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Estonia, allies to trigger NATO Article 4

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Re: Estonia, allies to trigger NATO Article 4

#301

Post by AniseAbyss »

rjzzleep wrote: post #271
ayngg wrote: post #260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is happening because the west has no leverage and asymmetrical priorities. Russia -really- cares that Ukraine stays out of NATO, probably to the point where they would scorched earth the country before it joined, and the west only kinda cares about Ukraine comparatively, as demonstrated in 2014 and 2008. If they actually really care, sanctions don't mean much. Makes me wonder why the west thought the third time…

> Makes me wonder why the west thought the third time would be the charm in this case Ignorance and arrogance, but mostly arrogance.

Yeah no. I'm sorry for Ukraine but how many people are willing to die over it? War was never on the table and Putin knew it so he acted.

Re: Estonia, allies to trigger NATO Article 4

#302

Post by MobiusHorizons »

jaspax wrote: post #139
jl6 wrote: post #121

https://oec.world/en/profile/country/rus Russia’s exports are >50% oil and gas products. The biggest retaliation the West can make right now is a commitment to a rapid exit at unprecedented speed from the oil economy, in favor of renewables.

It's basically a Mexican standoff, right? In the timeframe of months to years, Europe needs to buy Russian oil and gas as much as Russia needs to sell them. Neither side can unilaterally break off the relationship without suffering massive harm. Getting to full energy independence with renewables is a project that will take a decade or more, not something that you can do in the timeframe of the current conflict.

If they can make it through this winter, there may be time before next winter to ship LNG there from the US. I know the US is expanding their capability of LNG shipping, but I don't know how the capacity compares to the size of the need in Europe. I think the question will be if LNG exports from other countries can make up the difference in time.

Re: Estonia, allies to trigger NATO Article 4

#303

Post by xroche »

jl6 wrote: post #121

https://oec.world/en/profile/country/rus Russia’s exports are >50% oil and gas products. The biggest retaliation the West can make right now is a commitment to a rapid exit at unprecedented speed from the oil economy, in favor of renewables.

> The biggest retaliation the West can make right now is a commitment to a rapid exit at unprecedented speed from the oil economy, in favor of renewables.

You can't exit from the oil economy with renewable such as wind or solar due to their non-predictability.

If you want to stop importing Russian gaz, you need nuclear energy.

Re: Estonia, allies to trigger NATO Article 4

#304

Post by azeirah »

Giorgi wrote: post #59
chinathrow wrote: post #43

It makes me sad, angry and confused that Putin is showing force. What an absolute madman.

"showing force" is such a light way to describe it, this is full scale invasion into Europe, with the target to annihilate whole country while impotent civilized west watches it unfold in the fears that they may be next.

Dutch national news channel NOS had a historian and journalist called Hubert Smeets on. I'm Dutch, and will paraphrase what he said:

Interviewer: "What can the west do, what can the NATO do? It's said that military action is not going to happen, why?"

Smeets: "Very little. The consequences would be very large. This night, in his speech, Putin insinuated how Russia is a global nuclear superpower, and he said that the unthinkable could become thinkable. So that's off the table. All we can do is take economic and political measures; sanctioning, even if we don't know what the effect of these sanctions will be. And turning him into a political pariah, even China said Putin should not pull through on this evasion."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hm7JiO4tY_Y&t=1036s

Re: Estonia, allies to trigger NATO Article 4

#305

Post by mopsi »

vetinari wrote: post #296
raducu wrote: post #275

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Russia does not care about Ukraine joining NATO, Russia has nukes. Russian politicians care about Ukraine being a prospering democracy and a model for russian citizens. That's it.

In order to use nukes effectively, you need to have second strike capabilities. You know, the 'M' in 'MAD'. Ukraine in NATO means US nukes on Russia border, tipping the balance. It would be similar to Russia placing their bases and weapons into Canada or Mexico.

> Ukraine in NATO means US nukes on Russia border, tipping the balance.

No, it does not. A number of Eastern European countries are in NATO and none of them have American nuclear weapons.

Where does this silly idea come that after joining NATO, American missiles somehow appear in the new member? Modern-day NATO is a cooperation platform for joint exercises etc, not some missile club that starts delivering ICBMs every month.

Re: Estonia, allies to trigger NATO Article 4

#306

Post by trhway »

rebuilder wrote: post #156
trhway wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On the main, "voice of the state", the 1st channel of Russian TV they have just discussed that the West would introduce more sanctions, yet half a year down the road the West would just get used to the situation.

I wonder what that reflects. Sanctions would not be very popular among the Russian population, is this just the regime calming down the populace? Or does it genuinely reflect the calculus here?

Realistically Russia can't occupy any significant part of Ukraine, nor Kiev in particular - tens of millions of pissed-off resisting Ukrainians with many taking up arms (on Ukrainian TV they said that they already give arms to such civilians as former police, and Zelenskiy said that they would give arms to all "willing and capable to defend the country") would shake off any army, and any such occupation attempt would be very unpopular in Russia too. Such scenario would be fiasco and catastrophe for Russia and especially for Putin's regime and would make sanctions issue a noise. On the other side if Putin goes "only" for enlarged Donbass zone - like making Donetsk unreachable for Ukraine artillery, etc. - and limits the all-Ukrainian strikes only to military objects as it was officially declared then such conflict will soon again go back to slow-burn/frozen state, and that as usual would take international attention away from it.

Re: Estonia, allies to trigger NATO Article 4

#307

Post by krisoft »

mise_en_place wrote: post #85
chinathrow wrote: post #43

It makes me sad, angry and confused that Putin is showing force. What an absolute madman.

What’s strange to me is that Putin is behaving a lot like Saddam did when he invaded Kuwait. So he either must really fear regime change of some sort will happen soon, or thinks the West is OK with this.

So how many nukes did this Saddam guy have? Do you think that can change the calculation?

Re: Estonia, allies to trigger NATO Article 4

#308

Post by bitcharmer »

HL33tibCe7 wrote: post #217
jl6 wrote: post #121

https://oec.world/en/profile/country/rus Russia’s exports are >50% oil and gas products. The biggest retaliation the West can make right now is a commitment to a rapid exit at unprecedented speed from the oil economy, in favor of renewables.

Unfortunately countries like Germany have made completely idiotic moves in the past months in the exact opposite direction. Hopefully other sanctions will also help. Cutting them off from the international banking system, for example.

Sadly have to agree. Nordstream is just Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact 2.0 (modulo violence).

Re: Estonia, allies to trigger NATO Article 4

#309

Post by dvt »

sillysaurusx wrote: post #254

I'm trying to help people evacuate from Ukraine. If you know anyone who wants out, DM me: Twitter thread: https://twitter.com/theshawwn/status/1496761074258952193 Telegram: https://t.me/theshawwn Urgent: If you know anyone near Kiev who can drive two elderly people plus one child to Romania, please contact me ASAP. (Note: Male drivers need to be under 18 or over 55, since they'll likely be stopped by law enforcement…

I can put you in touch with my dad (who knows a lot of people in Eastern Romania) to potentially help. We live in California, but are originally from Romania. Feel free to get in touch (email at the bottom of https://dvt.name/resume/).

Re: Estonia, allies to trigger NATO Article 4

#310

Post by cloutchaser »

cleancoder0 wrote: post #230
jl6 wrote: post #121

https://oec.world/en/profile/country/rus Russia’s exports are >50% oil and gas products. The biggest retaliation the West can make right now is a commitment to a rapid exit at unprecedented speed from the oil economy, in favor of renewables.

This is unfortunately highly unlikely. A lot of EU politics depends on the pockets of rich Russian oil firms. Just look at Austria, very rich but obviously Russian run EU country. (latest prime minister got fired by Russians even though Russia cyberarmy helped him win the elections. They decided he was no longer as compliant, so they leaked data many years after elections, Russian scandals several years before that e…

> latest prime minister got fired by Russians even though Russia cyberarmy helped him win the elections.

Actual source? This "russian disinformation" and "russian election manipulation" has zero credibility if you read and listen to anything other than CNN at this point. Please send me actual proof before making claims like this.

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