# More background on Ukraine



## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

Jeffrey David Sachs is an American economist, academic, public policy analyst, and former director of The Earth Institute at Columbia University, where he holds the title of University Professor. He is known for his work on sustainable development, economic development, and the fight to end poverty.


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## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

Baker: If that happens, our troops will return home. We will leave any country that does not desire our presence. The American people have always had a strong position favoring this. However, if the current West German leadership is at the head of a unified Germany then they have said to us they will be against our withdrawal. And the last point. NATO is the mechanism for securing the U.S. presence in Europe. If NATO is liquidated, there will be no such mechanism in Europe. We understand that not only for the Soviet Union but for other European countries as well it is important to have guarantees that if the United States keeps its presence in Germany within the framework of NATO, not an inch of NATO’s present military jurisdiction will spread in an eastern direction. 






Record of conversation between Mikhail Gorbachev and James Baker in Moscow. (Excerpts) | National Security Archive







nsarchive.gwu.edu


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## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

The Russian invasion in 2022 would likely have been averted had Biden agreed with Putin’s demand at the end of 2021 to end NATO’s eastward enlargement. The war would likely have been ended in March 2022, when the governments of Ukraine and Russia exchanged a draft peace agreement based on Ukrainian neutrality. Behind the scenes, the US and UK pushed Zelensky to reject any agreement with Putin and to fight on. At that point, Ukraine walked away from the negotiations. 

Under Clinton’s watch, NATO expanded to Poland, Hungary, and the Czech Republic in 1999. Five years later, under President George W. Bush, Jr. NATO expanded to seven more countries: the Baltic states (Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania), the Black Sea (Bulgaria and Romania), the Balkans (Slovenia), and Slovakia. Under President Barack Obama, NATO expanded to Albania and Croatia in 2009, and under President Donald Trump, to Montenegro in 2019.
Russia’s opposition to NATO enlargement intensified sharply in 1999 when NATO countries disregarded the UN and attacked Russia’s ally Serbia, and stiffened further in the 2000’s with the US wars of choice in Iraq, Syria, and Libya. At the Munich Security conference in 2007, President Putin declared that NATO enlargement represents a “serious provocation that reduces the level of mutual trust.”

Putin continued: “And we have the right to ask: against whom is this expansion intended? And what happened to the assurances [of no NATO enlargement] our western partners made after the dissolution of the Warsaw Pact?” Where are those declarations today? No one even remembers them. But I will allow myself to remind this audience what was said. I would like to quote the speech of NATO General Secretary Mr. Woerner in Brussels on 17 May 1990. He said at the time that: “the fact that we are ready not to place a NATO army outside of German territory gives the Soviet Union a firm security guarantee. Where are these guarantees?”


Environmentalists Against War


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## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

*Washington D.C., December 12, 2017 –* U.S. Secretary of State James Baker’s famous “not one inch eastward” assurance about NATO expansion in his meeting with Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev on February 9, 1990, was part of a cascade of assurances about Soviet security given by Western leaders to Gorbachev and other Soviet officials throughout the process of German unification in 1990 and on into 1991, according to declassified U.S., Soviet, German, British and French documents posted today by the National Security Archive at George Washington University 






NATO Expansion: What Gorbachev Heard | National Security Archive


Western leaders gave multiple assurances against NATO expansion to Gorbachev in 1990-1991 according to declassified American, Russian, British, Germans documents




nsarchive.gwu.edu


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

About 2/3 of Ukraine's power grid has been destroyed and much of the country is already in freezing temperatures.


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## homesteadforty (Dec 4, 2007)

Funny how Russian threats, meddling, provocations, incursions, invasions and annexations before the latest war on Ukraine aren't mentioned.


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## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

homesteadforty said:


> Funny how Russian threats, meddling, provocations, incursions, invasions and annexations before the latest war on Ukraine are mentioned.


I'm not following you


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## nchobbyfarm (Apr 10, 2011)

HDRider said:


> I'm not following you


Exactly.

"not" is missing is my bet


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## Hiro (Feb 14, 2016)

MoonRiver said:


> About 2/3 of Ukraine's power grid has been destroyed and much of the country is already in freezing temperatures.


I thought you said it was over after Putin claimed those temporarily occupied  nazified territories were officially claimed annexed. Or am I remembering it incorrectly?

And I am in agreement that this billions just sent to Ukraine are being recycled back to criminal enterprises that masquerade as government. But, Putin (if he is really in charge of anything) is a war criminal. Russia, Iran and the CCP are wretched evils that prey upon humanity even worse than the WEF and the Australian, UK, EU, and New Zealand regimes.


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## oldasrocks (Oct 27, 2006)

MoonRiver said:


> About 2/3 of Ukraine's power grid has been destroyed and much of the country is already in freezing temperatures.


To bad biden misplaced 20 billion in aid for Ukraine. They could burn the dollars to stay warm.


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

All I posted was 2/3 of Ukraine's electrical grid has been destroyed. About a month ago, Russia started taking out the grid. An article in ZeroHedge shows the night sky almost void of any lights in Ukraine. This is expected to cause major migration out of Ukraine into neighboring countries who already have food and energy problems.


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## Hiro (Feb 14, 2016)

MoonRiver said:


> All I posted was 2/3 of Ukraine's electrical grid has been destroyed. About a month ago, Russia started taking out the grid. An article in ZeroHedge shows the night sky almost void of any lights in Ukraine. This is expected to cause major migration out of Ukraine into neighboring countries who already have food and energy problems.


That may be all you posted today. It is assuredly not all you posted regarding this unprovoked invasion that is killing a whole heck of a lot of innocent civilians. 

There are shenanigans in Ukraine. But, Russian orcs should not be celebrated. Their leaders are evil. (Not that ours , or purported ones aren't either)


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## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

__ https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1597265395093602304


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## homesteadforty (Dec 4, 2007)

HDRider said:


> I'm not following you





nchobbyfarm said:


> Exactly.
> 
> "not" is missing is my bet


I fixed it.


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## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

HDRider said:


> The Russian invasion in 2022 would likely have been averted had Biden agreed with Putin’s demand at the end of 2021 to end NATO’s eastward enlargement. The war would likely have been ended in March 2022, when the governments of Ukraine and Russia exchanged a draft peace agreement based on Ukrainian neutrality. Behind the scenes, the US and UK pushed Zelensky to reject any agreement with Putin and to fight on. At that point, Ukraine walked away from the negotiations.


You chose to provide the long quote without any commentary of your own, so we’re left to ask- what is your take on it?

How much of a “buffer” between Russia and NATO did Russia gain when they stole Crimea in 2014?

I know they gained a lot of Black Sea oil when they stole it. In fact, the lines Putin chose just happened to give Russia ALL of Ukraine’s claim to Black Sea oil- still not so sure about the “buffer”, though. I’m not so great at ciphering maps but, when I look at it, I’d almost think that land-grab put Russia’s southwest border _closer_ to NATO states. It’s almost as is the writer you quoted, and chose not to comment on, was full of **** _unfamiliar with the concept of intellectual honesty._



HDRider said:


> Under Clinton’s watch, NATO expanded to Poland, Hungary, and the Czech Republic in 1999. Five years later, under President George W. Bush, Jr. NATO expanded to seven more countries: the Baltic states (Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania), the Black Sea (Bulgaria and Romania), the Balkans (Slovenia), and Slovakia. Under President Barack Obama, NATO expanded to Albania and Croatia in 2009, and under President Donald Trump, to Montenegro in 2019.
> Russia’s opposition to NATO enlargement intensified sharply in 1999 when NATO countries disregarded the UN and attacked Russia’s ally Serbia, and stiffened further in the 2000’s with the US wars of choice in Iraq, Syria, and Libya. At the Munich Security conference in 2007, President Putin declared that NATO enlargement represents a “serious provocation that reduces the level of mutual trust.”
> 
> Putin continued: “And we have the right to ask: against whom is this expansion intended? And what happened to the assurances [of no NATO enlargement] our western partners made after the dissolution of the Warsaw Pact?” Where are those declarations today? No one even remembers them. But I will allow myself to remind this audience what was said. I would like to quote the speech of NATO General Secretary Mr. Woerner in Brussels on 17 May 1990. He said at the time that: “the fact that we are ready not to place a NATO army outside of German territory gives the Soviet Union a firm security guarantee. Where are these guarantees?”
> ...


And, why, exactly, should we give half a rat’s ass what Putin thinks about Russia’s former slave states voluntarily choosing to join a defensive alliance that ensures protection against future re-enslavement by Russia?

In all those words explaining how the west provoked Russia by allowing its former slave states to join NATO, the author somehow managed to get by without so much as a mention of Georgia or Chechnya. How do you think that figures? If I didn’t know better, I’d take it as proof that the author was unfamiliar with the concept of intellectual honesty _full of ****_.


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## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

GunMonkeyIntl said:


> You chose to provide the long quote without any commentary of your own, so we’re left to ask- what is your take on it?
> 
> How much of a “buffer” between Russia and NATO did Russia gain when they stole Crimea in 2014?
> 
> ...


Do you think Ukraine will retake the territory taken by Russia?


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## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

HDRider said:


> Do you think Ukraine will retake the territory taken by Russia?


So, now you’re signed up to the @Nevada School of Debate where making random non-sequitur pivots, ignoring questions asked of you and then thinking you are entitled to questions of your own is honest discourse?

To reacquaint you with intellectual honesty, I’ll answer your question, directly, and then reask mine.

_Answer to your non-sequitur pivot and question:_
I don’t know how much of what stolen lands remain that Ukraine will liberate but, if the last 90 days and the current state of the Russian military are any indication, and the west continues their support, I think there’s a good chance they’ll kick the invading orcs out of most if not all of it, and possibly even Crimea.

_Now, my questions again:_
What is your take on the series of long quotes you opened with without providing any commentary of your own?

How did the forceful theft of Crimea advance Russia’s stated (and your long-quote’s carried) goal of gaining “buffer” between its homeland and NATO territory?

If the west’s accepting the voluntary joining of NATO by former Soviet slave-states was a provocation of Putin’s Russia, how do you think Putin’s Russia forcefully re-enslaving Georgia and Chechnya figure into those former slave-states’ decisions to ask to join NATO?


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## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

GunMonkeyIntl said:


> I don’t know how much of what stolen lands remain that Ukraine will liberate but, if the last 90 days and the current state of the Russian military are any indication, and the west continues their support, I think there’s a good chance they’ll kick the invading orcs out of most if not all of it, and possibly even Crimea.


My earlier question is very pertinent to my position on the Ukraine war. It is in no way random, a non-sequitur, or a pivot


GunMonkeyIntl said:


> random non-sequitur pivots



My next question
How much should the west support escalation of the Ukraine war to retake territory now held by Russia?


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## Hiro (Feb 14, 2016)

HDRider said:


> My earlier question is very pertinent to my position on the Ukraine war. It is in no way random, a non-sequitur, or a pivot
> 
> 
> 
> ...


As soon as the orcs began pillaging, looting, executing, kidnapping civilians in a non-hostile neighboring sovereign nation using the word "escalate" in how we or Ukraine should respond seems rather trivial to me.


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## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

HDRider said:


> My earlier question is very pertinent to my position on the Ukraine war. It is in no way random, a non-sequitur, or a pivot
> 
> 
> 
> ...


So, you’re really not going to answer my questions?
You’ve become _that_, now, have you?

With your developing habit of posting leading text but carefully distancing yourself from owning any opinion about it, I’d almost think you married a painter. But, now making the discussion exclusively about what you want to say and ignoring every other detail added to the discourse is just self-serving and dishonest. Perhaps a blog would be a cozier safe space for you.

Since one of us still possesses intellectual honesty, I’ll answer your question, and then I’ll re-re-ask mine:

Russia’s attack of Ukraine is an attack against the west. Allowing them to rape and pillage unchecked puts allies to which we have commitments in Poland, Hungary and the Baltics in danger. Since Russia started a war with us, we should continue to batter the Russian army until it backs down or is no longer.

So, again, my questions, if you’ve got the integrity to answer them:
What is your take on the series of long quotes you opened with without providing any commentary of your own?

How did the forceful theft of Crimea advance Russia’s stated (and your long-quote’s carried) goal of gaining “buffer” between its homeland and NATO territory?

If the west’s accepting the voluntary joining of NATO by former Soviet slave-states was a provocation of Putin’s Russia, how do you think Putin’s Russia forcefully re-enslaving Georgia and Chechnya figure into those former slave-states’ decisions to ask to join NATO?


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## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

I am happy to answer your questions, even thought you pose them like a 13 year old bully. Your method of discourse has degraded considerably. 



GunMonkeyIntl said:


> What is your take on the series of long quotes you opened with without providing any commentary of your own?


I think there is merit in considering comments outside the MSM, and the psyops that is the Ukraine war.

I am not buying them, or selling them. I am just digesting them. I am using them to initiate a discussion.



GunMonkeyIntl said:


> How did the forceful theft of Crimea advance Russia’s stated (and your long-quote’s carried) goal of gaining “buffer” between its homeland and NATO territory?


In one of the comments Putin threatened to take Crimea if NATO pushed east. We disregarded his warning. I think Russia taking Crimea was wrong



GunMonkeyIntl said:


> If the west’s accepting the voluntary joining of NATO by former Soviet slave-states was a provocation of Putin’s Russia, how do you think Putin’s Russia forcefully re-enslaving Georgia and Chechnya figure into those former slave-states’ decisions to ask to join NATO?


I do not think any nation joining NATO is a provocation. Putin does.


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## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

Hiro said:


> As soon as the orcs began pillaging, looting, executing, kidnapping civilians in a non-hostile neighboring sovereign nation using the word "escalate" in how we or Ukraine should respond seems rather trivial to me.


Is there a limit to our escalation?

We have offered $100 billion. Should we go to $200 billion?

Should we offer more air support?

Should NATO put men in the mix?

What happens if Russia uses a tactical nuke?

Should we take the fighting into Russia in a more offensive fashion to flank Russia's incursion into Ukraine?

Someone is asking these questions, and they have answers ready


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## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

I think it is time to go to the table and bring the fighting to a close. I do not favor further escalation. 

Russia has shown itself as a deadly aggressor.

We should consider all this going forward.


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## Hiro (Feb 14, 2016)

HDRider said:


> I think it is time to go to the table and bring the fighting to a close. I do not favor further escalation.
> 
> Russia has shown itself as a deadly aggressor.
> 
> We should consider all this going forward.


It is up to Ukraine to decide whether to negotiate. IMHO, it would be absolutely foolhardy to negotiate with proven liars, murderers and general barbarians, especially when you are winning.


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## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

Hiro said:


> It is up to Ukraine to decide whether to negotiate. IMHO, it would be absolutely foolhardy to negotiate with proven liars, murderers and general barbarians, especially when you are winning.


Ukraine is operating under considerable pressure from NATO. They are not the deciders. They are the outsourced fighting force.

Many a treaty has been made, some honored, and some broken with "_proven liars, murderers and general barbarians_"

I do not see Ukraine winning like you do.


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

Hiro said:


> It is up to Ukraine to decide whether to negotiate. IMHO, it would be absolutely foolhardy to negotiate with proven liars, murderers and general barbarians, especially when you are winning.


You need better sources.


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## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

HDRider said:


> I am happy to answer your questions, even thought you pose them like a 13 year old bully. Your method of discourse has degraded considerably.


I interact with everyone, in real life of online, as they earn. I don’t know how many times you’ve criticized Mrs. Painter for dropping opinion turds in the form of someone else’s words, and refusing to stake a position of her own in order to avoid having to own it. That’s exactly what you did with this thread, a several other times recently. Likewise, you’ve criticized NV countless times for the ridiculous pivots and refusal to answer inconvenient questions, demanding answers to his own questions… and yet here you are.

If you didn’t start threads as drive-by turd flingings, or as a vehicle to make someone else answer the way you want them to in order to make your point for you, only to get butt-hurt and call them liars when they don’t answer the way you intended them to, I might start giving a flip of your opinion of my “method of discourse”. 



HDRider said:


> I think there is merit in considering comments outside the MSM, and the psyops that is the Ukraine war.
> 
> I am not buying them, or selling them. I am just digesting them. I am using them to initiate a discussion.


The MSM is definitely driving a narrative when it comes to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, but there are certain base realities that exist above anything the MSM can try to spin. In this entire discussion, there are the lies that western media are telling, the lies that the Russian media are telling, and there are the hard historical facts that we all know- lest we fall for the lies one side or the other is telling.

Ukraine is corrupt. Russia is corrupt. The EU and NATO are corrupt. Russia has a long history of building an empire out of its enslaved neighbors. Russia has been jockeying to rebuild the empire it had to put into hock in the 90s. Ukraine is the next prize in that stable of slave states, and Russia has been trying to take Ukraine back for almost two decades. They stole a big piece of it in 2014, and they tried taking the rest of it this year.

Those are facts; not either side’s media spin. Choosing to entertain Russia’s “reasons” for any of this is nothing more than substituting facts for pieces of their propaganda. 



HDRider said:


> In one of the comments Putin threatened to take Crimea if NATO pushed east. We disregarded his warning. I think Russia taking Crimea was wrong
> 
> 
> I do not think any nation joining NATO is a provocation. Putin does.


NATO hasn’t “pushed” east. Sovereign nations to the west of Russia asked to be admitted to NATO after watching Russia systematically retake its former slave states from the USSR era. The sovereign nations in question were also former slave states of Russia and saw Putin’s actions as incentive to enter into a defensive alliance with their neighbors to the west.

Putin is free to think whatever he wants to about it, but further hostilities against friendly, alliance-neighboring states should cost him his armaments, and continued hostilities should cost him his power and eventually his life. He’s no different than Stalin, running a plantation-empire no different than the USSR, and should fail and die like the Commie bastards that came before him.


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## Hiro (Feb 14, 2016)

MoonRiver said:


> You need better sources.


You really should put down RT. Pickup real professional, less biased stuff Institute for the Study of War or get reports from people you know that are there. Your pretending to understand conflict and international affairs is lacking.


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## kinderfeld (Jan 29, 2006)

We should give Ukraine more air power and some longer range missiles.
Might wrap things up quicker.


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## muleskinner2 (Oct 7, 2007)

If the West had stayed out of this all together, it would all be over. The power would be on and no one would be dying. One bad guy would have replace another bad guy, and life would go on. It's Eastern Europe, they have been doing this to each other since before Gengis Khan.

But, Biden would not have had a chance to play on the world stage, and spend other peoples money. The tail is wagging the dog, and we are paying for it. The so called experts claim that about 10% of the aid money goes to the war effort, the rest goes into somebody's pocket. Is it really worth it?

Ukraine was a second rate dung heap before all of this. Pouring american tax dollars on it won't change that. I dislike Russia with an intensity the average American could never understand. But pouring money down a bottomless pit, won't help.


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## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

muleskinner2 said:


> If the West had stayed out of this all together, it would all be over. The power would be on and no one would be dying. One bad guy would have replace another bad guy, and life would go on. It's Eastern Europe, they have been doing this to each other since before Gengis Khan.


You’re 100% correct, but your summary ignores the fact that Ukraine would be part of Russia right now, granting them the geo-political negotiating benefits of Ukraine’s grain production for the next time Russia wants to expand.

…which would happen some time in the next 12-48 months, once Russia had restocked its armaments, and concocted a story about Russian-speakers in Poland being oppressed by a Nazified Polish government.

It would never end because the Soviet Union never ended. It just declared bankruptcy, went on Pause, and let the West pay the humanitarian costs of rehabilitating its former slave states so they’d be worth something again when they took them back over.

Just as fewer people would have died if the world had stopped Hitler at the Czechoslovakian border, fewer people would be dying right now if we’d stepped in and stopped Putin at the Georgian border. That it’s now costing us this much more trying to stop him at the Ukrainian border is just the cost of us failing to act decisively when we first met the challenge.



muleskinner2 said:


> But, Biden would not have had a chance to play on the world stage, and spend other peoples money. The tail is wagging the dog, and we are paying for it. The so called experts claim that about 10% of the aid money goes to the war effort, the rest goes into somebody's pocket. Is it really worth it?


It’s not really just a Biden thing, though. Trump was spending big money to try to deter Putin. It seemed to be working, and Putin seemed to be emboldened after our massive failure in the pullout of Afghanistan, but Biden didn’t invent spending money to aid the Ukrainian resistance.

As far as the only 10% making it to the war effort; that may or may not be true, and I’d put my money on it being closer to true than it is to false. That said, can you think of a case where even 9% of our government’s ridiculous spending went to doing what they actually said it would? We’re nearly as corrupt as the other countries in this equation, and we’re orders of magnitude more wasteful than any of them.

If our government sent a check list with my tax bill, and let me choose to have my taxes applied to “Building Back Better” or “Turning Commies into Good Commies”, I’d check the second box without a second thought, because I’d at least have some confidence that at least a penny or two out of every dollar would actually go to what I checked.


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## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

Hiro said:


> You really should put down RT. Pickup real professional, less biased stuff Institute for the Study of War or get reports from people you know that are there. Your pretending to understand conflict and international affairs is lacking.


That’s the hidden cost of our MSM throwing away all trust we might have once had in it.

It’s a save bet that, in any given report, the MSM is lying. Occasionally, though, some version of a story that is at least somewhat related to the truth just so happens to be what the MSM controller’s want us to see so, there are times when they intentionally tell partial truths.

The problem is that we’ve learned to no believe anything they say, so sources like RT sometimes get conflated with the truth by default.


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## Nimrod (Jun 8, 2010)

Putin's goal is to reconstitute the USSR. He has already invaded Georgia and annexed regions. He continues to move the borders and take more.









Russia’s Occupation of Georgia’s Territories Intensifies | Embassy of Georgia







georgiaembassyusa.org





Now he's trying the same tactic to annex Ukraine. He took the Crimea back in 2014 without much struggle. 

The west has finally realized that Putin will continue to invade his neighbors and have finally taken steps to stop him by providing weapons to Ukraine. I don't think the current efforts will stop him in the long run. We need to take a limited war to Russia. Maybe give Ukraine some conventional Tomahawks they could drop on Moscow. If the war expanded to destroying Russia the citizens of Russia would overthrow Putin. I do not think Putin is crazy. Despite his threats he would never use a nuke if he thought that would result in one coming right back at him. Unfortunately the current president doesn't have the guts to call Putin's bluff.

Putin is using the same tactics that Hitler did at first, take a little and tell the west that's all. Then wait a bit and take some more. Appeasement doesn't work.

Lastly, Putin's method of war is actually war crimes. Even back when he was propping up the dictator in Syria he killed civilians and destroyed nonmilitary targets. He just killed people until opposition stopped. The most recent example is the destruction of the Ukraine power grid in winter. Putin needs to be tried and executed for war crimes.


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## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

Another level of escaltion 

The Pentagon has given a tacit endorsement of Ukraine’s long-range attacks on targets inside Russia after President Putin’s multiple missile strikes against Kyiv’s critical infrastructure.​​This represents a significant development in the nine-month war between Ukraine and Russia, with Washington now likelier to supply Kyiv with longer-range weapons.​​“We’re still using the same escalatory calculations but the fear of escalation has changed since the beginning,” a US defence source told The Times. “It’s different now.​







Pentagon gives Ukraine green light for drone strikes inside Russia


The Pentagon has given a tacit endorsement of Ukraine’s long-range attacks on targets inside Russia after President Putin’s multiple missile strikes against K




www.thetimes.co.uk


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## Hiro (Feb 14, 2016)

HDRider said:


> Another level of escaltion
> 
> The Pentagon has given a tacit endorsement of Ukraine’s long-range attacks on targets inside Russia after President Putin’s multiple missile strikes against Kyiv’s critical infrastructure.​​This represents a significant development in the nine-month war between Ukraine and Russia, with Washington now likelier to supply Kyiv with longer-range weapons.​​“We’re still using the same escalatory calculations but the fear of escalation has changed since the beginning,” a US defence source told The Times. “It’s different now.​
> 
> ...


That was obvious as the nose on my face after the Moore County, NC grid attack. FSB was "look what we could do"...less than a day later Russian nuclear capable bomber air base was attacked several hundred miles inside Russia.


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

Hiro said:


> That was obvious as the nose on my face after the Moore County, NC grid attack. FSB was "look what we could do"...less than a day later Russian nuclear capable bomber air base was attacked several hundred miles inside Russia.


I believe that was done with a drone.


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## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

Hiro said:


> That was obvious as the nose on my face after the Moore County, NC grid attack. FSB was "look what we could do"...less than a day later Russian nuclear capable bomber air base was attacked several hundred miles inside Russia.


I don't know what "FSB" is, but do I take from your post the grid attack in NC was done by Russians?


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## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

HDRider said:


> Another level of escaltion
> 
> The Pentagon has given a tacit endorsement of Ukraine’s long-range attacks on targets inside Russia after President Putin’s multiple missile strikes against Kyiv’s critical infrastructure.​​This represents a significant development in the nine-month war between Ukraine and Russia, with Washington now likelier to supply Kyiv with longer-range weapons.​​“We’re still using the same escalatory calculations but the fear of escalation has changed since the beginning,” a US defence source told The Times. “It’s different now.​
> 
> ...


How is it “escalation”? Russia invaded a sovereign country and began bombing their people and civilian infrastructure. Everything that Ukraine does, with or without the support of the US, up to and including an attack on Moscow and assassination attempt against Vladimir Putin, is just response in-kind, not “escalation”.


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## Hiro (Feb 14, 2016)

MoonRiver said:


> I believe that was done with a drone.


It was a drone(s). It was likely drone(s) that we helped modify and provide guidance to. But, they also had an off switch we had.

There is a reason the F-22 was never available to any other nation, no matter how close. There is a reason the F-35 is available to all of them. There was no way to engineer an F-22 with an effective off switch. The F-35 has it.


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## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

GunMonkeyIntl said:


> How is it “escalation”? ... an attack on Moscow and assassination attempt against Vladimir Putin, is just response in-kind, not “escalation”.


Now we change the meaning of words?


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## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

HDRider said:


> Now we change the meaning of words?


If by “we” you’re counting the mouse in your pocket, then yes, I guess so.

To escalate is to elevate or ratchet-up. Ukraine can’t “escalate” this war because Russia has already taken it to the point of war, including trying to kill/capture the Ukrainian president. Russia invaded Ukraine. If Ukraine were to invade Russia, and begin bombing their civilians and civilian infrastructure, that would not be escalation. It would be retaliation.


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## Nimrod (Jun 8, 2010)

Perhaps it's the royal We as in "We are not amused. Off with their heads."


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## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

Another level of enhanced retaliation -

CNN — The Biden administration is finalizing plans to send the Patriot missile defense system to Ukraine that could be announced as soon as this week, according to two US officials and a senior administration official.


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## painterswife (Jun 7, 2004)

Nah, not retaliation. Just helping out a country being invaded.


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## Hiro (Feb 14, 2016)

HDRider said:


> Another level of enhanced retaliation -
> 
> CNN — The Biden administration is finalizing plans to send the Patriot missile defense system to Ukraine that could be announced as soon as this week, according to two US officials and a senior administration official.


Patriot missile system is defensive by its very nature. It is a surface to air system. That is not escalation or "enhanced retaliation."


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## Hiro (Feb 14, 2016)

HDRider said:


> Another level of enhanced retaliation -
> 
> CNN — The Biden administration is finalizing plans to send the Patriot missile defense system to Ukraine that could be announced as soon as this week, according to two US officials and a senior administration official.


May I ask why you believe giving Ukraine advanced SAM's is escalatory? The orcs have been bombarding civilian infrastructure with long range missiles for some time. How is enabling Ukraine a better chance of downing them escalatory?


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## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

Hiro said:


> May I ask why you believe giving Ukraine advanced SAM's is escalatory? The orcs have been bombarding civilian infrastructure with long range missiles for some time. How is enabling Ukraine a better chance of downing them escalatory?


The longer the fighting continues the greater the chance of an out-of-control war that will become WWIII.

Ukraine has NO hope of reclaiming the territory firmly occupied by Russia. I have said all this before, multiple times. We need to hammer out an end to the fighting before it gets further out of control. The world sees Russia for the enemy it truly is. We can fight Russia without people freezing and dying.

There is too much at risk to escalate or retaliate or for the altruism of helping out a brother in the family of "democratic" nations.


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## Hiro (Feb 14, 2016)

HDRider said:


> The longer the fighting continues the greater the chance of an out-of-control war that will become WWIII.
> 
> Ukraine has NO hope of reclaiming the territory firmly occupied by Russia. I have said all this before, multiple times. We need to hammer out an end to the fighting before it gets further out of control. The world sees Russia for the enemy it truly is. We can fight Russia without people freezing and dying.
> 
> There is too much at risk to escalate or retaliate or for the altruism of helping out a brother in the family of "democratic" nations.


I disagree with your assessment of the battlefield. Before this is over, Crimea will be in play. The orcs are already constructing defensive lines in Crimea itself. So, I am uncertain that they agree with your opinion either.


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## homesteadforty (Dec 4, 2007)

HDRider said:


> Ukraine has NO hope of reclaiming the territory firmly occupied by Russia.


Ukraine is already poised to retake Crimea. They've prepped the area by retaking Kherson, which was the last major component of Putin's "land bridge" from the Donbas to Crimea and they've taken out the actual bridge between Crimea and Russia. They've also cut the freshwater supply to the area... effectively isolating Russian troops in the region.

Russia's conscripts are getting an average of three (3) days training, firing rifles as little as three (3) times due to time and ammunition shortage constraints. They are put in a truck and shipped to the areas with the heaviest fight... without weapons, ammunition or food. When the get near the front lines they are unloaded and told to scrounge for whatever they need.

After Crimea other areas should fall like dominoes. Look for news of the Ukrainian attacks to start as soon as the ground solidifies enough... my educated guess is that they'll retake Crimea by the end of spring or early summer.


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## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

Hiro said:


> HDRider said:
> 
> 
> > Ukraine has NO hope of reclaiming the territory firmly occupied by Russia.
> ...


100%. I think Ukraine thinks so as well.

Watch for talk in the coming weeks about offensives in the Zaporizhzhia area. Most of the talk right now is in and around Bahkmut, with a virtual stalemate or even slight gains on the Russian side- but the Ukrainians are massing for what appears to be an approach to Zaporizhzhia.

Zaporizhzhia isn’t really tactically significant to holding or advancing in Bakhmut, but it WOULD be tactically significant for an advance into Crimea.

Crimea.

I think Ukraine is going to prioritize at least taking the fight to Crimea before their western supporters begin to lose interest so that, if this does degrade to the point of the western world pushing for capitulation, Ukraine has at least put Crimea back on the table for discussion. They know that, if they don’t restate their claim to Crimea in this war, the world will adjust to the assumption that it belongs to Russia and it will be gone forever.


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## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

I hope the three of you are right and we see an end to the war soon.


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## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

HDRider said:


> I hope the three of you are right and we see an end to the war soon.


I too hope there is an end to the war soon, but only if it means all Russian soldiers out of Ukraine- including Crimea. Otherwise, I can’t think of many things that my tax dollars are spent on that have more merit than smoke-checking Commie invaders.


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## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

GunMonkeyIntl said:


> I too hope there is an end to the war soon, but only if it means all Russian soldiers out of Ukraine- including Crimea. Otherwise, I can’t think of many things that my tax dollars are spent on that have more merit than smoke-checking Commie invaders.


I feel otherwise. Enough have died. Don't need another 28K dead this time next year on top of the 14K that have already died. 

In Germany 38 / 29 °F / C is cold.


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## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

HDRider said:


> I feel otherwise. Enough have died. Don't need another 28K dead this time next year on top of the 14K that have already died.
> 
> In Germany 38 / 29 °F / C is cold.


I agree. Way too many Ukrainians have died. Unfortunately, not enough Russians have died for them to get it, go home and enact some meaningful management changes.

If you really want the dying to end soonest, the clearest path is to admit Ukraine into NATO, launch an Article 5 joint offensive, and restore Ukraine’s 2013 borders.

The credible threat of that would either have Putin pull back, the Russians throw Putin out, or bring about a very short global total war that we all know is going to happen eventually anyway.

Giving in to Putin is not going to end or even mitigate the killing. The minute Putin is recognized as the legitimate owner of any Ukrainian soil, the lives of those Ukrainians are now lost to the whims of a modern day, tech-savvy Stalin. Then, in another 3-5 years, a bunch of Lithuanians, Latvians, Estonians, Poles and Hungarians will meet the same fate. Then a bunch of Germans, Frenchmen and Spaniards. Then a bunch of Brits.

…and then we get to go to direct war with all of “Europe”.

But, hey, at least then it will only be two countries fighting and not a “world war”, right?


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## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

GunMonkeyIntl said:


> If you really want the dying to end soonest, the clearest path is to admit Ukraine into NATO, launch an Article 5 joint offensive, and restore Ukraine’s 2013 borders.


I get confused sometimes. Is this still in retaliation mode?


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## Hiro (Feb 14, 2016)

GunMonkeyIntl said:


> I agree. Way too many Ukrainians have died. Unfortunately, not enough Russians have died for them to get it, go home and enact some meaningful management changes.
> 
> If you really want the dying to end soonest, the clearest path is to admit Ukraine into NATO, launch an Article 5 joint offensive, and restore Ukraine’s 2013 borders.
> 
> ...


I think admitting a nation currently in conflict into NATO is not prudent. I do think Poland should line up a few armored battalions right on the border with Belarus and NATO should be flying CAP right up to their borders. Make the Belarus leader squirm.


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## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

HDRider said:


> I get confused sometimes. Is this still in retaliation mode?


I know you think you’re being cute, but you’re not. There is a war going on, in which people are dying and property is being destroyed, and it was started by one individual at the head of a nation.

That nation, headed by that individual, upset the global stability in a play to rebuild the empire that the Chairmen before him had to dismantle and place into hock because of the failure of their murderous Marxist ideology.

That Chairman doesn’t _only_ want eastern Ukraine any more than he _only_ wanted Crimea, or _only_ wanted Georgia or _only_ wanted Chechnya. He wants to rebuild to the state of the USSR, circa 1989, so that it can continue its progress toward an entire planet Earth unified under the oligarchy with him and his appointed more-equals at the helm.

We, as in the west, didn’t have the resolve to stop him at the Chechen border. We didn’t have the resolve to stop him at the Georgian border. We didn’t have the resolve to keep him out of Crimea. One of our leaders had the balls to deter him at Ukraine’s eastern border, but that leader was retired. Shorty after our management change, Russia’s current Chairman recognized our moment of weakness and took the opportunity to advance his goal of global domination.

Somewhere, from a place none of us expected and despite our overt lack of balls, the west found the resolve to draw a line, and support the Ukrainians in sending the orcs back home. Fighting that battle has cost more lives, in the near-term, than it would have cost by capitulating. BUT, the number of lives being lost right now are nothing compared to the number of lives that will be lost if we don’t end it right here and right now.

So, yes, Petunia, anything that a western-backed Ukraine does right now, up to and including painting the walls of the Kremlin with Putin’s putrid Commie blood will be a matter of relation, not escalation.


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## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

Hiro said:


> I think admitting a nation currently in conflict into NATO is not prudent. I do think Poland should line up a few armored battalions right on the border with Belarus and NATO should be flying CAP right up to their borders. Make the Belarus leader squirm.


I’m not advocating for brining Ukraine into NATO right now. We should have allowed it when they first asked, before the Soviet orcs invaded. That said, if the spineless among us want to decide our current actions according to the metric of the fewest net-sum lives lost, as @HDRider is asking, then that path is to grab Russia by the belt and beat them into a bloody pulp right now.

Every square inch of territory and every pound of resources that we allow them to steal right now only magnifies the costs of the battle we’ll have to fight with them eventually.

The compromise approach, and the one that I advocate for, is to make it so costly on the Russian people that they have no choice but to man up, do the right thing, and fight for a REAL democratic republic within their own borders, and send the last of their oligarchical rulers to his grave.


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## Hiro (Feb 14, 2016)

GunMonkeyIntl said:


> I’m not advocating for brining Ukraine into NATO right now. We should have allowed it when they first asked, before the Soviet orcs invaded. That said, if the spineless among us want to decide our current actions according to the metric of the fewest net-sum lives lost, as @HDRider is asking, then that path is to grab Russia by the belt and beat them into a bloody pulp right now.
> 
> Every square inch of territory and every pound of resources that we allow them to steal right now only magnifies the costs of the battle we’ll have to fight with them eventually.
> 
> The compromise approach, and the one that I advocate for, is to make it so costly on the Russian people that they have no choice but to man up, do the right thing, and fight for a REAL democratic republic within their own borders, and send the last of their oligarchical rulers to his grave.


I would have thought most people that are well educated would recall Neville Chamberlain's paper waving in the wind. Capitulation and appeasement do not satisfy those bent on conquest...ever. The earlier and more fierce the resistance, the less lives are lost overall.


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## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

Hiro said:


> I would have thought most people that are well educated would recall Neville Chamberlain's paper waving in the wind. Capitulation and appeasement do not satisfy those bent on conquest...ever. The earlier and more fierce the resistance, the less lives are lost overall.


The problem is that most people conflate being able to recite what their televisions tell them to say with being well educated.

We have one poster here who has justifiably eschewed the propaganda from the US MSM, and let that fool them into believing what RTdotCom tells them is fact, trying to argue that anything that runs counter to the RT narrative is just mindless following of western propaganda, and we have another poster here who fancies themselves a thinker but never manages to get past the step of devising what they expect others to say in response to whatever clever thing they’ve been fooled into thinking they’ve thought up, and then throws debasing tantrums when the discourse doesn’t go the way they expected.

Meanwhile, there are real men and women, of real resolve, putting their lives on the line on a dice roll that may just save the lives of a few innocents down the line.

Our world is on the brink of total war. Not just big war, and not just fancy TV war; actual total war. As a species, we’ve only managed to get ourselves entangled this far down the rabbit hole a few times and, somehow, beyond all chance and favor, we managed to come out of it OK. We did so at the sheer will of the strongest among us, and managed to do it despite the milquetoast spinelessness of capitulators like HD and the brainlessness of Tinmen like Moonriver.

…but we all get to sleep soundly tonight because there are actual men (and women) who are fighting for our future right now.

It’s literally as bad as the opening battles of WWI and WWII right now, but we’re largely being shielded from it because the opposing sides who tell HD and Moon what to think have too much to profit from convincing them that everything is not so bad. The Fourth and Fifth Reichs are simultaneously brewing and staking their claims right now, but HD just wants to let them divvy up the lands they pinky-swear are all they really intend to take (this time), so we can get back to normal life.


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## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

GunMonkeyIntl said:


> I know you think you’re being cute, but you’re not. There is a war going on, in which people are dying and property is being destroyed,


And the war needs to end.


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## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

HDRider said:


> And the war needs to end.


You’re right. It does. Russia needs to redeploy its troops within its own borders.


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## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

GunMonkeyIntl said:


> Russia needs to redeploy its troops within its own borders.


That would be good


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

Hiro said:


> I would have thought most people that are well educated would recall Neville Chamberlain's paper waving in the wind. Capitulation and appeasement do not satisfy those bent on conquest...ever. The earlier and more fierce the resistance, the less lives are lost overall.


So fighting to the last Ukrainian is a noble effort? Their army has been decimated through deaths and wounded. After a month or two of freezing weather, how many foreign mercenaries will still be there? 

A good chunk of the money we send is being used to pay foreign fighters. Who will man the Patriot missiles? This has clearly become a war between NATO and Russia. No checks on where the money is going as Ukrainian oligarchs and gangs sell weapons on the black market. Their military is more politicized than ours.


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## painterswife (Jun 7, 2004)

MoonRiver said:


> So fighting to the last Ukrainian is a noble effort? Their army has been decimated through deaths and wounded. After a month or two of freezing weather, how many foreign mercenaries will still be there?
> 
> A good chunk of the money we send is being used to pay foreign fighters. Who will man the Patriot missiles? This has clearly become a war between NATO and Russia. No checks on where the money is going as Ukrainian oligarchs and gangs sell weapons on the black market. Their military is more politicized than ours.


How long they fight is up to them. Would you say the same thing to Americans if Russia invaded and tried to take back Alaska?


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

painterswife said:


> How long they fight is up to them. Would you say the same thing to Americans if Russia invaded and tried to take back Alaska?


The Ukraine War has no similarities to Russia invading Alaska.


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## painterswife (Jun 7, 2004)

MoonRiver said:


> The Ukraine War has no similarities to Russia invading Alaska.


 The similarity is basic, one country is invading another. How would you feel being told by someone in another country that they should just give up what has been taken from them?


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## Hiro (Feb 14, 2016)

MoonRiver said:


> So fighting to the last Ukrainian is a noble effort? Their army has been decimated through deaths and wounded. After a month or two of freezing weather, how many foreign mercenaries will still be there?
> 
> A good chunk of the money we send is being used to pay foreign fighters. Who will man the Patriot missiles? This has clearly become a war between NATO and Russia. No checks on where the money is going as Ukrainian oligarchs and gangs sell weapons on the black market. Their military is more politicized than ours.


I don't recall calling it noble. I will say it is the only viable strategy if Ukraine wishes to survive. Negotiating/ceasing military operations just gives the orcs more time to refit and remobilize for their next terrorist/murderous offensive.


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

painterswife said:


> The similarity is basic, one country is invading another. How would you feel being told by someone in another country that they should just give up what has been taken from them?


You left out the fact both Ukraine and the West took provocative actions that led to the invasion. Neither side is blameless. 

The West has spent the last 20 years trying to put Russia in a box and, after several warnings, Russia took action. That doesn't absolve Russia, but it's not like Russia invaded Ukraine without provocation.

The war has causes and nothing is being done to address those causes. The linked article below presents a fair, but simplified discussion of the reasons for the Ukraine War. As I said, nothing has been done to address any of the causes.









Causes of Ukrainian war


Like nearly every human disaster, there are some responsible on all sides of the war in Ukraine. Russia is clearly the aggressor in this situation, ...




easttennessean.com


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## painterswife (Jun 7, 2004)

MoonRiver said:


> You left out the fact both Ukraine and the West took provocative actions that led to the invasion. Neither side is blameless.
> 
> The West has spent the last 20 years trying to put Russia in a box and, after several warnings, Russia took action. That doesn't absolve Russia, but it's not like Russia invaded Ukraine without provocation.
> 
> ...


LOL and Russia has not taken any provocative actions over the last few decades. Neither Ukraine or the US invaded another sovereign country killing and taking over someone else's land.

With your reasoning, Russia should invade Alaska because the US has taken proactive actions that have led to the invasion.


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

painterswife said:


> LOL and Russia has not taken any provocative actions over the last few decades. Neither Ukraine or the US invaded another sovereign country killing and taking over someone else's land.
> 
> With your reasoning, Russia should invade Alaska because the US has taken proactive actions that have led to the invasion.


I still don't think you understand what the war is about. Your Alaska analogy doesn't work to any degree.


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## painterswife (Jun 7, 2004)

MoonRiver said:


> I still don't think you understand what the war is about. Your Alaska analogy doesn't work to any degree.


I do understand. Russia/Putin is trying to take a country that is not his to take. Very Simple.

The reasons that he uses to justify that wrong don't matter to anyone that lives in Ukraine. He is killing innocent children and their families for something that is wrong at it's core and can't be explained away by you.


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## Redlands Okie (Nov 28, 2017)

HDRider said:


> And the war needs to end.


It would end tomorrow if russia would bring their troops home. Otherwise history will continue to repeat itself as russia continues to TAKE more Territory.

Pay now with lost lives or pay later, its a matter of historical patterns with russia and with putin.


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## Redlands Okie (Nov 28, 2017)

MoonRiver said:


> So fighting to the last Ukrainian is a noble effort? Their army has been decimated through deaths and wounded. After a month or two of freezing weather, how many foreign mercenaries will still be there?
> 
> A good chunk of the money we send is being used to pay foreign fighters. Who will man the Patriot missiles? This has clearly become a war between NATO and Russia. No checks on where the money is going as Ukrainian oligarchs and gangs sell weapons on the black market. Their military is more politicized than ours.


Yes its a noble effort. Worth every penny spent or lost. Letting russia continue with their historical patterns are not going to save money or life’s in the long run.


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## Redlands Okie (Nov 28, 2017)

MoonRiver said:


> The Ukraine War has no similarities to Russia invading Alaska.


Why not ? It Alaska used to be russian land. Why not let them make it so again…….

Gees, some people amaze me.


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

Redlands Okie said:


> Why not ? It Alaska used to be russian land. Why not let them make it so again…….
> 
> Gees, some people amaze me.


As I said, no similarity whatsoever.


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## Redlands Okie (Nov 28, 2017)

Moon river, the article you linked has numerous reasons in the article of why russia needs to be stopped and sent packing home. Urkraine old or new governments were not invading, or committing acts of aggression in russia. Business deals kept or broken are not a reason to start a war and invade a country. There is NO reason russia has to have a warm weather port other than trying to save money. They cannot justify a invasion over such a excuse, unless you think its a valid excuse for any other county in the world to react the same way.


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## Redlands Okie (Nov 28, 2017)

MoonRiver said:


> As I said, no similarity whatsoever.


Putin is claiming Ukraine is russia soil with russian people in it, using russian language. Could easily make the same claim for Alaska. Logical and accurate excuse, not for either.


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## Hiro (Feb 14, 2016)

MoonRiver said:


> As I said, no similarity whatsoever.


You have been conditioned to think this way. The same way Birx and Fauci initially conditioned your thinking. You grew past that. Grow past your Russian conditioning.


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## Greenbrook Acres (1 mo ago)

Russian Soldiers Run Away From Battle as Putin Military Struggles: Ukraine (msn.com)
Those poor boys
Putin readies massive nuclear missile capable of hitting US and UK (msn.com)
The nut won't do it
Patriot Missile-Defense Systems Would Be Legitimate Target, Kremlin Says (msn.com)
The Russian Military couldn't hit these any better than anything else they have been trying to hit
Putin may be about to force Belarus into war after mystery markings appear (msn.com)
Now that Putin has used up the Russian Army, he wants to use up the Belarus Army

The best-case scenario at this point is for Putin's inner circle to turn on him. Then the war could be over.


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## Redlands Okie (Nov 28, 2017)

It would be a good start to end it.


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

Redlands Okie said:


> Putin is claiming Ukraine is russia soil with russian people in it, using russian language. Could easily make the same claim for Alaska. Logical and accurate excuse, not for either.


Try 1950s and 1960s Cuba and you have a much better analogy. 

The US has not passed any laws restricting the use of the Russian language or Russian language TV shows in Alaska that I am aware of. I don't know of the US persecuting Russians in Alaska. 

There is nothing there. Outside of the fact Alaska once belonged to Russia, there are no other similarities.


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

Hiro said:


> You have been conditioned to think this way. The same way Birx and Fauci initially conditioned your thinking. You grew past that. Grow past your Russian conditioning.


You are half right, just that I am not the one who believes what the government is telling us. If Russia had done in Cuba what the US did in Ukraine, ... Wait, that already happened and the US through the CIA made a sorry attempt at overthrowing the Cuban government.


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

Redlands Okie said:


> Moon river, the article you linked has numerous reasons in the article of why russia needs to be stopped and sent packing home. Urkraine old or new governments were not invading, or committing acts of aggression in russia. Business deals kept or broken are not a reason to start a war and invade a country. There is NO reason russia has to have a warm weather port other than trying to save money. They cannot justify a invasion over such a excuse, unless you think its a valid excuse for any other county in the world to react the same way.


You apparently chose to believe only those reasons you agree with. I tried to link an article that was fairly objective, that was not either pro Russia or anti-Russia. 

I will bet that Ukraine took away rights to the warm water port based on the US "encouraging" them to do so.


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## Redlands Okie (Nov 28, 2017)

Lots of cases around the world where china, russia, USA, or whoever has used their money or political influence. Not a lot of civilian deaths normally result. 

War and invasion is a complete different issue, which russia has been using in Ukraine. Not to mention the intentional civilian casualties.


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## painterswife (Jun 7, 2004)

MoonRiver said:


> You are half right, just that I am not the one who believes what the government is telling us. If Russia had done in Cuba what the US did in Ukraine, ... Wait, that already happened and the US through the CIA made a sorry attempt at overthrowing the Cuban government.


Explain how a sovereign country passing laws on languages makes it acceptable for another country to invade and kill the citizens of the first country?


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## Redlands Okie (Nov 28, 2017)

As a refresher, what does moonriver think the war is about ?


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## Hiro (Feb 14, 2016)

MoonRiver said:


> You are half right, just that I am not the one who believes what the government is telling us. If Russia had done in Cuba what the US did in Ukraine, ... Wait, that already happened and the US through the CIA made a sorry attempt at overthrowing the Cuban government.


The mistake the US made when Castro took over was not making a real effort to overthrow him. Communism is and always has been evil. Apparently, false equivalencies are a useful tool for communists and their sympathizers.


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

Redlands Okie said:


> Lots of cases around the world where china, russia, USA, or whoever has used their money or political influence. Not a lot of civilian deaths normally result.
> 
> War and invasion is a complete different issue, which russia has been using in Ukraine. Not to mention the intentional civilian casualties.


US used war in Viet Nam, Afghanistan, Iraq, Grenada, Panama, etc. and there were quite a few casualties. Why are you so sure Russia does not try to minimize civilian casualties? You do know Ukraine has been caught several times faking civilian deaths, rapes, and murders don't you?

The Obama administration interfered in Ukraine, Libya, and several other Arab countries as well as interfering in the elections in Kenya, Israel, Macedonia, Libya, Honduras, and Egypt in violation of international law.

The question becomes did Russia attack Ukraine because of or in spite of US meddling in Ukraine? I believe the US was the cause and you don't. Maybe some day we will know the truth, but I doubt if we ever will.


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

Hiro said:


> The mistake the US made when Castro took over was not making a real effort to overthrow him. Communism is and always has been evil. Apparently, false equivalencies are a useful tool for communists and their sympathizers.


Russia is not a communist country.


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## Hiro (Feb 14, 2016)

MoonRiver said:


> Russia is not a communist country.


Try to keep up. You referenced Cuba....


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

Hiro said:


> Try to keep up. You referenced Cuba....


I'm sure we could go back and find posts where you described Russia as communist.


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## painterswife (Jun 7, 2004)

Moonriver

What do you believe justifies Russia invading Ukraine this year?


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

painterswife said:


> Moonriver
> 
> What do you believe justifies Russia invading Ukraine this year?


I don't think I have ever said it was justified. What I have said is that the US, NATO, and Ukraine all acted in a provocative and aggressive manner which left Russia with few options. For Russia to do nothing, as most here seem to advocate, doesn't make sense to me.

There is a strange coalition in US and western Europe of liberals, neoconservatives, and globalists that I think is dangerous to our Constitutional rights and sovereignty. It was started about 14 years ago and seems to be counter to individualism and individual rights. The war in Ukraine is both a local war over old grievances as well as a war to move us toward the new world order as seen by the globalists. The US, NATO, and globalists all are using Ukraine and the weakening of Russia to further their agenda.


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## painterswife (Jun 7, 2004)

MoonRiver said:


> I don't think I have ever said it was justified. What I have said is that the US, NATO, and Ukraine all acted in a provocative and aggressive manner which left Russia with few options. For Russia to do nothing, as most here seem to advocate, doesn't make sense to me.
> 
> There is a strange coalition in US and western Europe of liberals, neoconservatives, and globalists that I think is dangerous to our Constitutional rights and sovereignty. It was started about 14 years ago and seems to be counter to individualism and individual rights. The war in Ukraine is both a local war over old grievances as well as a war to move us toward the new world order as seen by the globalists. The US, NATO, and globalists all are using Ukraine and the weakening of Russia to further their agenda.


Doing something. 

Invading another country because you don't like how or who they are working with and killing the citizens may be doing something. It is however not an acceptable something and should not be rewarded with Ukraine bowing to the wants of Russia.

I don't expect it would be an acceptable response if they invaded the US or Germany or any other country because of old grievances. Only the Ukraine citizens decide how to end the war and it seems they don't want to give anything to Russia.


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

painterswife said:


> Doing something.
> 
> Invading another country because you don't like how or who they are working with and killing the citizens may be doing something. It is however not an acceptable something and should not be rewarded with Ukraine bowing to the wants of Russia.
> 
> I don't expect it would be an acceptable response if they invaded the US or Germany or any other country because of old grievances. Only the Ukraine citizens decide how to end the war and it seems they don't want to give anything to Russia.


Again, you don't seem to understand why Russia determined it needed to invade Ukraine. You make up hypotheticals that are not related to the actual environment that existed in Ukraine, specifically in eastern Ukraine.

War should never be the 1st option. On the other hand, the US has probably been in more wars since its founding than any other country in the world, so evidently war is a valid option. Did Russia have a valid reason for war?


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## painterswife (Jun 7, 2004)

MoonRiver said:


> Again, you don't seem to understand why Russia determined it needed to invade Ukraine. You make up hypotheticals that are not related to the actual environment that existed in Ukraine, specifically in eastern Ukraine.
> 
> War should never be the 1st option. On the other hand, the US has probably been in more wars since its founding than any other country in the world, so evidently war is a valid option. Did Russia have a valid reason for war?


Russia may believe they should have invaded Ukraine. So what. War is not a valid option in this circumstance. Putin has you believing it is and that is what the problem is. You have swallowed the propaganda and are regurgitating it.

Wanting land or wanting politics to be different in another country are not good reasons to invade. Ukraine was not killing off its citizens, so no good reason. Yes other countries including the US have started wars they should not have. That does not justify this one.

I still don't see you providing one good reason that would support Russia in this war.


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

painterswife said:


> Russia may believe they should have invaded Ukraine. So what. War is not a valid option in this circumstance. Putin has you believing it is and that is what the problem is. You have swallowed the propaganda and are regurgitating it.
> 
> Wanting land or wanting politics to be different in another country are not good reasons to invade. Ukraine was not killing off its citizens, so no good reason. Yes other countries including the US have started wars they should not have. That does not justify this one.
> 
> I still don't see you providing one good reason that would support Russia in this war.


You really need to do some research because you don't understand what caused the war. Do your research and you will find many reasons why Russia attacked Ukraine. There are many articles out there if you stay away from the mainstream media like Washington Post, NYT, Time, Newsweek, BBC.


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## painterswife (Jun 7, 2004)

MoonRiver said:


> You really need to do some research because you don't understand what caused the war. Do your research and you will find many reasons why Russia attacked Ukraine. There are many articles out there if you stay away from the mainstream media like Washington Post, NYT, Time, Newsweek, BBC.


You keep saying for me to do the research instead of posting why you believe Russia is justified in taking this to war. Why is that?


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## homesteadforty (Dec 4, 2007)

MoonRiver said:


> So fighting to the last Ukrainian is a noble effort?


Fighting for your freedom and your country has typically been considered noble.



> Their army has been decimated through deaths and wounded.


For a "decimated" army they seem to be doing pretty well.



> After a month or two of freezing weather, how many foreign mercenaries will still be there?


Ukrainian mercs tend to be from Chechnya, Georgia, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Armenia and other countries that have been invaded and occupied by Russia. All neighbors (or at least regional) that have a stake in the war.

The Russian mercenaries are primarily from Syria, Libya, Central African Republic and Mali... all Middle Eastern and African countries whose only stake in the war is money.













> A good chunk of the money we send is being used to pay foreign fighters.


So???



> Who will man the Patriot missiles?


Ukrainian soldiers.



> This has clearly become a war between NATO and Russia.


No... NATO is supporting Ukraine's effort... they are fighting the war.



> No checks on where the money is going as Ukrainian oligarchs and gangs sell weapons on the black market. Their military is more politicized than ours.


Evidence please...


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## homesteadforty (Dec 4, 2007)

painterswife said:


> Explain how a sovereign country passing laws on languages makes it acceptable for another country to invade and kill the citizens of the first country?


Just for clarification, Ukraine did not ban the Russian language. They merely made Ukrainian the official state language while recognizing Russian and several other minority languages. In other words, Ukrainian was to be used for official government functions. BTW, it was not aimed specifically against Russian... it seems they were having issues with the dozen or so minority languages spoken in Ukraine.

The ban on Russian came after the invasion and applies to books, other printed materials and recordings from the Donbas and other Russian occupied areas where propaganda was coming from.

@MoonRiver likes to try to twist facts to support his feeble-minded support of his hero Putin.


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## painterswife (Jun 7, 2004)

homesteadforty said:


> Just for clarification, Ukraine did not ban the Russian language. They merely made Ukrainian the official state language while recognizing Russian and several other minority languages. In other words, Ukrainian was to be used for official government functions. BTW, it was not aimed specifically against Russian... it seems they were having issues with the dozen or so minority languages spoken in Ukraine.
> 
> The ban on Russian came after the invasion and applies to books, other printed materials and recordings from the Donbas and other Russian occupied areas where propaganda was coming from.
> 
> @MoonRiver likes to try to twist facts to support his feeble-minded support of his hero Putin.


He has yet to provide a reasonable reason for Russia/Putin to invade another sovereign country. He is grasping at ways to support his support of the evil that is Putin.


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## Redlands Okie (Nov 28, 2017)

MoonRiver said:


> US used war in Viet Nam, Afghanistan, Iraq, Grenada, Panama, etc. and there were quite a few casualties. Why are you so sure Russia does not try to minimize civilian casualties? You do know Ukraine has been caught several times faking civilian deaths, rapes, and murders don't you?
> 
> The Obama administration interfered in Ukraine, Libya, and several other Arab countries as well as interfering in the elections in Kenya, Israel, Macedonia, Libya, Honduras, and Egypt in violation of international law.
> 
> The question becomes did Russia attack Ukraine because of or in spite of US meddling in Ukraine? I believe the US was the cause and you don't. Maybe some day we will know the truth, but I doubt if we ever will.


Russia seems to have attacked urkraine to access ports, natural resources, and to get back to Soviet era borders. After this latest attempt at expanding they have now had to resort to attacking civilian infrastructure such as the electric grid, and a variety of other targets such as hospitals, schools, etc in a attempt at getting the population to quit resisting the russian takeover. 
Will be interesting to see what happens if urkraine was to start getting serious about returning the treatment.


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## Hiro (Feb 14, 2016)

Redlands Okie said:


> Russia seems to have attacked urkraine to access ports, natural resources, and to get back to Soviet era borders. After this latest attempt at expanding they have now had to resort to attacking civilian infrastructure such as the electric grid, and a variety of other targets such as hospitals, schools, etc in a attempt at getting the population to quit resisting the russian takeover.
> Will be interesting to see what happens if urkraine was to start getting serious about returning the treatment.


Bravo. @MoonRiver is just repeating Kremlin talking points without question. It is sad, tbh.


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## Redlands Okie (Nov 28, 2017)

I am going to say that I hope moonriver appreciates how nice he has it that he lives in a country that allows for thoughts, ideas, lifestyles, speech, and other actions that are contrary to the government desires. Certainly could not do so in russia, at least not for long. I think Ukraine is very aware of the issue.


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

Redlands Okie said:


> Russia seems to have attacked urkraine to access ports, natural resources, and to get back to Soviet era borders. After this latest attempt at expanding they have now had to resort to attacking civilian infrastructure such as the electric grid, and a variety of other targets such as hospitals, schools, etc in a attempt at getting the population to quit resisting the russian takeover.
> Will be interesting to see what happens if urkraine was to start getting serious about returning the treatment.


I believe Russia is attacking military targets that Ukraine has located next to schools, hospitals, and apartment buildings. Ukraine seems to be using the same strategy Hamas uses against Israel. 

Russia has about 300,000 troops ready to advance. What I have heard is that the ratio of troops killed is about 8 Ukrainians per 1 Russian. It looks like Russia is destroying the electrical grid so that the cold will force Ukraine to negotiate. I don't know how much mercenaries are paid, but I doubt it is enough to keep them in foxholes through the freezing winter.

If Ukraine doesn't negotiate, the frozen ground will allow Russian tanks to sweep into Ukraine with the massive troops they have at the ready. What I heard a couple of days ago is Ukraine already lost the war but it will be a couple of months before they realize it.


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

Hiro said:


> Bravo. @MoonRiver is just repeating Kremlin talking points without question. It is sad, tbh.


Are they Kremlin talking points? How would you know? Maybe because that is what the state department and CIA plant with reporters so gullible people believe it is what Russia is doing.


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## Hiro (Feb 14, 2016)

MoonRiver said:


> I believe Russia is attacking military targets that Ukraine has located next to schools, hospitals, and apartment buildings. Ukraine seems to be using the same strategy Hamas uses against Israel.
> 
> Russia has about 300,000 troops ready to advance. What I have heard is that the ratio of troops killed is about 8 Ukrainians per 1 Russian. It looks like Russia is destroying the electrical grid so that the cold will force Ukraine to negotiate. I don't know how much mercenaries are paid, but I doubt it is enough to keep them in foxholes through the freezing winter.
> 
> If Ukraine doesn't negotiate, the frozen ground will allow Russian tanks to sweep into Ukraine with the massive troops they have at the ready. What I heard a couple of days ago is Ukraine already lost the war but it will be a couple of months before they realize it.


Good grief. Russia has admitted to targeting civilian infrastructure to punish them. Do you really live in southern VA or Moscow?

As to Russian tanks sweeping into Ukraine, they may have been able to do that if they had chosen now to invade. They didn't. Their military is impotent against a 2nd world military and the whole world knows it. Orcs are being killed for no possible chance of achieving anything resembling a victory.


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

homesteadforty said:


> Just for clarification, Ukraine did not ban the Russian language. They merely made Ukrainian the official state language while recognizing Russian and several other minority languages. In other words, Ukrainian was to be used for official government functions. BTW, it was not aimed specifically against Russian... it seems they were having issues with the dozen or so minority languages spoken in Ukraine.
> 
> The ban on Russian came after the invasion and applies to books, other printed materials and recordings from the Donbas and other Russian occupied areas where propaganda was coming from.
> 
> @MoonRiver likes to try to twist facts to support his feeble-minded support of his hero Putin.


Please point out where I have said anything that conflicts wit this quote from NYT.

In 2019, the government made Ukrainian the mandatory language used in most aspects of public life, including schools. Russia pointed to this law before its invasion to argue that Ukrainian Russian speakers were under attack.​​After that law passed, human rights organizations called on Ukraine to protect the rights of minority language speakers. They were again alarmed when, under Mr. Zelensky, the government began requiring in January that print media outlets registered in Ukraine publish in Ukrainian.​
An estimated one in every three Ukrainians speaks Russian at home, according to researchers.​


https://www.nytimes.com/2022/06/19/world/europe/ukraine-bans-russian-music-books.html


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## Hiro (Feb 14, 2016)

MoonRiver said:


> Please point out where I have said anything that conflicts wit this quote from NYT.
> 
> In 2019, the government made Ukrainian the mandatory language used in most aspects of public life, including schools. Russia pointed to this law before its invasion to argue that Ukrainian Russian speakers were under attack.​​After that law passed, human rights organizations called on Ukraine to protect the rights of minority language speakers. They were again alarmed when, under Mr. Zelensky, the government began requiring in January that print media outlets registered in Ukraine publish in Ukrainian.​
> An estimated one in every three Ukrainians speaks Russian at home, according to researchers.​
> ...


I am not going to argue sources, as it is verborten here, but you are way off base from the get go on this. Invading a neighboring nation that is not hostile should receive the exact response the orcs have gotten and they will suffer for generations being led into this terrible adventure. 

Russia was never threatened. It is the aggressor. It is being led by evil and doing evil. Full stop.


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## Redlands Okie (Nov 28, 2017)

MoonRiver said:


> I believe Russia is attacking military targets that Ukraine has located next to schools, hospitals, and apartment buildings. Ukraine seems to be using the same strategy Hamas uses against Israel.
> 
> Russia has about 300,000 troops ready to advance. What I have heard is that the ratio of troops killed is about 8 Ukrainians per 1 Russian. It looks like Russia is destroying the electrical grid so that the cold will force Ukraine to negotiate. I don't know how much mercenaries are paid, but I doubt it is enough to keep them in foxholes through the freezing winter.
> 
> If Ukraine doesn't negotiate, the frozen ground will allow Russian tanks to sweep into Ukraine with the massive troops they have at the ready. What I heard a couple of days ago is Ukraine already lost the war but it will be a couple of months before they realize it.


Russia seems to have done fine in hitting the power grid locations. When using their accurate weapons. Then you have russia using weapons that they know are highly inaccurate, launched at large metropolitan areas. Seems strange if they were trying to avoid civilian casualties. 

300,000 troops ready to advance. Dressed in what, armed with what, fed with what, transported by what? Get on the net and start looking at the videos of russian troops in or near combat locations. Look at their lack of shelter, their clothes, lack of body armor, weapons, ammo, medical supplies. Look at the food they are being supplied. Huge numbers of civilian vehicles tying to handle the logistics. Better hope they do better this time with their logistics, and not run out of fuel as they did at the start. How many radios do you see on the troops? Except for Russian propaganda films its shocking how they are supplied. If you look closely even many of the propaganda films show details that should make a person wonder. It’s even against the law in russia to talk about these problems, or to condemn putin. 




Read up on the massive Ukraine mobilization of troops in the last year. Look closely, even closer, not much to find. Instead they are training troops a few at a time and equipping them with good gear. 

Look at the films of the Ukraine militia (2nd class troops) and troops not in the combat zones. Even they are dressed better and often using better weapons than the russian front line troops. 

Largest best equipped troops russia seems to be able to use at the moment are Belarusian. So not even russian troops. I am sure the Belarusians are going to be real motivated…………..Heck even china has backed off on the amount of support for russia, but they are enjoying the oil from russia at cut rate prices. Probably also learning what not to do in combat from russia. 

As long as the rest of the world keeps supplying urkraine it seems to me they have the motivated troops to handle russia.


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

Hiro said:


> I am not going to argue sources, as it is verborten here, but you are way off base from the get go on this. Invading a neighboring nation that is not hostile should receive the exact response the orcs have gotten and they will suffer for generations being led into this terrible adventure.
> 
> Russia was never threatened. It is the aggressor. It is being led by evil and doing evil. Full stop.


Your comment has nothing to do with my post. Homestead40 said I "twisted facts" about Ukraine placing restrictions on use of the Russian language and I showed that what I said was correct per the NYT.

We differ on what we believe to be facts, At this time there is no way of knowing what the true facts are. All we have are opinions, abd I have frequently said in my posts that I was expressing my opinion.


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

Hiro said:


> Good grief. Russia has admitted to targeting civilian infrastructure to punish them. Do you really live in southern VA or Moscow?
> 
> As to Russian tanks sweeping into Ukraine, they may have been able to do that if they had chosen now to invade. They didn't. Their military is impotent against a 2nd world military and the whole world knows it. Orcs are being killed for no possible chance of achieving anything resembling a victory.


Russia never said they had targeted schools, churches, hospitals, or apartment buildings. They have said they were targeting infrastructure such as electric plants. What would you expect an army to fire missiles at?


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

Redlands Okie said:


> Russia seems to have done fine in hitting the power grid locations. When using their accurate weapons. Then you have russia using weapons that they know are highly inaccurate, launched at large metropolitan areas. Seems strange if they were trying to avoid civilian casualties.
> 
> 300,000 troops ready to advance. Dressed in what, armed with what, fed with what, transported by what? Get on the net and start looking at the videos of russian troops in or near combat locations. Look at their lack of shelter, their clothes, lack of body armor, weapons, ammo, medical supplies. Look at the food they are being supplied. Huge numbers of civilian vehicles tying to handle the logistics. Better hope they do better this time with their logistics, and not run out of fuel as they did at the start. How many radios do you see on the troops? Except for Russian propaganda films its shocking how they are supplied. If you look closely even many of the propaganda films show details that should make a person wonder. It’s even against the law in russia to talk about these problems, or to condemn putin.
> 
> ...


You could be right, Your sources may be better than mine. But so far, I haven't seen Ukraine be very successful. Even NATO has admitted to the large number of casualties the Ukrainian military has suffered.

It would be good if the truth came out some day, but it won't. A prediction I read which I think has merit is the US and NATO will throw a little more money and a few more missiles at it, but if Ukraine doesn't start winning in the next few months, popular support will dry up and Ukraine will be told to negotiate and probably give up territory. I don't know if it is the majority of House Republicans or not, but there is a good chance the new Congress will not continue to fund the war.


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## Redlands Okie (Nov 28, 2017)

MoonRiver said:


> Russia never said they had targeted schools, churches, hospitals, or apartment buildings. They have said they were targeting infrastructure such as electric plants. What would you expect an army to fire missiles at?


The weapons they choose to use and how they use them makes it clear on their intent and their lack concern about civilian deaths, schools,churches, hospitals, apartment buildings.

Edit 
Keep in mind its not just Ukraine. They have been done the same in Syria, Transnistria, Georgia, Chechnia to name a few.


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

Redlands Okie said:


> The weapons they choose to use and how they use them makes it clear on their intent and their lack concern about civilian deaths, schools,churches, hospitals, apartment buildings.


Again, if you co-locate a military site with a civilian building, the civilian building might get damaged. We condemn it when Hamas or Hezbollah does it. I seem to remember the US blowing up a van carrying innocent children in Afghanistan with a drone not to long ago.

You are also ignoring the damage and civilian deaths in eastern Ukraine caused by the Ukraine military.


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## Redlands Okie (Nov 28, 2017)

Not ignoring either side. Once again pay attention to how they handle combat. Russia uses mass artillery fire while using weapons that do not have a reputation for accuracy, even when new or well maintained. Ukraine has not, they seem to not want to destroy more that they to have to rebuild later, they do not want to alienate their own population, and probably because they do not have the ammo to spare.


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## Redlands Okie (Nov 28, 2017)

Done with the eduction lessons for the evening. Have a nice one.


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## Big_John (Dec 1, 2021)

Russia/Ukraine is a cluster..... I am hopeful that it doesn't escalate into WW3..... but have little hope this will end positive.

Likely..... America will be in a SHTF situation.....

........


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## wiscto (Nov 24, 2014)

So I just want to ask two questions... How _should _The West counter Russia's long term plans for regional and then global dominance? How much Putin have any of you actually read and followed over the years? Because every once in a while he just blatantly gives everyone his long term plans out loud...


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## poppy (Feb 21, 2008)

wiscto said:


> So I just want to ask two questions... How _should _The West counter Russia's long term plans for regional and then global dominance? How much Putin have any of you actually read and followed over the years? Because every once in a while he just blatantly gives everyone his long term plans out loud...



Russia isn't going to dominate the world. Putin has his hands full just in Ukraine. Perhaps if we quit giving billions of dollars to countries that don't like us and spent that money on improving our military and weapons, we wouldn't have to worry. We are not having enough young people signing up for our military. I suspect that is due to their woke policies andsvaccination rules. China is our real threat and yet our current Resident bends over backwards to kiss their fanny. It isn't Russia that steals our technology, takes our jobs, and gathers information on our citizens. It is China. I read today that our Resident wants to give Africa 55 billion dollars as some sort of payback for slavery. I think that works out to about $165.00 for every man, woman, and child in the US.


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## Big_John (Dec 1, 2021)

its all BS..... American taxpayer money to pockets elsewhere......

Expect WW3 to start soon.....


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## Greenbrook Acres (1 mo ago)

🍿 🕚


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

Redlands Okie said:


> Not ignoring either side. Once again pay attention to how they handle combat. Russia uses mass artillery fire while using weapons that do not have a reputation for accuracy, even when new or well maintained. Ukraine has not, they seem to not want to destroy more that they to have to rebuild later, they do not want to alienate their own population, and probably because they do not have the ammo to spare.


Please provide a recent reference on Russian weapons not being accurate. Their drones seem to be pretty accurate.

*How Russian and American Weapons Would Match Up in a New Cold War*


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## Hiro (Feb 14, 2016)

Big_John said:


> its all BS..... American taxpayer money to pockets elsewhere......
> 
> Expect WW3 to start soon.....


WWIII started a while back. So far, only the CCP and Russia are on the offensive.


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## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

wiscto said:


> So I just want to ask two questions... How _should _The West counter Russia's long term plans for regional and then global dominance? How much Putin have any of you actually read and followed over the years? Because every once in a while he just blatantly gives everyone his long term plans out loud...


I am no student of Putin. I have watched and read his speeches enough to know he wants a counterweight to NATO.

As I see it, we have three possible ways to deal with Ukraine.
1. Stay the course
2. Capitulation (Treaty)
3. Escalation (NATO goes all in)

All any of us can do is trust our president and his advisors to make the right choice.


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## sweetbabyjane (Oct 21, 2002)

Made a tiny little change, HD... 

All any of us can do is trust  pray our president and his advisors make the right choice. 

At least that is what I am doing...
SBJ


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## wiscto (Nov 24, 2014)

poppy said:


> Russia isn't going to dominate the world. Putin has his hands full just in Ukraine. Perhaps if we quit giving billions of dollars to countries that don't like us and spent that money on improving our military and weapons, we wouldn't have to worry. We are not having enough young people signing up for our military. I suspect that is due to their woke policies andsvaccination rules. China is our real threat and yet our current Resident bends over backwards to kiss their fanny. It isn't Russia that steals our technology, takes our jobs, and gathers information on our citizens. It is China. I read today that our Resident wants to give Africa 55 billion dollars as some sort of payback for slavery. I think that works out to about $165.00 for every man, woman, and child in the US.


So many things to say... First of all, China went from a backwater to the country slowly taking over the world within your lifetime. If not for the United States, Russia would have used Ukraine and his nuclear threats to bully Eastern Europe back into a Russian centric arrangement, with Russians migrating in and carving out enclaves and insisting on speaking Russian and _being _Russia just like they did to all their old Soviet states and Warsaw Pact allies.....

Germany underestimated Russia, now they're in an energy crisis that they may not emerge from without serious socio-economic consequences. You are underestimating the stupidity of not playing the game.... We play the game, whether efficiently or not, because aside from the UK and Israel, everyone else in The West is asleep at the wheel.

We aren't having people sign up for the military because for 50 years now American parents feed their kids garbage and let them drink all the soda they want. They're fat and lazy because the Baby Boomers(particularly the younger ones), GenX, and The Millennials were terrible parents who fed their kids convenience food and couldn't lead by example. And even those Zoomers who are physically capable are either completely self absorbed jackwagons, or they take one look at the suicide rate among Vietnam and 21st Century veterans, the uselessness of those wars, and they wonder what they'd be throwing their lives for. They hear anti-American propaganda from The Left, much of which was inspired and/or encouraged by the Soviets themselves, and now they're hearing the same stupid "it's really our fault" rhetoric that we heard in the wake of 9/11, but now it's coming from the Right.

It's just Putin plucking your strings like a maestro.



HDRider said:


> I am no student of Putin. I have watched and read his speeches enough to know he wants a counterweight to NATO.
> 
> As I see it, we have three possible ways to deal with Ukraine.
> 1. Stay the course
> ...


Okay well I've been paying attention since 1999. I wouldn't say I knew much about the world at that age, but I did study history pretty extensively and I had direct encounters with Soviet/Russian expats. Putin has tipped his hand more than once. He doesn't want a counterweight to NATO out of some altruistic desire for global tranquility... It's nothing more than one of the rhetorical devices he uses in the information war. What he wants is to regain control of Eastern Europe and all of the old Soviet States. What he wants is the same thing the old timers in the KGB who trained him wanted, the same agenda that saw them invading Finland. And the Soviet agenda was nothing more than a mutated strain of Russian Imperial agenda that incorporated the entire world into its list of goals.

More importantly, Putin has said definitively that one day one system, one people, one person will rule the world. He now believes that whoever creates a general purpose artificial intelligence will be that nation. If he believes that, which he does, and if he believes the Russian people are the most important in all humanity, which he does, can you imagine him not pursuing global dominance for the Russian people? Why would he accept defeat and subservience?

He has also stated many times that democratic nations will fall apart. He has believed for his entire reign that The West would simply fall apart, and why would he not want to pick up the pieces for himself? Do you think he isn't open to less direct means' of taking over Europe? Why do you suppose he worked so hard to become the sole supplier of gas and oil to a continent he believed was going to politically dissolve into chaos? Control... Power... Why do you suppose the Russians insisted on protecting their enclaves in Europe? Kaliningrad, Moldova...

The fact that Russia is the underdog does not mean they are a victim. Americans all need to stop buying his "we're just defending ourselves" rhetoric. They've been saying that since the day they divided Poland in half and shared it with Hitler.... Get real.

Edit: Laugh emojis are great for posturing, aren't they?


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## Redlands Okie (Nov 28, 2017)

Well said.


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## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

wiscto said:


> Edit: Laugh emojis are great for posturing, aren't they?


They are great for showing my disdain for your post.

I always tell myself I will not reply to you again because you take something someone says and embellish to some distorted meaning to satisfy your undeserved sense of self worth. 

Putin is 70 years old. He will be dead soon and all your illusion will die with him. The most ironic thing of all is how blind you are to how well you have been programmed.


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## painterswife (Jun 7, 2004)

Laugh emojis in response to a post always make me LOL That person's disdain is hilarious and makes my day.


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## Redlands Okie (Nov 28, 2017)

MoonRiver said:


> Please provide a recent reference on Russian weapons not being accurate. Their drones seem to be pretty accurate.
> 
> *How Russian and American Weapons Would Match Up in a New Cold War*



Many of the weapons being used are not designed for accuracy. Some old weapons are not considered accurate in todays world. 
Much of the artillery russia is using now has worn out barrels, resulting in highly inaccurate firing. 
Many of the weapons have been documented to be aimed at non military areas. Hospitals, schools, apartments. But in regards to your asking for a reference on inaccurate russian weapons I have some listed further down in this long post. 
———————
“A Russian tank is filmed firing on apartments in Mariupol; evidence emerges that a cluster bomb was used to strike against the train station in Kramatorsk and concerns surface about the possible use of phosphorus in Ukraine’s cities.”
“A preliminary war crimes assessment, conducted on behalf of 45 members of the OSCE, concluded that Russia had engaged in “a clear pattern” of war crimes, targeting, for example, hospitals, schools and places of shelter during the seven weeks of fighting.”









As Russia continues to bomb Ukraine, are its weapons of choice getting worse?


Analysis: Russia’s indiscriminate use of weaponry has already led to high numbers of civilian deaths




www.theguardian.com





————————
“12 missiles were fired by S-300s in a land attack role, targeting Mykolaiv Oblast, but he also notes that, despite the missiles being retrofitted with GPS guidance, they remain inaccurate.”

It’s normally a surface to air missile that is now being used to attack land targets. 









Russia Now Firing S-300 Surface-To-Air Missiles At Land Targets In Ukraine: Official


The Russian S-300 surface-to-air missile system does have a little-known latent ability to strike land targets.




www.thedrive.com




————————

While the Russians used antiship missiles against land targets, they apparently did not use them for antiship attacks. However, because the missiles have terminal sensors for antiship use, the accuracy problems demonstrated in Russian land attacks probably would not apply against a ship target.









Lessons from Russian Missile Performance in Ukraine


Careful analysis reveals that Russian missile performance in Ukraine has been poor compared with the capabilities Moscow has advertised.




www.usni.org





———————-


“Igor Girkin, a former Russian military leader, appeared to accidentally reveal that Russia is using Tochka-U missiles in Vladimir Putin's war—weeks after the Kremlin denied that the weapons are being deployed by Russian forces.”









Russian Official Accidentally Reveals Missiles Being Used in Ukraine


Just weeks ago, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov denied that Russian forces use Tochka-U missiles.




www.newsweek.com





SS-21 SCARAB (9K79 Tochka)
The SS-21 SCARAB missile (9M79) had a maximum range of 70 km and a CEP of 160 meters


https://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/russia/ss-21.ht



160 meters is not considered accurate in todays world. 
————————-

CLUSTER BOMBS
So far, Human Rights Watch has documented the use of these weapons by Russia in multiple places, including against a hospital in the Donetska region. The Washington Post also documented, and Human Rights Watch confirmed, their use in the eastern city of Kharkiv.









Russian forces are using weapons widely banned across the world, says Harvard Law expert - Harvard Law School


As the Russian invasion of Ukraine continues to unfold, of particular concern, says arms expert Bonnie Docherty, is the reported use of cluster munitions and other explosives in highly populated areas.




hls.harvard.edu





Inaccurate by design 
—————————-

“Citing U.S. intelligence, three U.S. officials said the United States estimated that Russia's failure rate varied day-to-day, depended on the type of missile being launched, and could sometimes exceed 50%. Two of them said it reached as high as 60%.”









Exclusive: U.S. assesses up to 60% failure rate for some Russian missiles, officials say


The United States assesses that Russia is suffering failure rates as high as 60% for some of the precision-guided missiles it is using to attack Ukraine, three U.S. officials with knowledge of the intelligence told Reuters.




www.reuters.com





That means they are not hitting what they are being aimed at. 

*_*

Almost all of the aircraft dropped bombs are old non guided ones. Highly inaccurate. 

“officials say the impact is now being borne by Ukrainian hospitals, schools and apartment buildings destroyed by Russia’s indiscriminate bombing campaign”



https://www.cnn.com/2022/03/11/politics/russia-ukraine-heavy-weaponry/index.html


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## wiscto (Nov 24, 2014)

HDRider said:


> They are great for showing my disdain for your post.
> 
> I always tell myself I will not reply to you again because you take something someone says and embellish to some distorted meaning to satisfy your undeserved sense of self worth.
> 
> Putin is 70 years old. He will be dead soon and all your illusion will die with him. The most ironic thing of all is how blind you are to how well you have been programmed.


A crying emoji would more accurately present your feelings... You aren't informed enough to tell us all that we've been programmed. You believe you are, of course. Go do some more Putin reading, I'm sure if you scratch the surface of what other people know about him you'll find the quotes I'm referring to. He doesn't even really hide the ball, and my opinion on that is....he knows he doesn't have to. People will do a minimal amount of reading and then feel like they have the big picture. Like I said... Information war. It's pretty much all just rhetoric. Of course it's based in some truth, because of course he would want a buffer between himself and NATO, but that doesn't mean he's entitled to one.


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## wiscto (Nov 24, 2014)

Redlands Okie said:


> Many of the weapons being used are not designed for accuracy. Some old weapons are not considered accurate in todays world.
> Much of the artillery russia is using now has worn out barrels, resulting in highly inaccurate firing.
> Many of the weapons have been documented to be aimed at non military areas. Hospitals, schools, apartments. But in regards to your asking for a reference on inaccurate russian weapons I have some listed further down in this long post.
> ———————
> ...


Well they're still managing to hit water and electrical with January, February, and March still on the way. Ukraine will need fuel and air cover to sew their crops come spring. This thing is nowhere near settled, right?


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## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

painterswife said:


> Laugh emojis in response to a post always make me LOL That person's disdain is hilarious and makes my day.


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

Redlands Okie said:


> Many of the weapons being used are not designed for accuracy. Some old weapons are not considered accurate in todays world.
> Much of the artillery russia is using now has worn out barrels, resulting in highly inaccurate firing.
> Many of the weapons have been documented to be aimed at non military areas. Hospitals, schools, apartments. But in regards to your asking for a reference on inaccurate russian weapons I have some listed further down in this long post.
> ———————
> ...


The references may be true or not but, for example, if they were talking about Covid I wouldn't believe a single one of them.

You do remember several of those same sources claiming a Russian missile hit inside Poland.


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## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

wiscto said:


> A crying emoji would more accurately present your feelings... You aren't informed enough to tell us all that we've been programmed. You believe you are, of course. Go do some more Putin reading, I'm sure if you scratch the surface of what other people know about him you'll find the quotes I'm referring to. He doesn't even really hide the ball, and my opinion on that is....he knows he doesn't have to. People will do a minimal amount of reading and then feel like they have the big picture. Like I said... Information war. It's pretty much all just rhetoric. Of course it's based in some truth, because of course he would want a buffer between himself and NATO, but that doesn't mean he's entitled to one.


With all due respect to your advanced studies in Putinology, I do not fear a world dominated by a Putin led Russia. 

I fear a nuclear attack by a desperate Putin.


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## painterswife (Jun 7, 2004)

HDRider said:


>


Thanks. you do know how to make my day better.


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## painterswife (Jun 7, 2004)

painterswife said:


> Thanks. you do know how to make my day better.


LOL, more disdain emojis. The week is ending well and it portends to be an outstanding next week.


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## poppy (Feb 21, 2008)

wiscto said:


> So many things to say... First of all, China went from a backwater to the country slowly taking over the world within your lifetime. If not for the United States, Russia would have used Ukraine and his nuclear threats to bully Eastern Europe back into a Russian centric arrangement, with Russians migrating in and carving out enclaves and insisting on speaking Russian and _being _Russia just like they did to all their old Soviet states and Warsaw Pact allies.....
> 
> Germany underestimated Russia, now they're in an energy crisis that they may not emerge from without serious socio-economic consequences. You are underestimating the stupidity of not playing the game.... We play the game, whether efficiently or not, because aside from the UK and Israel, everyone else in The West is asleep at the wheel.
> 
> ...


Not sure whose strings Russia is plucking. Just like Iran, China, Mexico, etc., Russia takes advantage of things when they see weak leaders in the US. There are bad people out there, no doubt about that. Notice that Russia, China, Iran, and North Korea were pretty calm under our former President. Why do you think they are all now flexing their muscles? Mexico even cooperated in slowing illegal immigration under Trump. Look at it now. They all feared Trump because they were unsure how he would respond if they pushed him. Now they know nothing will happen to them, except we may send the a few billion dollars now and then. Also notice it is mostly leftists willing to go to war with Russia. That is odd considering the left used to be the anti war crowd. What changed them? Simple. They still believe Putin helped Trump get elected even though it has totally been proven false. They are willing to go to war because they hate Trump more than they value their own lives.


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## wiscto (Nov 24, 2014)

HDRider said:


> With all due respect to your advanced studies in Putinology, I do not fear a world dominated by a Putin led Russia.
> 
> I fear a nuclear attack by a desperate Putin.


Well I'm not going to apologize to every would-be-professor for having actually studied Soviet and Russian history under two different people for two different courses... But with all due respect....

You just made my point for me. All he has to do now is threaten to nuke you if you don't film yourself pouring fire ants down your underpants, and he'll make you a TikTok star overnight.


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## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

wiscto said:


> Well I'm not going to apologize to every would-be-professor for having actually studied Soviet and Russian history under two different people for two different courses... But with all due respect....
> 
> You just made my point for me. All he has to do now is threaten to nuke you if you don't film yourself pouring fire ants down your underpants, and he'll make you a TikTok star overnight.


There is a reason it is called MAD. Too many have entered a dream state where MAD no longer exist


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## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

HDRider said:


> There is a reason it is called MAD. Too many have entered a dream state where MAD no longer exist


MAD is, I’ll argue, ironically named, and the observance of MAD is kind of the point. The cliche about MAD being “aptly named” is tired and not really all that prescient. 

Mankind has developed weaponry that, when in the hands of two or more opposing nations, is capable of rendering the Earth largely uninhabitable for our species. That that development even occurred, now more than a half-century ago, is somewhat “mad”, but MAD is the mature, considered realization by which those weapons will almost assuredly never be deployed- at least by rational men. In that regard, MAD is quite sane.

What we’re seeing with Putin is the breakdown of that geopolitical maturity into the tumult of a despotic bully. Putin is using the threat of MAD to leverage the world into backing down and letting him do whatever he wants; up to and including the enslavement of a sovereign nation’s people.

MAD is exactly why we can’t let him get away with this. MAD was something of a gentleman’s agreement that those of us in the nuclear-weapons community would agree not to antagonize each other to the point of no-return from Total War. We fought a dozen flare ups of hot war during the Cold War, and we kept those flare ups to proxy battles between capitalism and communism, on semi-neutral battlefields, for exactly that reason.

Ukraine is nothing more than the next in those series of flare ups. Despite @MoonRiver ‘s completely RT-driven “understanding” of the geopolitical landscape, The Russian Federation IS the USSR, albeit with a few less slave states in her stable. The USSR was never communist. It was Communist. It was ruled by a dictator-for-life who allowed a select few oligarchs to do business and become wealthy and powerful (with caveat) to the will of the dictator. The USSR thrived off of enslaving resource-rich states which it could milk for the thirst of its oligarchs.

That’s exactly what the Russian Federation is today. Putin is the dictator, his oligarch henchmen are The Party, and Ukraine is just the next nation to be bled dry in the name of prosperity for those more-equal few.

The problem we’re facing today is that the USSR’s RF’s dictator is nearing his final act and is coming to terms with his ego. This next conquest was his Swan Song, and he’s let the desire to achieve it trump his sense of reason and maturity, and has put MAD on the table. He’s trying to steal another nation for the reformed USSR, and he’s got his fingers hovering over the third rail of geopolitics.

The nuclear-weapons community is no longer the US and Russia. If Putin, who’s become nothing better than Kim-West, is allowed to break the gentleman’s agreement of MAD, for the sake of an empire-building maneuver, MAD will no longer be in force, and we will actually be at threat of assured destruction.

If Putin, Kim or Xi decide to go mad/MAD on their ego-stenched death beds, there’s nothing we can do about that. That is the everlasting liability of nuclear weapons. But, to allow one of the nuclear-weapons holders to have what they want, at their threat of MAD, is to allow the death of MAD as the voice of reason, and assure ourselves that we will be destroyed.

Putin can’t be allowed to retake his nation’s former slave states at the barrel of a silo. To allow that to happen is shortsighted and spineless.


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## kinderfeld (Jan 29, 2006)

HDRider said:


> All any of us can do is trust our president and his advisors to make the right choice.


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## kinderfeld (Jan 29, 2006)

poppy said:


> We are not having enough young people signing up for our military. I suspect that is due to their woke policies andsvaccination rules.


Could also be because they see that the wars we've been fighting for the past several decades had little or nothing to do with national defense. When someone enlists, they're trusting TPTB with the decision to deploy them. Do you have that kind of trust in our government? And then, after returning from a deployment, look at the "care" they receive. I met a guy who lost much of his hearing in Iraq. When I last spoke with him he had been trying for a few years to get a damned hearing aid. Think the politicians who sent him to Iraq have these problems? Organizations like The Wounded Warrior Project shouldn't be so necessary.


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## wiscto (Nov 24, 2014)

kinderfeld said:


> Could also be because they see that that wars we've been fighting for the past several decades had little or nothing to do with national defense. When someone enlists, they're trusting TPTB with the decision to deploy them. Do you have that kind of trust in our government? And then, after returning from a deployment, look at the "care" they receive. I met a guy who lost much of his hearing in Iraq. When I last spoke with him he had been trying for a few years to get a damned hearing aid. Think the politicians who sent him to Iraq have these problems? Organizations like The Wounded Warrior Project shouldn't be so necessary.


I've been wondering how many Americans realize what a failure of leadership Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan really were. I can't even sum it up, so I'll just say this for a guy I know... Stood up and shot at a sniper after one of his guy's was killed instantly, they wanted to court martial him for it because that's how the Obama Administration rolled. He knew the SEAL that took the first shower at the base and got electrocuted because Haliburton's contractor was trash... Got dysentery three times from the water Haliburton supplied, had to nuke his intestines with barium all three times. Knows burn pit victims. Hates going to work on garbage day because of all the object on the curb that in his mind might blow up any second.

And the insurgency in Iraq never had to gather the steam it did in the first place. There were reporters on the ground telling the Bush Administration about weapons caches being raided by Al Qaida, they didn't stop it. But never tell them they aren't brilliant strategists... Oh and don't mention the fact that Cheney and Rumsfeld made millions off of Haliburton. Speaking of that again... How about those truckers who were promised convoys but got left behind to fend for themselves?


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## gilberte (Sep 25, 2004)

Mutual destruction is inevitable. Can't put the nuclear genie back in the bottle and it's only a matter of time until the button(s) are pushed. I believe the next step is that a select few (in terms of the total population) are developing places and plans to survive a nuclear scenario. There will be widespread destruction and massive casualties with a few emerging to carry on with what's left.

With that in mind, we cannot allow a bully such as Putin to use threats to obtain what he desires. Not only does it embolden him but also his frightful counterparts in other parts of the world.


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## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

gilberte said:


> I believe the next step is that a select few (in terms of the total population) are developing places and plans to survive a nuclear scenario.


Maybe that is the plan. @Paumon is all in

Maybe the ultra-rich and a select few like 0bama, Klaus, Trudeau, etc. have a nuke nest set up so they can share the world with a much smaller number of people.


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## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

GunMonkeyIntl said:


> Putin can’t be allowed to retake his nation’s former slave states at the barrel of a silo. To allow that to happen is shortsighted and spineless.


You are wise and oh so brave in this dangerous game.


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## Redlands Okie (Nov 28, 2017)

Need to remember the long range look in this dangerous game. People like putin and places like china are figuring long term. USA does not seem to normally do so. 

We need wise and brave in this dangerous game.


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## Greenbrook Acres (1 mo ago)

? Once the world is past the Putin mess, how do the "good" people contain and dismantle (WMD) nuclear weapons? Can the uranium be used for peaceful purposes like fuel for power generation? or is going to be another one of those things that can only be buried?


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## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

HDRider said:


> You are wise and oh so brave in this dangerous game.


So being aware of and acknowledging the lessons of history is now worthy of sarcastic derision?

We’ve read this script before. We’ve paid the price in blood for listening to spineless chicken littles. In your world, all a despot has to do is gin up a nuclear bomb, and then they can take whatever they want, from whoever they want, without the “oh so brave” standing up to them.

You like to talk like a thinker, and bow out your chest about overcoming the threat of tyranny from within our own borders but, in a world led by HD, North Korea, Russia, China and Iran would own all the world (at least until one of them goes MAD on the other), while you sit there pleading with them not to hurt you.

Nuclear weapons are a reality. It sucks, but there’s nothing we can do to make it not so. If we let ourselves live our lives in fear of some evil man using them to destroy the world, we’ll end up allowing those evil men to enslave the world.

The reason freedom exists anywhere at all on this planet is because there were strong men who knew better than to listen to weak men like you.


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## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

Lickskillet Homestead said:


> ? Once the world is past the Putin mess, how do the "good" people contain and dismantle (WMD) nuclear weapons? Can the uranium be used for peaceful purposes like fuel for power generation? or is going to be another one of those things that can only be buried?


They don’t. Nuclear weapons exist and are never going away.

Rather than wasting time and geo-political capital chasing a pipe dream, we’re much better off developing the best defense we can against such a strike landing in our own territory, while projecting strength such that the evil men will think at least twice before trying anything.


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## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

GunMonkeyIntl said:


> So being aware of and acknowledging the lessons of history is now worthy of sarcastic derision?
> 
> We’ve read this script before. We’ve paid the price in blood for listening to spineless chicken littles. In your world, all a despot has to do is gin up a nuclear bomb, and then they can take whatever they want, from whoever they want, without the “oh so brave” standing up to them.
> 
> ...


If I truly felt Putin is the threat, you see him as I would say go all in. You can thump your chest all you want, but the fact of the matter is this conflict will not come to an end on the battlefield in Ukraine. 

The war will either escalate, possibly beyond anything any of us imagine, or there will be some type of negotiated peace. I don't believe either of those is the goal right now.

This war serves two purposes right now, and only these two. 
1. Ukraine is being used to bleed Russia in the hope that it is brought to bear within all the other WEF alum.

2. The Ukraine war is being used to move big money through the DC engine. This war is making a lot of people a lot of money.

You can call me chicken, or spineless all you want if it makes you feel better about your total support for all the lives lost and all those many more that will be lost. The possible loss is exponentially greater than the territory Ukraine has lost to Russia.

Russia has shown itself as a criminal state. No one debates that. The debate is about how to bring them to heel. I don't think using Ukraine as our proxy does that.

I don't think another Ukrainian life should be lost to serve the interest of the WEF and to make DC whores rich.


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## Redlands Okie (Nov 28, 2017)

Lickskillet Homestead said:


> ? Once the world is past the Putin mess, how do the "good" people contain and dismantle (WMD) nuclear weapons? Can the uranium be used for peaceful purposes like fuel for power generation? or is going to be another one of those things that can only be buried?


The bad people will always be around. Always. It’s human nature. 

The good people best remember that.


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## Redlands Okie (Nov 28, 2017)

HDRider said:


> If I truly felt Putin is the threat, you see him as I would say go all in. You can thump your chest all you want, but the fact of the matter is this conflict will not come to an end on the battlefield in Ukraine.
> 
> The war will either escalate, possibly beyond anything any of us imagine, or there will be some type of negotiated peace. I don't believe either of those is the goal right now.
> 
> ...


A lot if not most of the reason for russia going into Urkraine is money.

Seems Ukraine thinks it worth the lost and maimed life’s to try to keep their land and homes. They also seem to understand that people like putin will not volunteer to stop taking what they want. Seems they understand the possible loss is worth it.


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## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

Redlands Okie said:


> A lot if not most of the reason for russia going into Urkraine is money.
> 
> Seems Ukraine thinks it worth the lost and maimed life’s to try to keep their land and homes. They also seem to understand that people like putin will not volunteer to stop taking what they want. Seems they understand the possible loss is worth it.


Putin went to Ukraine because we baited him. His behavior was predictable.

Ukraine has no choice but to fight. Russia is their next-door neighbor. We pushed this fight onto Ukraine.


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

poppy said:


> Why do you think they are all now flexing their muscles? Mexico even cooperated in slowing illegal immigration under Trump. Look at it now. They all feared Trump because they were unsure how he would respond if they pushed him. Now they know nothing will happen to them, except we may send the a few billion dollars now and then. Also notice it is mostly leftists willing to go to war with Russia. That is odd considering the left used to be the anti war crowd. What changed them? Simple. They still believe Putin helped Trump get elected even though it has totally been proven false. They are willing to go to war because they hate Trump more than they value their own lives.


You may be right, but I think the reason Russia invaded Ukraine when Biden became President is because Trump stayed out of the internal affairs of Ukraine. Biden came in and immediately the old Obama team started meddling in Ukraine again. The war actually started, if I remember correctly, about 2014 when Obama was President and then the invasion in 2022 when Biden was President.


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## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

HDRider said:


> If I truly felt Putin is the threat, you see him as I would say go all in. You can thump your chest all you want, but the fact of the matter is this conflict will not come to an end on the battlefield in Ukraine.
> 
> The war will either escalate, possibly beyond anything any of us imagine, or there will be some type of negotiated peace. I don't believe either of those is the goal right now.


You’re right that this war won’t end in Ukraine. This war started in 1917, and the Communists have been trying to take over the world ever since. If Putin is stopped at the Ukrainian border, he’ll have no army worth adventuring at least in the remainder of his lifetime. The next dictator-for-life of Russia will try again, but it will take a couple/few decades for him to be ready to try it again.

On the other hand, if Putin is allowed to take Ukraine now, he’ll have what’s left of his army, plus the army of Ukraine and whatever remaining weapons the west gave them, and they’ll be pointed at Poland or the Balkan states while Putin is still on the throne. The next dictator-for-life of Russia will be emboldened and better equipped than if we show some resolve and stop him here.



HDRider said:


> This war serves two purposes right now, and only these two.
> 1. Ukraine is being used to bleed Russia in the hope that it is brought to bear within all the other WEF alum.
> 
> 2. The Ukraine war is being used to move big money through the DC engine. This war is making a lot of people a lot of money.


Of course there is a lot of corruption, money laundering and wealth redistribution going on right now. You think they need a war to do that? Are you so naive as to think that those things weren’t going on prior to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine? Did you miss Covid? Did you miss climate change? Did you miss Breton Woods II?

Wake up, and then work on growing a pair. 



HDRider said:


> You can call me chicken, or spineless all you want if it makes you feel better about your total support for all the lives lost and all those many more that will be lost. The possible loss is exponentially greater than the territory Ukraine has lost to Russia.
> 
> Russia has shown itself as a criminal state. No one debates that. The debate is about how to bring them to heel. I don't think using Ukraine as our proxy does that.
> 
> I don't think another Ukrainian life should be lost to serve the interest of the WEF and to make DC whores rich.


The circular logic in your argument is almost as ridiculous as your failure to see it.

Yes, the WEF wants the world under its thumb… but so does Putin. The WEF didn’t start this war. Putin did. Of course the WEF is doing its best to make good use of the crisis, but that doesn’t mean that the WEF started this war in order to do that. The WEF was doing everything it’s doing now before the war, and will continue doing it after the war. Putin, on the other hand, was doing everything he’s doing now before the war (_see: Chechnya, Uzbekistan, Georgia and Syria_) but, if he’s stopped here, will at least be put on temporary hold from future power grabs.

Your circular logic would hand Putin a victory in exchange for the illusion of handing the WEF a loss, when the WEF didn’t start this war, was doing everything it’s doing now long before the war, and will continue doing it long after it.


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## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

HDRider said:


> Putin went to Ukraine because we baited him. His behavior was predictable.


No he didn’t. He invaded Ukraine because he wanted the resources of Ukraine on his books.

From the minute the USSR ceded Ukraine to independence, the RF began meddling there in an attempt to get the benefits of its economy without having to pay its bills. When Putin took Crimea, that was nothing more than a (successful) attempt to steal Ukraine’s claims to Black Sea oil. This latest adventure was just an attempt to seal the deal on Crimea and steal Ukraine’s grain lands.

The only thing the west did to “bait” Putin into invading Ukraine was offering Ukraine the chance at alliance with non Russian powers. Putin was content to hold Ukraine by proxy. We gave Ukraine an alternative to keep their independence. So, Putin decided to take what he wanted by force.

That’s not our fault.


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## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

MoonRiver said:


> You may be right, but I think the reason Russia invaded Ukraine when Biden became President is because Trump stayed out of the internal affairs of Ukraine. Biden came in and immediately the old Obama team started meddling in Ukraine again. The war actually started, if I remember correctly, about 2014 when Obama was President and then the invasion in 2022 when Biden was President.


Trump was more involved in Ukrainian politics and Defense than Biden was prior to the invasion. Obama let the Russians take Crimea while offering them only bandages and bottled water. Trump almost immediately began sending them weapons, and helped posture them to keep Russia out. When Trump left office, Biden started softening the support for Ukraine, and even went on TV, prior to the invasion, and said that we wouldn’t respond unless it was more than “a limited incursion” into Ukraine.

The reason Putin didn’t invade Ukraine during Trump’s term was that he feared we’d get involved, militarily. He never expected Biden to show this much spine and do anything to stop him. The timing of Russia’s theft of Ukrainian territory, as it relates to the timeline of US leadership, could not possibly be more clear- just don’t expect your handlers at RT to tell it to you.


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## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

GunMonkeyIntl said:


> Your circular logic would hand Putin a victory in exchange for the illusion of handing the WEF a loss, when the WEF didn’t start this war, was doing everything it’s doing now long before the war, and will continue doing it long after it.





GunMonkeyIntl said:


> He invaded Ukraine because he wanted the resources of Ukraine on his books.


I don't fault you for believing all that. It is the message being promulgated by every organization in the world right now.

The WEF is fighting nationalism. Russia being one of the biggest proponents of "nationalism" must be taken down.


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## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

GunMonkeyIntl said:


> He never expected Biden to show this much spine


You honestly think Biden having "spine" is why we are helping Ukraine? You really believe that?


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## kinderfeld (Jan 29, 2006)

HDRider said:


> You honestly think Biden having "spine" is why we are helping Ukraine? You really believe that?


Biden isn't making any decisions. Not sure he picks his own ice cream flavors anymore.
It's the same reason we stayed in Afghanistan for so long and went to Iraq in the first place. A few people get to make a fortune off of it. Both elected and unelected officials get to wet their beaks a little. The fact that Americans aren't being killed in droves and the appearance that we're actually being humanitarians looks good and makes it more palatable to the public.


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## wiscto (Nov 24, 2014)

GunMonkeyIntl said:


> They don’t. Nuclear weapons exist and are never going away.


Working off of this and many of your other points, we better hope that when they do go away they all go away at once. Putin likes to play the victim to NATO's maneuvers and efforts to shield themselves from nukes, but the truth is that if he can develop the means to disarm the rest of the world or make our nukes irrelevant....he will...and then he will use his own nukes to threaten and dominate the world. 

He knows that this is unlikely not happen in his lifetime, but while many people see Putin as a one-off dictator, he isn't, he's just another in a long line, The Kremlin will still be The Kremlin when he's gone.

MAD will not be around forever. Someone will achieve generalized AI, and that AI will begin running simulations at an incomprehensible rate, and whoever "controls" it will develop technologies and weapons we don't believe possible today. Some speculate that undetectable nanite diffusers will be deployed to eliminate other nations' nukes, but I think there are other technologies on the way that will be more easily deployed and more effective. This is why we can't yield or appease. China and Russia are playing for keeps. They don't look at themselves and say, "oh man we can never win, it's too late", they look at us and see a decrepit old bull whose run is just about over, and they're trying to be the next ones to run ahead of the world.


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

GunMonkeyIntl said:


> Trump was more involved in Ukrainian politics and Defense than Biden was prior to the invasion. Obama let the Russians take Crimea while offering them only bandages and bottled water. Trump almost immediately began sending them weapons, and helped posture them to keep Russia out. When Trump left office, Biden started softening the support for Ukraine, and even went on TV, prior to the invasion, and said that we wouldn’t respond unless it was more than “a limited incursion” into Ukraine.
> 
> The reason Putin didn’t invade Ukraine during Trump’s term was that he feared we’d get involved, militarily. He never expected Biden to show this much spine and do anything to stop him. The timing of Russia’s theft of Ukrainian territory, as it relates to the timeline of US leadership, could not possibly be more clear- just don’t expect your handlers at RT to tell it to you.


So we have different opinions.


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## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

MoonRiver said:


> So we have different opinions.


And, has been shown out in multiple threads, “your” opinion is based on a series of fallacies. Remember your “but they needed a buffer” ridiculousness, when you claimed that there wasn’t a land bridge between NATO territory and Russia…but then how that land bridge didn’t matter because Russia could wipe it out? Remember your diatribes about the west meddling in Ukrainian politics, but conveniently leaving out the election years where Russia meddled first? Remember your warnings that Ukraine had better give up because Russia was standing by to quickly and decisively take Kyiv… and then Odessa… and then the western oblasts?

You’ve been wrong on literally every point in this war, and the events leading up to it and, when confronted with demonstrable fact that refutes your “understanding”, you quickly pull a Nevada and either pivot to some completely unrelated point, or go mum altogether.

The post history is there, and it makes you look ridiculous.


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## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

HDRider said:


> I don't fault you for believing all that. It is the message being promulgated by every organization in the world right now.
> 
> The WEF is fighting nationalism. Russia being one of the biggest proponents of "nationalism" must be taken down.


It’s not just the tale being told by “every organization in the world”, though, and that’s exactly the point. By and large “my media” is the right leaning kind, and their tendency is to argue for the position you’ve “chosen”. My position on this issue goes directly counter to the Fox News, Glenn Beck, etc take.

Why? Because, unlike apparently so many, I’m actually capable of constructing my own view points irrespective of what “my team” says about it. Oddly enough, you were hard against Russia in this, and generally supportive of getting them out of Ukraine… until, coincidentally, right about the time that the right-wing media started to lose their stomach for it… which was, coincidentally, right when the Ds were campaigning for more big money to be sent there.

My position on this matter is backed 100% by historical reference and acknowledgment of the lessons we’ve learned in history. Your position appears to track, and even change, with the right wing media.

What were you saying about not being surprised why I think this way?


----------



## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

HDRider said:


> You honestly think Biden having "spine" is why we are helping Ukraine? You really believe that?


That’s not what I said, but you knew that.
Since your intellectual honesty is obviously still in the shop, here it is, again, for you and your fellow residents of Rio Linda:


> The reason Putin didn’t invade Ukraine during Trump’s term was that he feared we’d get involved, militarily.* He never expected Biden to show this much spine and do anything to stop him.* The timing of Russia’s theft of Ukrainian territory, as it relates to the timeline of US leadership, could not possibly be more clear- just don’t expect your handlers at RT to tell it to you.


During Obama’s term in office, support for Ukraine, against Russia, was weak. They were asking for war material and we sent them humanitarian goods. It was during that time that Putin stole Ukraine’s Black Sea oil and Crimea. During Trump’s term, we sent serious weaponry, and postured that we would intervene in support of Ukraine if Russia attacked, and Putin ratcheted things down.

Which brings us to the point you so willfully misunderstood. As soon as Biden took office, the aid ratcheted back to Obama-era blankets and bottled water, and the rhetoric softened to the point of Biden literally telling Putin, in front of the world audience, that he was free to take small pieces of Ukraine without repercussions from the west.

Putin, being the Commie Orc that he is, took that to mean that he could have Ukraine, and that the west wouldn’t do anything to stop him. That we did, under a Biden administration no less, caught him off guard, and he’s been flailing for nearly a year now, watching his army get ground into a pulp by western-supplied armaments. Putin didn’t expect the west, especially Biden, to show any spine in resisting his adventurism.

You can make it about Biden in a partisan way, if you must. Even call it his handlers who showed some spine, but whoever is calling the shots is putting up more resistance than Putin expected.


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## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

HDRider said:


> The WEF is fighting nationalism. Russia being one of the biggest proponents of "nationalism" must be taken down.


What Russia’s doing is not nationalism. It’s dictatorial imperialism. Nationalism is about putting your own country, the land within its borders, first in an increasingly globalist reality. Brexit was nationalism. Build the Wall was nationalism. Taking Chechnya, Georgia and (trying to take) Ukraine is trying to rebuild the Soviet Union; nothing more or less.

The WEF wants to put the entire world under the leadership of a dictator in Switzerland. Putin wants to put the entire world under the leadership of a dictator in Moscow. Xi wants to put the entire world under the leadership of a dictator in Beijing.

The goal is so similar that I wouldn’t be one bit shocked to find out that the underlying plan actually puts the WEF, Putin and Xi all on the same team, all just waiting to show their hands until the world empires are distilled down to few enough that one world government is an achievable goal.

The Marxists succeeded in Europe (with Britain throwing a spanner in the cogs, as they say). Meanwhile Russia is trying to consolidate everything west of the EU, east of China, and north of the KSA together into one empire, and Xi is posturing to own everything that touches a pacific wave, west of Hawaii.

So, you think that allowing Putin to succeed somehow hurts the goals of the WEF? Maybe you’re right, but where does that actually put you?

Me? I’ll take the side that’s against globalism, Communism and the forming of empires in favor of smaller, more independent governments every single time.


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

GunMonkeyIntl said:


> And, has been shown out in multiple threads, “your” opinion is based on a series of fallacies. Remember your “but they needed a buffer” ridiculousness, when you claimed that there wasn’t a land bridge between NATO territory and Russia…but then how that land bridge didn’t matter because Russia could wipe it out? Remember your diatribes about the west meddling in Ukrainian politics, but conveniently leaving out the election years where Russia meddled first? Remember your warnings that Ukraine had better give up because Russia was standing by to quickly and decisively take Kyiv… and then Odessa… and then the western oblasts?
> 
> You’ve been wrong on literally every point in this war, and the events leading up to it and, when confronted with demonstrable fact that refutes your “understanding”, you quickly pull a Nevada and either pivot to some completely unrelated point, or go mum altogether.
> 
> The post history is there, and it makes you look ridiculous.


You can bluster all you want and it still doesn't make you right.


----------



## Hiro (Feb 14, 2016)

MoonRiver said:


> You can bluster all you want and it still doesn't make you right.


None of us may be right. Most of us know you have been wrong about this for some time. Didn't you say it was over when Putin announced annexation? A mea culpa at times may lead others to believe you less biased.


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## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

MoonRiver said:


> You can bluster all you want and it still doesn't make you right.


I don’t need to be right. History says you’re wrong, and the post history remains in proof of your foolishness.

Remember when you gave us this headline?









It’s been almost three solid months of the orcs getting their ass handed to them since then, and they lost control of the one regional capital they held at the time of your RT’s prediction. The orcs hold a little over two-thirds of the territory they held at that time.

Can you produce even a single post on this war that has aged well or hasn’t been outright debunked by fact?


----------



## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

Hiro said:


> None of us may be right. Most of us know you have been wrong about this for some time. Didn't you say it was over when Putin announced annexation? A mea culpa at times may lead others to believe you less biased.


If you go back and read my posts, I usually say I believe or I think. I have also posted that others may be right, but we don't yet know the truth about most things. This is a discussion forum and we know few proven facts, we all are posting what we think.

Where I was wrong is I underestimated the massive amount of financial aid and military equipment the US would provide Ukraine and that a large chunk of the money would be used to hire mercenaries to fight for Ukraine. I also didn't think the US, UK, Poland, and other NATO countries would put military, contractors, and other quasi military personnel into Ukraine. Like with the Patriot missiles. Ukraine doesn't have enough, if any, trained personnel to man them so either "contractors" or NATO military will need to be brought in.


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## Hiro (Feb 14, 2016)

MoonRiver said:


> If you go back and read my posts, I usually say I believe or I think. I have also posted that others may be right, but we don't yet know the truth about most things. This is a discussion forum and we know few proven facts, we all are posting what we think.
> 
> Where I was wrong is I underestimated the massive amount of financial aid and military equipment the US would provide Ukraine and that a large chunk of the money would be used to hire mercenaries to fight for Ukraine. I also didn't think the US, UK, Poland, and other NATO countries would put military, contractors, and other quasi military personnel into Ukraine. Like with the Patriot missiles. Ukraine doesn't have enough, if any, trained personnel to man them so either "contractors" or NATO military will need to be brought in.


I read your posts. I recall your posts. I didn't want to go where @GunMonkeyIntl did early on. Your bias is clear and inexplicable. 

There is and has been shenanigans in Ukraine. But, your bias is undeniable. 

Whoever is running this crapshow killing innocent civilians from the ex-USSR is absolutely evil and has nothing to do with the other evil that is the WEF. How you got sucked into that watch the other hand game is beyond me...


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## gilberte (Sep 25, 2004)

MoonRiver said:


> If you go back and read my posts, I usually say I believe or I think. I have also posted that others may be right, but we don't yet know the truth about most things. This is a discussion forum and we know few proven facts, we all are posting what we think.
> 
> *Where I was wrong is I underestimated the massive amount of financial aid and military equipment the US would provide Ukraine and that a large chunk of the money would be used to hire mercenaries to fight for Ukraine. I also didn't think the US, UK, Poland, and other NATO countries would put military, contractors, and other quasi military personnel into Ukraine. Like with the Patriot missiles.* Ukraine doesn't have enough, if any, trained personnel to man them so either "contractors" or NATO military will need to be brought in.


I think Putin may have the same problem.


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

Hiro said:


> I read your posts. I recall your posts. I didn't want to go where @GunMonkeyIntl did early on. Your bias is clear and inexplicable.
> 
> There is and has been shenanigans in Ukraine. But, your bias is undeniable.
> 
> Whoever is running this crapshow killing innocent civilians from the ex-USSR is absolutely evil and has nothing to do with the other evil that is the WEF. How you got sucked into that watch the other hand game is beyond me...


What I find interesting is that you and GunMonkey don't see that your comments are also biased. Everyone's comments are biased. We are interpreting what we read and view based on our own personal view of the world. I believe I have been less biased as I leave good and evil (moral judgement) out of it and try to interpret what is happening and why it is happening.


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## painterswife (Jun 7, 2004)

MoonRiver said:


> What I find interesting is that you and GunMonkey don't see that your comments are also biased. Everyone's comments are biased. We are interpreting what we read and view based on our own personal view of the world. I believe I have been less biased as I leave good and evil (moral judgement) out of it and try to interpret what is happening and why it is happening.


The results of your bias has you constantly claiming Ukraine has lost. Yet the facts don't back you up. You tell others to do more research with less bias but your sources are straight from the Russia propaganda machine.


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## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

MoonRiver said:


> What I find interesting is that you and GunMonkey don't see that your comments are also biased. Everyone's comments are biased. We are interpreting what we read and view based on our own personal view of the world. I believe I have been less biased as I leave good and evil (moral judgement) out of it and try to interpret what is happening and why it is happening.


You’re right that bias is impossible to entirely avoid, but it is a gradient and objectivity is generally inversely proportional to it.

On one side of this issue are those who are parroting every single take from RT and their sympathetic propagandists, word for word, like yourself. That propaganda has led to such ridiculous claims as the US being to blame for Russia’s invasion, that Russia is only stealing Ukrainian territory and resources as a self-defense mechanism, and that Russia has this conquest “in the bag” and was on the verge of sealing it six or eight different times now. The ridiculousness of this propaganda makes those who parrot it, like yourself, look foolish, yet still they do it.

On the opposite side of this issue are those who parrot every single take from CNN and their sympathetic propagandists, word for word. That propaganda has produced such ridiculousness as the claims that Biden is a magnanimous world leader who has nothing to hide in Ukraine, that Trump’s boorishness is what caused this war, and that Vladimir Zelenskyy is a paragon of virtue and a modern day Winston Churchill.

Then, in the middle, are those few of us who recognize that what’s coming out of both sides is self-serving propaganda and that tilted propaganda is all that we have on which to base our opinions, so we do the best we can to remain objective through weighting of what we have available. That produces such demonstrably provable positions as the fact the BOTH the US and Russia meddled in Ukrainian politics, but that Russia did it first and dirtiest, starting immediately after the fall of the Soviet Union, that Russia’s theft of Crimea was motivated by nothing more than Putin’s desire to deliver Ukraine’s Black Sea oil to his supporting oligarchy, that Russia’s conventional military has turned out to be a paper tiger, and that it’s being pulverized by western aid that is serving largely as a money laundering scheme for the oligarchies of the west.

There is truth to be found in temperance. Just because a given issue has been staked out by two sides doesn’t mean that you have to chose one of those sides and believe all the BS they feed you. Just look at some of the ridiculousness it’s caused you to post here


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

painterswife said:


> The results of your bias has you constantly claiming Ukraine has lost. Yet the facts don't back you up. You tell others to do more research with less bias but your sources are straight from the Russia propaganda machine.


I have only told you to do research because you don't understand the geopolitics if the war.


----------



## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

GunMonkeyIntl said:


> You’re right that bias is impossible to entirely avoid, but it is a gradient and objectivity is generally inversely proportional to it.
> 
> On one side of this issue are those who are parroting every single take from RT and their sympathetic propagandists, word for word, like yourself. That propaganda has led to such ridiculous claims as the US being to blame for Russia’s invasion, that Russia is only stealing Ukrainian territory and resources as a self-defense mechanism, and that Russia has this conquest “in the bag” and was on the verge of sealing it six or eight different times now. The ridiculousness of this propaganda makes those who parrot it, like yourself, look foolish, yet still they do it.
> 
> ...


You are no where near the middle. Your arguments are weak so you turn to name calling and attempts at intimidation.

I look at the war as a geopolitical fight between the East and the West. You look at it as good vs evil.


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## painterswife (Jun 7, 2004)

MoonRiver said:


> I have only told you to do research because you don't understand the geopolitics if the war.


LOL. You keep professing that but you still won't answer my questions about what reason gives Russia the right to invade and killing innocent citizens of another sovereign country. 

I think you are the one who does not understand that geopolitics doesn't give one country the right to invade another.


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## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

MoonRiver said:


> You are no where near the middle. Your arguments are weak so you turn to name calling and attempts at intimidation.
> 
> I look at the war as a geopolitical fight between the East and the West. You look at it as good vs evil.


My arguments may just be weak, but yours have been disproven time and time again. What does that make your arguments?

Seriously, you’ve said that the US meddled in Ukraine but Russia didn’t. You’ve said that the war was over except for “sporadic fighting“ after Putin’s annexation “vote”. You said that there was no landbridge between NATO and Russia except through Ukraine. You said at at least three or four points that Ukraine had better give up because the next Russia offensive was going to take them out. Your “arguments” have been 100% straight out of the RT machine, and have been proven wrong over and over.

And you have the gall to tell others that they “need to research geo-politics”? Seriously?


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## Redlands Okie (Nov 28, 2017)

HDRider said:


> Putin went to Ukraine because we baited him. His behavior was predictable.
> 
> Ukraine has no choice but to fight. Russia is their next-door neighbor. We pushed this fight onto Ukraine.


Putin has been trying to rebuild the Soviet 
Union. Putin needs the money / resources from some of these areas, such as Ukraine. The only way war could have been prevented would have been to make Ukraine a present. Assuming the citizens would have agreed. It sure how his desires and needs for the area has anything to do with being baited.


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## Redlands Okie (Nov 28, 2017)

MoonRiver said:


> If you go back and read my posts, I usually say I believe or I think. I have also posted that others may be right, but we don't yet know the truth about most things. This is a discussion forum and we know few proven facts, we all are posting what we think.
> 
> Where I was wrong is I underestimated the massive amount of financial aid and military equipment the US would provide Ukraine and that a large chunk of the money would be used to hire mercenaries to fight for Ukraine. I also didn't think the US, UK, Poland, and other NATO countries would put military, contractors, and other quasi military personnel into Ukraine. Like with the Patriot missiles. Ukraine doesn't have enough, if any, trained personnel to man them so either "contractors" or NATO military will need to be brought in.


A variety of countries have been training Ukraine citizens to operate the new weapons they are getting. If you checked it out you would find that often times training was almost completed or completed when the news starts to advertise that we might send Ukraine a new weapon system. Also Ukraine has been improving weapon systems they have had access to for years.


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## Redlands Okie (Nov 28, 2017)

Those of you claiming that the primary purpose of the USA helping Ukraine is to cover the transfer of wealth. Might have some truth to it. But it seems to me to be a very inefficient way to do so. China has been doing a much better job of it for decades than we have, no wars needed.


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## wiscto (Nov 24, 2014)

HDRider said:


> I don't fault you for believing all that. It is the message being promulgated by every organization in the world right now.
> 
> The WEF is fighting nationalism. Russia being one of the biggest proponents of "nationalism" must be taken down.


I don't fault you for believing all that. It is the message being promulgated by the organizations who need to sell you a product you want to believe in.

Of course WEF is a globalist, anti-liberal, anti-nationalist cesspool. Of course WEF and Putin don't like each other. Of course the globalists dislike Russia. That doesn't make Russia a heroic victim, except for in your own imagination. Two things can be true at once... WEF is trash and so is Putin.


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## wiscto (Nov 24, 2014)

MoonRiver said:


> You are no where near the middle. Your arguments are weak so you turn to name calling and attempts at intimidation.


Oh yea, because the main Putin Puppets in this thread have been so pleasant to deal with right? Get real.


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## wiscto (Nov 24, 2014)

I'm not going to say this war is decided, or that nukes will never fly, but Putin has completely failed his people. You all think he's just sticking up for "nationalism"? There were ways to do that without hording of all his nation's wealth for himself and for his little cronies. The Russian people didn't need to be losers in the global economy. They are the most patriotic people in the world, and we know he knows that because he uses it to propgandize them. They are far too patriotic to simply give into the Globalists, and Putin knows that. He doesn't care because he wants his power and he wants his riches...

Now suddenly our own patriots, people who smugly called everyone unAmerican for questioning the Patriot Act and Iraq/Afghanistan, are buying The Kremlin's lies too. Here's a little hint for you, okay?

Russian leaders are paranoid, delusional, self serving, brutal thugs. They always have been, and they always will be. Ukraine doesn't belong to them... Ukrainians were a different group of Slavs ruled by a different group of Rus, who were left to fight the Mongols on their own long ago and never forgot. They have their own language, their own history, and most of them still remember The Holodomor. They don't want to be part of Russia, and that doesn't mean that they trust The West or the Globalists.............they absolutely do not. They always wanted to maintain strong independent ties with Russia, until Putin tried to strong arm them by undoing their elections and bribing their leaders. They didn't want to join the EU, now they do. They didn't want to join NATO, now they do. None of that was true until the last decade.... It was Putin's own behavior that ruined the Ukrainian/Russian relationship.


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

Redlands Okie said:


> A variety of countries have been training Ukraine citizens to operate the new weapons they are getting. If you checked it out you would find that often times training was almost completed or completed when the news starts to advertise that we might send Ukraine a new weapon system. Also Ukraine has been improving weapon systems they have had access to for years.


Not the Patriot Missiles.


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

From a recent twitter release.

3. But behind the scenes, Twitter gave approval & special protection to the U.S. military’s online psychological influence ops. Despite knowledge that *Pentagon propaganda accounts used covert identities, Twitter did not suspend many for around 2 years or more. Some remain active.*


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## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

MoonRiver said:


> From a recent twitter release.
> 
> 3. But behind the scenes, Twitter gave approval & special protection to the U.S. military’s online psychological influence ops. Despite knowledge that *Pentagon propaganda accounts used covert identities, Twitter did not suspend many for around 2 years or more. Some remain active.*


The people who build their views on geo-politics based off information they find on Twitter are almost as ill-informed as the ones who get their news from RT.


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## JeffreyD (Dec 27, 2006)

GunMonkeyIntl said:


> They don’t. Nuclear weapons exist and are never going away.
> 
> Rather than wasting time and geo-political capital chasing a pipe dream, we’re much better off developing the best defense we can against such a strike landing in our own territory, while projecting strength such that the evil men will think at least twice before trying anything.


We may already have a system!


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## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

JeffreyD said:


> We may already have a system!


I agree. The focus on hypersonic technology tells me that we already have some formidable defenses that the Commies are desperately trying to overcome.


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## JeffreyD (Dec 27, 2006)

GunMonkeyIntl said:


> I agree. The focus on hypersonic technology tells me that we already have some formidable defenses that the Commies are desperately trying to overcome.


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## Hiro (Feb 14, 2016)

No comment.


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## Redlands Okie (Nov 28, 2017)

MoonRiver said:


> Not the Patriot Missiles.


Your probably correct. 

It does look like from what I am reading that a faster than normal speed training class starts next month in Germany. By the time the system transfer is approved, and in Ukraine’s territory, the classes would likely be completed. That seems to be the official story. Keep in mind a variety of Ukraine friendly nations already have the Patriot missiles, and can teach how to use the system. I would not be surprised to find out that training has already unofficially started some time back.


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

GunMonkeyIntl said:


> The people who build their views on geo-politics based off information they find on Twitter are almost as ill-informed as the ones who get their news from RT.


Do you think it is just twitter? Most media is in bed with the government. CNN is known for presenting government propaganda as news. The State Department uses the Washington Post. This has always been a problem but the Obama administration took it to a new level.


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## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

A $40 billion aid package to fortify Ukraine’s defenses against the Russian invasion won’t reach President Joe Biden’s desk this week, with one senator’s objections stalling the legislation.

Democratic and Republican leaders sought to clear the bill Thursday with enough time to head off a lapse in U.S. weapons shipments to Eastern Europe that’s expected next week. But those efforts were dashed after Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) blocked a fast-tracked vote, demanding leaders include a provision that would designate a special federal watchdog to oversee how the $40 billion is spent.









Senate falters in push to pass $40B Ukraine aid


Sen. Rand Paul, who is demanding Congress designate a federal watchdog to track the money, blocked a speedy vote on the massive military and humanitarian aid package.




www.politico.com


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

HDRider said:


> A $40 billion aid package to fortify Ukraine’s defenses against the Russian invasion won’t reach President Joe Biden’s desk this week, with one senator’s objections stalling the legislation.
> 
> Democratic and Republican leaders sought to clear the bill Thursday with enough time to head off a lapse in U.S. weapons shipments to Eastern Europe that’s expected next week. But those efforts were dashed after Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) blocked a fast-tracked vote, demanding leaders include a provision that would designate a special federal watchdog to oversee how the $40 billion is spent.
> 
> ...


From The Economist interview via Gateway Pundit. Must be subscribed to read the Economist article.

General Zaluzhny, who is raising a new army corps, reels off a wishlist. “I know that I can beat this enemy,” he says. “But I need resources. *I need 300 tanks, 600-700 IFVs [infantry fighting vehicles], 500 Howitzers.*” The incremental arsenal he is seeking is bigger than the total armoured forces of most European armies.​​A Closer Look At the Economist — Volodymyr Zelensky and His Generals Explain Why the War Hangs in the Balance​


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## homesteadforty (Dec 4, 2007)

MoonRiver said:


> From The Economist interview via Gateway Pundit. Must be subscribed to read the Economist article.
> 
> General Zaluzhny, who is raising a new army corps, reels off a wishlist. “I know that I can beat this enemy,” he says. “But I need resources. *I need 300 tanks, 600-700 IFVs [infantry fighting vehicles], 500 Howitzers.*” The incremental arsenal he is seeking is bigger than the total armoured forces of most European armies.​​A Closer Look At the Economist — Volodymyr Zelensky and His Generals Explain Why the War Hangs in the Balance​


Ah yes, The Economist... more dubious, leftist drivel.

Just the paragraph you posted is blatantly false. Those numbers are right on par with most similar sized European countries. Of course, I'm not considering such military powerhouses as Bosnia, Bulgaria, Moldova and such.

Also, they don't seem to have considered Russia in their "total armoured forces" equation... that might skew their writing a bit.

Factor in what they're up against (and doing quite well), those numbers are miniscule.

I would have thought that any great military analyst, such as yourself, would have seen the above points.


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

homesteadforty said:


> Ah yes, The Economist... more dubious, leftist drivel.
> 
> Just the paragraph you posted is blatantly false. Those numbers are right on par with most similar sized European countries. Of course, I'm not considering such military powerhouses as Bosnia, Bulgaria, Moldova and such.
> 
> ...


I didn't offer my opinion, but thanks for your critique, for what it's worth, anyway.

You need a reading comprehension class. The article said "most European armies", not most similar-sized European countries.


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## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

homesteadforty said:


> Ah yes, The Economist... more dubious, leftist drivel.
> 
> Just the paragraph you posted is blatantly false. Those numbers are right on par with most similar sized European countries. Of course, I'm not considering such military powerhouses as Bosnia, Bulgaria, Moldova and such.
> 
> ...


You see Ukraine as a Right/Left thing?

Germany has less than 300 tanks








2022 Germany Military Strength (globalfirepower.com)


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## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

MoonRiver said:


> Do you think it is just twitter? Most media is in bed with the government. CNN is known for presenting government propaganda as news. The State Department uses the Washington Post. This has always been a problem but the Obama administration took it to a new level.


Of course it is. That’s the way of the world, today. The US government puts a heavy thumb on what the likes of CNN, NBC and Twitter and Facebook report, but RT is literally the mouthpiece of the Russian government.

Anyone who builds their worldview on the words of any “news” organization is a fool. Just look at some of the kooky opinions that RT gave you. You actually spent the better part of two or three threads arguing how Russia needed to take Ukraine in order to avoid a landbridge into Russia from NATO countries. It didn’t take a “news” organization for me to provide you with a map showing a highway going right from a NATO country into Russia, and, when I did, you immediately pivoted from the point as if you’d never tried to make it.

RT told you a lie. You dutifully repeated that lie for them and, when confronted with the truth, stuck your fingers in your ears and shouted “NaNaNaNa…”

You are so backward on this whole issue. No one denies that the Ukraine and the western countries, including our own, is corrupt. No one is claiming that our media is honest. We’ve been arguing the propaganda you bring from RT-fed sources with actual historical, provable points.

Russia is only trying to take Ukraine because it wants its land and resources. It’s done exactly the same thing several times in this very century. No amount of meddling or “staying out of it”, on the part of the US, would have changed anything. If we weren’t there trying to support Ukraine‘s sovereignty and right, if it so chooses, to align with the west, then Russia would have settled for just taking Ukraine via crooked-political means. That failed because, with our support, the Ukrainians resisted it, and now Russia is trying to take it militarily… and falling mightily upon its own ass.


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## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

MoonRiver said:


> I didn't offer my opinion, but thanks for your critique, for what it's worth, anyway.
> 
> You need a reading comprehension class. The article said "most European armies", not most similar-sized European countries.


If not, then, what was the point? Were you just down on your quota of parroted Russian media for the day?

Why should it matter how much armament a Ukrainian general is asking for, right up to and even surpassing that of the Russian army? Given that the Russian army has invaded, it seems like a very reasonable request for a general in the defender’s army to be pleading for equal or better armaments.

You know what would have prevented the request altogether, don’t you?
If Russia had stayed in Russia.


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## homesteadforty (Dec 4, 2007)

MoonRiver said:


> I didn't offer my opinion, but thanks for your critique, for what it's worth, anyway.


Yeah, that's your SOP... copy and paste any RT, pro-Russia, anti-Ukrainian or anti-American bull you can find, then claim you didn't post your opinion. Why don't you grow a pair and own up to your beliefs???



> You need a reading comprehension class. The article said "most European armies", not most similar-sized European countries.


Yeppers, that was my point... guess that went over your head. By including the countries with almost no armor and omitting the country with the most armor they heavily skewed the comment of "most European armies". In do so they were trying to make the Generals request appear as something outrageous. Though that does seem to work with Putin apologists.

If you can't see that _you_ need the reading comprehension classes... along with some math and statistics instruction.

счастливого Рождества
schastlivogo Rozhdestva


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## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

HDRider said:


> Germany has less than 300 tanks
> View attachment 117044
> 
> 2022 Germany Military Strength (globalfirepower.com)


In fairness, prior to this war, most betting men in the world would have bet on Russia beating Germany (barring their NATO backing). 

This war has shown us what a joke the Russian conventional army is but, back when Germany built that stable of tanks, we didn’t know that the Russians were incompetent, under-equipped, and riding to war on wheeled garbage.


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## homesteadforty (Dec 4, 2007)

HDRider said:


> You see Ukraine as a Right/Left thing?


If I had to categorize it I would say it's more of a good vs. evil or a right vs. wrong thing.



> Germany has less than 300 tanks


Yep... but their tanks are state of the art and several notches above Russia's best. They also have the backing of NATO and have roughly 1/2 the territory to defend as compared to Ukraine.


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

GunMonkeyIntl said:


> Of course it is. That’s the way of the world, today. The US government puts a heavy thumb on what the likes of CNN, NBC and Twitter and Facebook report, but RT is literally the mouthpiece of the Russian government.
> 
> Anyone who builds their worldview on the words of any “news” organization is a fool. Just look at some of the kooky opinions that RT gave you. You actually spent the better part of two or three threads arguing how Russia needed to take Ukraine in order to avoid a landbridge into Russia from NATO countries. It didn’t take a “news” organization for me to provide you with a map showing a highway going right from a NATO country into Russia, and, when I did, you immediately pivoted from the point as if you’d never tried to make it.
> 
> ...


I don't read RT, but recently I started reading the Moscow Times.


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

homesteadforty said:


> Yeah, that's your SOP... copy and paste any RT, pro-Russia, anti-Ukrainian or anti-American bull you can find, then claim you didn't post your opinion. Why don't you grow a pair and own up to your beliefs???
> 
> 
> 
> ...


If you would apply some thought before you posted, maybe your posts would make sense. I replied to a post made by @HDRider which was about the new money for Ukraine in the Omnibus bill.

A $40 billion aid package to fortify Ukraine’s defenses against the Russian invasion won’t reach President Joe Biden’s desk this week, with one senator’s objections stalling the legislation.​
I responded to that post with a list of military equipment the top Ukraine general said they needed. I didn't price it out, but it looks to me like it could be more than the $40 billion in the bill.

As I have said several times, I don't have a dog in this fight. Looking at the facts as I understand them, I still believe Ukraine will have to negotiate for peace and will have to give up eastern Ukraine. I heard a report today that because of the cold, Ukrainian soldiers are deserting.

I just want it to end and the killing to stop. I couldn't care less who gets what. We always have wars and there is always a winner and a loser.


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## painterswife (Jun 7, 2004)

MoonRiver said:


> If you would apply some thought before you posted, maybe your posts would make sense. I replied to a post made by @HDRider which was about the new money for Ukraine in the Omnibus bill.
> 
> A $40 billion aid package to fortify Ukraine’s defenses against the Russian invasion won’t reach President Joe Biden’s desk this week, with one senator’s objections stalling the legislation.​
> I responded to that post with a list of military equipment the top Ukraine general said they needed. I didn't price it out, but it looks to me like it could be more than the $40 billion in the bill.
> ...


It is important to care who gets what. Putin succeeding in taking more of what is not his to take will result in him or others continuing to wage more wars to take more.


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## Redlands Okie (Nov 28, 2017)

HDRider said:


> You see Ukraine as a Right/Left thing?
> 
> Germany has less than 300 tanks
> View attachment 117044
> ...


Less to loose that way……


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## Redlands Okie (Nov 28, 2017)

MoonRiver said:


> If you would apply some thought before you posted, maybe your posts would make sense. I replied to a post made by @HDRider which was about the new money for Ukraine in the Omnibus bill.
> 
> A $40 billion aid package to fortify Ukraine’s defenses against the Russian invasion won’t reach President Joe Biden’s desk this week, with one senator’s objections stalling the legislation.​
> I responded to that post with a list of military equipment the top Ukraine general said they needed. I didn't price it out, but it looks to me like it could be more than the $40 billion in the bill.
> ...


A few months ago it was being said Ukraine would be over ran in a few days. Then it was in a month…… and now they have actually taken ground back and severely damaged russian combat power. 

Personally I think we all have a dog in the fight. Russian actions can easily cause even more of a effect on the worlds food, energy, and economy than they already have. China is watching and learning. Better to teach lessons with someone else’s troops and on someones land. 

Urkraines troops seem to have pretty good personal gear and food, unlike most of the russian troops. The cold is normal for them and russia. Just sucks to be in the trenches with it. 

Russia needs to be the looser for the good of most of the world in my view.


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

Redlands Okie said:


> A few months ago it was being said Ukraine would be over ran in a few days. Then it was in a month…… and now they have actually taken ground back and severely damaged russian combat power.
> 
> Personally I think we all have a dog in the fight. Russian actions can easily cause even more of a effect on the worlds food, energy, and economy than they already have. China is watching and learning. Better to teach lessons with someone else’s troops and on someones land.
> 
> ...


I guess it depends on where one gets their news from and how they determine what is fact and what is propaganda.

I believe Ukraine has lost at least 8 soldiers for every one Russian. Probably between 100k-125k Ukrainians and the number I saw today for Russians was only about 10k. These numbers are for military, not civilian.

My understanding, from what was confirmed today, is Putin went in thinking Ukraine would fold quickly, so he went in with too few troops. That has been resolved with the new general in charge having fresh troops ready to invade Ukraine. 

The people I have been listening to thought the invasion would be as soon as the ground was frozen enough for tanks to roll into Ukraine. Now they are saying they don't know when Russia will invade. That it could be soon or Russia might keep targeting power facilities and other critical infrastructure and let the cold do the damage, then roll in later in the winter.


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## Redlands Okie (Nov 28, 2017)

When people are trying to defend their families, homes, way of life in their homeland, they probably are not as fixated on loss ratios. Eight to one losses as defenders, against attackers poorly trained and equipped seems suspect. 

I think this might drag out for years, or if lucky until putin is out of power. Even if all of the Russians are kicked out, there is nothing to stop them from coming back. Might take years to get new equipment, training, supplies. Seems to be the way putin has handled the last couple decades of invasions. Hopefully Europe and others will follow through on the lessons they are now learning.


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## Hiro (Feb 14, 2016)

MoonRiver said:


> I guess it depends on where one gets their news from and how they determine what is fact and what is propaganda.
> 
> I believe Ukraine has lost at least 8 soldiers for every one Russian. Probably between 100k-125k Ukrainians and the number I saw today for Russians was only about 10k. These numbers are for military, not civilian.
> 
> ...


Seriously? What was confirmed today that are you referring to? 

I'll grant a large number of Ukrainian civilians have been killed by the orcs. More orcs have been killed by a large measure than Ukrainian military. None of those are indicative of winning. But, the attacker has lost the initiative and that is not a good place to be.


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## wiscto (Nov 24, 2014)

MoonRiver said:


> Do you think it is just twitter? Most media is in bed with the government. CNN is known for presenting government propaganda as news. The State Department uses the Washington Post. This has always been a problem but the Obama administration took it to a new level.


Not really. The entire system lined up to feed us the Iraq WMD lies.


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

Hiro said:


> Seriously? What was confirmed today that are you referring to?
> 
> I'll grant a large number of Ukrainian civilians have been killed by the orcs. More orcs have been killed by a large measure than Ukrainian military. None of those are indicative of winning. But, the attacker has lost the initiative and that is not a good place to be.


Here's my sources. Where's yours? It's impossible to know if a source is accurate, but I used 2 that are independent and have access to the information.

The BBC Russian Service and Mediazona use open-source data — media reports, social networks and official statements — to verify the deaths of soldiers and last week their total hit 10,002.​
https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2022...n-soldiers-confirmed-killed-in-ukraine-a79699

The EU Commission Chief Ursula von der Leyen gave the number in a now-defunct video, stating that 20,000 non-combatants and 100,000 AFU have died so far, noted Twitter.​​Note: The twitter reference includes the video of von der Leyon.​
https://www.hngn.com/articles/24564...al-casualties-alleged-eu-commission-chief.htm

Why would you think the attacker has lost the initiative? Russia plays the long game, unlike the US.


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

Redlands Okie said:


> When people are trying to defend their families, homes, way of life in their homeland, they probably are not as fixated on loss ratios. Eight to one losses as defenders, against attackers poorly trained and equipped seems suspect.
> 
> I think this might drag out for years, or if lucky until putin is out of power. Even if all of the Russians are kicked out, there is nothing to stop them from coming back. Might take years to get new equipment, training, supplies. Seems to be the way putin has handled the last couple decades of invasions. Hopefully Europe and others will follow through on the lessons they are now learning.


Russia is getting drones from Iran and it is rumored they might be getting armaments from NK. Their own munitions factories are in full production. You might want to rethink Putin out of power.

The* Russian military currently has about 1 million soldiers*, compared with China’s force of 2 million and the U.S. force of about 1.4 million. India also has more than 1.4 million soldiers.​​Russian military announces plan to expand, create new units​​*Ukrainian Winter Offensive in Donetsk*


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## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

MoonRiver said:


> Here's my sources. Where's yours? It's impossible to know if a source is accurate, but I used 2 that are independent and have access to the information.
> 
> The BBC Russian Service and Mediazona use open-source data — media reports, social networks and official statements — to verify the deaths of soldiers and last week their total hit 10,002.​​


The Moscow Times, reporting that the BBC has reported a third source (citing social media accounts) claims that the Russians have lost 10k, while Russia claims to only have lost 5k… and you leave out the linked BBC reporting of estimates of roughly 100k on each side:








Ukraine war: US estimates 200,000 military casualties on all sides


The estimates are the highest offered yet by a Western official on the months-long conflict.



www.bbc.com







MoonRiver said:


> https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2022...n-soldiers-confirmed-killed-in-ukraine-a79699
> 
> The EU Commission Chief Ursula von der Leyen gave the number in a now-defunct video, stating that 20,000 non-combatants and 100,000 AFU have died so far, noted Twitter.​​Note: The twitter reference includes the video of von der Leyon.​
> https://www.hngn.com/articles/24564...al-casualties-alleged-eu-commission-chief.htm


…and here, you quote right down to the correction that subject of the article provided, clarifying that the numbers cited were estimated _casualties_, which includes both killed AND wounded. Funny (not funny) that you should choose to leave that out.

Literally every post on this topic further cements your bias. You accuse everyone who sees Russia as wrong and/or as experiencing anything short of an assured success as falling for western propaganda, yet you routinely quote demonstrably Russian-centric media and even selectively quote things to make it look even more favorable for Russia than their own articles were able to. 



MoonRiver said:


> Why would you think the attacker has lost the initiative? Russia plays the long game, unlike the US.


Why? Russia started with 200k soldiers amassed at the border; a number that was supposed to allow them to roll over Ukraine in a matter of days. Six months later, we get to watch Putin on TV announcing the civilian mobilization of a further 300k troops.

If there had not been a significant number of those original 200k killed/wounded, and Putin had only thrown a small percentage of his standing army at the front already, why would he need to call some 300k civilians up for active duty… and to the front no less?

If Russia hasn’t “lost the initiative”, why did we see their forces pull back from one of the oblasts that Russia had declared as their property, and watch them pull out from the one regional Capitol that they’d taken since this invasion started? Their tanks weren’t stuck in the mud in the city… yet they had to pull back.

We have videos of captured Russian equipment, and dead Russian soldiers wearing TOY helmets (as in, marked for play not for protective use). We have battle lines that are identifiable on a map, and not subject to the spin of either side’s propaganda. We see the Russian army continuing to lose ground some 9 months after you assured us it would all be over… and Ukrainians in control of Odessa, still months after you told us that the Russian fleet was just days away and equipped to take it easily… and Russia losing regional capitols after you assured us they we “heard it here first” the war is over, and Russia had taken the territory it wanted.

Seriously, try to muster even an ounce of objectivity and intellectual honesty.


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## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

__ https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1606700397942431744


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## nchobbyfarm (Apr 10, 2011)




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## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said his government is preparing to participate in the World Economic Forum (WEF) in Davos in January 

The Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights has recorded 17,831 civilian casualties in Ukraine between the end of February when Russia launched its full-scale invasion and December 26, including 6,884 killed and 10,947 injured. 

In total, more than 35,000 facilities across the country have been destroyed as a result of Russian attacks, Yenin said on television late Tuesday.








Zelensky prepares for Ukraine's participation at WEF in Davos


Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said his government is preparing to participate in the World Economic Forum in Davos next month and that he spoke again with BlackRock Inc. Chief Executive Officer Larry Fink about the postwar rebuilding effort.




www.businesslive.co.za


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## kinderfeld (Jan 29, 2006)

GunMonkeyIntl said:


> This war has shown us what a joke the Russian conventional army is...


Which is why I never thought that uniting the former Soviet Union was Putin's end game with all this.


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## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

kinderfeld said:


> Which is why I never thought that uniting the former Soviet Union was Putin's end game with all this.


That may be, but I’m not sure Putin knew what a joke his own army was.

Forming Putin’s perspective, he saw what happened with the grind-down in Afghanistan. After that, he didn’t see the Russian army tested again until he was the one issuing the orders and, even then, it never really got tested. The world largely stood by while he took Chechnya, Georgia and Crimea back for his neo-Soviet empire.

Any army can look formidable on short, uncontested campaigns like that, just as how any pair of Chinese boots can seem sturdy when trying them on in the store.

Putin was planning for a campaign measured in hours, and the Ukrainians are standing up for a campaign that can be measured in years. The orc army simply wasn’t prepared for that, and they’re finding out what junk their equipment is after just nine months.


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## Hiro (Feb 14, 2016)

GunMonkeyIntl said:


> That may be, but I’m not sure Putin knew what a joke his own army was.
> 
> Forming Putin’s perspective, he saw what happened with the grind-down in Afghanistan. After that, he didn’t see the Russian army tested again until he was the one issuing the orders and, even then, it never really got tested. The world largely stood by while he took Chechnya, Georgia and Crimea back for his neo-Soviet empire.
> 
> ...


It isn't just their equipment. It is their whole command structure. Dropping off ill equipped troops with clear objectives can go somewhere. Dropping off ill equipped troops with no clear objective facing a determined opposition is just killing off your own forces.


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## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

I see this as validation -

Ukraine has acquired one of the largest and most effective land armies in Europe, equipped by America and its allies. A peace process should link Ukraine to Nato, however expressed. The alternative of neutrality is no longer meaningful, especially after Finland and Sweden joined Nato. This is why, last May, I recommended establishing a ceasefire line along the borders existing where the war started on 24 February. Russia would disgorge its conquests thence, but not the territory it occupied nearly a decade ago, including Crimea. That territory could be the subject of a negotiation after a ceasefire. 








How to avoid another world war


The first world war was a kind of cultural suicide that destroyed Europe’s eminence. Europe’s leaders sleepwalked – in the phrase of historian Christopher Clark – into a conflict which none of them would have entered had they foreseen the world at war’s end in 1918. In the previous decades, they...




www.spectator.co.uk


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## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

Russian President Vladimir Putin on Thursday ordered a 36-hour ceasefire in Ukraine to run during Orthodox Christmas, a move that war-battered Kyiv swiftly branded as “hypocrisy”.

Putin’s directive to his troops was announced days after Moscow suffered its deadliest reported loss of the invasion, and following 11 months of brutal combat.

Both nations celebrate Orthodox Christmas and the Russian leader’s order came after a ceasefire was urged by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Russia’s spiritual leader Patriarch Kirill, a staunch Putin supporter.

“Taking into account the appeal of His Holiness Patriarch Kirill, I instruct the defence minister of the Russian Federation to introduce… a ceasefire along the entire line of contact between the sides in Ukraine,” said a Kremlin statement.

It will run from from 12:00 (0900 GMT) January 6, until 24:00 (2100 GMT) on January 7, the Kremlin said.

Kyiv attacked the announcement, calling it “hypocrisy”.

Russia “must leave the occupied territories — only then will it have a ‘temporary truce’. Keep hypocrisy to yourself,” Ukrainian presidential adviser Mykhailo Podolyak wrote on Twitter.









Putin orders Ukraine ceasefire for Orthodox Christmas - Breitbart


Russian President Vladimir Putin on Thursday ordered a 36-hour ceasefire in Ukraine to run during Orthodox Christmas, a move that war-battered Kyiv




www.breitbart.com


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## kinderfeld (Jan 29, 2006)

GunMonkeyIntl said:


> You know what would have prevented the request altogether, don’t you?
> If Russia had stayed in Russia.


To be fair, NATO isn't blameless in all of this. They reneged on their 1991 promises regarding eastern expansion.


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## Hiro (Feb 14, 2016)

kinderfeld said:


> To be fair, NATO isn't blameless in all of this. They reneged on their 1991 promises regarding eastern expansion.


No one is blameless in this crapshow. But, one party is responsible for killing and destruction in a non-hostile neighboring sovereign nation. The "ceasefire" offer is just the orc boss being an orc boss when the orcs are looking around whether they should listen to their orc boss anymore.


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## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

kinderfeld said:


> To be fair, NATO isn't blameless in all of this. They reneged on their 1991 promises regarding eastern expansion.


This isn’t intended as a defense of NATO or an implication that NATO is totally benevolent, but that claim of a “promise” is extremely dubious. Nothing was ever formalized, and even the strongest claims of its happening are nothing more than claims of back room talks.

Gorbachev is on the record as saying that he thought any eastward expansion of NATO was a bad idea, but that no such promise was made, and Boris Yeltsin later negotiated a position where he openly supported Poland joining NATO (which would have gone against and negated the “not one inch east” 1991 agreement, if one existed).

In later decades, Putin ratcheted up the indignation over NATO expansion, but that’s nothing more than crocodile tears. NATO is not an offensive alliance, and contains no obligation for cooperative aggression. The only logical reason Putin has to be against former USSR states joining NATO is that it grants them cooperative defense agreements should Russia try to take them over again. If a Russian leader ever expresses resistance to a state joining NATO, that is hard sign that that state desperately needs to join NATO… right now.

Here’s an interesting article on the nuance of the 1991 talks and what may or may not have been promised, implied, or even discussed:


https://www.spiegel.de/international/world/nato-s-eastward-expansion-is-vladimir-putin-right-a-bf318d2c-7aeb-4b59-8d5f-1d8c94e1964d


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## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

Hiro said:


> No one is blameless in this crapshow. But, one party is responsible for killing and destruction in a non-hostile neighboring sovereign nation. The "ceasefire" offer is just the orc boss being an orc boss when the orcs are looking around whether they should listen to their orc boss anymore.


…not to mention that it’s a shameless attempt at a “time-out…TIME-OUT!!” when the bully took a gut punch that knocked his wind out from the kid he’s trying to beat up.

The Ukrainians just killed somewhere around 500 Russian soldiers in a single HIMARS shot into a massive barracks. The Russian frontline “leadership” is catching heavy criticism for concentrating soldiers so tightly close to the front line. Putin’s ceasefire is an attempt to open a window to get his pawns spread out.


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## wiscto (Nov 24, 2014)

Someone is going to have to explain to me how it's a bad thing for countries who were invaded, occupied, and controlled by the Soviet Union for decades, to join an alliance designed explicitly to protect members from Soviet/Russian aggression? The question isn't really who the heck is NATO to court all of these countries. The question is who the heck are you to say that these countries shouldn't be allowed to join? I don't respect that position at all. I don't care if Russia scares you.


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## kinderfeld (Jan 29, 2006)

GunMonkeyIntl said:


> Gorbachev is on the record as saying that he thought any eastward expansion of NATO was a bad idea, but that no such promise was made...


Assurances were made but not put into writing.

_"The decision for the U.S. and its allies to expand NATO into the east was decisively made in 1993. I called this a big mistake from the very beginning. It was definitely a violation of the spirit of the statements and assurances made to us in 1990."_

Hind sight is 20/20. Gorbachev probably should have pushed the issue a bit more.









Mikhail Gorbachev: I am against all walls


The first and last president of the Soviet Union spoke with RBTH about the past and how it should inform the present.




www.rbth.com


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## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

kinderfeld said:


> Assurances were made but not put into writing.
> 
> _"The decision for the U.S. and its allies to expand NATO into the east was decisively made in 1993. I called this a big mistake from the very beginning. It was definitely a violation of the spirit of the statements and assurances made to us in 1990."_
> 
> ...


For sure, but maybe the reason he didn’t push it further was exactly the same reason that Yeltsin, when pressed, gave his blessing to Poland joining NATO: he knew he was not in a position of strength and didn’t have a leg to stand on.

If NATO had felt like it needed to, it probably would have offered Gorbachev an assurance in writing, and I wouldn’t put it past NATO to reneg on that written assurance. That said, that written assurance was never made, and for a good reason; the Russians were in no position to demand it.

Putin even bringing that back up is just more Commie side-mouth speak. Russia has done more than enough to nullify any written agreement that might have come out of those talks, anyway.


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## homesteadforty (Dec 4, 2007)

kinderfeld said:


> To be fair, NATO isn't blameless in all of this. They reneged on their 1991 promises regarding eastern expansion.


To be fair, if Russia had not invaded or interfered in Transnistria, Abkhazian, Chechnya, Georgia, Crimea, Syria, Ukraine, etc. maybe Ukraine and other countries wouldn't feel the need for NATO's protection. Countries are asking to join NATO... NATO is not forcing them to join.


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## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

Ukraine is paying dearly with the lives of their people to join NATO, like pawns of a chessboard.


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## homesteadforty (Dec 4, 2007)

HDRider said:


> Ukraine is paying dearly with the lives of their people to join NATO, like pawns of a chessboard.


So...would you say they would be better off being subjugated by Russia?... maybe another Holodomor?... or maybe just lose their country and their identity?


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## homesteadforty (Dec 4, 2007)

HDRider said:


> Ukraine is paying dearly with the lives of their people to join NATO, like pawns of a chessboard.


Maybe they wouldn't have wanted to join NATO had Russia not invaded Crimea and the other countries I listed in post #236.

Seems to me that a lot of people throughout the centuries have been willing to pay dearly to preserve or gain their freedom.


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## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

homesteadforty said:


> So...would you say they would be better off being subjugated by Russia?... maybe another Holodomor?... or maybe just lose their country and their identity?


They have lost part of it. Myself, I don't think they get most of that back.


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## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

homesteadforty said:


> Maybe they wouldn't have wanted to join NATO had Russia not invaded Crimea and the other countries I listed in post #236.
> 
> Seems to me that a lot of people throughout the centuries have been willing to pay dearly to preserve or gain their freedom.


Ukraine will be in NATO. They are paying to get in.


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

HDRider said:


> Ukraine will be in NATO. They are paying to get in.


NATO may not be around. The US is bearing most of the military equipment expense and many, if not most, European countries are in serious financial trouble.


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## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

MoonRiver said:


> NATO may not be around. The US is bearing most of the military equipment expense and many, if not most, European countries are in serious financial trouble.


You really should cut back on huffing that propaganda. It’s bad business to get high on your own supply.

There may not be a NATO for Ukraine to join? Russia is literally conscripting convicts and mobilizing retirees, sending them to the front line in WWII vehicles, wearing toy helmets and carrying early cold-war small-arms, all after having decimated the 200k-strong invasion force they amassed for a 72 hour war that is now in month 12.

Meanwhile, NATO is just piping in weapons and providing training, but hasn’t even sent in their ground troops yet.


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## gilberte (Sep 25, 2004)

GunMonkeyIntl said:


> You really should cut back on huffing that propaganda. It’s bad business to get high on your own supply.
> 
> There may not be a NATO for Ukraine to join? Russia is literally conscripting convicts and mobilizing retirees, sending them to the front line in WWII vehicles, wearing toy helmets and carrying early cold-war small-arms, all after having decimated the 200k-strong invasion force they amassed for a 72 hour war that is now in month 12.
> 
> Meanwhile, NATO is just piping in weapons and providing training, but hasn’t even sent in their ground troops yet.


Doesn't it worry you just a little bit though, that Russia may be holding the "good stuff" back just a little as part of a more elaborate plan? Or are they just as primitive and desperate as they appear to be?


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## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

gilberte said:


> Doesn't it worry you just a little bit though, that Russia may be holding the "good stuff" back just a little as part of a more elaborate plan? Or are they just as primitive and desperate as they appear to be?


(Q1) Not really. 
(Q2) Likely even more so.

From a conventional warfare standpoint, Russia has thrown pretty much everything the global armaments community knew about with the exception of hyper-sonic missiles (at least in any volume), and it’s worth noting that most in the know were dubious on Russia’s HS program being as advanced as they’d been claiming. It makes sense, in that light, that Russia hasn’t been using them because they’re not as ready as they wanted the world to believe when they were just posturing over taking Ukraine.

Russia lined the Ukrainian borders with 200k soldiers and the most intimidating armaments package they could. Once they invaded, it was quickly discovered that the battalions were largely cobbled together from geographically and dogmatically distant units. That implies that Russia had to dig deep to assemble that intimidating invasion force.

When the west pushed back more than anticipated, the Russia main-force equipment was proven to be fragile and in disrepair. Then, within 8 months of an invasion (that was supposed to take only 72 hours), Putin had to make a very risky and unpopular announcement to mobilize 300k civilians, and started sending units cobbled together from office workers, old men, and prisoners, wearing toy helmets and cosplay “armor”.

Putin still has some “good stuff”, but it’s almost entirely nuclear weapons. Yes, we should find that worrying, but there’s nothing we can do about it and it’s something we should have found worrying even in peace time.


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## Alice In TX/MO (May 10, 2002)

If you care to watch the Joe Rogan interview with Peter Zeihan about the Ukraine, Russia, and China, you might find it fascinating. It's almost two hours. Zeihan is a geopolitical analyst.

The interview is on Spotify, which I have on my phone, not my computer, or I would try to post a link.

There is analysis of factors that I hadn't considered.


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

gilberte said:


> Doesn't it worry you just a little bit though, that Russia may be holding the "good stuff" back just a little as part of a more elaborate plan? Or are they just as primitive and desperate as they appear to be?


I don't believe we can produce weapons as fast as we have been sending them to Ukraine.


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## Alice In TX/MO (May 10, 2002)

Reducing our own stockpile? What could possibly go wrong?


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## painterswife (Jun 7, 2004)

From the several articles I have read, the US has only sent weapons from its excess stockpiles not what it keeps ready for it,s own needs. Combine that with the reduced need because the US is not in a war in Afghanistan it might not be that difficult to rebuild the excess weapons stockpiles.


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## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

Alice In TX/MO said:


> If you care to watch the Joe Rogan interview with Peter Zeihan about the Ukraine, Russia, and China, you might find it fascinating. It's almost two hours. Zeihan is a geopolitical analyst.
> 
> The interview is on Spotify, which I have on my phone, not my computer, or I would try to post a link.
> 
> There is analysis of factors that I hadn't considered.


Any bullet point to share in case we don’t get to watch it? I’m not even sure how to watch Joe Rohan outside of the occasional YouTube edit posted here.


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## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

MoonRiver said:


> I don't believe we can produce weapons as fast as we have been sending them to Ukraine.


You know who, for sure, can’t? Russia.

I know. I know. Intellectual honesty and objectivity aren’t exactly your strong suit.

Tell us again how NATO is going to dissolve before Ukraine would have any chance of joining. We promise not to look at Russia’s high-visibility implosion while you’re putting on such a good show.


----------



## Alice In TX/MO (May 10, 2002)

It’s a two hour interview. He explains the political situation surrounding Putin, the status of Russian military equipment, their reasons for desperately needing land for food production and the seaports and ultimately most of Western Europe, the chaos in China, the decline of population in Russia and China, how the leaders of both countries have eliminated any opposition, and various other information.

I am still listening. He has started explaining what is happening in Mexico.


----------



## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

Hosts L Todd Wood and Dan O'Shea give the latest developments from the Ukraine War, with a special appearance from reporter on the ground in Kyiv.

Start at 1 minute.









Episode 4 - Ukraine SitRep Live From Kyiv


Hosts L Todd Wood and Dan O'Shea give the latest developments from the Ukraine War, with a special appearance from reporter on the ground in Kyiv.




rumble.com


----------



## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

From CNN Jan 10.

A Ukrainian soldier fighting in the eastern town of Soledar told CNN that the situation is “critical” and the death toll is now so high that “no one counts the dead”.​​The soldier is from the 46th air mobile brigade, which is leading Ukraine’s fight to hold onto Soledar in the face of a massive assault from Russian troops and Wagner mercenaries.​​He described a dynamic battlefield where buildings change hands daily and units can’t keep track of the escalating death toll. “No one will tell you how many dead and wounded there are. Because no one knows for sure. Not a single person,” he said. “Not at the headquarters. Not anywhere. Positions are being taken and re-taken constantly. What was our house today, becomes Wagner's the next day.”​​“In Soledar, no one counts the dead,” he added.​​The soldier said it was unclear as of Tuesday night how much of the town was held by the Russians: “No one can definitely say who moved where and who holds what, because no one knows for sure. There is a huge grey area in the city that everyone claims to control, [but] it’s just any empty hype.”​​The Ukrainians have lost many troops in Soledar but the ranks are being replenished as the fight for the mining town continues, he said: *“The personnel of our units have been renewed by almost half, more or less. We do not even have time to memorize each other’s call signs [when new personnel arrive].”*​
more


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## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

MoonRiver said:


> Hosts L Todd Wood and Dan O'Shea give the latest developments from the Ukraine War, with a special appearance from reporter on the ground in Kyiv.
> 
> Start at 1 minute.
> 
> ...


So, basically what those guys were saying is that this guy has no idea what he’s talking about and was just spouting pro-Russian propaganda, then?


----------



## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

GunMonkeyIntl said:


> So, basically what those guys were saying is that this guy has no idea what he’s talking about and was just spouting pro-Russian propaganda, then?


You hear what you want to hear. This is a former US military man who is now a war correspondent in Kiev, providing up-to-date information on the war. What I got out of it is you can't believe what the US government says about the war, that Ukraine is fairly successful at shooting down missiles in Kiev but not very good at shooting down drones, much of the electrical grid is destroyed, but Ukraine has been quickly restoring some of the power, and the overall war is basically a draw at this time.

As I have said many times, I don't have a dog in this fight, but I don't trust what my own government is saying or doing. I try to find truth, not propaganda.


----------



## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

The war in Ukraine will end when the US feels it has extracted all the toll on Russia it can.

If there is some lull we will keep the war going by admitting Ukraine into NATO


----------



## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

HDRider said:


> The war in Ukraine will end when the US feels it has extracted all the toll on Russia it can.
> 
> If there is some lull we will keep the war going by admitting Ukraine into NATO


I don't think it will happen, as all NATO members have to approve, and I can think of at least 2 or 3 that would likely vote against it.


----------



## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

MoonRiver said:


> I don't think it will happen, as all NATO members have to approve, and I can think of at least 2 or 3 that would likely vote against it.


I disagree. We went into this as a way to scuttle present day Russia. NATO is at war with Russia, we are just paying Zelensky to use Ukrainians to fight it.

Tremendous pressure will be put on NATO nations to keep the war going. There might be some outliers. Turkey comes first to mind.

*NATO ENLARGEMENT*
NATO membership is open to “any other European state in a position to further the principles of this Treaty and to contribute to the security of the North Atlantic area.”

ALBANIA (2009)
BELGIUM (1949)
BULGARIA (2004)
CANADA (1949)
CROATIA (2009)
CZECHIA (1999)
DENMARK (1949)
ESTONIA (2004)
FRANCE (1949)
GERMANY (1955)
GREECE (1952)
HUNGARY (1999)
ICELAND (1949)
ITALY (1949)
LATVIA (2004)
LITHUANIA (2004)
LUXEMBOURG (1949)
MONTENEGRO (2017)
NETHERLANDS (1949)
NORTH MACEDONIA (2020)
NORWAY (1949)
POLAND (1999)
PORTUGAL (1949)
ROMANIA (2004)
SLOVAKIA (2004)
SLOVENIA (2004)
SPAIN (1982)
TÜRKIYE (1952)
THE UNITED KINGDOM (1949)
THE UNITED STATES (1949)
*NATO ENLARGEMENT*
NATO membership is open to “any other European state in a position to further the principles of this Treaty and to contribute to the security of the North Atlantic area.”


----------



## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

MoonRiver said:


> You hear what you want to hear. This is a former US military man who is now a war correspondent in Kiev, providing up-to-date information on the war. What I got out of it is you can't believe what the US government says about the war, that Ukraine is fairly successful at shooting down missiles in Kiev but not very good at shooting down drones, much of the electrical grid is destroyed, but Ukraine has been quickly restoring some of the power, and the overall war is basically a draw at this time.
> 
> As I have said many times, I don't have a dog in this fight, but I don't trust what my own government is saying or doing. I try to find truth, not propaganda.


I heard everything they said quite clearly. This response is a transparent admission that you only “heard what you wanted to hear”.

You’re correct that the analysts said that an accurate assessment of the situation on the ground can’t be formed solely from western media, but not one single person here (myself included) has said that it could be. What you missed (or selectively ignored) was their very clear implications that the pro-Russian media is likewise biased, and that they are trying to form their best assessment based on flawed reporting from both sides.

Also, their bottom line assessment was that Russia’s casualty count was much higher than Ukraine’s, that Russia’s armor and air had effectively been neutralized, resulting in brutal, high body-count WWI-style fighting for the last several months, that it didn’t appear that Ukraine had the remaining horse power to take back everything that Russia had taken, and that Russia didn’t appear to have the remaining horsepower to take much of anything more.

That’s not a selective hearing of their analysis and, when combined with the frontlines of the war today, completely at odds with the one-sided, pro-Russian reports we’ve gotten from you, that Kyiv was just hours from falling (_and Ukraine had better give up now_), how Odessa was going to fall within days (_and Ukraine had better give up now_), and how the war was, “for all practical purposes”, over back in September when Putin said the Donbas was now his (but before Ukraine took back Kherson and Bakhmut), and that Ukraine had better just give up now.


----------



## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

HDRider said:


> I disagree. We went into this as a way to scuttle present day Russia. NATO is at war with Russia, we are just paying Zelensky to use Ukrainians to fight it.
> 
> Tremendous pressure will be put on NATO nations to keep the war going. There might be some outliers. Turkey comes first to mind.


And Hungary.


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## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

MoonRiver said:


> And Hungary.


They can all be brought to heel


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## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

I could see Putin offering to trade Luhansk, Donetsk and Crimea for NATO membership.

Nobody wants an all out hot war between Russia and NATO, at least not right now, and encouraging NATO acceptance of Ukraine would be a viable path to Putin getting to keep Donbas and Crimea. An agreement to accept Ukraine into NATO would likely require them to pull back from the annexation lines from last year, and would not guarantee Ukraine NATO backing if they went back in, essentially ceding Donbas and Crimea to Russia.


----------



## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

GunMonkeyIntl said:


> I could see Putin offering to trade Luhansk, Donetsk and Crimea for NATO membership.
> 
> Nobody wants an all out hot war between Russia and NATO, at least not right now, and encouraging NATO acceptance of Ukraine would be a viable path to Putin getting to keep Donbas and Crimea. An agreement to accept Ukraine into NATO would likely require them to pull back from the annexation lines from last year, and would not guarantee Ukraine NATO backing if they went back in, essentially ceding Donbas and Crimea to Russia.


Short of outright ceding what Russia has occupied, that was essentially what was in the article I posted earlier.

I'll post it again in case some missed it.









How to avoid another world war


The first world war was a kind of cultural suicide that destroyed Europe’s eminence. Europe’s leaders sleepwalked – in the phrase of historian Christopher Clark – into a conflict which none of them would have entered had they foreseen the world at war’s end in 1918. In the previous decades, they...




www.spectator.co.uk


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## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

HDRider said:


> Short of outright ceding what Russia has occupied, that was essentially what was in the article I posted earlier.
> 
> I'll post it again in case some missed it.
> 
> ...


Ok, but the cession of territory is kind of critical in any sort of peace deal that Putin is going to entertain. This was Kissinger’s suggestion:



> A peace process should link Ukraine to Nato, however expressed. The alternative of neutrality is no longer meaningful, especially after Finland and Sweden joined Nato. This is why, last May, I recommended establishing a ceasefire line along the borders existing where the war started on 24 February. Russia would disgorge its conquests thence, but not the territory it occupied nearly a decade ago, including Crimea. That territory could be the subject of a negotiation after a ceasefire.


Kissinger is saying that Ukraine should be welcomed into NATO, and that Russia should walk back to where it was on 2/24/22, which means only Crimea, and that Crimea be subject to further negotiation.

Sure, that would be a great outcome, but how out of touch does Kissinger have to be to even make that suggestion? Putin just chewed up a sizable part of his army in a play to steal Ukrainian territory. Prior to Kissinger’s writing that article, Putin had already held an annexation vote to claim the matter of Luhansk and Donetsk “settled”. He thinks Putin’s going to give that back AND entertain talks of Crimea not being his?

Kissinger made some thought-provoking points, but his “suggestion” for peace was so ridiculous and tone-deaf as to be completely meaningless.


----------



## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

GunMonkeyIntl said:


> his [Kissinger]“suggestion” for peace was so ridiculous and tone-deaf


How so?


----------



## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

HDRider said:


> How so?


His proposal for peace was the following:

1- Ukraine joins NATO

2- Russia gives back everything they stole in this war (meaning the 2022 leg of it)

3- Russia entertains later talks of possibly giving back (or giving concessions on) Crimea.

Unless I’m missing something, that reads like a peace agreement only a CNN-sycophant could think realistic. Russia would have to walk away with nothing, and potentially give up what it took previously.

I, personally, think that would be a great outcome (especially if Russia does end up having to give back Crimea), but Russia’s not going to entertain that unless/until they are rendered completely militarily impotent, Putin is dead, and Wolf Blitzer is elected king of the world for life.


----------



## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

GunMonkeyIntl said:


> His proposal for peace was the following:
> 
> 1- Ukraine joins NATO
> 
> ...


It might be a good negotiating strategy, or the initial ask. 

What does winning look like to you, seriously?


----------



## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

HDRider said:


> It might be a good negotiating strategy, or the initial ask.
> 
> What does winning look like to you, seriously?


I’m not saying that Kissinger’s suggestion wouldn’t be “winning”. That’s exactly what it would be, and I don’t doubt that Ukraine would accept those terms, but that’s not a win that’s going to be negotiated. Kissinger is suggesting that Ukraine get everything, and it get it through negotiation. I don’t think Russia is going to be willing to give up nearly that much without being completely militarily defeated… and, even then, probably wouldn’t because of their nuclear ace.

So, sure, if I somehow had signatory power, and the offer on the table was that Russia totally pull out of Ukraine (except Crimea; to be discussed later) and Ukraine joins NATO, I’d sign.

….but only if one clause is that the Cleveland Browns win the Super Bowl, the World Series and the Stanley Cup… all in the same year. I mean, why not, they’re both about as realistic.


----------



## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

To clarify: I don’t care about Russia being completely defeated. They’ve proven themselves to be a giant paper tiger worth fear of nothing except nuclear war. If Russia gets out of Ukraine, with or without their remaining army of old men and child rapists wearing toy helmets, I don’t care. Let them have their “army”.

Standing by for Putin’s response to the “offer”.


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## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

GunMonkeyIntl said:


> I’m not saying that Kissinger’s suggestion wouldn’t be “winning”. That’s exactly what it would be, and I don’t doubt that Ukraine would accept those terms, but that’s not a win that’s going to be negotiated. Kissinger is suggesting that Ukraine get everything, and it get it through negotiation.


To repeat myself, what Kissinger is suggesting might be a reach, but it would be a good staring position in the negotiations.


----------



## barnbilder (Jul 1, 2005)

Let Russia have Ukraine. It's nothing but a breeding ground for corruption anyway. The good people in Ukraine have had plenty long enough to evaluate the wisdom of living in a former possession of the USSR and leave while the gates were open. Any US involvement, financial or otherwise, amounts to fighting a proxy war on behalf of shady oligarchs and Biden family business interests. Leave it alone. If the Ukrainians hold out and Russia over-leverages itself, and the Russian people revolt because of an unpopular and expensive war, great. But it's not worth one US dollar or worth scuffing the boot of one US soldier to be involved with an event that would need the commitment of complete and total war to change the outcome of. Send a missile here, a tank there, amounts to involvement, and can only prolong the inevitable and be viewed as an act of aggression.


----------



## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

HDRider said:


> To repeat myself, what Kissinger is suggesting might be a reach, but it would be a good staring position in the negotiations.


“A reach”?
Ok.

Sure. What was I thinking? If “Russia ceases hostilities, pulls out of Ukraine-proper, considers giving up Crimea, and blesses off on Ukraine joining NATO is a GREAT “starting point”. I wonder why no one thought of that yet. Who is this Kissinger guy, anyway, maybe he should write the president a letter and see if he can get a response. Someone should follow up on that.

I mean, it’s not even that far from Putin’s demands that Ukraine give him everything he’s stolen so far, and then some, out to the borders that he claimed, that Ukraine sign assurances that they’d never seek NATO membership, and rebuild their government around Russian-friendly actors who will ensure that that agreement is enforced.

HD, I …_struggle…_ with your ideas sometimes, but I’ve never considered you dumb. This string of posts about Kissinger’s article make it seem like you’re just not paying attention at all.


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## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

barnbilder said:


> …Any US involvement, financial or otherwise, amounts to fighting a proxy war on behalf of shady oligarchs and Biden family business interests…


Was that the case in 2016-2020, when Donald Trump sent the first substantial material support to Ukraine after at least eight years of bandaids and pillows under Obama?


----------



## barnbilder (Jul 1, 2005)

GunMonkeyIntl said:


> Was that the case in 2016-2020, when Donald Trump sent the first substantial material support to Ukraine after at least eight years of bandaids and pillows under Obama?


Though my opinion is likely unpopular, I would tend to be opposed to sending them bandaids and pillows.


----------



## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

GunMonkeyIntl said:


> Sure. What was I thinking? If “Russia ceases hostilities, pulls out of Ukraine-proper, considers giving up Crimea, and blesses off on Ukraine joining NATO is a GREAT “starting point”. I wonder why no one thought of that yet. Who is this Kissinger guy, anyway, maybe he should write the president a letter and see if he can get a response. Someone should follow up on that.


I thought HK suggested 
1) Russia and Ukraine cease hostilities.
2) Negotiate recent land grabs
3) Negotiate Crimea
4) Ukraine join NATO

I don't think 2 & 3 will favor Ukraine, but if we get 1 & 4 that would be a win. I would put Ukraine on some type of NATO probationary period to see progress cleaning up corruption. That said, who the hell are we to accuse anyone of government corruption?



GunMonkeyIntl said:


> I mean, it’s not even that far from Putin’s demands that Ukraine give him everything he’s stolen so far, and then some, out to the borders that he claimed, that Ukraine sign assurances that they’d never seek NATO membership, and rebuild their government around Russian-friendly actors who will ensure that that agreement is enforced.


I did not see Henry suggesting that at all.



GunMonkeyIntl said:


> HD, I …_struggle…_ with your ideas sometimes, but I’ve never considered you dumb. This string of posts about Kissinger’s article make it seem like you’re just not paying attention at all.


It seems to me that you and I have a different understanding what HK suggested. I don't understand what you think winning looks like.


----------



## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

barnbilder said:


> Though my opinion is likely unpopular, I would tend to be opposed to sending them bandaids and pillows.


I don't disagree with you, but this is really not about Ukraine. The war is about the US and NATO bleeding out Russia. We have outsourced the war.

The only question is how much is that worth? $100 billion, $200, how much?


----------



## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

I never considered this as a motivating factor. Win/Win


__ https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1613311948283842560


----------



## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

HDRider said:


> I never considered this as a motivating factor. Win/Win
> 
> 
> __ https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1613311948283842560


A huge deal for whom? Not Europe.


----------



## poppy (Feb 21, 2008)

barnbilder said:


> Let Russia have Ukraine. It's nothing but a breeding ground for corruption anyway. The good people in Ukraine have had plenty long enough to evaluate the wisdom of living in a former possession of the USSR and leave while the gates were open. Any US involvement, financial or otherwise, amounts to fighting a proxy war on behalf of shady oligarchs and Biden family business interests. Leave it alone. If the Ukrainians hold out and Russia over-leverages itself, and the Russian people revolt because of an unpopular and expensive war, great. But it's not worth one US dollar or worth scuffing the boot of one US soldier to be involved with an event that would need the commitment of complete and total war to change the outcome of. Send a missile here, a tank there, amounts to involvement, and can only prolong the inevitable and be viewed as an act of aggression.


I agree. Why people insist on supporting Zelensky is beyond weird IMO. He's hailed as a hero by our current government, including many republicans. He has banned all his political opposition and has or is trying to ban a whole Christian sect. We have sent more money to Ukraine last year than we spent on road and bridge infrastructure in the whole US. And we have no accountability of where that money went or what it was spent on. Given the long known corruption in Ukraine, there is no doubt much of it went into the pockets of those highly connected in Ukraine.


----------



## barnbilder (Jul 1, 2005)

poppy said:


> I agree. Why people insist on supporting Zelensky is beyond weird IMO. He's hailed as a hero by our current government, including many republicans. He has banned all his political opposition and has or is trying to ban a whole Christian sect. We have sent more money to Ukraine last year than we spent on road and bridge infrastructure in the whole US. And we have no accountability of where that money went or what it was spent on. Given the long known corruption in Ukraine, there is no doubt much of it went into the pockets of those highly connected in Ukraine.


In a perfect world, where any elected official that was proven to benefit from any form of stock trading faced a mandatory minimum sentence of ten years hard labor, and the same held true for any politician involved in foreign affairs who benefited monetarily from foreign interests, you would see a lot less interest in helping corrupt despots escape reaping what they have sewn.


----------



## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

By Spiridon Ion Cepleanu - History Atlases available., CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=17831314


----------



## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

Some high-end theatrics


__ https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1613516291511287810


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## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

HDRider said:


> I thought HK suggested
> 1) Russia and Ukraine cease hostilities.
> 2) Negotiate recent land grabs
> 3) Negotiate Crimea
> ...


Here is what Kissinger said, once again:


> …ceasefire line along the borders existing where the war started on 24 February. Russia would disgorge its conquests thence, but not the territory it occupied nearly a decade ago, including Crimea. That territory could be the subject of a negotiation after a ceasefire.


Russia “disgorging its conquests thence” would be giving back everything they’ve taken in this invasion. The “that territory” he references in the last sentence is the territory mentioned in the preceding sentence; the land Russia stole in 2014, “nearly a decade ago”.

Therefore, Kissinger’s brilliant negotiation “suggestion” is, exactly as I said:


> 1- Ukraine joins NATO
> 
> 2- Russia gives back everything they stole in this war (meaning the 2022 leg of it)
> 
> 3- Russia entertains later talks of possibly giving back (or giving concessions on) Crimea.





HDRider said:


> I don't understand what you think winning looks like.


Winning, to me, looks like whatever still exists of the Russian military being entirely in Russia; actual Russia, not what Putin says is Russia today.


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## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

poppy said:


> I agree. Why people insist on supporting Zelensky is beyond weird IMO. He's hailed as a hero by our current government, including many republicans. He has banned all his political opposition and has or is trying to ban a whole Christian sect. We have sent more money to Ukraine last year than we spent on road and bridge infrastructure in the whole US. And we have no accountability of where that money went or what it was spent on. Given the long known corruption in Ukraine, there is no doubt much of it went into the pockets of those highly connected in Ukraine.


Of course the Ukrainian government is corrupt. So is Russia’s, and so is ours. Money being sent to Ukraine surely is making it into the pockets of well-connected Ukrainians, but also into the pockets of well-connected Americans. The whole thing is a con. There’s no question about that.

But, some percentage of those dollars are being used to kill invading Russians. Sending arms to Ukraine isn’t about supporting Zelenskyy. It’s about supporting the average Ukrainian soldier who is using those weapons to scatter the blood of Orc invaders.

Putin is our enemy, just as much as Xi is. Both of them are bent on world domination, and that domination aim doesn’t stop at the Atlantic of Pacific oceans. They want to dominate Europe because domination of Europe will make it easier to dominate us. We are the prize.

That this war is being fought 5,000 miles from our shores is entirely a function of the fact that we have built alliances that allows it to be so. The enemy has to fight through those 5,000 miles to get to our homeland but, if we don’t support the fight where it is happening, it will no longer be 5,000 miles away.

In the end, it doesn’t matter what happens to Zelenskyy, as an individual. It matters where his country’s border lies, because that puts our enemy that much further away from ours.


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## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

barnbilder said:


> Though my opinion is likely unpopular, I would tend to be opposed to sending them bandaids and pillows.


If we had taken and held that position throughout our history, there would be only two countries on Earth, the United States, and the kingdom of whatever Commie faction came out on top in the eastern hemisphere in the 20th century. And, in light of the later country’s existence, the former may not… so maybe there would be only one.

The western globalist cabal of the WEF/FED/UN is evil and something to be feared and fought, no doubt, but it would be foolhardy to forget about the evil that is Marxism, and the brink of destruction to which it brought our world in the 20th century.


----------



## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

GunMonkeyIntl said:


> Russia “disgorging its conquests thence” would be giving back everything they’ve taken in this invasion. The “that territory” he references in the last sentence is the territory mentioned in the preceding sentence; the land Russia stole in 2014, “nearly a decade ago”.


I considered this also in Kissinger's position,
If the pre-war dividing line between Ukraine and Russia cannot be achieved by combat or by negotiation, recourse to the principle of self-determination could be explored. Internationally supervised referendums concerning self-determination could be applied to particularly divisive territories which have changed hands repeatedly over the centuries.​which led me to this


HDRider said:


> 2) Negotiate recent land grabs


Regardless of how you and I interpret HK, I see the steps I outlined as a way to bring an end to current hostilities, and eventually finalizing the Russian invasion.

The world is not going to forget what Russia is doing, and pressure should be kept on them until land taken in this conflict is returned to Ukraine, or maybe as KH suggested some type of self-rule in that area (I struggle with this).


----------



## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

MoonRiver said:


> By Spiridon Ion Cepleanu - History Atlases available., CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=17831314


Well, I guess that settles it, then.

Funny that you’ve spent so many threads on preparing to sell “your” house, when you clearly don’t own it at all. All this time, you’ve been squatting on land owned by the British crown and claiming it as your own.









Or is it the Occannechi Tribe that really owns your house?


----------



## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

HDRider said:


> I considered this also in Kissinger's position,
> If the pre-war dividing line between Ukraine and Russia cannot be achieved by combat or by negotiation, recourse to the principle of self-determination could be explored. Internationally supervised referendums concerning self-determination could be applied to particularly divisive territories which have changed hands repeatedly over the centuries.​which led me to this
> 
> 
> ...


That’s all well and good, but the question was about the “suggestion” that Kissinger was so proud of, which was, explicitly, in his own words, once again, from YOUR article this:


> This is why, last May, I recommended establishing a ceasefire line along the borders existing where the war started on 24 February. Russia would disgorge its conquests thence, but not the territory it occupied nearly a decade ago, including Crimea. That territory could be the subject of a negotiation after a ceasefire.


Now, as far as how the land that belongs to Ukraine (which includes Crimea) gets divided between Ukraine, Russia, or, hell, The Lollipop Kingdom, when Ukraine ceases caring, I no longer care. I support us supporting Ukraine to fight for their land so long as they’re willing to fight for it. The Russian army being obliterated is not a win condition, but it is a very nice collateral effect of the win condition that Russia seems to insist on pushing Ukraine to.

I agree that “self rule” of the areas that Russia claims as its own as being dubious, because that really just means that those lands become Russia’s but with a puppet government of another name installed to run it… lest the west “meddle” there as well in hopes of gaining their allegiance and some hope for freedom.


Kissinger made, as I said, some thought provoking points (despite the absolute ridiculousness of his resolution suggestion). The one that stuck out to me the most was his point about how Russia, while a violence-prone enemy to the US, was at least a somewhat stabilizing force in the Eurasian continent. That’s true. Had it not been for a strong Russia, that much open land would have been a power vacuum, likely taken by more radically terroristic nations, or even China.

We learned that lesson when we took out Saddam Hussein. As bad as he was for his people, and untrustworthy as he was on the world stage, he was the only thing keeping an ISIS-like caliphate from forming there. Likewise, a power vacuum in Eurasia would probably be even more dangerous than Russia.

That said, the Gulf War, in hindsight, was a perfect outcome and would have been best left alone. Hussein invaded a sovereign and western-allied nation, and needed to be knocked back into his place. It wasn’t until later, when we unnecessarily destroyed his army and dismantled his government that we created the Petri dish for ISIS to form.

The west has allowed Russia to go too far in its rebuilding of its empire, when we didn’t react to Chechnya, Georgia or Crimea, and now we’re paying a much higher price to knock Putin back into his own borders.

If we hadn’t helped with the Ukrainian resistance, and Kyiv fell in 72 hours, as Comrade @MoonRiver was so desperately hoping for, later this year, Putin would have been amassing his Orc army at the border of the Balkans, and we would have been facing a true Article 5 crisis, and the fighting, then, would have been even more costly for us than it is now.


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## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

Did Sweden say who blew up Nord Stream?


----------



## poppy (Feb 21, 2008)

GunMonkeyIntl said:


> Of course the Ukrainian government is corrupt. So is Russia’s, and so is ours. Money being sent to Ukraine surely is making it into the pockets of well-connected Ukrainians, but also into the pockets of well-connected Americans. The whole thing is a con. There’s no question about that.
> 
> But, some percentage of those dollars are being used to kill invading Russians.* Sending arms to Ukraine isn’t about supporting Zelenskyy. *It’s about supporting the average Ukrainian soldier who is using those weapons to scatter the blood of Orc invaders.
> 
> ...


If it isn't about supporting Zelensky, why are some Congressmen proposing a bust of him being permanently placed in Congress?


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## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

poppy said:


> If it isn't about supporting Zelensky, why are some Congressmen proposing a bust of him being permanently placed in Congress?


Perhaps I mispoke. MY (and I think many others’) support for Ukraine isn’t about support for Zelenskyy.

The play with Congress is easy to see through. By making Zelenskyy into some Churchillesque hero, they can rally the support of CNN’s Tinman army, and therefore launder even more money through this cause.

Make no mistake, Congress creatures deifying Zelenskyy, placing his bust in their office and such, is not about supporting Zelenskyy either. It’s about supporting their bank accounts.


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## homesteadforty (Dec 4, 2007)

MoonRiver said:


> I try to find truth, not propaganda.


Interesting dynamic... trying to find the truth by espousing Russian and pro-Russian propaganda??? Hmmmm?


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## homesteadforty (Dec 4, 2007)

poppy said:


> If it isn't about supporting Zelensky, why are some Congressmen proposing a bust of him being permanently placed in Congress?


1. Because as President of Ukraine he is the "symbol" of it's people. He enjoys over 90% approval in Ukraine.

2. Because Congressmen are political opportunists and think it will get them support at home.

3. For some, because they see him as admirable.


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

*BlackRock to advise Zelensky on investments aimed to rebuild Ukraine*

Ukrainian President Volodymyr *Zelensky and BlackRock CEO Larry Fink agreed to coordinate investments geared toward rebuilding Ukraine*, an announcement from Zelensky’s office published Wednesday said following a call between the two parties.​​The readout of the call comes after Fink and Zelensky held a meeting earlier this year to discuss a project that involves BlackRock's Financial Markets Advisory group guiding the Ukrainian government in allocating reconstruction funds and creating opportunities to drive further investment.​​more​


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## homesteadforty (Dec 4, 2007)

MoonRiver said:


> *BlackRock to advise Zelensky on investments aimed to rebuild Ukraine*
> 
> Ukrainian President Volodymyr *Zelensky and BlackRock CEO Larry Fink agreed to coordinate investments geared toward rebuilding Ukraine*, an announcement from Zelensky’s office published Wednesday said following a call between the two parties.​​more​


Is there a point to this post?


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## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

homesteadforty said:


> 1. Because as President of Ukraine he is the "symbol" of it's people. He enjoys over 90% approval in Ukraine.
> 
> 2. Because Congressmen are political opportunists and think it will get them support at home.
> 
> 3. For some, because they see him as admirable.


I will say, exposing myself to our local Putin’s mouthpiece as being biased because of it, that I do find Zelenskyy’s handling of his nation’s invasion admirably.

The man was a comedian and TV actor who got in office strictly on the basis of his people rejecting both Russia and the US’ choices to be their president. I don’t think anyone expected much from him, in the event that Russia did invade, but he’s certainly at least playing the part of a president with cajones.

He could have accepted luxury accommodations from any of a number of western countries while he presided from exile, but he opted to stay behind for the inspiration of his countrymen. His “I don’t need a ride. I need more ammunition.” no doubt generated a lot of the good will that’s turned into materiel support from the west and, given Putin’s original comedic play to take Kyiv at the start did place him in significant personal danger.


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## GunMonkeyIntl (May 13, 2013)

homesteadforty said:


> Is there a point to this post?


@MoonRiver knows that every time he tries to concoct commentary from the Russian propaganda that he’s gorging himself on, he ends up saying something completely and demonstrably false (like “Kyiv taken in hours”, “Odessa to be taken in days”, “no NATO land bridge into Russia”, and “you heard it hear first, the war is over”… just to name a few), so he’s taken to just dropping silent turds hoping to make his quota and his Chairman happy… like the map showing that Ukrainian land used to belong to Mother Russia a few posts up.


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## Redlands Okie (Nov 28, 2017)

HDRider said:


> I considered this also in Kissinger's position,
> If the pre-war dividing line between Ukraine and Russia cannot be achieved by combat or by negotiation, recourse to the principle of self-determination could be explored. Internationally supervised referendums concerning self-determination could be applied to particularly divisive territories which have changed hands repeatedly over the centuries.​which led me to this
> 
> 
> ...


The world has been ignoring and working at forgetting the invasion of a variety of areas by russia during the last couple of decades.


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## Alice In TX/MO (May 10, 2002)

Centuries?


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## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

Redlands Okie said:


> The world has been ignoring and working at forgetting the invasion of a variety of areas by russia during the last couple of decades.


Do you think our attention is worth in an unaccounted for and without audit $100 billion+ borrowed from the Bank of China?


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