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Japan has declared today that the southern Kurils is their sovereign territory

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Re: Japan has declared today that the southern Kurils is their sovereign territory

#291

Post by jhbadger »

Giorgi wrote: post #289
jhbadger wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are confusing the motivation of Russia (which was indeed to build military bases) with that of the oppressed minorities. Again, these people are not "Russians". They are traditionally Muslim peoples who speak languages completely unrelated to Russian.

There are gazillion of people in Russian federation who are not "Russians" culturally, Abkhazians speak Russian and South Ossetians are invaders into Georgia from North Ossetia which is... Part of Russia. Also, there are no "oppressed minorities" in Georgia, never was. That would be part of Russian propaganda.

Abkhazians speak Abkhazian (a Circassic language) and Ossetians speak Ossetian (related to Farsi). Sure, many of them may speak Russian too. But so do Georgians. All these areas were part of the Soviet Union which imposed Russian as the standard language. But people still kept their native languages. The point is that these people want to live where they do, speaking their own languages -- they have no desire to go "back" to Russia, but on the other hand they have no desire to be assimilated into Georgian culture either. Why is this so hard to understand?

Re: Japan has declared today that the southern Kurils is their sovereign territory

#292

Post by EGreg »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #168
EGreg wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hawaii? Philippines / Guam / etc? Guantanamo? Panama canal? But I see Russia invading and occupying, not annexing (unless you mean stationing troops in the “independent” regions). They specifically disavow annexing unless the government refuses to negotiate and sign a peace agreement. They already did this exact playbook in the Russo-Georgian war, down to defending the two breakaway republics, the provocations, the “…

> I see Russia invading and occupying, not annexing Crimea was unambiguously annexed in 2014 [1]. The U.S. hasn’t annexed territory since WWII (the Marshall Islands) or WWI (the Virgin Islands and Kingman Reef). [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Annexation_of_Crimea_by_the_...

Wasn’t Hawaii given statehood in 1959? Is that not considered annexing?

Puerto Rico has referendums to join the US pretty often. Crimea had one and voted to join Russia. The international community could have placed more observers there, they just didnt do it in protest of the legitimacy of the very referendum itself. The international community just doesn’t recognize the principle of self-determination for any regions other than countries. That’s also why they accept Hong Kong being gifted top down by one empire to another.

Back during USSR days one guy (Khruschtchev) unilaterally gifted Crimea to Ukraine. Why is that more legitimate than an entire referendum? It’s not surprising how Crimea voted. It’s far more Russian than Ukrainian ethnically. If you want to blame anyone, blame Stalin who deported the vast majority of Crimean Tatars, otherwise they might have voted differently.

Re: Japan has declared today that the southern Kurils is their sovereign territory

#293

Post by TheCoelacanth »

EGreg wrote: post #292
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I see Russia invading and occupying, not annexing Crimea was unambiguously annexed in 2014 [1]. The U.S. hasn’t annexed territory since WWII (the Marshall Islands) or WWI (the Virgin Islands and Kingman Reef). [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Annexation_of_Crimea_by_the_...

Wasn’t Hawaii given statehood in 1959? Is that not considered annexing? Puerto Rico has referendums to join the US pretty often. Crimea had one and voted to join Russia. The international community could have placed more observers there, they just didnt do it in protest of the legitimacy of the very referendum itself. The international community just doesn’t recognize the principle of self-determination for any regio…

A territory becoming a state is not annexation. The US annexed Hawaii in 1898.

Puerto Rico is already part of the US.

The referendum in Crimea was run by Russia as a pretext after it had already invaded. It is extremely doubtful that it represents the actual views of the people living there.

Re: Japan has declared today that the southern Kurils is their sovereign territory

#294

Post by antiterra »

nullifidian wrote: post #290
antiterra wrote: post #203

There’s no question in my mind that this is Putin continuing to follow the Foundations of Geopolitics playbook: > Russia should manipulate Japanese politics by offering the Kuril Islands to Japan and provoking anti-Americanism From https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foundations_of_Geopolitics

Dugin has no power or influence on the Russian elite. Only clueless westerners post links to this book. Putin's imperialism is of his own biographical origins, and there is no shortage of other nationalist/pro-imperialist authors. Dugin is just one of the more intellectual ones, which isn't actually helpful in getting him popular among the Putin's "elite".

Whether it was influential or merely representative of a Eurasianist Russian Idea, the book has been prescient as a guideline for over 23 years. I wouldn’t expect it to be directly held contemporary doctrine. After all, the world is a bit different than it was back then.

This does not rely on any current influence by Dugin, who did not write the book entirely on his own.

Re: Japan has declared today that the southern Kurils is their sovereign territory

#295

Post by smcl »

tut-urut-utut wrote: post #257
tut-urut-utut wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I would not be starkly opposed to Crimean independence, nor even Russian-integration, but in essence it looks like Russia took Crimea and then held a fake referendum to legitimize it. > But the question always goes - where do we draw lines. Should we support the concept of the Confederate States of America seceding from the United States? If California or Texas wanted to secede, should we support it? Wales? Okinawa…

Wanted to edit the previous comment, but it won't let me anymore. I usually don't comment about downvotes, but here I'd really like to know the reason? What is so controversial about giving the right of self-determination to everyone? If everyone, regardless of the colour, race of gender has equal right, why some people should, and some should not determine if they want to live in one country? You can even choose you…

I didn’t downvote but one glaring issue is that you’re well of the mark here:

> Allowing Crimea but not California, or allowing Kosovo but not Mexico and allowing Slovakia and not Catalonia

Slovakia had a popular recognised referendum and decided to vote for the velvet divorce

Catalonia had an informal referendum that was not legally recognised, but afaik there is still technically a path to do so.

Kosovo - I do not know a great deal about Kosovo.

California can secede and there doesn’t seem to be a huge interest in doing so.

Mexico … idk where you’re going with this one.

But importantly in Crimea the Russian “little green men” showed up, took over, hastily ran a referendum that was very dubious and happened to just coincidentally deliver the result that said exactly what the Russians wanted. It was a fix.

I think you know this though, and that you’re engaging in what’s known as “sealioning” :-)

Re: Japan has declared today that the southern Kurils is their sovereign territory

#296

Post by fomine3 »

FpUser wrote: post #136
Armisael16 wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Article 9 doesn’t really mean what it says, at least in practice. If Japan is attacked the state won’t just roll over and die - it’ll try to defend itself (hence the JSDF). You can read it as forbidding offensive war, but if Japan has claimed that those islands are part of Japan for a while then there’s enough of an argument for it being defensive war that no one will much care.

So repeating something long enough suddenly changes a reality?

Yes, current the constitution of Japan is very hard to change so it had never changed. Still govt need to do some military-ish operation so they changed how to interpret multiple times.

Re: Japan has declared today that the southern Kurils is their sovereign territory

#297

Post by fomine3 »

SideburnsOfDoom wrote: post #42
Freak_NL wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When asking the question “what is the value of those islands/rocks-in-the-sea?” the answer is always 'EEZ boundaries'. I.e., having extra bits of land in the middle of the sea enlarges your exclusive economic zone where you can exploit resources in the ocean and below the ocean bed (oil) significantly. Which is why so many disputes exist over really boring bits of rock jutting out of the water.

See also: Rockall, a rock in the North Atlantic which is "25 metres (80 ft) wide and 31 m (102 ft) long" all of which gets wet in a storm. The UK claims it as territory. 1) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rockall

Japan's case https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Okinotorishima

Re: Japan has declared today that the southern Kurils is their sovereign territory

#298

Post by EGreg »

TheCoelacanth wrote: post #293
EGreg wrote: post #292

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wasn’t Hawaii given statehood in 1959? Is that not considered annexing? Puerto Rico has referendums to join the US pretty often. Crimea had one and voted to join Russia. The international community could have placed more observers there, they just didnt do it in protest of the legitimacy of the very referendum itself. The international community just doesn’t recognize the principle of self-determination for any regio…

A territory becoming a state is not annexation. The US annexed Hawaii in 1898. Puerto Rico is already part of the US. The referendum in Crimea was run by Russia as a pretext after it had already invaded. It is extremely doubtful that it represents the actual views of the people living there.

Why is it extremely doubtful given the demographics and the fact that they were a Russian territory annexed to Crimea without ever being asked?

Re: Japan has declared today that the southern Kurils is their sovereign territory

#299

Post by TheCoelacanth »

EGreg wrote: post #298
TheCoelacanth wrote: post #293

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A territory becoming a state is not annexation. The US annexed Hawaii in 1898. Puerto Rico is already part of the US. The referendum in Crimea was run by Russia as a pretext after it had already invaded. It is extremely doubtful that it represents the actual views of the people living there.

Why is it extremely doubtful given the demographics and the fact that they were a Russian territory annexed to Crimea without ever being asked?

The referendum was run while the region was being held at gunpoint by an invading force. There is no possible way to hold a legitimate referendum in those circumstances.

Re: Japan has declared today that the southern Kurils is their sovereign territory

#300

Post by EGreg »

TheCoelacanth wrote: post #299
EGreg wrote: post #298

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why is it extremely doubtful given the demographics and the fact that they were a Russian territory annexed to Crimea without ever being asked?

The referendum was run while the region was being held at gunpoint by an invading force. There is no possible way to hold a legitimate referendum in those circumstances.

Either way regions are "held at gunpoint" by your definition. It's either going to be from one government or another. For example just a few years ago:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2017_Catalan_independence_refe...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2017_Kurdistan_Region_independ...

The key is whether the referendum actually got held and there was a large enough turnout that it was meaningful. No one was stopping more observers from coming and overseeing it, including whether coersion was happening. And anyway, what difference would guns make in how people voted? Because I don't see how the soldiers could possibly know the way people voted in a closed booth. So even if there were people with guns out there, that by itself wouldn't affect how people vote. The most they could do is try to force people to the voting booth, as they do in Australia for example, or try to keep them from showing up, as they do in Southern US states.

And besides, when it comes to Russia or Belarus, it doesn't matter that the legitimate government is dominant in the region instead of "an invading force", you don't trust the outcome of the referendums anyway. For example, Belarus just had one a week ago, do you trust the results?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2022_Belarusian_constitutional...

Finally, a technical point: Russia had 25,000 troops in the Crimean peninsula, which it was allowed to have according to the Partition Treaty about the Black Sea Fleet, so it wasn't an "invasion" there: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Partition_Treaty_on_the_Status....

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