5 ms·

Ukraine (and the world) can only make the price of the war unacceptable to Russia. There will be a treaty in the end. Hopefully sooner rather than latter.

throwaway0a5e 5y ago
Ukraine needs to do this mostly on their own [1]. If the west helps too much then in 50yr the next Russian despot will take another crack at it when they think the west won't help. [1] Barring the plausibly deniable arms shipments and clandestine training that the underdog in any sort of conflict like this gets. Nobody ever starts a war without their enemies sending aid to whoever they started it with. Anyone who's read their history already knows this.
- oneoff786 5y ago
  Setting a precedent is bad because in a long time that precedent might not hold? That makes no sense.
  - throwaway0a5e 5y ago
    The idea of a "precedent" doesn't make any sense. Nation states don't do "precedents" when it comes to helping each other out. They do "what is good for me here and now and maybe on a future timeline I happen to care about". For democracies this timeline is short. For dictatorships and monarchies this timeline tends to be a little longer because nobody wants to leave a giant mess for their kid. Sending in green beret advisors or the FFL isn't a "precedent". And everybody knows it. It's a one off based on the political realities of the minute. The kind of political realities that lead to those sort of interventions are short lived decades long things at best. In contrast, "our country, fuck off" is a solution that will likely live as long as Ukraine maintains some sort of national identity. Nobody's invaded Afghanistan twice.
    - modo_mario 5y ago
      > Nobody's invaded Afghanistan twice. There's about 3 anglo-afghan wars and the more recent invasion and occupation involving Britain. There's earlier examples but I'm not sure if the place even fully existed as a concept back then.
      - throwaway0a5e 5y ago
        The Anglo-<pick a random group in that general area> wars are just the baggage that went with their colonization of the Indian subcontinent (including Pakistan) The idea of nation state borders didn't really work well in that part of the word in that century. In any case they sure aren't interested in wasting returning to the region. Pretty much all the other colonial powers have a similar "nope, not our problem any more" attitude toward meddling portions of their sphere or influence that they left because the locals made staying too expensive. Algeria is across the pond and the French want nothing to do with it. Contrast with Russia which is constantly poking and occasionally invading its former sphere of influence.
        ashwagary 5y ago
        >Pretty much all the other colonial powers have a similar "nope, not our problem any more" attitude >Algeria is across the pond and the French want nothing to do with it. The French are currently robbing the citizens of ~1/3 of all African countries through their central banks and they have assassinated 22 African presidents since ~1970. I don't think you are qualified to discuss this topic in any depth, most of your earlier claims are patently false. I only picked this one to tear apart due to time constaints.
    - long_time_gone 5y ago
      > Nation states don't do "precedents" when it comes to helping each other out. NATO is a nation state alliance built on mutual defense and strengthened by precedent. The precedent of defending allies is built into the NATO agreement. > For democracies this timeline is short. For dictatorships and monarchies this timeline tends to be a little longer because nobody wants to leave a giant mess for their kid. Great point on the different timelines, I have to disagree on the reason. Dictators/monarchies have a longer timeline because they tend to rule for much longer than leaders in democracies. By definition, democracies involve turning over the ideals and ideas of leadership every few years. Do you believe Putin is worried about leaving things to the daughters that he never mentions?
drran 5y ago
Russian Empire is known as «Prison of peoples» [0]. It's time to free peoples from the jail. RF is too big to form a proper liberal democracy. It's better to allow every nation inside RF to establish their own democracy instead, and join a union after that, when they will be ready. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prison_of_the_peoples https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prison_of_the_peoples
- sorokod 5y ago
  A small correction, was known. The quote is from an essay [1] by the future leader of Communist Russia - Lenin, describing the Czarist Russian empire on April, 1914. [1] Original in Russian: http://libelli.ru/works/25-5.htm http://libelli.ru/works/25-5.htm [2] Google translated: https://libelli-ru.translate.goog/works/25-5.htm?_x_tr_sch=http&_x_tr_sl=auto&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=en&_x_tr_pto=wapp https://libelli-ru.translate.goog/works/25-5.htm?_x_tr_sch=h...
  - drran 5y ago
    Russian Federation is not created on free will, but on force. Nobody asked peoples is they want to become members of RF. IMHO, if an exit referendum will be allowed in RF (they are forbidden), then most nations will take opportunity and escape. Currently, escape is not possible. For example, Chechnya tried to escape the prison, so Russian used thousands of tons of explosives, FAE's (which is comparable to low yield nuclear weapons) to destroy independent Chechnya state, which was able to escape after first war. Russian FSB bombed their own citizens to provoke war with Chechnya.
    - sorokod 5y ago
      Chechen wars (both of them), deserve to be known more widely in the west. My comment was specific to your quote.
  - throwaway0a5e 5y ago
    I think it's worth noting that the USSR (intentionally) did a heck of a lot to negate that and build a (more or less Russian less christian influence) national identity by re-settling minority groups that didn't like them. This kind of worked, somewhat, and not for reasons they were anticipating. Turns out that forcibly resettling people doesn't make them like you but it does make them tolerate each other a little bit better because they all now have one thing in common: shared adversity under the USSR. However, in the places where it didn't work it created bigger problems. Places (Chechnya) that could have been clean breakaway republics didn't do so because they had a ethnic Russian minority holding them in and in cases where those nations did break you have the Russian group trying to lean politically into Russia and the non-Russian group leaning away and that causes its own problems (Georgia, Ukrainian breakaway provinces, etc) Russia is far more unified across ethnic lines than people give it credit for. It's not going to pull a Yugoslavia and erupt into genocide as soon as Putin croaks. That said, it's nowhere near as unified as the US (where you can basically count on any immigrant group becoming functionally "American" in 2 generations).

throwaway0a5e 5y ago

Ukraine needs to do this mostly on their own [1]. If the west helps too much then in 50yr the next Russian despot will take another crack at it when they think the west won't help. [1] Barring the plausibly deniable arms shipments and clandestine training that the underdog in any sort of conflict like this gets. Nobody ever starts a war without their enemies sending aid to whoever they started it with. Anyone who's read their history already knows this.

oneoff786 5y ago
Setting a precedent is bad because in a long time that precedent might not hold? That makes no sense.
- throwaway0a5e 5y ago
  The idea of a "precedent" doesn't make any sense. Nation states don't do "precedents" when it comes to helping each other out. They do "what is good for me here and now and maybe on a future timeline I happen to care about". For democracies this timeline is short. For dictatorships and monarchies this timeline tends to be a little longer because nobody wants to leave a giant mess for their kid. Sending in green beret advisors or the FFL isn't a "precedent". And everybody knows it. It's a one off based on the political realities of the minute. The kind of political realities that lead to those sort of interventions are short lived decades long things at best. In contrast, "our country, fuck off" is a solution that will likely live as long as Ukraine maintains some sort of national identity. Nobody's invaded Afghanistan twice.
  - modo_mario 5y ago
    > Nobody's invaded Afghanistan twice. There's about 3 anglo-afghan wars and the more recent invasion and occupation involving Britain. There's earlier examples but I'm not sure if the place even fully existed as a concept back then.
    - throwaway0a5e 5y ago
      The Anglo-<pick a random group in that general area> wars are just the baggage that went with their colonization of the Indian subcontinent (including Pakistan) The idea of nation state borders didn't really work well in that part of the word in that century. In any case they sure aren't interested in wasting returning to the region. Pretty much all the other colonial powers have a similar "nope, not our problem any more" attitude toward meddling portions of their sphere or influence that they left because the locals made staying too expensive. Algeria is across the pond and the French want nothing to do with it. Contrast with Russia which is constantly poking and occasionally invading its former sphere of influence.
      - ashwagary 5y ago
        >Pretty much all the other colonial powers have a similar "nope, not our problem any more" attitude >Algeria is across the pond and the French want nothing to do with it. The French are currently robbing the citizens of ~1/3 of all African countries through their central banks and they have assassinated 22 African presidents since ~1970. I don't think you are qualified to discuss this topic in any depth, most of your earlier claims are patently false. I only picked this one to tear apart due to time constaints.
  - long_time_gone 5y ago
    > Nation states don't do "precedents" when it comes to helping each other out. NATO is a nation state alliance built on mutual defense and strengthened by precedent. The precedent of defending allies is built into the NATO agreement. > For democracies this timeline is short. For dictatorships and monarchies this timeline tends to be a little longer because nobody wants to leave a giant mess for their kid. Great point on the different timelines, I have to disagree on the reason. Dictators/monarchies have a longer timeline because they tend to rule for much longer than leaders in democracies. By definition, democracies involve turning over the ideals and ideas of leadership every few years. Do you believe Putin is worried about leaving things to the daughters that he never mentions?

drran 5y ago

Russian Empire is known as «Prison of peoples» [0]. It's time to free peoples from the jail. RF is too big to form a proper liberal democracy. It's better to allow every nation inside RF to establish their own democracy instead, and join a union after that, when they will be ready. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prison_of_the_peoples https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prison_of_the_peoples

sorokod 5y ago
A small correction, was known. The quote is from an essay [1] by the future leader of Communist Russia - Lenin, describing the Czarist Russian empire on April, 1914. [1] Original in Russian: http://libelli.ru/works/25-5.htm http://libelli.ru/works/25-5.htm [2] Google translated: https://libelli-ru.translate.goog/works/25-5.htm?_x_tr_sch=http&_x_tr_sl=auto&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=en&_x_tr_pto=wapp https://libelli-ru.translate.goog/works/25-5.htm?_x_tr_sch=h...
- drran 5y ago
  Russian Federation is not created on free will, but on force. Nobody asked peoples is they want to become members of RF. IMHO, if an exit referendum will be allowed in RF (they are forbidden), then most nations will take opportunity and escape. Currently, escape is not possible. For example, Chechnya tried to escape the prison, so Russian used thousands of tons of explosives, FAE's (which is comparable to low yield nuclear weapons) to destroy independent Chechnya state, which was able to escape after first war. Russian FSB bombed their own citizens to provoke war with Chechnya.
  - sorokod 5y ago
    Chechen wars (both of them), deserve to be known more widely in the west. My comment was specific to your quote.
- throwaway0a5e 5y ago
  I think it's worth noting that the USSR (intentionally) did a heck of a lot to negate that and build a (more or less Russian less christian influence) national identity by re-settling minority groups that didn't like them. This kind of worked, somewhat, and not for reasons they were anticipating. Turns out that forcibly resettling people doesn't make them like you but it does make them tolerate each other a little bit better because they all now have one thing in common: shared adversity under the USSR. However, in the places where it didn't work it created bigger problems. Places (Chechnya) that could have been clean breakaway republics didn't do so because they had a ethnic Russian minority holding them in and in cases where those nations did break you have the Russian group trying to lean politically into Russia and the non-Russian group leaning away and that causes its own problems (Georgia, Ukrainian breakaway provinces, etc) Russia is far more unified across ethnic lines than people give it credit for. It's not going to pull a Yugoslavia and erupt into genocide as soon as Putin croaks. That said, it's nowhere near as unified as the US (where you can basically count on any immigrant group becoming functionally "American" in 2 generations).