411–420 of 521 posts
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Nobody expects the attack from Kaliningrad!
It would be very hard to pull off tho. Seeing as our neighbors would supply intel and equipment, while they have to cross the baltic sea in plain view. I mean they can barely take southern Ukraine.
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Finland, twice. My grand-grandfather got grenade shrapnel from Russians pouring over the border to murder men, rape women, and steal children.
That was pre-NATO in 1939-44. This counts as history, but not the reason to expand NATO post 2004.
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It is not background but U.S. centric perspective, that results in tunnel world view and bubble info diet, and man in question is analyst for Stratfor from 2000. Zeihan spent 12 years at Stratfor, eventually rising to vice-president.
For anyone hailing from russia to be taken seriously, can you please answer these basic questions first: 1) Is Ukraine a sovereign country that belongs to the free people of Ukraine?, 2) Who does Crimea belong to?, 3) is russian army committing war crimes in Ukraine, and 4) are you personally supporting the russians war of genocide on Ukraine?
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> the BRICS surpassed the G7 in terms of GDP and more countries are seeking to join. Is "the BRICS" something besides a joint meeting that happens every now and then? What's the point in joining a joint meeting that happens every now and then?
Yes, members are collaborating closer with each other and also members are a part of BRICS Development Bank which is basically a international bank for all members. I guess you could consider BRICS the closest thing to a rival of G7, but that's of course a simplification, the structures are different.
People and countries collaborate on things all the time, not necessarily because of a consultative organization they happen to be in.
It's more likely that those countries, they collaborate with each other "despite BRICS", or "despite G7" that because of it.
> BRICS Development Bank
But the same countries are also part of the International Monetary Fund, a kind-of-bank that is more or less the "G7 Bank" (G7 countries usually hold large ammounts of XDR votes in the IMF) and much more important.
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Of course that's not true. Nations can run out of at least three things required to wage war: resources, people, or will. And the Soviets were nowhere near running out of resources or people at the end of the Winter War, as shown by their ability to defeat a much more powerful enemy a few years later.
Yes, we all know Nazi Germany was only fighting against the Soviets between '40-'45. Truly, the use of U.S. and U.K. bombers that incapacitated Berlin's war machinery production never happened. The western side of the war was dealt with promptly, leaving only in the east, the Soviets to repent the Nazis. It was the pure will of the Soviets which led them to their, and only their victory. I don't even know what to say…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eastern_Front_(World_War_II)#C...
Edit: What do you think would have happened if they had sent 10m soldiers to Finland instead of 500k?
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What legitimate business russia has being in Ukraine at all? Let alone you just lying about russia only targeting military.
> What legitimate business russia has being in Ukraine at all? That's a strange question. There is very little common sense when a war is in progress. What legitimate business US had in Afghanistan? Such questions make zero sense. > Let alone you just lying about russia only targeting military. 30 minutes ago I jumped off a call with my parents in Ukraine. That's what they told me. That's what they've been telling me…
Ukraine did not attack russia. Russia attacked Ukraine and is killing Ukrainians. This war may just be the least morally ambiguous war out there.
Ukrainians are fighting for SURVIVAL. What are russians fighting for? So their pathetic muppet can live out his delusional fantasies? And what do you get for for trying to whitewash genocide here?
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> Why put up with Russia expansion Why put up with NATO expansion? Russia's expansion is also totally defensive! wink-wink > It's funny how Russia always pretend to be a victim It's ironic how Russia is always assumed to be a passive unresponsive corpse with no concerns or perspective and memory of its own. I wonder if it's even hypothetically possible for people to try to fairly grasp that perspective, otherwise Eur…
> It's ironic how Russia is always assumed to be a passive unresponsive corpse with no concerns or perspective and memory of its own. Indeed, and apologists of Russia often take this position: in their mind, Russia has no will and no ambitions, and only reacts to what the US is doing. Whatever they do is always the fault of americans and never a manifestation of their own will. Here in Eastern Europe the perspective…
Thank you for that perspective, but isn't it similar to the mindset of north-atlantics? "Russia is acting totally unprovoked, we hoped for totally good neighborhood trade and whatnot"
> Here in Eastern Europe the perspective is a bit different: Russia is a failed state that never developed a free and open civil society
I've been to Eastern Europe and my experience with it makes me feel like this is a European chauvinism mentality bit and a patting thyselves on the back.
> Their dictators tend to develop imperialist delusions from time to time and that makes them a direct threat to their neighbors and that's why everyone is so keen on building international cooperation to set up an unified front against Russian invasions.
Eh, Russia is fighting against imperialism (at least from its perspective) and that "international cooperation" largely consists of countries that had historical struggles with Russia, as you say.
> The ground under my feet has seen Russian invasions, raping, pillaging every 1-2 generations for as long as Russians have existed.
I always chuckle when Europeans try to do some historical moral grandstanding. Yo, man, Europe is the source of the most of genocides and is the birthplace of fascism and nazism. The people that had lived on the ground under your feet had been doing the same to everyone around, including Russians, all while being awfully proud of themselves. Even more so when spoken of Baltic states, but whatever, by all accounts, the historical perception of Europeans is that of pompous brutal animals.
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Very true. Though it's good to remember the Soviet Union did even worse things to Russia.
Eh, Moscow always ran the USSR. That’s a bit like lamenting that how messed up an abusers knuckles got after hitting it on folks faces for so long.
But anyway, I would encourage reading "The Revolution Betrayed: What Is the Soviet Union and Where Is It Going? Преданная революция: Что такое СССР и куда он идет?" by the exiled Soviet Bolshevik leader Leon Trotsky to get perspective whether the peaople (Narodnost народность)were really represented in the Soviet nomenklatura (номенклату́ра). At least almost every Finnish speaking representative from Karelia were "neutralized", leaving the previously most prosperious part of Finland in the state as it is now. Finland would not take it back even it was paid for it.
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> Why put up with NATO expansion? Russia's expansion is also totally defensive! wink-wink The difference between NATO's expansion and Russia's expansion is that Finland is not under a threat of violence from NATO. Quite clearly Russia is threatening Ukraine with violence if it doesn't become part of Russia. That would be why Russia's expansion isn't totally defensive. I mean, it's defensive for Russia sure. Just not…
> The difference between NATO's expansion and Russia's expansion is that Finland is not under a threat of violence from NATO. But Finland isn't technically under a threat of violence from Russia. "Wasn't" at least, as there had been no warm grievances that anyone really cared about. You'll say that Finland has to assume threat and mitigate risks, but this is hardly any different from Russia's perspective against NATO…
Finland is considered by Russia to be an unfriendly country. That's an escalation towards violence and the USSR and Finland have fought several wars. No reason to wait a decade to get invaded like Ukraine; just join NATO now while you can.
The difference is how Finland and Russia are mitigating their threats. Finland is mitigating the threat of Russia by joining a defense alliance. Russia is mitigating the threat of NATO's power expansion by invading countries that might join.
Russia could create their own defense alliance, lets call it the Warsaw Pact. And then it could allow Ukraine to join their Warsaw Pact. If NATO invaded Ukraine to prevent Ukraine from joining the Warsaw pact I'd say NATO was in the wrong.
> Eh, methinks this is an overestimation of Russia's ambition. One could realistically argue that Russia merely "defends" east-leaning loyalish "Russian-speaking" regions. Realistically, even action towards Odessa would automatically involve Prednisone and then no one would be handle that Genie without major clusterfuck.
The problem is the phrase "regions". Nobody cares when you kill people within your own borders. Ukraine is outside of Russia's borders and so we care.