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Finland will seek NATO membership immediately

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Re: Finland will seek NATO membership immediately

#911

Post by signatoremo »

maratc wrote: post #838
mrits wrote: post #741

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't see it as a gamble at all. It would be a huge gamble for Russia to react to this though. The only possible negative outcome for Finland would also result in the removal of Russia from the planet.

> the removal of Russia from the planet The smartest people on the planet, since the 60's, have worked on this problem, and that's how we got to the concept of "mutually assured destruction" (triad and all that). That means that this "removal" would likely also mean a symmetrical "removal" of the West. I have a privilege to live in neither a NATO country nor Russia, nor anywhere near, so for me it still looks like a…

You just repeat Russia’s propaganda — thinly veiled thread of nuclear war. The fact is that Russia won’t use it, because nobody will attack Russia. They threaten to use nuke the same way North Korea show off their missile tests, because they have no other option. They know full well that using it will mean the end of Russia, even though it may cause severe damages, or the other end, to NATO countries

To Russia bullying, cyberwar, energy as weapon, or misinformation make a lot more sense.

Re: Finland will seek NATO membership immediately

#912

Post by signatoremo »

maratc wrote: post #867
watwut wrote: post #859

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In what way did Ukraine doubled down? What exact step made it more likely?

Ukraine has done joint "war games" with NATO ships in 2020 and 2021 (see HMS Dragon and HMS Defender for example). On November 11, 2021 Russian jets were scrambled to intercept "British spy plane". On November 29, 2021, a NATO summit was held in Riga, where the commitment to admitting Georgia and Ukraine was repeated, and the idea of sending NATO soldiers to Ukraine was discussed. Zelenskyy was quoted repeatedly sayi…

What do you think Russia did during that period? Did they stand still and let Ukraine alone? No, they bullied, harassed, raised the rhetoric against Ukraine. Putin questioned the validity of Ukraine. They fought the proxy war in Donbas. Is that your idea of being provoked?

Re: Finland will seek NATO membership immediately

#913

Post by bzbarsky »

bell-cot wrote: post #718
piokoch wrote: post #601

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The ship has sailed for Russia already. USA will not tolerate obstruction by Germany, France or Hungary. Recent meeting about Ukraine support was hold in Ramstein and this place was chosen intentionally - to show who is the master of the show and who should sit and listen. By attacking Ukraine Russia wanted to "push" NATO away from its borders, but it all went backwards - now they will have a new, 1300 km long border…

> In fact in case of military conflict [St.] Petersburg is lost, can be attacked from the West and the North by land and covered by long range rocket artillery... Ah...if I recall, the Germans - with a very large, experienced, and well-equipped army, at the time - assumed that St. Petersburg could be taken fairly easily back in 1941. That turned out not to be the case.

Just to make the numbers clear, Leningrad had something like 2.5 million residents in 1941. Depending on who is counting, somewhere between 600 thousand and a million died during the siege of Leningrad (largely from hunger, which is a separate long discussion).

There were also somewhere on the order of 350-400 thousand Soviet soldiers killed in the battles around Leningrad.

It's pretty hard to "take" a multi-million person city if the residents are willing to accept double-digit-percentage fatality rates to prevent it... The big unknown is always whether they will be willing to accept it.

Re: Finland will seek NATO membership immediately

#914

Post by fsloth »

refurb wrote: post #901
mcv wrote: post #618

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So do you agree that letting Russia invade Ukraine is wrong? Like I said, the US was wrong to invade Vietnam and Iraq, and Russia is just as wrong to invade Ukraine. > take a step back and ask "If I were Russia how would I view this?" As a big mistake. Russia is not getting anything out of this that's going to help Russia in any way. Russia has made itself the enemy of everybody around them. They've completely aliena…

What do you mean “letting Russia”? We didn’t let them do anything, they just did it. And maybe a better analogy is if your next door neighbor was blasting music at 2am. They’re wrong but you have a choice:1) call the cops and now you have a pissed of neighbor you get to live with forever or 2) go over and nicely ask them to turn it down. The neighbor is wrong and your right to call the cops but you may just screw you…

The war in Ukraine was not some neigborly dispute. It is a logical continuation of Russian imperialism which for centuries has used genocide and terror to suppress the masses.

That's how Russia gained it's land area. Pure fucking violence. I have no idea while western colonialism has been judged harshly no-one in the west has spent much effort lamenting the fates of the people subjugated by Russia.

This is not you neighbour blasting music. This is a narcist psycho terrorizing the neighbourhood by wanton burglary and murder. For years. The war in Ukraine is this psycho once again breaking in, shooting your grandmother, raping your son, stealing your washing machine and then telling everyone proudly how rightfull he was to do so.

They went in with the full intent to end Ukrainian identity once and for all. Pure genocide. The last time they tried this was by manufacturing a famine https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holodomor

What's the best analogue to think about this? While Germany was effectively de-nazified after ww2 Russia never de-stalinized or made amends for it's imperial stance. You really have to think of the Russian state you would think about Germany if it was run by third reich institutions.

Re: Finland will seek NATO membership immediately

#915

Post by maratc »

meepmorp wrote: post #910
maratc wrote: post #854

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interesting. And what would be your suggestions on the nuclear missiles that are based on Russian submarines that are wandering somewhere in the ocean?

Attack subs. The US alone has 60 nuclear ones, able to pursue Russian missile boats.

Considering that each nuclear sub has 80-100 warheads that are enough to destroy an entire continent, and considering it takes about an hour to fire them while underwater, do you suggest to attack the subs before they fire or after? How do you suggest to locate them?

Re: Finland will seek NATO membership immediately

#916

Post by maratc »

signatoremo wrote: post #912
maratc wrote: post #867

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ukraine has done joint "war games" with NATO ships in 2020 and 2021 (see HMS Dragon and HMS Defender for example). On November 11, 2021 Russian jets were scrambled to intercept "British spy plane". On November 29, 2021, a NATO summit was held in Riga, where the commitment to admitting Georgia and Ukraine was repeated, and the idea of sending NATO soldiers to Ukraine was discussed. Zelenskyy was quoted repeatedly sayi…

What do you think Russia did during that period? Did they stand still and let Ukraine alone? No, they bullied, harassed, raised the rhetoric against Ukraine. Putin questioned the validity of Ukraine. They fought the proxy war in Donbas. Is that your idea of being provoked?

I do not condone what Russia did. I just answered the question of how Ukraine doubled down on NATO.

Re: Finland will seek NATO membership immediately

#917

Post by maratc »

signatoremo wrote: post #911
maratc wrote: post #838

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the removal of Russia from the planet The smartest people on the planet, since the 60's, have worked on this problem, and that's how we got to the concept of "mutually assured destruction" (triad and all that). That means that this "removal" would likely also mean a symmetrical "removal" of the West. I have a privilege to live in neither a NATO country nor Russia, nor anywhere near, so for me it still looks like a…

You just repeat Russia’s propaganda — thinly veiled thread of nuclear war. The fact is that Russia won’t use it, because nobody will attack Russia. They threaten to use nuke the same way North Korea show off their missile tests, because they have no other option. They know full well that using it will mean the end of Russia, even though it may cause severe damages, or the other end, to NATO countries To Russia bullyi…

I can’t “repeat Russia’s propaganda” because I never listen to it. I stick to the facts. If Russian propaganda machine says that E=mc2, we can’t dismiss that because “Russian propaganda said so” and hence it must be a lie.

Re: Finland will seek NATO membership immediately

#918

Post by refurb »

fsloth wrote: post #914
refurb wrote: post #901

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What do you mean “letting Russia”? We didn’t let them do anything, they just did it. And maybe a better analogy is if your next door neighbor was blasting music at 2am. They’re wrong but you have a choice:1) call the cops and now you have a pissed of neighbor you get to live with forever or 2) go over and nicely ask them to turn it down. The neighbor is wrong and your right to call the cops but you may just screw you…

The war in Ukraine was not some neigborly dispute. It is a logical continuation of Russian imperialism which for centuries has used genocide and terror to suppress the masses. That's how Russia gained it's land area. Pure fucking violence. I have no idea while western colonialism has been judged harshly no-one in the west has spent much effort lamenting the fates of the people subjugated by Russia. This is not you ne…

It's odd that what you got from my analogy was "this is a neighborly dispute".

The statement I was making was "everyone benefits when problems are resolved with minimal bloodshed".

Do you disagree with that?

Re: Finland will seek NATO membership immediately

#919

Post by supergirl »

ochoseis wrote: post #839

To appreciate this may require some understanding of the historical context. I’d heard of the Winter War between Finland and the USSR prior to WWII, but had no idea that: - Finland was formerly part of the Russian Empire - Finland held out, but conceded a significant chunk of land to the USSR (Karelian Isthmus, now part of Russia…sounds kind of like eastern Ukraine) - The Soviet forces were generally inept - The West…

you “accidentally” left out some events: Finland fought alongside Nazi Germany against USSR, for example in the infamous siege of Leningrad

Re: Finland will seek NATO membership immediately

#920

Post by djhn »

stult wrote: post #840
Regic wrote: post #729

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The hungarian leading party (fidesz) has already declared they will not veto Ukrain's adoption to the EU so I personally really doubt they would veto Finland's entry to the NATO. They are playing a double-game (sorry, this probably doesn't make sense in english, it's a hungarian expression): Orban had a famous quote he said to EU leaders "don't listen to what I say, only to what I do", which in practice means alienat…

We don't have that phrase in English but it translates very clearly. Interestingly, your description of Orban's behavior exactly matches a somewhat famous game theoretic analysis of international leaders' behavior called "the two-level game." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Two-level_game_theory He's not unique in this regard. Every national leader has to consider the interests and perceptions of their domestic power b…

While you might be right in that there has been a recent shift in emphasis in Russian domestic coverage, in general Ukraine was being branded (and/or perceived) as having mild "NATO/EU/CIA interference" since the mid-2000s when the first serious aspirations to align with the West emerged. This escalated in the 2012-2014 period, with the Maidan movement painted broadly as heavily "NATO/EU/CIA orchestrated". The war in Ukraine has been waged "against the USA and The West" for its entire history.
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