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U.S. pauses all military aid to Ukraine

wsj.com

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Re: U.S. pauses all military aid to Ukraine

#691

Post by arandomusername »

motorest wrote: post #662
gershy wrote: post #626

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure what to think. Ukraine can't militarily defeat russia or reclaim its lost territory, and as long as it continues to try to do so, there will be war and the world will be less stable. But if a line is not drawn against russia, I think we have every reason to believe putin will continue to conquer more land over time. Russia is the source of instability, but it can't be defeated or reasoned with. What to d…

> I'm not sure what to think. Ukraine can't militarily defeat russia or reclaim its lost territory, (...) Are you sure about that? I mean, didn't Afghanistan forced Russia to retreat in defeat and leave the country? > and as long as it continues to try to do so, there will be war and the world will be less stable. All the more reason to help Ukraine finish the job and force Russia to leave. Ultimately, worst case sce…

> Are you sure about that? I mean, didn't Afghanistan forced Russia to retreat in defeat and leave the country?

Logistics (Ukraine shares a large border with Russia) and people - the people in currently occupied Ukraine aren't as against Russia as those in Afghanistan may be. Even now, we don't really see much of sabotage.

> All the more reason to help Ukraine finish the job and force Russia to leave.

And how are you going to do that? Russia has been gaining land. Currently, Russia is winning.

> Ultimately, worst case scenario Ukraine can simply keep Russian in a war of attrition while eating away at it's economic base.

While losing hundred of thousands of young men and decimating their population. Russia has more men. They can stand a war of attrition a lot longer - and they value soldier's lives less than we do in the west.

> Russia is already sending it's soldiers with crutches riding donkeys into battle. They are scraping the bottom of the barrel for resources.

Similarly, Ukraine is kidnapping people on the streets to send them to the front lines.

Re: U.S. pauses all military aid to Ukraine

#692

Post by codedokode »

jyscao wrote: post #428
nuccy wrote: post #6

Thus two messages for every other country: 1. Make nukes, never give up on those regardless of what assurances of safety you get 2. If you are bigger and stronger - you are right, do whatever you want, international laws and rules do not matter any more Lets see where all this will bring the world to in the next 10 years or a generation.

> If you are bigger and stronger - you are right, do whatever you want, international laws and rules do not matter any more In reality, that was always the case.

"International laws" are also a weird thing. There is no international parliament, international police and international court. I think the only viable agreements are of a kind "if you don't do A then we don't do B".

Re: U.S. pauses all military aid to Ukraine

#693

Post by s1artibartfast »

sethammons wrote: post #628
s1artibartfast wrote: post #389

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Budapest Memorandum says the US wont invade Ukraine. It is easy to do that from home.

from the wiki, 4th point in the agreement: > Seek immediate Security Council action to provide assistance to the signatory if they "should become a victim of an act of aggression or an object of a threat of aggression in which nuclear weapons are used". Ukraine was the victim of an act of aggression from Russia. Pretty obvious that the US gave its word it would protect them.

How do you get that. The US sought security council action within days of the war starting.

Nowhere does it say us has to guarantee safety or go to war. Nevermind the fact that threats of nuclear aggression came much later.

Re: U.S. pauses all military aid to Ukraine

#694

Post by CapricornNoble »

iammjm wrote: post #325

"Free world" my ass. As a European, the US has always been my favorite country and I've been basically universally pro-US all my life. The Recent US decisions managed to turn it 180 degrees for me, in a matter of basically a couple of months. As I consider myself to be a more or less statistical normie, I assume theres many, many more people like me. So: fuck US & eat shit, go suck Putins dick while the EU & the rest…

>while the EU & the rest of the true free world should focus our efforts on getting nukes, investing in military and intelligence, and leveraging new drone & radar technologies.

You do realize all of that requires massive investment? Where is the EU going to get that money? Raise taxes on a population that is already struggling in a stagnant economy? An economy that is stagnant partly due to the loss of the dirt-cheap energy that European heavy industry was importing from Russia.

As an American (and not one of European decent, so I don't hold the romantic attachment to Europe that many have), I'm perfectly happy with the salty, delusional Europeans agreeing with severing trans-Atlantic relations. Europe has spawned two World Wars and seems intent on flirting with a third. The sooner we disconnect from you guys, and pivot back to a mix of the Pacific Rim + the Americas, the better.

Now if only we could disband AIPAC...

Re: U.S. pauses all military aid to Ukraine

#696

Post by codedokode »

onlypassingthru wrote: post #685
codedokode wrote: post #668

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because West has no means to put more pressure on Russia (they cannot even stop buying natural gas), so it has to talk nicely. US cannot demand, for example, that Russia gives them a share of their minerals and generally cannot demand anything. Actually in hindsight the best time for negotiations was somewhere in end of 2022, but that chance is long gone. But while West cannot demand, it still can offer (i.e. removin…

The West absolutely has more means at its disposal, by arming Ukraine to the teeth. The slow drip of arms has been really effective at degrading Russia (just look at the golf cart brigades and North Korean wave attacks), but an increase in long range capability is what's needed to finish the job.

"arming Ukraine to the teeth" does not guarantee the victory but guarantees more casualties and suffering. To win you also need to have 3x more soldiers which is not the case. West cannot even pay a salary comparable to what Russia pays to its volunteer soldiers.

Re: U.S. pauses all military aid to Ukraine

#697

Post by MiscCompFacts »

skinnymuch wrote: post #671
4ndrewl wrote: post #92

Zelensky's Ukraine stood and fought against Russia for 3 years. Trump's USA surrendered in 6 weeks.

[flagged]

Presumably innocent Russian men are being kidnapped and forced to fight for a dictator just as much. So let’s stop blaming the victim when Russia is clearly the aggressor and started this whole ordeal.

Re: U.S. pauses all military aid to Ukraine

#698

Post by arandomusername »

_DeadFred_ wrote: post #516
anonfordays wrote: post #441

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>There is a good reason why the USA was called "world policeman". And Europeans and leftist shit talked the US for it for decades. They called for the US to close military bases around the world, shit talked the amount the US spends on defense, etc. Now that the US is packing up and going home, the same people are screaming for the US to stay and continue being the exact thing they shit talked the US for. What a spec…

Heck yeah bro, we're owning the Europeans! What a win for the USA! Love basing our geopolitical policy, and breaking our honor in keeping commitments on that. So much winning.

USA has not made commitments to defend Ukraine. They have not broken their comittments in defending countries they promised to, e.g NATO

Re: U.S. pauses all military aid to Ukraine

#699

Post by JoshuaDavid »

blargey wrote: post #630
JoshuaDavid wrote: post #550

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Twitter community notes are popular and pretty effective at calling out misleading information that has gone viral (organically or inorganically). I think writing off facts and arguments is premature.

Is that sort of stuff actually effective against propaganda though? I'd assume that by the time a disclaimer is written up, submitted, and accepted according to whatever the criteria is, the original un-disclaimered message has been received and digested by its target audience.

There are a few things working in favor of community notes there

1. Viral tweets have a longer-than-average time window between the time they start to go viral and the time the median viewer sees them, so a community note can get there before the median viewer. 2. Users who interacted with a tweet before it got a community note will get a notification when the community note is added. 3. Community note writers can leave a note on a piece of media. If a tweet with a video gets a community note, and that note is about the video rather than about the tweet, that note will show on all other tweets that show that video.

Source: this excellent interview with the Community Notes team (https://asteriskmag.com/issues/08/the-making-of-community-no...), in the section that starts with "Asterisk: Another thing I wanted to talk about is speed". Really that whole interview is great, highlights how deliberate and thoughtful the Community Notes team was regarding everything about the feature. Which is, I think, why community notes have succeeded where a lot of previous fact-checking attempts have failed.

Re: U.S. pauses all military aid to Ukraine

#700

Post by codedokode »

KiwiJohnno wrote: post #672
codedokode wrote: post #650

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In theory West could offer something in exchange for peace, so that Russia will not want to break it, for example: withdrawing NATO forces from Eastern Europe, withdrawing nuclear weapon from Europe, lifting sanctions, paying a compensation for losses due to sanctions etc. There is actually a whole spectrum of options for negotiations.

The problem is any of those things are effectively a reward for Russia for starting the war and invading Ukraine in the first place. Why should Russia get any advantage out of the war that they 100% started?? And pay them compensation! What a suggestion! Russia is a bully. What do you think will happen if we have to pay the bully off each time they start smashing up their neighbors stuff up or just making threats? An…

> NATO is a purely defensive organization

Are nuclear missiles located in Europe and pointed to the East also "purely defensive" weapon? It doesn't help good relations when you have a gun pointed at your face.

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