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Show HN: Crowdsource creation of Ukraine/Russia peace agreement

• majewsky 5y ago
  As far as art projects go, this could be pretty interesting. How do you handle moderation?
  • _6p8i 5y ago
    Anyone can create a new agreement without logging in. Agreement link and negotiator links are all public but not guessable. Only "published" agreements show on the front page. To get the agreement published, submit it to either @PeaceAgreementO or peaceagreementorg@gmail.com .
• q3k 5y ago
  Have you considered implementing the peace agreement as an NFT? The blockchain can revolutionize peace or even armistice talks, allowing for traceability of signatures, terms and military positions.
  • deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  • wut42 5y ago
    We could also tie countries reserves to a specific smart contract which removes the funds if an NFT agreement is breached!
    • unfocussed_mike 5y ago
      I genuinely do not know if either one of you is joking, or if you know for sure the other is/is not. This is the point we have reached with NFTs.
      • wut42 5y ago
        I don't know if the OP was joking, but I surely am
      • Kaze404 5y ago
        Hell I can't even tell if the OP is serious
  • _joel 5y ago
    You must be taking the mickey, surely.
• dash2 5y ago
  I appreciate your concern, but why would anyone take this seriously? In particular, why would crowdsourcing a foreign policy agreement be a good idea? Would you crowdsource the plan for your open heart surgery? Because this affects a lot more lives than that.
  • _6p8i 5y ago
    As it says in the FAQ, this project is likely going to fail, but I think it was worth trying given the stakes. In terms of seriousness, I've committed real $1000. > In particular, why would crowdsourcing a foreign policy agreement be a good idea? I think Internet's collective intelligence could be higher than that of any person on a well defined task. > Would you crowdsource the plan for your open heart surgery? Desperate situations, call for desperate measures. If I did, I would ask for "qualified heart surgeons to contribute" the same way I asked about "people with the understanding of geopolitical situation". There are people that are not in the political administrations of the warring sides that have called the situation much more correctly than the administration. Example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JrMiSQAGOS4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JrMiSQAGOS4
    • carlosdp 5y ago
      With respect, if someone actually came up with a peace agreement that worked for Ukraine/Russia, I would hope it would be worth far more than $1k.
      • _6p8i 5y ago
        I agree. Do you want to commit to the cause?
      • mediumsmart 5y ago
        They did 8 years ago and it was far more worth but still below billions of military spending.
    • stared 5y ago
      > I think Internet's collective intelligence could be higher than that of any person on a well defined task. Well, maybe - but as long as it is led by people who know the political circumstances and are willing to dig deeper. For comparison, there was a Post-WW1 Middle-East map, which took into cultures and ethnicities. It took a lot of work to interview communities: https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2015/02/the-middle-east-that-might-have-been/385410/ https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2015/02/th... And? It was entirely ignored. Not for another meritocratic approach. Instead - with the "cutting pies" approach, where the great powers divided the territory among themselves.
• jacknews 5y ago
  I'm not sure what a peace treaty would even look like, except essentially Ukraine surrendering to Putin's demands. It is not as if Russia and Ukraine were two bitter enemies, locked in a death-match. Ukraine is extremely close to Russia historically, culturally, etc, but they chose democracy, and were moving more and more toward a western style open and free society. It seems that was too much for the Putin regime in Russia. Ukraine must now be brought back into the fold, and never again be allowed to stray. Honestly, the relationship seems to be more like an abusive marriage than two independent states. Is a peace treaty even really possible, or meaningful, with that underlying grievance? Perhaps only if Ukraine promises never to stray ever again, and to always be there when Putin demands it, etc. Or if Putin is brought to his knees with sanctions or other means.
  • unfocussed_mike 5y ago
    > I'm not sure what a peace treaty would even look like, except essentially Ukraine surrendering to Putin's demands. Putin isn't seeking a peace (as between nations) treaty with Ukraine at all. This is about adding to his recreated historic Russia, and on that basis to push forward for a new accommodation with the west. If this war ends with a peace treaty it will do so because it eventually escalated to a nuclear standoff with NATO. That's the only umbrella under which Putin could ever agree a "retreat". > Honestly, the relationship seems to be more like an abusive marriage than two independent states. This is a good characterisation and it has been made before -- that Putin's approach is that of an abusive spouse. "Look what you made me do."
    • jacknews 5y ago
      I agree, the only 'peace treaty' that will work for Putin is Ukraine agreeing to become a vassal. Unless his power is diminished to the point he cannot impose his will.
      • unfocussed_mike 5y ago
        Yes. I suppose that would technically have to have some "treaty" to ratify it, so in that sense there will be one.
• galfarragem 5y ago
  I really appreciate the initiative but I dislike the form: should be way simpler. This may justify the low participation on such a relevant issue. Each informal proposal could have maximum of 10(?) items/lines to be easy to reason about. Russians/Ukranians/Other people could vote, results would be percentual. (e.g.: 56% of Russian voters, 32% Ukranians and 65% other voters agree with this proposal). I believe, the real negotiators would take a look as source of ideas, the media has been fundamental in this war. Simplistically, as an outsider, I would propose: 1. Immediate cease fire. 2. Crimea and separatist territories get independence and are free to join Russia. 3. Ukraine joins EU. 4. Ukraine stays neutral and out of NATO.
  • KingOfCoders 5y ago
    3. and 4. What if the EU builds an army?
    • waffleiron 5y ago
      Secondly, like NATO the EU has it's own mutual defense clause contained in the treaty of Lisbon.
    • galfarragem 5y ago
      Ukraine stays neutral unless Russia is an EU ally/member also. Post-Putin Russia should integrate somehow EU. I believe young generations would rejoice. "A day will come when you — France, Russia, Italy, England, Germany — all you nations of the continent will merge, without losing your distinct qualities and your glorious individuality, in a close and higher unity to form a European brotherhood, just as Normandy, Brittany, Burgundy, Lorraine, Alsace, all our provinces are merged together in France." -- Victor Hugo (1849)
      • KingOfCoders 5y ago
        So I assume Russia will join the EU 13 years after being utterly destroyed as Germany has been joining the EU in 1958 - we have only very limited data points here. Though because of the Russian scare of the 50s perhaps Germany was let in earlier then one would have guessed. We would need an external threat like China that unites the EU with Russia, something very unlikely from the current point in time.
• brabel 5y ago
  The most interesting aspect to this project, to me, is that if you try as hard as you can to come up with something, I am almost certain that there's no way an agreement can be even remotely reached given the known positions of Ukraine and Russia... I would be incredibly happy if someone actually proposed something that could be acceptable to both parties... failing to do so is like admitting that war was the only way (not saying was is justified, just that given the known positions of both parties, that if one of them was willing to sacrifice themselves by entering a war with the other party - and we knew Russia was willing - and even then, no agreement could be reached, that we couldn't have expected any other outcome).
  • trhway 5y ago
    your post is predicated on the view that it is just a conflict between positions of 2 countries, like say where to put the border. While theoretically "conflict of positions" description is true, the situation here is really different. The position of Ukraine which is its existence and existence of its people is in conflict with the Russian position of "non-existence of Ukraine and Ukrainians" (a bit more on that https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30540609 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30540609 ). In such situations there is no midway "half-existence". The peace agreement possible here is only like the one in 1945 with Nuremberg 2 for Putin and his clique. As Zelensky has said 20 minutes ago on Ukranian TV "Russians need to start learning the words 'reparations' and 'contributions'". Lets give it a crack: 1. Immediate ceasefire and withdrawal of Russian forces 2. Russia acknowledges criminal nature of the aggression and gives up the war criminals - Putin, his generals, top political leaders and oligarchs who approved and participated. 3. Russia compensates all the damage to Ukraine. 4. Russia returns Crimea and Donbass (with grace period for the people to relocate who want to stay in Russia and/or Ukraine agrees for Russian language to be a second official language there and some extended autonomy for those regions, may be gradually expiring in say 50-100 years, may be some UN force presence for the next 10-20 years) 5. Russia gives up nuclear weapons and agrees to the limits on military power so it would be suitable and sufficient only for pure defense. 6. Probably some changes to Russian Constitution like hard term limit for President, electability of regional powers, freedom of speech, judicial independence and other measures to make sure that a fascist regime like the current Putin's regime has no chances to arise again.
• spywaregorilla 5y ago
  > I cannot see how adding more suffering to the World is good and is bringing us closer to peace. Sometimes change is painful
• dang 5y ago
  A word of advice (offtopic, sorry): your text loses credibility because you repeat the link https://peaceagreement.org/ https://peaceagreement.org/ 4 times. It comes across as spammy and gets in the way of your story. You should have that link once at the top of your thread. (The other link is ok, since it's pointing to a different page.) You can edit your text above, or I can edit it for you and fix the formatting to fit HN conventions a bit better (I'm an admin here.) If you want me to do that, let me know.
  • _6p8i 5y ago
    Thank you @dang, I've taken your advice into account.
• yessirwhatever 5y ago
  Sidenote, but that's a really nice system you've got there. I'd consider making it available as a debate platform for any topic, or release it as an open source project. Nice work!
• known 5y ago
• perceptronas 5y ago
  I love the idea and love your implementation. However, from the perspective of Ukraine, Russia cannot be trusted. This is due broken security assurances made less than 30 years ago [1]. Actually, If I were to speculate, I am not sure any other country in the world will trust Russia or any other 'big state' on 'security assurances' after this conflict. [1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Budapest_Memorandum_on_Security_Assurances https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Budapest_Memorandum_on_Securit...
  • deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
• iSysAdmin 5y ago
  The problem is much deeper than Ukraine vs Russia. It is a proxy war. And if you see a war then start looking for money. When you realized how big those money, then the only solution might be: Put in octagon may be 50-100 maximum people, those who ruling the world and leave them there to fight as gladiators until only one left. If you can find a way how to corner them in octagon, I will commit much more than $1000... but time will pass and there would be another "leaders" who will want exclusive world power, so it is circle of live... unfortunately
• jyounker 5y ago
  I mean this in all seriousness, but I can't figure out if you're ignorant, naive, or a Russian troll.
  • yessirwhatever 5y ago
    I mean this in all seriousness, but I can't figure out if you're ignorant, naive, or a Russian troll.
  • _6p8i 5y ago
    I'm curious to understand what makes you think so?
• _6p8i 5y ago
  To create a new agreement you can go to: https://peaceagreement.org/new https://peaceagreement.org/new
• zivkovicp 5y ago
  Public opinion is the last thing on the mind of the leadership. If they cared what we thought, there wouldn't be a war in the first place. Nice idea though.
• foobarbecue 5y ago
  A peace agreement is the outcome of a negotiation. Without the participation of the parties, there is no negotiation, and no agreement.
• jcranmer 5y ago
  While the idea is a noble one, this is not going to be a viable option. Let's look at the opening negotiating positions. Russia wants the effective end of Ukraine as a sovereign state. Ukraine... doesn't. Well, so much for finding compromise there. The goal of war is to make the situation such that one side realizes it can't achieve its political aims. Here again, both sides have reasons to be hopeful. From Russia's perspective, an operation that wins successful control of much of the country would hopefully make Ukraine realize that its existence as a sovereign state is already de facto impossible, so it might as well commit to that in a peace treaty. But Ukraine can point out that the war has not been going well for Russia, and the longer the war drags on, the less likely Russia will be able to reach that culminating point. Wars can simmer on for decades without concluding if things stalemate--the Korean War is 70 years long without a peace treaty and still ticking. If your concern is that nuclear weapons would be involved, then this initiative is even more useless. There is no geopolitical reason for Russia to be firing nukes (and NATO isn't going to militarily intervene in large part to avoid giving anybody a reason to fire nukes), so if those start coming, Russia is already not acting with concern for geopolitics, so the foremost geopolitical expert is utterly useless here.
• PrimeDirective 5y ago
  > they all escalate and deepen the divide between the nuclear armed military powers. Hello, Vladimir
  • deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  • yessirwhatever 5y ago
    Hello, Cheney
• seebs 5y ago
  https://twitter.com/thingskatedid/status/1498803126765191173 https://twitter.com/thingskatedid/status/1498803126765191173 > hello i'm from the tech industry. today i'm going to explain how to solve all problems with whatever it is you do! based on my experience of writing software! which means i'm qualified to solve any problem in any field. i have checked this with zero people
• isuleman 5y ago
  Why