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Ukraine was never a threat to Russia's borders. Quite the opposite, Ukraine lost territory due to Russia's aggression.
by NoPie 5y ago
Ukraine was never a threat to Russia's borders. Quite the opposite, Ukraine lost territory due to Russia's aggression.
- howmayiannoyyou 5y agoA facts based explanation of Russia's perspective can be found here: https://www.fpri.org/article/2022/01/moscows-compellence-str https://www.fpri.org/article/2022/01/moscows-compellence-str...
- NoPie 5y agoJudging by the protests against this war in Russia itself, it is more likely the perspective of the Russian government not the Russian people.
- thiagoharry 5y agoProtests means that a minimal discontentment exist. But not necessarily more than this. The fact that there are protests do not mean that the manifestants are the majority or have much power. They can be, but they can be not.
- moonchrome 5y agoReally? From what I've seen reported it seems like there were minor protests and the rest is either scared or support the move.
- goldsteinq 5y agoIt’s complicated. There’re people who support war because the Russian government maintains an information blockade about the topic. Saying anything about the war that was not previously said by the government is going to become a criminal offence tomorrow. Two independent media (TV Rain and Echo of Moscow) were recently banned for telling too much. At the same time, every state-controlled media is spreading propaganda non-stop. Many citizens genuinely think that Ukraine is ruled by Nazis, and Russian military is successfully removing these Nazis without damaging non-combatants. It’s hard to spread the truth because government is going all-in on stopping opposition.
- criddell 5y agoCNN showed a pro-war protestor who said something to the effect of "Ukraine today, the rest of Europe tomorrow". There's definitely a faction that wants to see a new Soviet Union.
- goldsteinq 5y agoIdiots exist, but this isn’t even a common opinion among pro-Putin people.
- foverzar 5y agoThis is a purely wargames matter, so obviously.
- shawabawa3 5y agoAm I missing something or is the argument really: 1. Russia continuously invades and annexes ex soviet neighbors 2. Neighbors join defensive alliance against Russia for protection 3. Russia claims this is provocation against them and uses it as justification to invade another neighboring country
- slybootz 5y agoNo, you have it exactly correct. https://imgur.com/a/KbuYT7h https://imgur.com/a/KbuYT7h
- rayiner 5y agoThat’s an absurd statement, akin to saying there was never a threat from Soviet missiles in Cuba.
- tptacek 5y agoThis is an argument that would appear to mitigate a Russian attack on Finland.
- rayiner 5y agoIf they tried to join NATO, absolutely. Russia has tremendous national interest in not allowing a hostile military alliance to absorb states on its border.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- tptacek 5y agoI guess I just wonder if you have any arguments that would be persuasive to those who believe Finland should be its own sovereign country, rather than a client of Russia's with fully devolved domestic policy authority.
- rayiner 5y agoAny dissatisfaction the Fins have with that answer has to do with the facts of life--they're a country with a smaller population than Maryland--not my argument. If you're a border state to a major power, you don't get to adopt a foreign policy that antagonizes your neighbor. Bangladesh doesn't get to do anything that would cause India to feel threatened; Mexico (and realistically speaking, all of Latin America) doesn't get to do anything that would cause the United States to feel threatened; etc.
- tptacek 5y agoThat's just straightforwardly not true, right? You can't park nuclear missiles in Cuba, but you can do everything short of that. Cuba remained a COMECON member after the crisis. The USSR ran SIGINT missions out of Cuba. They were treaty partners in all but name --- far more involved than the US is with Ukraine in 2022, or, really, than they would be as a NATO member.
- goda90 5y agoWhile I wouldn't call Russia justified at all, Ukraine presented a number of threats to Putin's desire to be a superpower. The main threat to Putin is Ukraine's growing but still undeveloped natural gas resources. One of the biggest parts of the Russian economy is fossil fuels. There's large amounts of underwater gas right around Crimea that are now under Russian control. And there's large deposits of shale gas in the eastern edge of Ukraine that Russia could at least disrupt long term with the war. On top of that, Ukraine charges Russia tariffs on the Soviet era gas pipelines running through it. If considering NATO a threat, the further west Russia can put it's troops, the easier time it would have defending it's territory. The flat open lands of northern Europe expand the further east you go, all the way to the Urals. If they have troops at the western end of Ukraine, then it's a smaller front line to guard with the Carpathian mountains to the south and the Baltic sea to the north.
- JaimeThompson 5y agoThe largest threat to Russia becoming a superpower was Putin allowing himself and the other ultra rich to take so much out of the Russia economy and keep it for themselves. Had they not down this and actually grown the economy he might have been able to get what he wanted.
- goda90 5y agoI agree that Putin and co are the primary cause of Russia not prospering. I honestly think that Russia joining the EU would be great for the Russian people and the EU, but it's not great for plutocrats.
- modo_mario 5y agoOn one hand yeah but on the other it would require a ludicrous amount of change that we won't see for the forseeable future. Additionally Russia and Turkey's populations are too big would create power imbalances in the EU that Italy, Germany and France wouldn't like. Oh and eastern EU countries are absolutely (and justifiably) paranoid over Russia of course
- thiagoharry 5y agoNot Ukraine, but NATO. US and NATO knew since 2008 that an invasion, civil war and Ukraine being split in two were a probable outcome of trying to expand NATO there: https://wikileaks.org/plusd/cables/08MOSCOW265_a.html https://wikileaks.org/plusd/cables/08MOSCOW265_a.html