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A human life is inconsequential in an authoritarian regime. The only thing that counts is that the dictator stays in power, trumping all other concerns. This h

A human life is inconsequential in an authoritarian regime. The only thing that counts is that the dictator stays in power, trumping all other concerns. This holds in both China and Russia.

nine_zeros 5y ago
This is so true. The veil of nationalism is only a tool for the authoritarian. Individuals who fall for the authoritarian are merely "useful idiots". If you are Russian and reading this, fight to end authoritarism in your country.
jacquesm 5y ago
That's very true. But the ability to wage war is subject to real world constraints, no matter how deranged the dictator.
jonathanstrange 5y ago
I don't think this is generally true, there are already dissenting voices quite high up in the Russian government hierarchy. The full-scale aggression against the whole of Ukraine seems to have caught many high-ranking government and military officials by surprise. The decision was made in the Kremlin. Of course, it is unlikely that these people will take huge personal risks to rectify the situation, so it doesn't make too much of a difference in the short term. But I thought it's worth mentioning.
- jacquesm 5y ago
  Yes, but they don't have any power, until someone actually stands up it is Putin that is in charge, and if someone does stand up it will still be a very iffy outcome, chances are that that person would be dead in 24 hours. Watch the inner circle security council meeting in Russia for some idea of how afraid everybody is of him.
- graphpercolator 5y ago
  There has to be so many questions in so many of the Russian boots on the grounds minds about this. That matters more IMO than what the military brass thinks.
blagie 5y ago
.... I don't think this is quite true in China. The Chinese political system is complex, but I think it's trying to do right by its people. It just has an extremely non-Western perspective on the concept of "right." The Chinese political establishment doesn't concern itself with the rights and outcomes for individuals, in the way the West does. It concerns itself with the outcome of populations. In the US, the needs of the individual outweigh the needs of the many. In China, the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few. If an individual or a group is disrupting the collective good, they need to be managed. China has done amazingly well for improving the general welfare. It was a very poor country until just a few decades ago. Extreme poverty is on-track to being eliminated, if it hasn't been already (depending on where you place the threshold). Thing like access to housing, food, and medicine are improving. Schools are excellent. Once you have those basic needs met by everyone, China seems to be moving onto handling issues like stress; the human load of the progress, in terms of work weeks, was tremendous, and China is trying to curtail that, perhaps not to Western standards, but to something manageable. China has increasingly started cracking down on corruption too. It has problems, and I'm not trying to downplay those, but it's not Russia, where an oligarchy is draining and bankrupting the general population for their own betterment.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- istjohn 5y ago
  China is also happy to steam roll large portions of its population, e.g., Uyghurs, Tibetans, Hong Kong; and has no regard for privacy or free speach or democracy. I'm not sure a genocidal regime can really be said to treat its people better than Russia.
- whodunnit 5y ago
  I think China is trying to do right by China, while the people are secondary. They are such a different culture than the West it’s hard to see their system from our perspective as anything but totalitarian and abusive, but the idea that the collective is more important than the individual is a valid perspective, just not one that fits with Western ethics, which we hold to be the superior perspective, naturally.
graphpercolator 5y ago
This is a video game view of war though. As if the authoritarian has a video game controller that lets the video game characters do as the authoritarian pleases. This has nothing to do with the reality of the Russian military on the ground. Surely, the Iraq invasion was over so fast exactly because so much of the Iraq military did not want to die to defend Saddam Husein. The will to fight is so asymmetrical in Ukraine. Surely, the Russian military is not oblivious to what the world thinks of this. So one side is willing to die to defend their country and the other side probably just wants to get back home alive and get this over. The Russians also can't just level every city to the ground and call that victory. They have to break the will of the people without destroying everything. It is a recipe to lose the war even if you win some battles. The Russian path to victory is extremely small and maybe even impossible in this situation.
- jacquesm 5y ago
  And there is no Russian 'endgame', they will be under attack forever, whereas for the Ukrainians there is a very clear goal.
GoodJokes 5y ago
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A human life is inconsequential in an authoritarian regime. The only thing that counts is that the dictator stays in power, trumping all other concerns. This holds in both China and Russia.

nine_zeros 5y ago

This is so true. The veil of nationalism is only a tool for the authoritarian. Individuals who fall for the authoritarian are merely "useful idiots". If you are Russian and reading this, fight to end authoritarism in your country.

jacquesm 5y ago

That's very true. But the ability to wage war is subject to real world constraints, no matter how deranged the dictator.

jonathanstrange 5y ago

I don't think this is generally true, there are already dissenting voices quite high up in the Russian government hierarchy. The full-scale aggression against the whole of Ukraine seems to have caught many high-ranking government and military officials by surprise. The decision was made in the Kremlin. Of course, it is unlikely that these people will take huge personal risks to rectify the situation, so it doesn't make too much of a difference in the short term. But I thought it's worth mentioning.

jacquesm 5y ago
Yes, but they don't have any power, until someone actually stands up it is Putin that is in charge, and if someone does stand up it will still be a very iffy outcome, chances are that that person would be dead in 24 hours. Watch the inner circle security council meeting in Russia for some idea of how afraid everybody is of him.
graphpercolator 5y ago
There has to be so many questions in so many of the Russian boots on the grounds minds about this. That matters more IMO than what the military brass thinks.

blagie 5y ago

.... I don't think this is quite true in China. The Chinese political system is complex, but I think it's trying to do right by its people. It just has an extremely non-Western perspective on the concept of "right." The Chinese political establishment doesn't concern itself with the rights and outcomes for individuals, in the way the West does. It concerns itself with the outcome of populations. In the US, the needs of the individual outweigh the needs of the many. In China, the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few. If an individual or a group is disrupting the collective good, they need to be managed. China has done amazingly well for improving the general welfare. It was a very poor country until just a few decades ago. Extreme poverty is on-track to being eliminated, if it hasn't been already (depending on where you place the threshold). Thing like access to housing, food, and medicine are improving. Schools are excellent. Once you have those basic needs met by everyone, China seems to be moving onto handling issues like stress; the human load of the progress, in terms of work weeks, was tremendous, and China is trying to curtail that, perhaps not to Western standards, but to something manageable. China has increasingly started cracking down on corruption too. It has problems, and I'm not trying to downplay those, but it's not Russia, where an oligarchy is draining and bankrupting the general population for their own betterment.

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
istjohn 5y ago
China is also happy to steam roll large portions of its population, e.g., Uyghurs, Tibetans, Hong Kong; and has no regard for privacy or free speach or democracy. I'm not sure a genocidal regime can really be said to treat its people better than Russia.
whodunnit 5y ago
I think China is trying to do right by China, while the people are secondary. They are such a different culture than the West it’s hard to see their system from our perspective as anything but totalitarian and abusive, but the idea that the collective is more important than the individual is a valid perspective, just not one that fits with Western ethics, which we hold to be the superior perspective, naturally.

graphpercolator 5y ago

This is a video game view of war though. As if the authoritarian has a video game controller that lets the video game characters do as the authoritarian pleases. This has nothing to do with the reality of the Russian military on the ground. Surely, the Iraq invasion was over so fast exactly because so much of the Iraq military did not want to die to defend Saddam Husein. The will to fight is so asymmetrical in Ukraine. Surely, the Russian military is not oblivious to what the world thinks of this. So one side is willing to die to defend their country and the other side probably just wants to get back home alive and get this over. The Russians also can't just level every city to the ground and call that victory. They have to break the will of the people without destroying everything. It is a recipe to lose the war even if you win some battles. The Russian path to victory is extremely small and maybe even impossible in this situation.

jacquesm 5y ago
And there is no Russian 'endgame', they will be under attack forever, whereas for the Ukrainians there is a very clear goal.

GoodJokes 5y ago

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