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EU bans Belarusian airlines from European skies

bbc.com

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Re: EU bans Belarusian airlines from European skies

#411

Post by thu2111 »

alkonaut wrote: post #395
thu2111 wrote: post #394

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That strategy has, I think, never worked in the history of dictatorships. It probably won't start working now.

It at least has a very low cost so even if it has marginal success it seems like an easy call. However, it can’t stop there. In this case, unfortunately, it has to get worse before it gets better for the average citizen in Belarus.

I used to agree. These days I don't. I find it very harsh and unsympathetic to use a strategy that can be summed up as, "we will make your life as shit as possible in the hope that despite having no access to military power you nonetheless start a civil war in which you will probably die without achieving anything, and if you don't, you just won a civil war so your whole country is destroyed and lots of people hate you for it".

If the west is serious about taking down foreign dictators it needs to man up and start assassinating them, either with hit squads or drone strikes. No pussyfooting around and hiding behind the hope that locals will get the blood on their hands so the foreign bureaucrats don't have to. And if the EU isn't willing to do that, then it should be trying to do what it can to make life better for the Belarusians, just like a doctor would try to help a sick patient even if they spent a lifetime smoking and thus in some way might have some culpability for it.

Re: EU bans Belarusian airlines from European skies

#412

Post by pydry »

mopsi wrote: post #176
pydry wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Holidaymakers who were unlikely to be Lukashenko supporters in the first place and who now can't come home and tell people how great the West is. I don't think he's losing out that badly here. Indeed, increased isolation from the West may have been a goal from the outset. Having the West do it for him is even better.

> Holidaymakers who were unlikely to be Lukashenko supporters in the first place and who now can't come home and tell people how great the West is. Now even his supporters have to make every foreign flight through Moscow as a constant reminder of what great relations the potato czar has with rest of the world. Dictatorship are very sensitive to image issues (see Winnie the Pooh). On the practical side, it starves Bel…

>Dictatorship are very sensitive to image issues (see Winnie the Pooh).

Of course. That's why they goaded the West into sanctioning them for the most hypocritical reason they could.

"Western hypocrisy" is a key plank of Russian propaganda that works decently well at keeping them suspicious, afraid and angry at us. It's used similarly by Democrats on their base against Republicans and vice versa to great effect at keeping the base fired up.

Belarus is not Russia but I'm sure the same applies there.

>The stunt will cost them hundreds of millions

This is probably why RT stated that Putin was willing to step in to help out financially. I expect that was actually even agreed ahead of time.whol

Lukashenko on the whole would probably prefer that as much foreign aid and investment came from Russia as possible. It's his opponents who will want to demonstrate all the great stuff Western investment can do for the country.

And, of course, Putin would prefer it if we severed links given the strategic importance of the country. He doesn't want another Ukraine.

Re: EU bans Belarusian airlines from European skies

#413

Post by simonh »

jcranmer wrote: post #316
simonh wrote: post #247

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To me, full democracy just means a democratic system which enjoys the consent of the majority of the people. It could be parliamentary, presidential, proportional representation, direct democracy, whatever. I don't think outsiders or third parties have a right to decide whether a system of rule that enjoys the support of the people 'counts' or not. That's entirely independent of my view that direct democracy is a ter…

> * We can see this with the Brexit referendum. For 2 years the UK had a government and parliament that didn't want to leave the EU responsible for implementing legislation and a treaty to leave it. The result was political paralysis. Fortunately we now have a government aligned with the goal, but that's just pure luck. That's not entirely accurate. Theresa May called a snap election within a year (explicitly on the…

That's quite right, this is the trickiest issue. However if Brexit had been decided in the usual way then responsibility for addressing and resolving that issue would have been clear. So a party would have put Brexit in their manifesto, campaigned on the issue of delivering Brexit, and perhaps held a referendum to double-guarantee they had a solid mandate to do it. This is the exact process we followed to join 'Europe' in the first place, after all.

Instead the May government utterly collapsed the moment it got anywhere close to actually delivering anything. We're very, very lucky that Boris ended up leading the Conservative Party on a deliver Brexit platform and got a solid majority.

And I say this as a dedicated, thoroughgoing Remainer that will never forgive Boris for his sheer political opportunism over Brexit in the first place. But still. My attitude is, we eventually did have an election on the issue and a government committed to the goal, so let's get on and do it, and get it over with.

Re: EU bans Belarusian airlines from European skies

#415

Post by jiofih »

newdude116 wrote: post #400
jiofih wrote: post #384

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What statistics? What happens in 10-30 years? You haven’t provided a single data point in the context of this conversation. The graph showing the growth over centuries is logarithmic, so that blue line going a little south is actually a massive deviation from an exponential curve and completely disproves the point. That article talks about 100-300 years as the first physical limits if you kept this absurd growth rate…

"The country’s energy consumption is down to 1990 levels." Yes, sure. Since they outsourced the energy intensive productions. But since you don't want to understand it, it is meaningless to try to explain it to you.

Again you’re stating something to support your worldview based purely on opinion.

The German Industrial Production Index has been sitting at basically the same levels since 1979, check for yourself.

Re: EU bans Belarusian airlines from European skies

#416

Post by K0balt »

cutemonster wrote: post #373
proxysna wrote: post #372

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I appreciate your concern, but lets be real. I am a nobody, Raman was a prominent opposition figure even before aug 2020 and ex-editor of NEXTA (biggest belarusian opposition channel on tg). He was arrested because of his relation to NEXTA. Me? I am just a dude, who works\lives abroad and has to deal with shit that my beloved leader pulls off. Reason why people in Belarus are getting arrested for stuff like commentin…

> socials that are working with cops ... whatsapp WhatsApp?

While it may vary by the government or jurisdiction in question, whatsapp is definitely compromised at the LE/Judicial level in some places. This leads me to believe that in fact it is universally compromised, though I have no direct evidence to support that conclusion.

Re: EU bans Belarusian airlines from European skies

#417

Post by ryanlol »

K0balt wrote: post #416
cutemonster wrote: post #373

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> socials that are working with cops ... whatsapp WhatsApp?

While it may vary by the government or jurisdiction in question, whatsapp is definitely compromised at the LE/Judicial level in some places. This leads me to believe that in fact it is universally compromised, though I have no direct evidence to support that conclusion.

Be more specific.

Compromised how? Which places?

Re: EU bans Belarusian airlines from European skies

#418

Post by piva00 »

briandear wrote: post #357
londons_explore wrote: post #221

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are a few countries who will pretty much let anybody in. Migrants often bring with them skills that the locals don't have, and in any mass migration, those who migrate (vs stay where they are) tend to be the fitter, smarter, richer people. The main reason not to take migrants is you might see substantial economic losses as migrants send income back home to support family. You might alienate your existing popula…

> in any mass migration, those who migrate (vs stay where they are) tend to be the fitter, smarter, richer people. Completely not true. Look at the migrations to the EU, as well as to the US. The “smarter, fitter, richer” people aren’t mass migrating from Latin America. Not at any significant percentage at least.

> The “smarter, fitter, richer” people aren’t mass migrating from Latin America

Not mass migrating but it isn't completely untrue either here in the EU, I keep meeting other Latin Americans like me who emigrated away and plan to never come back. It has only grown the past 5 years, of course I'm in a bubble of tech workers but most of the engineers I know who got a job in the EU from Latin America are some of the smartest and richer ones.

Re: EU bans Belarusian airlines from European skies

#419

Post by ranndino »

jacquesm wrote: post #352
stjohnswarts wrote: post #317

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You think Russia would risk having their planes banned all through Europe to give a two bit dictator a reporter?

They shot down a passenger jet not all that long ago and got away with it.

That's not true actually. Not a fan of the modern Russia but a fan of accuracy. That plane was shot down by rebel Donbass forces by mistake. They were not well trained and mistook it for a military plane.

Re: EU bans Belarusian airlines from European skies

#420

Post by nomercy400 »

FinanceAnon wrote: post #178
nomercy400 wrote: post #91

I am surprised Hungary agreed. And Poland. The governments in those nations are not shy to touch on the freedoms of their population, and often disagree with the EU when the EU points these things out. Also Poland being directly next to Belarus will affect their relations.

Just because a country has an authoritarian government, doesn't mean it supports other authoritarian governments.

Isn't blaming a government for being authoritarian whilst being authoritarian alike shooting yourself in the foot?
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