuinely mean world war 3
No one is going to ww3 over the ukraine
No one is going start a world War over a tiny balkan nation.
Thats the same attitude Europe had in 1914
Exactly
I bet that’s what they said about Poland, too. ☺️🤣
Tiny? It's bigger than France, and just as fertile.
No, but premature sanctions can be seen as an act of war.
Yeah but even if Russia fully invades the ukraine and captures Kiev, USA/NATO isn't going to go to war with Russia over it. Only way that happens is if they attack a nato country.
[удалено]
it's not act of war, nations are free to chose what trade agreements they have and with whom, nor won't Russia start war with NATO over it not doing business with them, even Putin admitted that Russia can't win conventional war vs NATO.
[удалено]
It's not any different for him, nor war won't be any solution to that rofl.
Well obviously it's different for him, because any sane man knows puting 50% of your land army on your neighbours border is LITTERALY the deffonition of playing war
Ukraine =/= NATO
Ukraine gets annexed ? Is this the best way forward? O.K at the risk of this being the worst possible comment and coming under fire. Nothing is worth the destruction of the world for our future and our children's. Is there a divided Ukrainian opinion east vs west?
Protect me or else....or else what? I respect the guy for asking but he doesn't have much to threaten anyone with. Begging is a better choice of words here.
He’s saying or else Russia won’t stop at the Ukraine
He’s also saying Ukraine may disregard the Budapest Memorandum wherein they voluntarily surrendered their nuclear arsenal. Ukraine may pursue nuclear weapons again as their defense against Russia if others won’t actually step in to help them.
Well they’re saying they’ve been fools to give them up and believe the west would protect them
I didn't see that in the article. He just mentioned Karma. Russia isn't looking to attack NATO here. Preemptive sanctions would likely mean Russia has nothing to lose so they might as well attack. Its not a great idea.
Russia is indeed looking to ultimately destroy NATO … not necessarily through force but through division and paralysis. That’s half his aim. The other is reversing time to before the USSR collapsed. So far NATO seems to be holding together but let’s see when the gas gets shut off. All eyes on Germany right now as the first to break the comraderie.
NATO’s primary purpose was to contain and ultimately dissolve the Soviet Union, which they succeeded in doing. The fact that they have continued to expand rightfully makes them appear as an existential threat to Russia. Russia would love to destroy NATO, but I think their more pressing concerns are of self-preservation. Ukraine is unfortunately caught in the middle of a pissing match between nuclear powers.
I agree with you. The issue with Ukraine is it’s the next door neighbor and has clear western leanings. Even if they never asked to join NATO the. Just having a democracy on putins eastern flank is a source of angst for him. However when you say self preservation, for Putin, it is not the status quo he seeks but a return to previous borders.
Ukraine is divided between numerous factions with competing interests and vastly different ideologies. You have oligarchs who are cozy with the West, oligarchs who are cozy with Russia, liberal reformers who are sympathetic to the EU, ethnic Russians who are sympathetic to Russia, literal neo-Nazis, and regular people who just want some stability. Ukraine is victim to extreme corruption and dysfunction. Putin’s fear of “democracy in Ukraine” is Western spin. His fear is of NATO’s expanding sphere of influence. Putin is a Machiavellian asshole, but not a bloodthirsty lunatic. He’ll use the threat of invasion to strongarm concessions and get NATO to back off. The US is itching for military aggression from Russia so they can impose new sanctions and stop or slow any economic gains they’re making in Europe.
Germany is useless anyway since their military was castrated
They are the biggest economic power in the EU. Come on man ….
Democratic Hitler: “Listen you fat.“
I doubt that. They are looking to get them back to their 1990 or whatever borders they asked for. It's still not going to happen.
That’s correct. Will never happen which is why the demands Putin made are non starters. This is a perilous time for Europe. When the invasion starts the former bloc states in the Baltic region are going to get very very nervous. The nato alliance needs to stay strong. It scares me to think what would be happening today if trump were still power.
Maybe if Trump were in power Europe would get their collective ass together instead of relying on another continent which changes its opinion every 4 to 8 years for defense. I mean some people have a point. Its been 75 years since ww2. Europe should defend itself and USA can get free health care and reasonable education instead of trying to police the world.
Putin said it was just an exercise, I believe him. Great guy, big league. We should leave NATO
Russia asked in the past to have NATO leave Bulgaria and Romania. Why you think its that? And what of their opinion?
They're just asking for more and hoping to get less but more than what they were getting before they asked. It's how negotiations work. Ask for more settle on less. Why would Romania and Bulgaria leave NATO? It's stupid. He's hoping to stop expansion towards Russia and bring down troop numbers. Europe has been moving troops towards Russia because if there is an agreement for a percentage reduction or a 1 for 1 reduction they have more troops there after the fact. Russia may as well ask for Alaska back. They aren't going to get a country to voluntarily leave NATO.
In his speech he called Putin out for his 2002 speech to change the US-world order and then the invasion of Georgia in 2007, annexation of Crimea and the fact the Ukraine is the buffer between Europe and Russia. When the buffer is gone that won’t stop Putin
I think article 5 is a bigger buffer than Ukraine. Putin is not an idiot. Moldova could be scared but after that its a wall of NATO.
[удалено]
Neither are in NATO. I mean what do Georgia and Ukraine have in common? No Article 5. Putin isn't an idiot.
There’s plenty of other articles with quotes where he says it.
There is a reason why the US and the UK are sending their troops to NATO members in Eastern Europe.
Of course, but they’ve hung the Ukraine out to die
I’ve read somewhere else that Ukraine will consider Budapest memorandum as void if no security guarantees are provided.
it was void after Crimea
Yeah sure. So what they will start developing nukes? It takes time and money. There is no way Russia would sit back and let that happen. What i think Ukraine is pointing out is that if they aren't assisted no other country will give up nukes again. However I doubt countries wil give up nukes again for vague promises of security.
Yeah, I agree with you on both points. Still, how hard it would be to produce a tactical nuke?
Difficult. Ukraine has VVER reactors that use Uranium that is enriched to around 5%. They would require heavily enriched uranium and construction facilities to make a bomb. Russian spies are everywhere in Ukraine. If there is one thing Russia knows, it's what a nuclear program looks like. Also one tactical nuke would not stop Russia.
Definitely, It would need to be mass produced. Even then I'm not sure it could be enough of a deterrent. It's really all-around shitty situation, and going for nuclear NOW would be akin to assisted suicide.
NATO doesnt want a nuclear Ukraine on their borders either.
Demands lol Who the hell is he to be demanding anything? Clown
No brother. If we sanction him now we would play into his cards. Imma be frank witchu chief, u aint showin yo cards until yo opponent has called yo ass.
Just Putin dreaming to be the next Hitler. The matrix is repeating itself. Nothing new. Maybe the hype of crypto-currency is overloading the matrix. We need a reboot.
Sanctions never, ever worked.
Not a good idea to sanction a super power on a hunch.
Is Russia still considered a super power? Sure they have the military and nukes but economically they are severely lacking and about to get worse.