Ukraine

@timba

Quote “I’m going to take a rest from this”

Please don’t. You clearly have a good grasp of some of the elements and that is what I am here for; genuine insight in to this whole sorry/bloody mess.

This whole mad affair has made quite alot of very smart people look daft, from hawkish military analysts to doveish political commentators. Sure, someone folks have got the whole thing right, but they’ve been scarce.

It’s been especially challenging for people like me who started out with a leftish perspective of ‘America Bad’ (grew up with the 2nd gulf war, went on all the protests etc) and dovish perspective of ‘Nukes Bad’, militaries do bad things to innocent people. We’ve been left reeling in a new world where America is the least bad of all the bullies in the playground, and guns and a military is a thing we absolutely need if we don’t want someone else’s to be used on our families. I expect some will scoff at the naivety, but i’d urge understanding for us! (ofc i would lol). I’ll still be voting for parties that’ll increase my taxes, but will regretfully, be more willing for those taxes to be spend on the military.

I think the magnitude of how terrible Putin is has finally sunk in and the apologists have given up trying.

Or rather they were bullied off the thread with the use of insults and abuse like ‘apologists’ and ‘appeaser’. If we’d followed the advice of the hawks early on in this thread I’m not sure any of us would be here now. I for one am relieved that cool heads appear to inhabit the White House and NATO HQ, because early on it was looking like we were on a downward spiral to oblivion. It seems pretty obvious now that this situation is not going to solved militarily, so hopefully the diplomats and politicians can figure out a resolution which won’t provoke Putin into doing something stupid. As unpalatable as it may be, this isn’t going to end with his total defeat and dethronement so we’d best start getting used to that.

This isn’t going to end ’till Putin is gone. There is no end game for him… if Ukraine isn’t fully captured, the war continues… if Ukraine is fully captured, other countries are next… if Ukraine is fully lost, he’ll keep trying to claim it with force. War will not end ’till he has gone… and he’ll never lose democratically or step down… so the deaths continue ’till he dies.

I’m not suggesting Russia should be attacked, or that Putin should be taken out, only that we have to accept that military action will continue ’till he dies of natural causes, or he is removed internally. Much more likely the former.

For now, Russia is on a military footing that forces other countries, and not just Ukraine, to do the same. Depressing.

I respectfully disagree with your analysis Daz. Putin doesnt give a damn about negotiation and diplomacy. We tried that and he invaded anyway.

We signed The Budapest Memorandums when Ukraine gave up its nukes. He ignored it and invaded anyway.

Russia only respects strength. He thinks our politicians are weak and will give in. Letting the bully steal your pocket money doesnt mean he will leave you alone, it means he will come back for your lunch.

diplomats and politicians can figure out a resolution which won’t provoke Putin into doing something stupid. 

what you are advocating is the cannonical definition of appeasement…

Appeasement is a diplomatic strategy. It means making concessions to an aggressive foreign power in order to avoid war

much as it pains me to say, had we listened to the hawks 10 years ago and created a credible deterrent Ukraine would not have been invaded. I’m not an expert on geopolitics, but I do know a few things about bullies. And giving them a little of what they want does not make them go away

I’m not suggesting Russia should be attacked, or that Putin should be taken out, only that we have to accept that military action will continue ’till he dies of natural causes, or he is removed internally. Much more likely the former.

There was a Russia expert on Radio 4 not long back saying that it is hopelessly naive to think that who or what will replace or follow Putin will be any better. A lot in the Kremlin are even more hardline than Vlad and want an even more confrontational attitude towards the west

it is hopelessly naive to think that who or what will replace or follow Putin will be any better

This. Irrespective of what has gone before, what actual or perceived slight has occurred, countries like Russia, China, North Korea and Iran will forever be committing some form of shithousery. It’s in their socio-political DNA.

Although, the absence of Putin may curtail this particular military escapade, which would be a good thing, what could come after could be worse, or at the very least, different.

It seems pretty obvious now that this situation is not going to solved militarily

There has to be a catalyst for negotiation, quite often it is the simple sum attrition. Every body, bullet & tank has a cost. Be that humanitarian, industrial or financial; you simply keep grinding until the cost starts to impact the political or military will or ability to fight, then the negotiations or surrender appears on the table.

The end of war may be brought by political means , but the beginning of the end is always a military one.

It seems pretty obvious now that this situation is not going to solved militarily, so hopefully the diplomats and politicians can figure out a resolution

To you maybe. Putin on the other hand (and the people around him that enable his behaviour) thinks that as long as he feeds the war (and Russia has a total war-economy now) that eventually he’ll defeat the Ukrainian forces. There’s zero incentive for him to start a negotiation that may see him getting less than the total victory that he thinks is his right.

It’s such a shame that the moderators can’t ban or suspend people from individual threads.

STW would be a much nicer place to visit and engage with if the people who insist on having a pissing up the wall competition and are never wrong could be put on hold.

It’s been especially challenging for people like me who started out with a leftish perspective of ‘America Bad’ (grew up with the 2nd gulf war, went on all the protests etc) and dovish perspective of ‘Nukes Bad’, militaries do bad things to innocent people. We’ve been left reeling in a new world where America is the least bad of all the bullies in the playground, and guns and a military is a thing we absolutely need if we don’t want someone else’s to be used on our families.

I was adamantly opposed to the 2nd Gulf War, it was so obviously going to be a disaster. However, I’m old enough to remember the end of the Cold War and have no illusions that the USSR was an utterly terrible place. The naive leftist view that “America bad – anti-America good” was always ridiculous and just served to discredit the people who held that view.

I’m up to Ep 4 of Turning Point: The Bomb and the Cold War, which I find frustrating, but an excellent reminder of how terrifying the Cold War was. The extreme anti-communist right in the U.S. over-reacted and alienated countries around the world by backing right-wing dictators who used anti-communism as an excuse for violent repression. However, the Vietnam debacle and the fall of the Shah in Iran did lead to reappraisal, so the 1st Gulf War was a much more restrained, multinational effort. Then the pendulum swung back again and the W. Bush administration overreacted to Islamic terrorism, leading to another debacle. After that, U.S. public opinion has changed and their policies have changed. Key point is that in the U.S., Presidents only serve 8 years maximum and policy reversals are pretty common.

Russia, however, has regressed back to harsh anti-democratic regression and Putin did not learn the lessons of the Cold War. The USSR collapsed because it was harshly repressive and there was no mechanism to reverse failed policies – dissenters were imprisoned so no alternative policy ideas were considered. Putin has reprised that repressive system and there is no mechanism to correct the enormous blunders that he has made. I’m all in with criticizing Vietnam and the 2nd Gulf War, but the left-wing view that anything is better than the U.S. has always been nonsense. Stalinist Russia was worse and Putinist Russia is worse too.

Putin doesnt give a damn about negotiation and diplomacy.

Did I say he did? Putin isn’t coming to the negotiating table any time soon, that much is obvious. But giving up on that only ensures greater entrenchment and potential escalation. As we have seen with many other supposedly unsolvable conflicts, the solutions lie in talking to people you don’t want to talk to, and considering options which are very unappealing. Putin needs a way out (Biden has said as much himself), and the west needs to figure out what that is.

much as it pains me to say, had we listened to the hawks 10 years ago and created a credible deterrent Ukraine would not have been invaded.

Equally you could argue that had the west not encouraged Ukraine to move towards joining nato and the EU it would never have been invaded. Hindsight is great isn’t it? If the hawks had their way 10 years ago all that would have happened is Ukraine being invaded much earlier.

It’s such a shame that the moderators can’t ban or suspend people from individual threads.

STW would be a much nicer place to visit and engage with if the people who insist on having a pissing up the wall competition and are never wrong could be put on hold.

I’m not seeing that on here right now tbh.  I’m seeing people voicing differing views, some of which I disagree with but which appear to genuinely, even passionately held.  Nothing wrong with that, it’s OK to disagree.

Equally you could argue that had the west not encouraged Ukraine to move towards joining nato and the EU it would never have been invaded. Hindsight is great isn’t it? If the hawks had their way 10 years ago all that would have happened is Ukraine being invaded much earlier.

Why can’t a sovereign nation choose for itself which trading and defensive alliances it aspires to join, without the threat of invasion from an aggressive neighbour?

STW would be a much nicer place to visit and engage with if the people who insist on having a pissing up the wall competition and are never wrong could be put on hold.

Dissenters and non-conformists must be silenced. Putin would be proud. 🤔

Just watching the Beeb.

The Russian media are absolutely pushing the Ukrainian blame narrative and that’s not going to happen without Putin’s approval.

I suspect Kyiv is going to have a large uptick in middle/drone attacks directed at civilian targets. ‘Cos Putin.

F*** Putin.

Equally you could argue that had the west not encouraged Ukraine to move towards joining nato and the EU

Except they didn’t. Ukraine elected a democratic government and rejected being a Russian satellite in favour of closer ties with the EU. That’s what Ukraine wanted.  Putin does not want a prosperous, democratic Ukraine that is independent of Russia. That’s why he invaded. Nobody provoked him, he is an old-school imperialist and wants to resurrect the Russian Empire.

Likewise with NATO. Countries can only join by applying to join, unlike the Warsaw pact. Ukraine is not eligible to join, the NATO thing is just a smokescreen. Putin invaded because he wanted to, not because there was any prospect of Ukraine joining NATO. Ironically, that backfired on him and Sweden and Finland dropped their previous neutrality and applied to join NATO because they saw that NATO was the only guarantee against Russian aggression.

Why can’t a sovereign nation choose for itself which trading and defensive alliances it aspires to join

In a perfect world they would. But it’s very much not a perfect world and geopolitics is a complex game which doesn’t respect the wishes of populations, politicians or commentators. It’s interesting that anyone who doesn’t toe the hawkish line is accused of being naive, when in reality all they are doing is pointing out the cold reality of the situation.

Putin needs a way out (Biden has said as much himself), and the west needs to figure out what that is.

putins ‘way out’ is capturing the whole of Ukraine, completely breaking its culture, replacing all leaders with his appointed puppets, doing what he has done to Nalvavny and any opposition in Russia, across Ukraine .

Failing that he will settle for a temporary stalemate where he keeps all he has captured so far , whilst he re-arms & rebuilds, before launching another war to achieve all of the above, exactly as he did after the 2014 invasion.

Its nuts that you’re still giving him the benefit of the doubt on this.

let alone that you think he should dictate to the Ukrainians whether they can join the EU or not and their membership of NATO was never in the cards, for fear of provoking Russia, thanks to Putin’s mad war thats now a moot point

History shows that appeasing dictators never works and Putin’s own history in Ukraine shows it doubly so.

that’s the cold reality of the situation.

and its very naive to think Putin wouldn’t do again, exactly what he did after annexing donbass & crimea in 2014

It’s interesting that anyone who doesn’t toe the hawkish line is accused of being naive, when in reality all they are doing is pointing out the cold reality of the situation.

The cold reality is that you are toeing the hawkish Putin line – this war started because Putin believes he can take whatever he wants by force, it’ll keep going until he learns otherwise.

In a perfect world they would. But it’s very much not a perfect world and geopolitics is a complex game which doesn’t respect the wishes of populations, politicians or commentators. It’s interesting that anyone who doesn’t toe the hawkish line is accused of being naive, when in reality all they are doing is pointing out the cold reality of the situation.

To follow that position logically.  If cold reality in an imperfect world tells us Putin wants to recreate the Soviet empire and subjugate other neighbours too, should they and we just accept it?

Its nuts that you’re still giving him the benefit of the doubt on this.

Oh give over, I’m doing nothing of the sort. Whether you like it or not he’s not going to be ‘defeated’ by more weapons and more posturing. If you really think that then we might as well get on with it and launch the missiles now and get it over with. Like I said, it’s a good job there are more serious and realistic people in charge of the west’s response than many on this thread.

putins ‘way out’ is capturing the whole of Ukraine, completely breaking its culture, replacing all leaders with his appointed puppets

And that’s not going to happen either. The endgame of this mess is not going to be one side won and the other lost. The sooner everyone recognises that the better.

In a perfect world they would. But it’s very much not a perfect world and geopolitics is a complex game which doesn’t respect the wishes of populations, politicians or commentators.

Seems a rather odd position for a self-proclaimed anarchist to adopt.

Equally you could argue that had the west not encouraged Ukraine to move towards joining nato and the EU it would never have been invaded.

Nah, still not buying that line. Putin doesn’t see Ukraine as a separate country (and has said as much) It rightfully belongs to Russia as far as he’s concerned. This is a just another extension of behaviour that has seen two brutal wars in Chechnya, an invasion of Georgia and the annexation of Crimea in 2014. Putin has said that the event that made him who he is today was the (self) destruction of the USSR, and that his ambition is to re-create it, it’s probably about time we took that seriously.

Wot Nick said

Oh give over, I’m doing nothing of the sort.

so do you genuinely think if Ukraine agreed to stop fighting tomorrow that Putin wouldn’t take over the rest of Ukraine??

What does peace look like in your view? Russia keeps what its captured so far , even though Putin has declared the whole of donetsk, luhansk, zaphorizhaziha and kharkiv as part of Russia, and intends to capture the remaining parts, will Ukraine have to give them up?

putins ‘way out’ is capturing the whole of Ukraine, completely breaking its culture, replacing all leaders with his appointed puppets, doing what he has done to Nalvavny and any opposition in Russia, across Ukraine .

You missed “abduct their children, ship them to Russian Far East and destroying their documents so they can never be reunited with their Ukrainian parents”

Seems a rather odd position for a self-proclaimed anarchist to adopt.

Not really sure what my political leanings have to do with this? But seeing as you bring it up, what should the position be for a ‘self proclaimed anarchist’? (I’m not sure I’ve ever proclaimed that BTW but whatevs)

so do you genuinely think if Ukraine agreed to stop fighting tomorrow that Putin wouldn’t take over the rest of Ukraine??

Where have I said Ukraine should stop fighting? They’ve been invaded, it’s perfectly within their right to defend themselves. If you think that’s my position then you’ve completely misunderstood it (or more likely you’ve invented whatever you think my view is because you’ve taken something I’ve said and extrapolated it into some sort of fantasy lefty peacenik charicature. I really thought you’d be better than that)

What does peace look like in your view?

I’ve got no idea, I woudn’t presume to predict geopolitical events. I don’t even have much of an opinion on what it should look like, only that peace would be better than war and greater military escalation. TBH I don’t think ‘peace’ is even achievable. It’s obvious that we’re entering a new cold war and nuclear stand off with Putin. If we’re lucky it’ll settle into some sort of stalemate and we can carry on. If we’re unlucky on the other hand, that doesn’t even bear thinking about.

when in reality all they are doing is pointing out the cold reality of the situation.

But you likely wouldn’t accept the US invading whichever Southern American state it felt like on that basis, or the destruction of Gaza as “cold realities” You’re essentially just saying you’ll turn a blind eye to selected country’s behaviour because it suits your interests.

I’m happy to condemn them all for what they are; Imperialism. Just because it’s not America this time, doesn’t make it any better.

But you likely wouldn’t accept the US invading whichever Southern American state it felt like on that basis, or the destruction of Gaza as “cold realities”

Where the hell have I said that I ‘accept’ the invasion of Ukraine?? FFS stop inventing whatever you think I believe and stick to what I post. It’s funny that you guys seem to know better than I do what I think about this, because I have yet to figure it out. The only thing I do know for certain is that I don’t want it to escalate to nuclear war. I’ll accept pretty much any scenario to avoid that.

Where the hell have I said that I ‘accept’ the invasion of Ukraine??

To be fair, your stated position of “pointing out the cold reality of the situation” could give the strong impression that you accept it.

 I’ll accept pretty much any scenario to avoid that.

Which clearly means that you’ll accept Ukraine as a Satellite or wholly subsumed into Russia. As that’s what either negotiation with Putin or “Accepting the cold realities” means, doesn’t it? You can’t on the one hand applaud Ukraine for resisting the Russian invasion while at the same time condemn it for not rolling over so that you’re not faced with the possibility of nuclear war. Make your mind up.

your stated position of “pointing out the cold reality of the situation” could give the strong impression that you accept it.

Nope. Recognising something has happened and isn’t going away is a million miles away from aggreeing with it.

Which clearly means that you’ll accept Ukraine as a Satellite or wholly subsumed into Russia.

I suppose if the choice is myself, my entire family and all my friends dying a horrible grisly death in a post-nuclear war world, or Ukraine being not being a wholly independent state then yeah I’ll accept the latter. Who wouldn’t? I strongly hope it doesn’t come to either of those scenarios but I doubt one can be avoided without the other coming to fruition.

To add to the Putin will not stop, the Kremlin papers from a few weeks ago suggested that he’s not going to stop, that he is going to cause more disruption and arguments in any way they can, and that Ukraine is not the end goal either – basically world domination is the end goal.

I suppose if the choice is myself, my entire family and all my friends dying a horrible grisly death in a post-nuclear war world, or Ukraine being not being a wholly independent state then yeah I’ll accept the latter. Who wouldn’t?

What about when Putin invades Poland, Czechia, Estonia, Finland…. Because that’s his plan. Success in Ukraine would be succor to his global ambitions and his brutal way of behaving. It would get a lot worse.

Who wouldn’t?

Ukranians.

Anyway, Daz’s reality distortion field aside, this is interesting listening on the factors that fuel domestic terrorism in russia:

https://inmoscowsshadows.buzzsprout.com/1026985/14754213-in-moscow-s-shadows-140-terror-and-totalitarianism

dying a horrible grisly death in a post-nuclear war world

What makes you think that Putin would use nuclear weapons on 1. a bit of the world that he thinks is his, and 2. the birthplace of the Russian people? And as stupid as that second one should sound in a rational world.  I would invite you read Putin’s rationale for invasion that he wrote way back in July 2021. That has by the by, nothing what so ever to do with NATO or the EU

You can read it here on the Kremlin site  

Just want to point out that (admittedly only from reading the last page or so) that it seems like Dazh made the quite blunt statement that (paraphrase) “I’ll accept anything in preference to nuclear war”, and everyone’s interpreting that to mean “I’ll accept anything in preference to the chance of nuclear war”.

It’s quite different. I’m inclined to agree with the first version, hard as it may be.

Theres only one person threatening nuclear war, the same as he does whenever he doesnt like something. It certainly isnt NATO.

Neville Chamberlains views during the rise of Hitler were from the same script. How did that go?

Give Ukraine what they need to defend themselves. Now. If we had followed your thoughts early in the war, Kyiv would have fallen, and Putins hordes would now be on the Polish/Romanian border with all his armys might intact.

Russia is only under threat from its own policies.