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Honest question, fully admitting my ignorance here, not an intention-to-troll question: How do we know for sure the real title shouldn't be: "US to stage false

Honest question, fully admitting my ignorance here, not an intention-to-troll question: How do we know for sure the real title shouldn't be: "US to stage false flag information campaign claiming 'russia is about to use crisis actors to stage false flag operation and start war in days', followed by false flag operations in Ukraine, in order to justify upcoming unilateral action against Russia?" Like, I've seen soo many unprovoked articles in the last few days about how the US is "actively" gearing for war over something Russia "may" do, it's all a bit reminiscent of the "War on Iraq/Terror/WMD" stuff to me, and we all know how that ended up. Furthermore, what I'm more worried when hearing press releases like that is that it's exactly the kind of talk that becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. I mean, it's chicken and egg situation, isn't it? If got whiff that someone was planning an armed raid to my house on the pretext of finding guns, first thing I'd do would be to arm myself to fend off the raiders. If I heard that someone was accusing me of "planning to throw eggs at the school windows", my first thought would be that someone is planning to do this on my behalf already in order to frame me, and maybe I should go near the school with some eggs and wait for the offenders. At what point do we take such speculative projections justifying real military actions at face value without questioning the intelligence and motives involved?

clarge1120 5y ago
Another honest question that was prompted by the remembering WMD debacle: why is the American military going to fight in a border war between Russia and Ukraine?
Invictus0 5y ago
Which came first, this press release, or Russia amassing 150k troops on Ukraine's border? Come on, unilateral military action against Russia? You can't be serious.
2a0c40 5y ago
relevant: https://twitter.com/nntaleb/status/1489757554326523907?s=20&t=6_hvqt_iK7kW9Xm4UcG79A https://twitter.com/nntaleb/status/1489757554326523907?s=20&...
- NikolaeVarius 5y ago
  How? This is something that any news media does when there are large scale events going on, write multiple headlines with multiple outcomes
motoboi 5y ago
USA will not take unilateral action against Russia. The fact the it is willing to try to uncover those actions by Russia is a signal that it is doing whatever possible to make clear to the public that Russia is invading Ukraine (not defending itself), but also making clear that it does not want to support Ukraine military.
- another_why 5y ago
  Your message is based on a guess "USA government willing to uncover some actions". You can't make anything "clear" to the public without evidence. The only thing it makes clear is that you have interests there.
Isinlor 5y ago
By the fact that Russia gave Ukraine security guarantees for giving up nuclear arsenal (3rd largest in the world) in the Budapest memorandum and still decided to annex Crimea in 2014. Ukraine was already invaded and is at war with Russia over Donbas since 2014. Russia does not deny their current military buildup on Ukraine border with Belarus and Russia.
- ivan_gammel 5y ago
  Those facts are not the evidence that Russia is preparing for a full-scale invasion or even for a local escalation in Donbas. The pretext for those events was quite different.
  - dandanua 5y ago
    You must be sleeping, really. They've collected troops on all sides of Ukrainian border, and ships are on the move.
  - Isinlor 5y ago
    Russia is obviously preparing for a full-scale invasion. It may be a bluff or not, we don't know. But as I said, they don't even deny buildup. They just say that they do not want to invade and that it is their right to gather army all around Ukraine. None of our business. Instead they make demands with regard to security of countries like Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland and of course Ukraine.
    - vbezhenar 5y ago
      Ukraine is preparing to attack Donbass. Of course Russia is gathering army to be ready to defend from Ukrainian forces if necessary.
      - Isinlor 5y ago
        Yes, very possible. Ukraine wants Donbas and Crimea back. And they are not excluding use of force. This is also why Ukraine will not join NATO until they resolve their business with Russia.
323 5y ago
Ah yes, the old "Russia was provoked into invading Ukraine" defense. Along the lines of "Germany was provoked into invading Poland".
- myth_drannon 5y ago
  Or the old Iraq has WMDs, it must be invaded!
  - sam_lowry_ 5y ago
    You can not draw parallels with Iraq. US is not willing to go to war over Ukraine, and Europe does not even want to sell weapons to Ukraine. They are on their own against Putin's Russia.
    - another_why 5y ago
      > You can not draw parallels with Iraq. US is not willing to go to war over Ukraine, and Europe does not even want to sell weapons to Ukraine. "We didn't plan to do this, we stated this so many times in all media, but what we said they are going to do is so bad, that we had to take actions... Totally not our fault, everyone can see that..."
  - ethbr0 5y ago
    I'm not sure how anyone sees similarities between these two scenarios: Scenario 1) US disseminates bad intelligence and invades a sovereign country. Iraq War. Scenario 2) US disseminates bad intelligence and arms / militarily supports a sovereign country which is being invaded. Ukraine. Nobody is remotely considering a scenario where the US is saying "Russia might invade Ukraine, so we're going to invade Russia." A defensive war is by definition the fault of the aggressor. Because they are literally on land that is yours.
NikolaeVarius 5y ago
While I have strong skepticism of anything from the Government, I literally cannot find any reason that NATO or the USA would have any reason to to start a conflict with Russia inside Ukraine without provocation. https://news.un.org/en/story/2022/01/1110912 https://news.un.org/en/story/2022/01/1110912 The UN reports that Russian troop buildup is happening at the border The area has already had Russian agression via Crimea https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Status_of_Crimea https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Status_of_Crimea Are people suggesting that no one should respond militarily to an allies plea for help to respond to military aggression?
- another_why 5y ago
  > I literally cannot find any reason that NATO or the USA would have any reason to to start a conflict with Russia inside Ukraine without provocation. First you say "this is going to happen" and then courageously prevent it by something you needed to do but had no excuse before.
- jimmydorry 5y ago
  Literally no reason? Having just finishing the war in the middle east, I'm sure the military complex would have a vested interest in joining / starting another conflict. What about using a conflict to deflect attention away from a market breakdown? What about using a conflict to drive a post-COVID recovery? I'm not saying it definitely has to be one of these reasons, but I can think of many off the top of my head. Why are you so certain that USA or NATO nations would have no reason to start a conflict?
  - lern_too_spel 5y ago
    Nobody has put an armed conflict with Russia on the table, with the idea of sending US troops into Ukraine explicitly ruled out. The only responses being discussed are economic sanctions, which would slow a post-COVID recovery and would not distract from the domestic economy, and arming and training Ukrainian insurgents from bordering NATO countries. Your conspiracy theory just doesn't make sense in this context.
- ivan_gammel 5y ago
fshbbdssbbgdd 5y ago
If someone was falsely accusing me of throwing eggs I would stay the hell away from eggs.
h2odragon 5y ago
Others saying similar: > after eight years of facing down one another across about 200 meters of no-man’s land at the line of demarcation, the situation between Ukrainian armed forces and Donbas forces is very tense and volatile, so that it would be very easy for a provocation staged by British or American special forces, who are known to be in the area, to touch off a major conflagration. https://gilbertdoctorow.com/2022/02/04/look-at-the-map-where-are-the-ukrainian-military-forces-concentrated-and-where-are-they-absent/ https://gilbertdoctorow.com/2022/02/04/look-at-the-map-where...
sto_hristo 5y ago
Russia already invaded Ukraine and conquered land. Now it's coming back for more using the same tactics they used for Crimea, but with a twist here and there and on larger scale. No one wants to deal with Russia, have anything to do with Russia, or hear of it at all. No one. They're a nation of misery and nothingness. Would you leave your apartment, right now, go to the slums and start shit with the people over there? The thought that the US is looking for excuses to mess with Russia is insane. And spending any time on Russia is a wasted time and resources which could have been spent towards more productive things. But if you let Russia run around and conquering this and that will force your hand eventually, at which point the time and resources you have to spent to deal with them would have grown massively.
- coolspot 5y ago
  > Would you leave your apartment, right now, go to the slums and start shit with the people over there? Describes South Los Angeles or San Francisco SoMa perfectly.
- philistine 5y ago
  Russia has natural resources, which is vital to the European economy. But you're right, the mere idea that the US government would have any interest in a conflict with them is so bizarre.
im3w1l 5y ago
Russia has deployed troops to the border. They have stocked up blood - short shelf life. The clock is ticking for them, they need to make a move soon. Given this, I consider it quite believable.
- bathtub365 5y ago
  Is there a non-US for the blood supply information? All I could find was stories citing unnamed US officials.
  - alkonaut 5y ago
    As with the Uighur issue in China it’s really simple: we assume the worst wherever independent media isn’t allowed to report. It would be very easy for the Chinese authorities to allow critical media in every province just like it would be easy for Russia to have OSCE (or equivalent) inspection of “excercises” near the Ukrainian border. Questioning sources and rumors is a good thing - but in cases when the sources are scarce because they are denied, one should assume the worst from the party refusing oversight. This is a plausible rumor.
kortex 5y ago
Short answer: Russia is quite different from Iraq because it has nukes. Iraqi WMD was all about chemical/biological and the capability of a nuclear program. Most sources today say that Iraq had halted and dismantled their CBW program in the 90s, but they did have those weapons prior to that. USA will proxy war with Russia all over the world, but always falls short of direct conflict. It's too likely to turn nasty, and trigger MAD. I think it's an important distinction that the US isn't gearing up for war with Russia (US-Russia), but rather readying themselves for a Ukraine-Russia escalation, and whatever ways in which that might spill over. Arguably they are already at war. The concern is not just another territory grab, but outright attack on Ukrainian sovereignty. I don't know enough about world politics to have a say in to what degree the US is willing to come to Ukraine's defense. I do know that US doctrine since the Cold War is to not directly square off with the bear, not discounting giving the bear death stares from across the bar.
- etoya 5y ago
  "but rather readying themselves for a Ukraine-Russia escalation" - but rather *pushing* for a Ukraine-Russia escalation. You should read not only what the state department tries to claim, but also what the russian official figures are saying (google translate?). Objectively, you are advancing troops to Russian border, and not Russia advancing its troops to yours. And you have the history of invading other nations, not Russia (though you would claim Russia invaded Ukraine, remember that Ukraine was part of Russia long before the american state came into being, that no one ever considered Lugansk and Donetsk "ukrainian cities", and that the current ukranian neonazi government, supported by US in its role of a battering ram against Russia, tries to ban the Russian language in Ukraine, and glorifies WWII collaborationists).
  - belltaco 5y ago
    >And you have the history of invading other nations, not Russia So Russia didn't invade Afghanistan, USSR did. Okay I guess. >remember that Ukraine was part of Russia So now Russia is the same as USSR? But didn't invade other countries? What? Doublespeak much? >the current ukranian neonazi government Okay I now regret reading your comment. It's just swallowing and regurgitating Russian state propaganda.
irthomasthomas 5y ago
The title here is technically correct in representing the content and the U.S. view. But you aren't the only getting weird vibes from it. In fact, I think I can honestly say that it is actually, literally the weirdest announcement I ever heard the U.S. government give.
keewee7 5y ago
Because Russia and Putin have a recent history of using false-flag attacks. The 1999 Russian apartment bombings are universally considered false-flag attacks by Russian journalists and historians who are not on the Kremlin payroll. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_apartment_bombings#Russian_government_involvement_theory https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_apartment_bombings#Rus...
- twelve40 5y ago
  the US officials, who are quoting no sources other than unspecified "declassified information" for this false-flag stuff, also have a history of false flag operations and lying with the goal to start a war.
yucky 5y ago
Uncanny isn't it? I don't know if just getting older and wiser or if the propaganda is getting sloppier.
lobocinza 5y ago
Unless you are to pass moral judgment it doesn't matter. One of the parties staged a causus belli, a plausible reason to initiate war, this escalate things.

clarge1120 5y ago

Another honest question that was prompted by the remembering WMD debacle: why is the American military going to fight in a border war between Russia and Ukraine?

Invictus0 5y ago

Which came first, this press release, or Russia amassing 150k troops on Ukraine's border? Come on, unilateral military action against Russia? You can't be serious.

2a0c40 5y ago

relevant: https://twitter.com/nntaleb/status/1489757554326523907?s=20&t=6_hvqt_iK7kW9Xm4UcG79A https://twitter.com/nntaleb/status/1489757554326523907?s=20&...

NikolaeVarius 5y ago
How? This is something that any news media does when there are large scale events going on, write multiple headlines with multiple outcomes

motoboi 5y ago

USA will not take unilateral action against Russia. The fact the it is willing to try to uncover those actions by Russia is a signal that it is doing whatever possible to make clear to the public that Russia is invading Ukraine (not defending itself), but also making clear that it does not want to support Ukraine military.

another_why 5y ago
Your message is based on a guess "USA government willing to uncover some actions". You can't make anything "clear" to the public without evidence. The only thing it makes clear is that you have interests there.

Isinlor 5y ago

By the fact that Russia gave Ukraine security guarantees for giving up nuclear arsenal (3rd largest in the world) in the Budapest memorandum and still decided to annex Crimea in 2014. Ukraine was already invaded and is at war with Russia over Donbas since 2014. Russia does not deny their current military buildup on Ukraine border with Belarus and Russia.

ivan_gammel 5y ago
Those facts are not the evidence that Russia is preparing for a full-scale invasion or even for a local escalation in Donbas. The pretext for those events was quite different.
- dandanua 5y ago
  You must be sleeping, really. They've collected troops on all sides of Ukrainian border, and ships are on the move.
- Isinlor 5y ago
  Russia is obviously preparing for a full-scale invasion. It may be a bluff or not, we don't know. But as I said, they don't even deny buildup. They just say that they do not want to invade and that it is their right to gather army all around Ukraine. None of our business. Instead they make demands with regard to security of countries like Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland and of course Ukraine.
  - vbezhenar 5y ago
    Ukraine is preparing to attack Donbass. Of course Russia is gathering army to be ready to defend from Ukrainian forces if necessary.
    - Isinlor 5y ago
      Yes, very possible. Ukraine wants Donbas and Crimea back. And they are not excluding use of force. This is also why Ukraine will not join NATO until they resolve their business with Russia.

323 5y ago

Ah yes, the old "Russia was provoked into invading Ukraine" defense. Along the lines of "Germany was provoked into invading Poland".

myth_drannon 5y ago
Or the old Iraq has WMDs, it must be invaded!
- sam_lowry_ 5y ago
  You can not draw parallels with Iraq. US is not willing to go to war over Ukraine, and Europe does not even want to sell weapons to Ukraine. They are on their own against Putin's Russia.
  - another_why 5y ago
    > You can not draw parallels with Iraq. US is not willing to go to war over Ukraine, and Europe does not even want to sell weapons to Ukraine. "We didn't plan to do this, we stated this so many times in all media, but what we said they are going to do is so bad, that we had to take actions... Totally not our fault, everyone can see that..."
- ethbr0 5y ago
  I'm not sure how anyone sees similarities between these two scenarios: Scenario 1) US disseminates bad intelligence and invades a sovereign country. Iraq War. Scenario 2) US disseminates bad intelligence and arms / militarily supports a sovereign country which is being invaded. Ukraine. Nobody is remotely considering a scenario where the US is saying "Russia might invade Ukraine, so we're going to invade Russia." A defensive war is by definition the fault of the aggressor. Because they are literally on land that is yours.

NikolaeVarius 5y ago

While I have strong skepticism of anything from the Government, I literally cannot find any reason that NATO or the USA would have any reason to to start a conflict with Russia inside Ukraine without provocation. https://news.un.org/en/story/2022/01/1110912 https://news.un.org/en/story/2022/01/1110912 The UN reports that Russian troop buildup is happening at the border The area has already had Russian agression via Crimea https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Status_of_Crimea https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Status_of_Crimea Are people suggesting that no one should respond militarily to an allies plea for help to respond to military aggression?

another_why 5y ago
> I literally cannot find any reason that NATO or the USA would have any reason to to start a conflict with Russia inside Ukraine without provocation. First you say "this is going to happen" and then courageously prevent it by something you needed to do but had no excuse before.
jimmydorry 5y ago
Literally no reason? Having just finishing the war in the middle east, I'm sure the military complex would have a vested interest in joining / starting another conflict. What about using a conflict to deflect attention away from a market breakdown? What about using a conflict to drive a post-COVID recovery? I'm not saying it definitely has to be one of these reasons, but I can think of many off the top of my head. Why are you so certain that USA or NATO nations would have no reason to start a conflict?
- lern_too_spel 5y ago
  Nobody has put an armed conflict with Russia on the table, with the idea of sending US troops into Ukraine explicitly ruled out. The only responses being discussed are economic sanctions, which would slow a post-COVID recovery and would not distract from the domestic economy, and arming and training Ukrainian insurgents from bordering NATO countries. Your conspiracy theory just doesn't make sense in this context.
ivan_gammel 5y ago

fshbbdssbbgdd 5y ago

If someone was falsely accusing me of throwing eggs I would stay the hell away from eggs.

h2odragon 5y ago

Others saying similar: > after eight years of facing down one another across about 200 meters of no-man’s land at the line of demarcation, the situation between Ukrainian armed forces and Donbas forces is very tense and volatile, so that it would be very easy for a provocation staged by British or American special forces, who are known to be in the area, to touch off a major conflagration. https://gilbertdoctorow.com/2022/02/04/look-at-the-map-where-are-the-ukrainian-military-forces-concentrated-and-where-are-they-absent/ https://gilbertdoctorow.com/2022/02/04/look-at-the-map-where...

sto_hristo 5y ago

Russia already invaded Ukraine and conquered land. Now it's coming back for more using the same tactics they used for Crimea, but with a twist here and there and on larger scale. No one wants to deal with Russia, have anything to do with Russia, or hear of it at all. No one. They're a nation of misery and nothingness. Would you leave your apartment, right now, go to the slums and start shit with the people over there? The thought that the US is looking for excuses to mess with Russia is insane. And spending any time on Russia is a wasted time and resources which could have been spent towards more productive things. But if you let Russia run around and conquering this and that will force your hand eventually, at which point the time and resources you have to spent to deal with them would have grown massively.

coolspot 5y ago
> Would you leave your apartment, right now, go to the slums and start shit with the people over there? Describes South Los Angeles or San Francisco SoMa perfectly.
philistine 5y ago
Russia has natural resources, which is vital to the European economy. But you're right, the mere idea that the US government would have any interest in a conflict with them is so bizarre.

im3w1l 5y ago

Russia has deployed troops to the border. They have stocked up blood - short shelf life. The clock is ticking for them, they need to make a move soon. Given this, I consider it quite believable.

bathtub365 5y ago
Is there a non-US for the blood supply information? All I could find was stories citing unnamed US officials.
- alkonaut 5y ago
  As with the Uighur issue in China it’s really simple: we assume the worst wherever independent media isn’t allowed to report. It would be very easy for the Chinese authorities to allow critical media in every province just like it would be easy for Russia to have OSCE (or equivalent) inspection of “excercises” near the Ukrainian border. Questioning sources and rumors is a good thing - but in cases when the sources are scarce because they are denied, one should assume the worst from the party refusing oversight. This is a plausible rumor.

kortex 5y ago

Short answer: Russia is quite different from Iraq because it has nukes. Iraqi WMD was all about chemical/biological and the capability of a nuclear program. Most sources today say that Iraq had halted and dismantled their CBW program in the 90s, but they did have those weapons prior to that. USA will proxy war with Russia all over the world, but always falls short of direct conflict. It's too likely to turn nasty, and trigger MAD. I think it's an important distinction that the US isn't gearing up for war with Russia (US-Russia), but rather readying themselves for a Ukraine-Russia escalation, and whatever ways in which that might spill over. Arguably they are already at war. The concern is not just another territory grab, but outright attack on Ukrainian sovereignty. I don't know enough about world politics to have a say in to what degree the US is willing to come to Ukraine's defense. I do know that US doctrine since the Cold War is to not directly square off with the bear, not discounting giving the bear death stares from across the bar.

etoya 5y ago
"but rather readying themselves for a Ukraine-Russia escalation" - but rather *pushing* for a Ukraine-Russia escalation. You should read not only what the state department tries to claim, but also what the russian official figures are saying (google translate?). Objectively, you are advancing troops to Russian border, and not Russia advancing its troops to yours. And you have the history of invading other nations, not Russia (though you would claim Russia invaded Ukraine, remember that Ukraine was part of Russia long before the american state came into being, that no one ever considered Lugansk and Donetsk "ukrainian cities", and that the current ukranian neonazi government, supported by US in its role of a battering ram against Russia, tries to ban the Russian language in Ukraine, and glorifies WWII collaborationists).
- belltaco 5y ago
  >And you have the history of invading other nations, not Russia So Russia didn't invade Afghanistan, USSR did. Okay I guess. >remember that Ukraine was part of Russia So now Russia is the same as USSR? But didn't invade other countries? What? Doublespeak much? >the current ukranian neonazi government Okay I now regret reading your comment. It's just swallowing and regurgitating Russian state propaganda.

irthomasthomas 5y ago

The title here is technically correct in representing the content and the U.S. view. But you aren't the only getting weird vibes from it. In fact, I think I can honestly say that it is actually, literally the weirdest announcement I ever heard the U.S. government give.

keewee7 5y ago

Because Russia and Putin have a recent history of using false-flag attacks. The 1999 Russian apartment bombings are universally considered false-flag attacks by Russian journalists and historians who are not on the Kremlin payroll. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_apartment_bombings#Russian_government_involvement_theory https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_apartment_bombings#Rus...

twelve40 5y ago
the US officials, who are quoting no sources other than unspecified "declassified information" for this false-flag stuff, also have a history of false flag operations and lying with the goal to start a war.

yucky 5y ago

Uncanny isn't it? I don't know if just getting older and wiser or if the propaganda is getting sloppier.

lobocinza 5y ago

Unless you are to pass moral judgment it doesn't matter. One of the parties staged a causus belli, a plausible reason to initiate war, this escalate things.