341–350 of 470 posts
Earlier quoted context omitted.
US deployments aren’t generally against the will of host nations. There certainly is plenty of coercion involved in having so many deployments, but plenty of it has to do with strategic alliances.
Syria and South American countries have US military by force.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don't think NATO particularly wanted to include Ukraine, but they definitely don't want Russia to be able to dictate who is allowed to be included. Russia is aware of this, which is why in order to set the grounds for an invasion of Ukraine, they repeatedly asked NATO "please swear that you'll never let Ukraine into NATO" with the added non-starter of "remove troops from existing NATO countries". And when NATO righ…
The EU still has to consider how other nations will react to their policies. Russia and China are still in the 50-100 years ago mentality and will ruthlessly enforce having buffer states between major powers. Sharing a border is simply not in their interests and they would rather destroy Ukraine than allow it to join the EU. The US would do the same thing. Just think about how much we freaked out over the Cuban Missi…
To be clear, their policy is "we will not ban nations from joining on the basis that a non-EU nation objects". I think they're aware that this may make some nations unhappy, but it's better than the alternative, which would make it very difficult to ever expand the EU (beyond how difficult it is already).
> Just think about how much we freaked out over the Cuban Missile Crisis.
Notice how that resolved though; the United States pledged (and followed through) with not invading or overthrowing Cuba. Cuba stayed as a USSR-aligned state on the border of the United States. Similarly in the Ukraine situation, Russia pledged to respect the sovereignty of Ukraine if they voluntarily handed over the nuclear weapons the USSR had planted there. Unlike the Cuban Missile Crisis, Russia has no intention of following through with its promises.
> If China struck a deal with Canada to put a military base in Vancouver, we'd lose our shit, but we act shocked and insulted when Russia does the same.
I agree that the US would panic, but Ukraine didn't strike any deals. They weren't in the process of joining NATO (and likely wouldn't be admitted due to "external territorial disputes") and they weren't in the process of joining the EU. In addition, the EU doesn't put military bases anywhere.
The analogous situation would be if the United States invaded Canada because China refused to promise that they wouldn't make exclusive trade deals with Canada, and also refused to promise to remove soldiers from Hong Kong because they made the US feel unsafe.
Anyone have thoughts on how this all pans out? I think that the only way out is that Ukraine cuts off its arm to save the head. It acknowledges the territories as lost, and consolidates what it has left. But I'm not sure how they do that without: 1. The current leader losing legitimacy, and likely resigning. 2. Opening the door for other parts of Ukraine to split off. 3. Opening the door to Russia to meddle in other…
As you've mentioned, I don't see NATO or Europe taking direct risks for Ukraine. But I expect that once Russia invades Ukraine proper and takes Kyiv, US and European sanctions will be the most severe we've seen. Russia has done a lot to prepare for this with limiting export dependency to just what the West needs (energy) and holding a lot of foreign currency. I will be interested to see what the UK does as they have been highly enriched by Putin's henchmen and acting as a playground for oligarchs.
Ukraine has been bumbling along since the Soviet Union collapsed and is in no position to do anything about it. There isn't enough pain to inflict on Russia to stop it from taking what it wants (which I believe is a infantile and subservient Ukraine). Immediately after the Soviet Union collapsed likely would have been a better time to prepare. The countries that took the reemergence of an aggressive Russia seriously right after the cold war have mostly fared better with stronger economies and ties to Europe to protect themselves. Even if all went well it would still be a very difficult challenge for Ukraine to get out of the sphere of Russia.
This is state craft so I wouldn't think along the lines of this year or this decade. I would look out decades to try and see where this is all going. I don't believe that Ukraine will be an EU or NATO member as long as Russia has its current military and economic capabilities. I speculate that Ukraine will be a vassal state for the rest of my lifetime. I would have to see some major fractures in the Russian political position and its economic and military capabilities for my opinion to change. Maybe post Putin the politics changes, I'm not clear on succession planning here. Maybe oil and gas prices go way down and Russia can't field an aggressive military. But I can't see anyone take back Ukraine once Russia invades and changes the political course in Ukraine.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
The EU still has to consider how other nations will react to their policies. Russia and China are still in the 50-100 years ago mentality and will ruthlessly enforce having buffer states between major powers. Sharing a border is simply not in their interests and they would rather destroy Ukraine than allow it to join the EU. The US would do the same thing. Just think about how much we freaked out over the Cuban Missi…
> Russia and China are still in the 50-100 years ago mentality and will ruthlessly enforce having buffer states between major powers. And having "50-100 year ago mentality" doesn't mean "unintelligent" either, it means "no bs wokeness" and "meticulously calculating", which is a crucially important skill in modern day global politics, perhaps even more important than 50 years ago.
My personal opinion: All this Ukraine stuff is also supported by China. I bet they are ready to buy Russian oil and gas to compensate even if this costs them more than getting them from the open market. Why? Because this is a wonderful test drive to check how the West (sorry for the approximation) is reacting to a country theoretically supported by the West being invaded by another one. For me, the next one on the li…
It's not a good test drive. The situation around Taiwan is fundamentally different and can't be compared. The US or even EU just care soso about Ukraine. The lost of trust of partners, lost face and potential follow up actions and consequences are things they care about more then the Ukraine itself. Hence why they didn't get too much involved in recent years. But at least the US cares _a lot_ about Taiwan and the EU…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
The EU still has to consider how other nations will react to their policies. Russia and China are still in the 50-100 years ago mentality and will ruthlessly enforce having buffer states between major powers. Sharing a border is simply not in their interests and they would rather destroy Ukraine than allow it to join the EU. The US would do the same thing. Just think about how much we freaked out over the Cuban Missi…
> The EU still has to consider how other nations will react to their policies. To be clear, their policy is "we will not ban nations from joining on the basis that a non-EU nation objects". I think they're aware that this may make some nations unhappy, but it's better than the alternative, which would make it very difficult to ever expand the EU (beyond how difficult it is already). > Just think about how much we fre…
This is actually untrue. Ukraine has repeatedly stated their intention to become a NATO member state. It's even written into their Constitution. The Vilnius Summit joint declaration (which Ukraine's pro-Russia President at the time did not sign and ended up with his government being removed...) included language from the EU affirming Ukraine's intention to become a member state. Ukraine is currently preparing to put in its application to join the EU and has been formally working on this since Jan 2021.
Ever since the Eastern Partnership (2009) and Ukraine-EU Association Agreement (2012), Russia has been publicly condemning this chosen course of action.
Both NATO and the EU have been courting Ukraine since the early 2000s.
You should check this out: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JrMiSQAGOS4 it's worth a watch.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> All this Ukraine stuff is also supported by China Tolerated is a better word. There was ample ex ante evidence that the offensive was to be delayed until after the Olympics. And Russia being more beholden to Beijing as an energy supplier is certainly not bad. But supporting separatism, in any form, isn’t great for Beijing. And China has relations with Ukraine. Huawei has contracts. And China buys Ukrainian weapons.
Some Russians view Ukraine as legitimately part of Russia. China views Taiwan as part of China. China also wishes to garner as much support as possible for its desired takeover of Taiwan. The recent agreement between Russia and China spells out each country’s respective views on these matters. They are in agreement with each other.
RU actions are against PRC interests in terms of international norms. Also PRC has not spelled out alignment on RU/UKR issue in terms of sovereignty, while Russian did endorse PRC's sovereignty position on TW, PRC statement of the meeting side stepped RU position on UKR. PRC position has been RU security interests should be respected, preferably via political settlement (Minsk) that doesn't involve violation of Ukrainian sovereignty. The parallel is PRC security interest in taking TW (again a domestic issue) should be respected, without outsiders like US violating Chinese sovereignty.
It's going to be interesting to see how PRC attempts to square the circle now that Putin has invaded and stated UKR has no sovereignty.
That is not remotely pulling the plug. This is "thinking about it" again. They already stopped accreditation a few weeks ago, otherwise it would already transport gas as the pipeline is already filled. They just say that they have officially stopped the process which they more or less already did. I think in a year it might come online again if the news cycle is on another topic. Overall it will be much more expensiv…
Markets disagree here. The ruble tumbled as well as the main Russian index, 500% more than the USA/Europe did. Russia has a lot to lose.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
It should be extremely simple tax structure. It's not about intimidation. Nord Stream 2 intention was to make it way more profitable than other routes so Putin can freely mess with countries those other routes go through. By firmly taxing whatever comes out of NS2 you nullify it's attractiveness for consumers. And giving Ukraine this much money would strengthen it economically so they can adavance faster towards west…
Ukraine is still a kleptocracy. The money would be largely stolen. Also, there is no such thing as "irrevocably". Ukraine had just such irrevocable security guarantees granted when they agreed to let go of their nuclear inheritance. There is no way to stop a determined despot via diplomacy or economical pressures. Putin is trying to replicate the first few years of Hitler's intimidation blitz and the world would do w…
That's true but it's true of any country to one degree of another. European union has a lot of mechanism for preventing misapplication of funds it awards to countries.
> Putin is trying to replicate the first few years of Hitler's intimidation blitz and the world would do well to not appease him in any way.
That's pure BS straight from the mouths of propagandist of USA military industrial complex that Putin is godsent enemy that justifies their existence with zero risk.
Putin just wanted to grab for himself a new coal mine which two republics of eastern Ukraine really are.
He just repeats scenario from Georgia (the one near Russia) .