6 ms·

Can we please start de-escalating this situation? Speculative headlines like these do nothing to improve the situation.

by elric 5y ago

yakshaving_jgt 5y ago
How do you imagine that would work? Because it currently seems that the only way to de-escalate is to kill tens of thousands of Russian soldiers, and/or a coup and consequent total regime change in Russia.
- user3939382 5y ago
  The US needs to push Ukraine to agree to neutrality. Had we done that in the first place this war likely wouldn't be happening. Ukraine would have lost nothing by agreeing to that. Zelenskyy already said he was told in private Ukraine wouldn't be admitted to NATO anyway, making this entire war senseless.
  - keewee7 5y ago
    >The US needs to push Ukraine to agree to neutrality. Russia's version of "neutrality" is a joke. Russia's demand for "neutrality" means letting Russia decide Ukraine's foreign and military policies. Russia want to enforce specific limits on the size and capabilities of Ukraine's military. That will never be accepted by Ukraine.
    - user3939382 5y ago
      It's interesting that we have no popular qualms about the Monroe Doctrine, which we've abused to interfere with and overthrow legitimate governments in South America for decades, but when Russia takes a Monroe-Doctrine-esque position with a country on their border it's out of the question. I see basically 3 possibilities. Ukraine agrees to neutrality, Ukraine resists neutrality and has its country destroyed and is eventually forced to agree to it anyway (what is happening now), or the western powers start a hot war with Russia and risk WW3/nuclear holocaust. Given those options I'd go with the first.
      - xdennis 5y ago
        Typical Russian whataboutism. Who, other than American right-wingers and Russian trolls, are defending the Monroe Doctrine? - 1 is a joke which cannot be accepted. - 3 is a bluff. - 2 is the only option. Ukraine has already beaten you in the north. How long till it defeats you in the east and south? Ukraine will suffer many dead civilians and hundreds of billion in damages, but Russia is losing thousands of soldiers and the economic impact will last for decades while Ukraine will be rebuilt.
        golemotron 5y ago
        Whataboutism is good. It's not a Russian thing.
        klawcode 5y ago
        It takes a special kind of dumb to criticize the mistakes of others ferociously then make the exact same mistakes yourself, with the only difference being even greater incompetence. All of the Russian criticism was plainly self serving anyway. You can clearly tell by this war that they had no qualms with anything the US did in Iraq, excluding maybe their own geopolitical interests in the area.
        fsloth 5y ago
        Is this a common law thing? Whatever was done in the past, is something you have to allow everyone else to do? Surely you see how that is morally untenable? Errors of the past do not need to be repeated or allowed. (Even though they likely will be as human life is complex and fallible).
        user3939382 5y ago
        It’s not even the past. Look at what the US is doing right this moment in Somalia Yemen Palestine. No one here actually believes Joe Biden cares about the Ukrainian people right?
      - keewee7 5y ago
    - golemotron 5y ago
      Spheres of influence are a geopolitical reality despite any disbelief people might entertain.
  - yakshaving_jgt 5y ago
    Well that's completely wrong. Please read this[0] so that you have some real context on this matter. [0]: https://euvsdisinfo.eu/into-the-heart-of-darkness-what-russia-wants-in-ukraine/ https://euvsdisinfo.eu/into-the-heart-of-darkness-what-russi...
  - Koshkin 5y ago
    But as we all know, it was just a pretext; the idea behind the invasion was to make Ukraine part of Russia, which is evidenced by all these talks about Ukrainians being Russian people.
    - user3939382 5y ago
      That's correct if you're talking about Donbas.
      - yakshaving_jgt 5y ago
        Sorry, which country are you from? You're English, right? You must be since you're communicating in English. This would be consistent with the idea that every person in the world who communicates in English is actually English.
  - lottin 5y ago
    This is pure speculation. Nobody knows what would have happened, had Ukraine agreed to Russia's demands. Maybe the invasion would not have happened, or maybe Russia would have come up with more demands.
  - xdennis 5y ago
    > The US needs to push Ukraine to agree to neutrality. Why would the US willfully feed countries to Russia? Ukraine is being attacked exactly because it's not allied with major powers. > Zelenskyy already said he was told in private Ukraine wouldn't be admitted to NATO anyway, making this entire war senseless. You're living in a parallel reality. Ukraine is fighting for its right to exist. The war is senseless, but that's something you need to tell Putin.
keewee7 5y ago
>Can we please start de-escalating this situation? Only Russia can de-escalate the situation. The irony is that Russia could have taken Donetsk and Luhanks and the war would have been out of the news cycle by now. The West would just have repeated the harmless 2014 targeted "sanctions" on Russian oligarchs and politicians. Putin's and Lavrov's genocidal speeches about Ukraine being a fake nation that should be "de-nazified" and the Russian attempt at taking the capital Kyiv has escalated this conflict into its current state.
- Barrin92 5y ago
  One of the biggest reasons for the Russian military offensive is to establish borders that Russia considers defensible, which always indicated that Russia would push up to the Carpathians because it vastly narrows the attack surface on the northern European plane. Ukraine anchors Russia in the Carpathians and a loss basically opens the entire south up to Volgograd and Moscow. Just conquering Donetsk and Luhansk has fairly limited military value.
  - tsupiroti 5y ago
    Why would Russia, a large nuclear power, need defensible borders? To prevent an invasion by Ukraine, Finland or Estonia?
    - xdennis 5y ago
      It doesn't. This "geopolitical realism" is the ideology that Russia uses to justify its aggression to useful idiots in the West.
    - Barrin92 5y ago
      to bolster its defense against NATO, Russia's largest threat which is present in Eastern Europe, these countries are not non-aligned. Taking important strategic positions gives Russia leverage, reduces defense burden and ensures access to important geographic access points (like to the Black Sea). It increases Russia's opportunities and margin for error and diminishes their opponents'. It's kind of a weird question honestly, why do you think India, China and the United States pursue territorial interests and fight wars? History and conventional warfare hasn't ended just because countries have nukes.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
0x64 5y ago
You clearly don't live in a country bordering Russia. This is not an issue you will solve with de-escalation, it's a fundamental issue that stems from the fact that Russia has shown that nothing they say can be trusted. Try telling the people of Finland that Putin promises to not invade the country, and try not to get laughed out of the room.
edanm 5y ago
All other issues aside - it's not the newspaper's job to de-escalate anything. It's their job to print the news. Should they avoid true headlines that are actually important, because of the perceived effect on politics / international relations?
- elric 5y ago
  > All other issues aside - it's not the newspaper's job to de-escalate anything. It's their job to print the news. Unbiased, truthful news? That would be the day. Until that happens, newpapers always editorialize. They exaggerate. They clickbait. They speculate. It's fine and often harmless. But it's not harmless when sabres are rattling and people are dying. Newspapers, more than anyone, should check, verify, and double-check before they publish anything pertaining to anything as polarized as an armed conflict. Polarized, in this case, because Russians seem to think they are on the right side of history, while the West obviously feels the same. Should they avoid publishing true headlines? Maybe. They should at least make sure the headlines are truthful. Newspapers often delay publication of sensitive issues. See important leaks like the Panama Papers, where many journalists coordinated publication. Same with various criminal investigations, where reports are delayed or initially partially redacted to protect the integrity of the investigation, or to protect the victims.
  - edanm 5y ago
    > Should they avoid publishing true headlines? Maybe. They should at least make sure the headlines are truthful. I totally agree about the "making sure the headlines are truthful" part. Not sure how I feel about not publishing truthful things because it might escalate the war. Should the press not publish anything about the war in Ukraine, because it might lead to nuclear war? I guess that's a defensible view in some sense, but I sure don't want to live in a world in which that happens.

Can we please start de-escalating this situation? Speculative headlines like these do nothing to improve the situation.

by elric 5y ago

Can we please start de-escalating this situation? Speculative headlines like these do nothing to improve the situation.

How do you imagine that would work? Because it currently seems that the only way to de-escalate is to kill tens of thousands of Russian soldiers, and/or a coup and consequent total regime change in Russia.

user3939382 5y ago
The US needs to push Ukraine to agree to neutrality. Had we done that in the first place this war likely wouldn't be happening. Ukraine would have lost nothing by agreeing to that. Zelenskyy already said he was told in private Ukraine wouldn't be admitted to NATO anyway, making this entire war senseless.
- keewee7 5y ago
  >The US needs to push Ukraine to agree to neutrality. Russia's version of "neutrality" is a joke. Russia's demand for "neutrality" means letting Russia decide Ukraine's foreign and military policies. Russia want to enforce specific limits on the size and capabilities of Ukraine's military. That will never be accepted by Ukraine.
  - user3939382 5y ago
    It's interesting that we have no popular qualms about the Monroe Doctrine, which we've abused to interfere with and overthrow legitimate governments in South America for decades, but when Russia takes a Monroe-Doctrine-esque position with a country on their border it's out of the question. I see basically 3 possibilities. Ukraine agrees to neutrality, Ukraine resists neutrality and has its country destroyed and is eventually forced to agree to it anyway (what is happening now), or the western powers start a hot war with Russia and risk WW3/nuclear holocaust. Given those options I'd go with the first.
    - xdennis 5y ago
      Typical Russian whataboutism. Who, other than American right-wingers and Russian trolls, are defending the Monroe Doctrine? - 1 is a joke which cannot be accepted. - 3 is a bluff. - 2 is the only option. Ukraine has already beaten you in the north. How long till it defeats you in the east and south? Ukraine will suffer many dead civilians and hundreds of billion in damages, but Russia is losing thousands of soldiers and the economic impact will last for decades while Ukraine will be rebuilt.
      - golemotron 5y ago
        Whataboutism is good. It's not a Russian thing.
        klawcode 5y ago
        It takes a special kind of dumb to criticize the mistakes of others ferociously then make the exact same mistakes yourself, with the only difference being even greater incompetence. All of the Russian criticism was plainly self serving anyway. You can clearly tell by this war that they had no qualms with anything the US did in Iraq, excluding maybe their own geopolitical interests in the area.
        fsloth 5y ago
        Is this a common law thing? Whatever was done in the past, is something you have to allow everyone else to do? Surely you see how that is morally untenable? Errors of the past do not need to be repeated or allowed. (Even though they likely will be as human life is complex and fallible).
        user3939382 5y ago
        It’s not even the past. Look at what the US is doing right this moment in Somalia Yemen Palestine. No one here actually believes Joe Biden cares about the Ukrainian people right?
    - keewee7 5y ago
  - golemotron 5y ago
    Spheres of influence are a geopolitical reality despite any disbelief people might entertain.
- yakshaving_jgt 5y ago
  Well that's completely wrong. Please read this[0] so that you have some real context on this matter. [0]: https://euvsdisinfo.eu/into-the-heart-of-darkness-what-russia-wants-in-ukraine/ https://euvsdisinfo.eu/into-the-heart-of-darkness-what-russi...
- Koshkin 5y ago
  But as we all know, it was just a pretext; the idea behind the invasion was to make Ukraine part of Russia, which is evidenced by all these talks about Ukrainians being Russian people.
  - user3939382 5y ago
    That's correct if you're talking about Donbas.
    - yakshaving_jgt 5y ago
      Sorry, which country are you from? You're English, right? You must be since you're communicating in English. This would be consistent with the idea that every person in the world who communicates in English is actually English.
- lottin 5y ago
  This is pure speculation. Nobody knows what would have happened, had Ukraine agreed to Russia's demands. Maybe the invasion would not have happened, or maybe Russia would have come up with more demands.
- xdennis 5y ago
  > The US needs to push Ukraine to agree to neutrality. Why would the US willfully feed countries to Russia? Ukraine is being attacked exactly because it's not allied with major powers. > Zelenskyy already said he was told in private Ukraine wouldn't be admitted to NATO anyway, making this entire war senseless. You're living in a parallel reality. Ukraine is fighting for its right to exist. The war is senseless, but that's something you need to tell Putin.

keewee7 5y ago

>Can we please start de-escalating this situation? Only Russia can de-escalate the situation. The irony is that Russia could have taken Donetsk and Luhanks and the war would have been out of the news cycle by now. The West would just have repeated the harmless 2014 targeted "sanctions" on Russian oligarchs and politicians. Putin's and Lavrov's genocidal speeches about Ukraine being a fake nation that should be "de-nazified" and the Russian attempt at taking the capital Kyiv has escalated this conflict into its current state.

Barrin92 5y ago
One of the biggest reasons for the Russian military offensive is to establish borders that Russia considers defensible, which always indicated that Russia would push up to the Carpathians because it vastly narrows the attack surface on the northern European plane. Ukraine anchors Russia in the Carpathians and a loss basically opens the entire south up to Volgograd and Moscow. Just conquering Donetsk and Luhansk has fairly limited military value.
- tsupiroti 5y ago
  Why would Russia, a large nuclear power, need defensible borders? To prevent an invasion by Ukraine, Finland or Estonia?
  - xdennis 5y ago
    It doesn't. This "geopolitical realism" is the ideology that Russia uses to justify its aggression to useful idiots in the West.
  - Barrin92 5y ago
    to bolster its defense against NATO, Russia's largest threat which is present in Eastern Europe, these countries are not non-aligned. Taking important strategic positions gives Russia leverage, reduces defense burden and ensures access to important geographic access points (like to the Black Sea). It increases Russia's opportunities and margin for error and diminishes their opponents'. It's kind of a weird question honestly, why do you think India, China and the United States pursue territorial interests and fight wars? History and conventional warfare hasn't ended just because countries have nukes.

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

0x64 5y ago

You clearly don't live in a country bordering Russia. This is not an issue you will solve with de-escalation, it's a fundamental issue that stems from the fact that Russia has shown that nothing they say can be trusted. Try telling the people of Finland that Putin promises to not invade the country, and try not to get laughed out of the room.

edanm 5y ago

All other issues aside - it's not the newspaper's job to de-escalate anything. It's their job to print the news. Should they avoid true headlines that are actually important, because of the perceived effect on politics / international relations?

elric 5y ago
> All other issues aside - it's not the newspaper's job to de-escalate anything. It's their job to print the news. Unbiased, truthful news? That would be the day. Until that happens, newpapers always editorialize. They exaggerate. They clickbait. They speculate. It's fine and often harmless. But it's not harmless when sabres are rattling and people are dying. Newspapers, more than anyone, should check, verify, and double-check before they publish anything pertaining to anything as polarized as an armed conflict. Polarized, in this case, because Russians seem to think they are on the right side of history, while the West obviously feels the same. Should they avoid publishing true headlines? Maybe. They should at least make sure the headlines are truthful. Newspapers often delay publication of sensitive issues. See important leaks like the Panama Papers, where many journalists coordinated publication. Same with various criminal investigations, where reports are delayed or initially partially redacted to protect the integrity of the investigation, or to protect the victims.
- edanm 5y ago
  > Should they avoid publishing true headlines? Maybe. They should at least make sure the headlines are truthful. I totally agree about the "making sure the headlines are truthful" part. Not sure how I feel about not publishing truthful things because it might escalate the war. Should the press not publish anything about the war in Ukraine, because it might lead to nuclear war? I guess that's a defensible view in some sense, but I sure don't want to live in a world in which that happens.