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I refer you to these two comments https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31602479 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31602479 https://news.ycombinator.com/item

I refer you to these two comments https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31602479 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31602479 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31603138 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31603138 Criticizing does not help. It does not matter if you criticize the worst, or the second worst or the third worst actor. Helping helps. The first important step in this is figuring out what will help. I explained it in the linked comments, so I will not repeat it here. The way Chomsky addresses the issue makes him look dishonest and this removes all his credibility. His failure to recognize genocide Serbians committed on Balkan is very repulsive for me. Also seeing him dance around Ukrainian question does create similar associations in me. I will address Russia and Israel in other comment.

eveningcoffee 4y ago
Btw. if you have access to Chomsky, I would recommend you to stress this to him if he cares about his legacy.
EGreg 4y ago
Putin said one of his primary motivations for the invasion for the genocide of Russians in Donbass. Well, what we do know is that Ukraine kept firing rockets into that region, and those people were completely disenfranchised. I don’t think it was a genocide. I also do not think it is a genocide what Russia is doing in Ukraine now. If it was a genocide, then why did less civilians die than Russian soldiers? If Russia wanted to simply kill and exterminate Ukrainian civilians for being Ukrainian — which is what real genocide is about, such as Armenian genocide and especially the Holocaust - then obviously they would go about it very differently. Everyone claims genocide in order to justify military action. To justify our invasion of Libya, we claimed there was a genocide there. In that case I can excuse the UN for thinking so, the security council unanimously authorized the intervention and it was rather international, which is why I blame Obama and USA far less for invading Libya. We all were under the impression at the time that genocide was taking place. But anyway, as you can clearly see, such an intervention created a failed state, which is rules by warlords and gangs now. The international community needs to have more cooperation and prevention of wars, its current methods are like bloodletting and leeches were for health interventions until we wised up and got scientific ! https://www.theguardian.com/world/2011/feb/23/gaddafi-libya-un-security-council https://www.theguardian.com/world/2011/feb/23/gaddafi-libya-... The word genocide and concentration camps has been co-opted and cheapened to the point where Ocasio Cortez used it to refer to migrants held in detention on the border. Yes those are basically internment camps but not full blown concentration camps. I will definitely press Chomsky on the Balkans next time we speak because it is one of the examples of NATO aggression, bombing civilians for regime change. The difference between that, with Ukraine war (as well as with Russo-Georgian war for instance) is that those wars ended quickly, otherwise MORE civilians would have died. You go on and on about how “capitulation by Ukraine” is the only possible alternative and it’s going to lead to more Russian aggression. But that is plainly ridiculous fearmongering. Georgia is better off, Serbia is better off, than if they had continued to fight for a decade like Afghanistan. In fact, Zelensky already agreed on the main demands, including non membership in NATO, before Boris Johnson visit. If Ukrainian negotiators — whom I spoke to personally — took the negotiations seriously and spent more than 2 hours a day discussing one topic and ignoring others, we could have stopped the war by now. You should listen to my vimeo video to see what Chomsky says about genocide in Balkans. I will press him on the timeline further. But I would like to ask you… what was so bad about Minsk II agreements? Why couldn’t Ukraine and Russia simply agree instead of both sides insisting “you go first, no you go first”. Don’t you see it is the incompetence of the politicians that causes the civilians to pay a heavy price, while the politicians sit in their safe spots and give interviews and make $$$… or even escape abroad. Same with Ismail Haniyeh and Hamas for example. You have to wake up and see that it is less about Country A vs Country B and more about the system screwing over the civilians. All this could also be avoided tomorrow if the people (Catalonians, Kurds, Basques, Donbass, Crimeans) could hold referendums regularly that the international community would agree to oversee and respect. Demographics change over time and regions like Kosovo should be choosing the country to serve them, not the other way around.
- eveningcoffee 4y ago
  You are so deep in the Russian propaganda ass, that it is pathetic. You are about to relearn a lot about your perception of the reality. Let me prepare it for you.
  - eveningcoffee 4y ago
    This comment was mainly motivated by this comment of yours https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31607305 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31607305 I gave it now complete answer.
- eveningcoffee 4y ago
  I see that the same topic is covered by you here https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31607305 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31607305 I will give multiple answers over the course of the day there.
- eveningcoffee 4y ago
  I will just mention here that Putin can claim what ever he wants. It does not make it true. All this "8 years in Donbas" is a huge fabrication of reality by Russian propaganda. Russian invasion in Donbas deliberately created a failed state ruled by warlords and gangs. It was no accident. The economy of the whole occupied region has been destroyed. The main reason of reduced civilian casualties has been many fold in my opinion. First is timely evacuation before Russian forces had reached the populated areas. Around 14 million people fled their homes. Where this was not successful there were huge numbers of civilian casualties like in Mariupol where the estimated death toll is over 20000 people. Destruction of lives in Mariupol has been deliberate to set it as an example result of not surrendering. The actual number is also really unknown. Over 1000 of dead have been discovered in the liberated Kyiv region where many people were evacuated before Russian forces and where occupation was very short lived. Russian forces have not managed to take, or even reach large centers yet. Ukrainian air defense has been effective against bombing attempts and Russian capacity to use long range missiles is limited. Most importantly, we also do not know what is really happening on occupied territories. Bucha massacre was only revealed after Russian forces were pushed out in hurry. You are here mixing up many things like they are somehow comparable. You can't compare Serbia, where attacking civilians was not deliberate, or Georgia where fighting did not reach larger centers and was stopped because of international pressure, to Ukraine. In fact mentioning NATO operation in Kosovo war here in any capacity demonstrates your complete lack of integrity. NATO campaign did not target civilians. In contrary only in Mariupol 600 people died in a single deliberate strike against clearly marked civilian shelter. This is 100 more people killed deliberately in a single strike than after full campaign in Kosovo war by accident (including Albanians used as human shield by Serbian forces). Objective of the Kosovo war was to prevent Serbian (confirmed) planned genocide against Kosovo Albanians. Serbians committed deliberate planned genocide against other nations on Balkan https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RAM_Plan https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RAM_Plan It is sickening that there are people who call themselves libertarians and who deny this genocide. Objective of the war in Ukraine, as has been clearly stated on numerous occasions, is genocide against Ukrainians. There are already numerous people who could be arrested based on the international law for committing incitement to genocide if they happen to travel out of Russia. Minsk II, at least on paper, is restoring pre 2014 invasion situation and having a democratic referendum about the status of the region. I don't see why Ukraine should be against it and in my opinion Ukraine has made all the steps possible from its side to reach this situation. The agreement is very clear about pulling out all the Russian forces from the territory and about disarming other illegal armed groups. Ukraine can't do it. It can't pull out Russian forces, it was also not in any capacity to disarm the illegal armed groups with heavy weapons. Claiming otherwise and accusing Ukraine in any wrongdoing is extremely dishonest. No democratic referendum is possible if Donbas is still occupied by Russian forces and controlled by terrorist groups. This conflict was beneficial for Russia. So it continued. I do not know why are you so eagerly supporting Russia's imperialist ambitions. There is war in Ukraine because Putin thinks that it belongs to Russia. It is simple as that. How is it so hard to process for self claimed libertarians when this is what Putin himself clearly claims. If you are so eager to give something to Russia, why not give Alaska? Why not give Sunny Isles Beach to Russia? Don't want to? What if Ukrainians also don't want to give their land to Russia?

eveningcoffee 4y ago

Btw. if you have access to Chomsky, I would recommend you to stress this to him if he cares about his legacy.

EGreg 4y ago

Putin said one of his primary motivations for the invasion for the genocide of Russians in Donbass. Well, what we do know is that Ukraine kept firing rockets into that region, and those people were completely disenfranchised. I don’t think it was a genocide. I also do not think it is a genocide what Russia is doing in Ukraine now. If it was a genocide, then why did less civilians die than Russian soldiers? If Russia wanted to simply kill and exterminate Ukrainian civilians for being Ukrainian — which is what real genocide is about, such as Armenian genocide and especially the Holocaust - then obviously they would go about it very differently. Everyone claims genocide in order to justify military action. To justify our invasion of Libya, we claimed there was a genocide there. In that case I can excuse the UN for thinking so, the security council unanimously authorized the intervention and it was rather international, which is why I blame Obama and USA far less for invading Libya. We all were under the impression at the time that genocide was taking place. But anyway, as you can clearly see, such an intervention created a failed state, which is rules by warlords and gangs now. The international community needs to have more cooperation and prevention of wars, its current methods are like bloodletting and leeches were for health interventions until we wised up and got scientific ! https://www.theguardian.com/world/2011/feb/23/gaddafi-libya-un-security-council https://www.theguardian.com/world/2011/feb/23/gaddafi-libya-... The word genocide and concentration camps has been co-opted and cheapened to the point where Ocasio Cortez used it to refer to migrants held in detention on the border. Yes those are basically internment camps but not full blown concentration camps. I will definitely press Chomsky on the Balkans next time we speak because it is one of the examples of NATO aggression, bombing civilians for regime change. The difference between that, with Ukraine war (as well as with Russo-Georgian war for instance) is that those wars ended quickly, otherwise MORE civilians would have died. You go on and on about how “capitulation by Ukraine” is the only possible alternative and it’s going to lead to more Russian aggression. But that is plainly ridiculous fearmongering. Georgia is better off, Serbia is better off, than if they had continued to fight for a decade like Afghanistan. In fact, Zelensky already agreed on the main demands, including non membership in NATO, before Boris Johnson visit. If Ukrainian negotiators — whom I spoke to personally — took the negotiations seriously and spent more than 2 hours a day discussing one topic and ignoring others, we could have stopped the war by now. You should listen to my vimeo video to see what Chomsky says about genocide in Balkans. I will press him on the timeline further. But I would like to ask you… what was so bad about Minsk II agreements? Why couldn’t Ukraine and Russia simply agree instead of both sides insisting “you go first, no you go first”. Don’t you see it is the incompetence of the politicians that causes the civilians to pay a heavy price, while the politicians sit in their safe spots and give interviews and make $$$… or even escape abroad. Same with Ismail Haniyeh and Hamas for example. You have to wake up and see that it is less about Country A vs Country B and more about the system screwing over the civilians. All this could also be avoided tomorrow if the people (Catalonians, Kurds, Basques, Donbass, Crimeans) could hold referendums regularly that the international community would agree to oversee and respect. Demographics change over time and regions like Kosovo should be choosing the country to serve them, not the other way around.

eveningcoffee 4y ago
You are so deep in the Russian propaganda ass, that it is pathetic. You are about to relearn a lot about your perception of the reality. Let me prepare it for you.
- eveningcoffee 4y ago
  This comment was mainly motivated by this comment of yours https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31607305 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31607305 I gave it now complete answer.
eveningcoffee 4y ago
I see that the same topic is covered by you here https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31607305 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31607305 I will give multiple answers over the course of the day there.
eveningcoffee 4y ago
I will just mention here that Putin can claim what ever he wants. It does not make it true. All this "8 years in Donbas" is a huge fabrication of reality by Russian propaganda. Russian invasion in Donbas deliberately created a failed state ruled by warlords and gangs. It was no accident. The economy of the whole occupied region has been destroyed. The main reason of reduced civilian casualties has been many fold in my opinion. First is timely evacuation before Russian forces had reached the populated areas. Around 14 million people fled their homes. Where this was not successful there were huge numbers of civilian casualties like in Mariupol where the estimated death toll is over 20000 people. Destruction of lives in Mariupol has been deliberate to set it as an example result of not surrendering. The actual number is also really unknown. Over 1000 of dead have been discovered in the liberated Kyiv region where many people were evacuated before Russian forces and where occupation was very short lived. Russian forces have not managed to take, or even reach large centers yet. Ukrainian air defense has been effective against bombing attempts and Russian capacity to use long range missiles is limited. Most importantly, we also do not know what is really happening on occupied territories. Bucha massacre was only revealed after Russian forces were pushed out in hurry. You are here mixing up many things like they are somehow comparable. You can't compare Serbia, where attacking civilians was not deliberate, or Georgia where fighting did not reach larger centers and was stopped because of international pressure, to Ukraine. In fact mentioning NATO operation in Kosovo war here in any capacity demonstrates your complete lack of integrity. NATO campaign did not target civilians. In contrary only in Mariupol 600 people died in a single deliberate strike against clearly marked civilian shelter. This is 100 more people killed deliberately in a single strike than after full campaign in Kosovo war by accident (including Albanians used as human shield by Serbian forces). Objective of the Kosovo war was to prevent Serbian (confirmed) planned genocide against Kosovo Albanians. Serbians committed deliberate planned genocide against other nations on Balkan https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RAM_Plan https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RAM_Plan It is sickening that there are people who call themselves libertarians and who deny this genocide. Objective of the war in Ukraine, as has been clearly stated on numerous occasions, is genocide against Ukrainians. There are already numerous people who could be arrested based on the international law for committing incitement to genocide if they happen to travel out of Russia. Minsk II, at least on paper, is restoring pre 2014 invasion situation and having a democratic referendum about the status of the region. I don't see why Ukraine should be against it and in my opinion Ukraine has made all the steps possible from its side to reach this situation. The agreement is very clear about pulling out all the Russian forces from the territory and about disarming other illegal armed groups. Ukraine can't do it. It can't pull out Russian forces, it was also not in any capacity to disarm the illegal armed groups with heavy weapons. Claiming otherwise and accusing Ukraine in any wrongdoing is extremely dishonest. No democratic referendum is possible if Donbas is still occupied by Russian forces and controlled by terrorist groups. This conflict was beneficial for Russia. So it continued. I do not know why are you so eagerly supporting Russia's imperialist ambitions. There is war in Ukraine because Putin thinks that it belongs to Russia. It is simple as that. How is it so hard to process for self claimed libertarians when this is what Putin himself clearly claims. If you are so eager to give something to Russia, why not give Alaska? Why not give Sunny Isles Beach to Russia? Don't want to? What if Ukrainians also don't want to give their land to Russia?