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It's far too late to change this. You cannot restructure the energy sources of a whole continent in a few months or even years. This could've been fixed if the

by _xnmw 4y ago

It's far too late to change this. You cannot restructure the energy sources of a whole continent in a few months or even years. This could've been fixed if the West had understood and reacted appropriately to the magnitude of the Russian threat about 10 years ago, as foreseen by academics like Stephen Cohen and businessmen like Bill Browder, instead of blindly falling for its own hubristic self-delusion (which continues till today), i.e. the delusion of considering the West to be omnipotent and the delusion of considering Russia to be an irrelevant, backward, economically insignificant country (Obama famously called it a "regional power" much to the chagrin of Putin). But the West is too decadent, fat, and blind to see anything but its own narrative of post-cold-war unipolar dominance. The worst part is, this delusion of believing in Western omnipotence continues fuelling bad decisions today. I was in Kharkiv, Ukraine when the war hit -- there were two major delusions prevalent in the weeks and months leading up to the war. 1. People believed the war could not happen because we believed our American superpower ally would somehow magically prevent the war or stop it quickly, or 2. we believed our leaders would have the sense to settle with Russia instead of destroying our country. 4 months later after losing 20% of our territory, both fantasies evaporated quickly, but I'm astounded at how many people continue to live in the 3rd fantasy of believing Ukraine could somehow "defeat" Russia while still avoiding WW3. Do people understand what a defeat of Russia would look like? Are you trying to bring a global thermonuclear war apocalypse? What is your endgame here?

ajsnigrutin 4y ago
What I find most sad is, how differently we treat eg. USA when they decide to destroy a sovereign country due to their interests, compared to eg. now russia... I'm from slovenia, and we even sent soldiers to help them in afghanistan, and we still have them in syria... somehow noone mentions words like "war", "occupation", "civilian deaths" etc., when our soldiers are there...
- hourago 4y ago
  > somehow noone mentions words like "war", "occupation", "civilian deaths" etc., when our soldiers are there... Read more newspapers. You can choose: https://www.google.com/search?q=civilians%20dead%20in%20afghanistan https://www.google.com/search?q=civilians%20dead%20in%20afgh...
  - ajsnigrutin 4y ago
    This is google, so results might vary, but this is the first result for me: https://reliefweb.int/report/afghanistan/civilian-casualties-explosive-violence-mount-taliban-capture-kabul https://reliefweb.int/report/afghanistan/civilian-casualties... "Civilian casualties of explosive violence mount as Taliban capture Kabul" Somehow wikipedia is only the second link, mentioning the actual numbers of civilians.... but again... when was the last time news like this made headlines? When was the last time anyone imposed sanctions against countries killing civilians there? Also, considering we're still there (eg. syria), we're still the occupying force there, why is there not daily reporting of what we did there and how bad it was? Why are there not international efforts to pull our soldiers out of there?
    - throwrqX 4y ago
      If you count New York Times as mainstream then plenty of times. For example https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2021/10/16/pentagon-payment-afghanistan-drone/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2021/10/16/pentagon-pay... https://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/11/world/middleeast/11casualties.html https://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/11/world/middleeast/11casual... https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/11/16/magazine/uncounted-civilian-casualties-iraq-airstrikes.html https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/11/16/magazine/unco... https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/12/18/us/airstrikes-pentagon-records-civilian-deaths.html https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/12/18/us/airstrikes... Although I agree there was no real punishment, after all the US isn't going to charge their own soldiers unless they can find hard evidence it was done on purpose because it would disincentivise them from doing their work, at best they could hope for some payment from the US, that did happen on the odd occasion, no where nearly as much I doubt as they would have received if they killed someone domestically like that though.
      - ajsnigrutin 4y ago
        NY times is behind a paywall for me, but even the first story mentions a "mistake"... somehow when americans kill someone, it's "a mistake". The other stories are from (judging by the URLs) from 2006, 2017 and 2021... so yeah... considering america is still in quite a few countries now, and noone cares. > because it would disincentivise them from doing their work You mean "making mistakes" and killing civilians? Why can't EU impose sanctions on US? Like kick them out of the EU teritory as a start? USA even bombed a couple of weddings in pakistan... and they aren't even at war with pakistan. And let's not forget what happens when US kills a reuters journalist... they go after the whistleblower of course, and the website operator that published the video. Look, we all know russians are bad, but for many more countries america is the "number one risk and enemy", and even at this moment, many more countries are occupied by US army than by the russians. If we (the europeans) don't mind americans destroying countries all around the world, even bombing some in europe (yugoslavia 1999, similar reasons to what putin is doing now), why are we destroying our own economies now, when the russians are doing it? The only ones having any benefit out of this current crisis are the american politicians... EU economy is fucked, russian economy is fucked, and Biden is taking the taxpayers money, giving it to Zelensky, so zelensky can buy weapons from bidens buddies, who (probably) give a percentage back to biden (or whoever his handler is). Oh, and also china for getting cheap oil an gas from russia.
- redeeman 4y ago
  and why is it that we continue to do immense trade with china, given their treatment of various people? their extreme pollution(the green agenda is supposedly holier than the pope), why is it that we happily buy a gazillion trinkets from king pooh but putin is simply unacceptable in ALL ways. china is arguably far worse.
  - ajsnigrutin 4y ago
    China also gets a lot of cheap russian gas now, so apart from american politicians, they're on the "winning side" of this conflict.
  - tim333 4y ago
    It's the rolling tanks into other people's countries thing.
    - redeeman 4y ago
      so lets summize: organ harvesting: ok. concentration camps for ethnic minority: ok. rolling tanks: NO!
      - kzrdude 4y ago
        Except when the US helps Saudi to roll their tanks, then it's ok again /s It's all very hard to be consistent about. For one thing, one can't fanatically support any "side" since there are bad deeds being done in many corners of the world.
karpierz 4y ago
> 2. we believed our leaders would have the sense to settle with Russia instead of destroying our country. What settlement could Ukraine have with Russia that wouldn't be the end of Ukraine? Russia is demanding that Ukraine allow part of its territory to secede and form "independent" nations, as well as have Ukraine avoid bolstering its ability to protect itself from its neighbours. Do you think those countries won't try to take more territory from Ukraine, with Russian backing? Do you think Russia will really stop invading Ukraine, after having already done it twice?
- _xnmw 4y ago
  > What settlement could Ukraine have with Russia that wouldn't be the end of Ukraine? Any settlement would've been better than this. Every major city destroyed, 15% of the population emigrated.
  - karpierz 4y ago
    Again, what settlement would Russia accept and leave Ukraine safe from further Russian invasion? Because the only one on the table simply has Ukraine remove its ability to defend itself, and create a Russian client state that Russia will continue to use to wage proxy war on Ukraine until they're entirely within Russia's control.
  - toss1 4y ago
    Absolutely NOT. Appeasing the bully or tyrant leads only to more of the same. From the tyrant's perspective, what they did worked (gial achieved) and the opponents indicated that they are OK with it. Thus, they should try the next step they want. The reason this invasion happened was because there was no real push-back to the Crimea invasion. When would you propose that we start fighting back instrad of allowing Russia ti annex ever more - when Lithuania and Poland are being bombed? Berlin & Frankfurt? Paris? London? DC?
    - elforce002 4y ago
      Are you Ukrainian? Because your take doesn't make sense. Do you really think Russia can afford going to war with literally half of the planet? If that's the case, NATO might as well send preemptive strikes (nukes, etc..) to avoid that scenario or probably Russia could foresee that and strike first since they are currently at war. The US was looking to buy petroleum from Venezuela. The same Venezuela they were vehemently criticizing and putting economic sanctions because of the ongoing dictatorship over there. This war is more complex than we think. The world is already in a second cold war and now we have to blocks: the West (US and the EU) vs The East (China and Russia). We are at "...hard times make strong men..." Cycle now.
hash872 4y ago
1. 'The West' wasn't hubristic, Europe was. The US has been telling Europe to get off of Russian gas & oil for decades, under multiple administrations. Both parties have been extremely clear about this for over two decades now. 'I'm astounded at how many people continue to live in the 3rd fantasy of believing Ukraine could somehow "defeat" Russia while still avoiding WW3' 2. The US lost in Vietnam without using nukes. Even more relevant, the USSR lost in Afghanistan without using them! I believe Pakistan has lost 3 straight wars to its arch-enemy, with no nuclear weapons being used. If we follow your logic to its conclusion, Russia can annex Poland, Lithuania, Germany, France, and so on, and at every step of the way we'd say 'well we can't defeat Russia or else they'll use nukes'. They'd be able to conquer.... everything this way. This seems bad? Would you like to live in this world?
- hgazx 4y ago
  > The US has been telling Europe to get off of Russian gas & oil for decades, under multiple administrations Yeah and buy American liquefied gas instead. Thanks but no thanks.
  - redeeman 4y ago
    but perhaps we could have had the foresight to do something else? its time to admit that our elected, due in no small part to the electorate, have not been very smart, and have basically fucked up. again. This is allowed because the regular joe is sedated with crappy television, gorging in grotesk amounts of crappy food, and washing it down with unlimited amounts of beer. at no point does the average european (or american) care at all about what happens
  - tim333 4y ago
    Not all of Europe was like that. Lithuania built LNG facilities and now can get by with no Russian gas and supply part of Poland too.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- MrRiddle 4y ago
hourago 4y ago
Europe did not believe to be omnipotent but they just though that Russia could be trusted. Putin has thrown away a great deal looking for personal glory at the cost of Russia's future. Did you believed that Russia was going to get Ukrainian territory easily, Putin thought that also. > What is your end game? Too avoid repeating the same mistake that with Hitler. Give Putin more territory and he will need hungry for even more. This may end the war now instead of encouraging further fights.
realcertify 4y ago
Absolutely agree. And one more thing that looked incomprehensible just a short while ago was that Russia could completely shut down the gas flow to Europe (Russia needs money for the war in the end, so why would it do it?). However it seems quite a possible scenario as of now. Stakes became quite high, and unfortunately very little (if any) work is carried to stop the conflict and start negotiations.
poisonborz 4y ago
> Ukraine could somehow "defeat" Russia while still avoiding WW3 Why? These kind of cold-war era proxy wars happened throughout history. One big power makes a move directly or indirectly, while the other side will be supported indirectly by other powers. It becomes a pure resource war, and no party has a reason to escalate it beyond the conflict zone. Russia has no reason to open new fronts even if NATO props the war zone, or covertly supports sabotage attacks within Russia's border - the same way the US or China fights proxy wars, based on success, they take it or leave it (for the time). Ukraine is a long term strategic investment for Russia, not a life and death struggle.
- _xnmw 4y ago
  This is not a proxy war. Russia is involved directly on its border. A proxy war is in a far off land.
  - dreig 4y ago
    Afghanistan was on the border of USSR. Why was that a proxy war and this one isn't?
    - _xnmw 4y ago
      USSR is not Russia. Afghanistan was a not a "core interest" or existential threat to any of the USSR nations. If we use the Afghanistan analogy, Ukraine is on the border of NATO too. Interestingly, then NATO would be the overextended multinational entity trying to expand even further in this scenario. If we expect an "Afghanistan" scenario to repeat itself, then logically one would expect NATO to collapse.
      - dreig 4y ago
        I was not saying that USSR is Russia. In earlier comment you said: "Vietnam and Afghanistan .... Those were pure proxy wars. This is not a proxy war, it is a direct hot war." And here you wrote: "This is not a proxy war. Russia is involved directly on its border. A proxy war is in a far off land." And I was saying that Afghanistan was not a far off land, it was on the border, so your two usages of "proxy war" weren't consistent. Sorry, I don't understand your second paragraph, I was not trying to draw an analogy with USSR and Afghanistan. As I understand, your argument is instead that: "Afghanistan was not important to USSR, so USSR did not consider using nuclear weapons then", while "Ukraine is a core interest of Russia, so it will rather start a nuclear war (and risk destruction of the world) rather than back down and return to the positions before Feb 24th." I don't know if this statement is as obviously correct as it may seem to you. Certainly many believe that Russia is not willing to self-destruct to stand the ground here.
throwrqX 4y ago
It could definitely be changed in years if there was sufficient will to do it, unfortunately there isn't because despite all the drama nothing has really changed except prices have gone up a bit. If people started going after politicians and CEOs with violence I am sure they would figure out a way soon enough. I definitely agree about American hubris though, they had the opportunity in the 1940s to use nuclear weapons against the Soviets to prevent them from getting nuclear weapons but the risk avoiders and pacifists won out, those who thought America would win without war because they were under God or because their system was better or something of those ideals. I guess that ultimately was true and it did potentially save lots of lives but culturally & militarily speaking I don't see modern Russia being much different from the USSR. Whether you consider that Ukraine can 'win' the war depends on your definition of 'win'. They could certainly stop them from taking any more than what they currently have, perhaps even take back significant parts of Ukraine, but it would require much more military support than is currently given. The US seems content on draining Russia without really having them lose much of the territory they have gained. I am not quite sure why people think you could just 'settle' with Russia. Settling would only happen when Putin wants it to happen, and from his own speeches and writings it is clear he wants to restore Russia to how the USSR was geopolitically. I remember even 5 years ago some Russian military guys I knew who would joke about one day being able to have a second try of mass raping German and Polish women (WW2 being the first) so in my view I doubt settling would do much except delay further ambition of Putin. I very much doubt that Putin would be willing to go to WW3 over Ukraine though no matter how many military defeats he had in Ukraine, he isn't stupid and Ukraine isn't worth that much.
rasz 4y ago
> What is your endgame here? Im affraid the person you directed this question to (putler) doesnt read HN. Russian win in Ukraine means more attacks in the future.
martythemaniak 4y ago
I remember you, the day before the war started, you bet me $25 that there would be no war (https://news.ycombinator.com/threads?id=martythemaniak&next=30449912#30430805 https://news.ycombinator.com/threads?id=martythemaniak&next=...). I'm glad you're alive and there's obviously no need to settle that bet, but despite everything you've been through, your understanding of the situation has not improved. First, the Americans warned everybody that Russia would attack on Feb 16 and they were widely mocked for it... for a week. Second, there is no "settling". Ukraine could either be a puppet state with all its leaders, laws and policies decided and picked by Moscow, or it can be a normal country. This was never about Russia getting the Donbas and Crimea and you could not have assuaged Putin by giving him this. Sadly this will take a while, but Russia will lose this war the way they lost Afghanistan, Poland, Japan and countless other wars.
- vfclists 4y ago
  Ukraine cannot win this war unless it turns into a war between Russia and NATO, not Russia and Ukraine, with NATO troops and weapons entering the war on Ukraine's side. This war will continue unless the Ukrainian govt decides to sue for peace and enter negotiations with Russia. This war is really about Russia telling the US and NATO to go F themselves. Putin is done with those "b**ches." The purpose of prolonging this war through military support is to draw Ukraine into the remit of the West as they will be indebted in one way or another to the West if they "win" this war. That part is already done. The question is whether a defeat of Russia will allow that to be realized. Ukraine's best bet now is to get rid of the Zelensky regime and replace it with one ready to enter into negotiations. If the West will not enter the war directly then the war is lost as far is Ukraine is concerned.
  - int_19h 4y ago
    Zelensky has been ready for negotiations since day 1. The problem is that when Russia talks about "negotiations", what they seem to mean is complete surrender. Zelensky rightly rejects that, along with >80% of the Ukrainian population.
  - _kbh_ 4y ago
baybal2 4y ago
tomjen3 4y ago
Oh for the love of god or whatever, Russia likes to think it’s a world power. It couldn’t fucking take kiev, so calling it a regional power is already pandering.
tim333 4y ago
Endgame sorta: Ukraine gets the military advantage and pushes the Russians back, maybe to the Feb 23 line, maybe more. Russia gets fed up like they did in Afghanistan, or the American/French did in Vietnam. A ceasefire is had and things kind of go back to normal. Later maybe we'll get a more moderate government in Russia and they'll give up the neo fascist dictatorship thing?

by _xnmw 4y ago

ajsnigrutin 4y ago

What I find most sad is, how differently we treat eg. USA when they decide to destroy a sovereign country due to their interests, compared to eg. now russia... I'm from slovenia, and we even sent soldiers to help them in afghanistan, and we still have them in syria... somehow noone mentions words like "war", "occupation", "civilian deaths" etc., when our soldiers are there...

hourago 4y ago
> somehow noone mentions words like "war", "occupation", "civilian deaths" etc., when our soldiers are there... Read more newspapers. You can choose: https://www.google.com/search?q=civilians%20dead%20in%20afghanistan https://www.google.com/search?q=civilians%20dead%20in%20afgh...
- ajsnigrutin 4y ago
  This is google, so results might vary, but this is the first result for me: https://reliefweb.int/report/afghanistan/civilian-casualties-explosive-violence-mount-taliban-capture-kabul https://reliefweb.int/report/afghanistan/civilian-casualties... "Civilian casualties of explosive violence mount as Taliban capture Kabul" Somehow wikipedia is only the second link, mentioning the actual numbers of civilians.... but again... when was the last time news like this made headlines? When was the last time anyone imposed sanctions against countries killing civilians there? Also, considering we're still there (eg. syria), we're still the occupying force there, why is there not daily reporting of what we did there and how bad it was? Why are there not international efforts to pull our soldiers out of there?
  - throwrqX 4y ago
    If you count New York Times as mainstream then plenty of times. For example https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2021/10/16/pentagon-payment-afghanistan-drone/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2021/10/16/pentagon-pay... https://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/11/world/middleeast/11casualties.html https://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/11/world/middleeast/11casual... https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/11/16/magazine/uncounted-civilian-casualties-iraq-airstrikes.html https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/11/16/magazine/unco... https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/12/18/us/airstrikes-pentagon-records-civilian-deaths.html https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/12/18/us/airstrikes... Although I agree there was no real punishment, after all the US isn't going to charge their own soldiers unless they can find hard evidence it was done on purpose because it would disincentivise them from doing their work, at best they could hope for some payment from the US, that did happen on the odd occasion, no where nearly as much I doubt as they would have received if they killed someone domestically like that though.
    - ajsnigrutin 4y ago
      NY times is behind a paywall for me, but even the first story mentions a "mistake"... somehow when americans kill someone, it's "a mistake". The other stories are from (judging by the URLs) from 2006, 2017 and 2021... so yeah... considering america is still in quite a few countries now, and noone cares. > because it would disincentivise them from doing their work You mean "making mistakes" and killing civilians? Why can't EU impose sanctions on US? Like kick them out of the EU teritory as a start? USA even bombed a couple of weddings in pakistan... and they aren't even at war with pakistan. And let's not forget what happens when US kills a reuters journalist... they go after the whistleblower of course, and the website operator that published the video. Look, we all know russians are bad, but for many more countries america is the "number one risk and enemy", and even at this moment, many more countries are occupied by US army than by the russians. If we (the europeans) don't mind americans destroying countries all around the world, even bombing some in europe (yugoslavia 1999, similar reasons to what putin is doing now), why are we destroying our own economies now, when the russians are doing it? The only ones having any benefit out of this current crisis are the american politicians... EU economy is fucked, russian economy is fucked, and Biden is taking the taxpayers money, giving it to Zelensky, so zelensky can buy weapons from bidens buddies, who (probably) give a percentage back to biden (or whoever his handler is). Oh, and also china for getting cheap oil an gas from russia.
redeeman 4y ago
and why is it that we continue to do immense trade with china, given their treatment of various people? their extreme pollution(the green agenda is supposedly holier than the pope), why is it that we happily buy a gazillion trinkets from king pooh but putin is simply unacceptable in ALL ways. china is arguably far worse.
- ajsnigrutin 4y ago
  China also gets a lot of cheap russian gas now, so apart from american politicians, they're on the "winning side" of this conflict.
- tim333 4y ago
  It's the rolling tanks into other people's countries thing.
  - redeeman 4y ago
    so lets summize: organ harvesting: ok. concentration camps for ethnic minority: ok. rolling tanks: NO!
    - kzrdude 4y ago
      Except when the US helps Saudi to roll their tanks, then it's ok again /s It's all very hard to be consistent about. For one thing, one can't fanatically support any "side" since there are bad deeds being done in many corners of the world.

karpierz 4y ago

> 2. we believed our leaders would have the sense to settle with Russia instead of destroying our country. What settlement could Ukraine have with Russia that wouldn't be the end of Ukraine? Russia is demanding that Ukraine allow part of its territory to secede and form "independent" nations, as well as have Ukraine avoid bolstering its ability to protect itself from its neighbours. Do you think those countries won't try to take more territory from Ukraine, with Russian backing? Do you think Russia will really stop invading Ukraine, after having already done it twice?

_xnmw 4y ago
> What settlement could Ukraine have with Russia that wouldn't be the end of Ukraine? Any settlement would've been better than this. Every major city destroyed, 15% of the population emigrated.
- karpierz 4y ago
  Again, what settlement would Russia accept and leave Ukraine safe from further Russian invasion? Because the only one on the table simply has Ukraine remove its ability to defend itself, and create a Russian client state that Russia will continue to use to wage proxy war on Ukraine until they're entirely within Russia's control.
- toss1 4y ago
  Absolutely NOT. Appeasing the bully or tyrant leads only to more of the same. From the tyrant's perspective, what they did worked (gial achieved) and the opponents indicated that they are OK with it. Thus, they should try the next step they want. The reason this invasion happened was because there was no real push-back to the Crimea invasion. When would you propose that we start fighting back instrad of allowing Russia ti annex ever more - when Lithuania and Poland are being bombed? Berlin & Frankfurt? Paris? London? DC?
  - elforce002 4y ago
    Are you Ukrainian? Because your take doesn't make sense. Do you really think Russia can afford going to war with literally half of the planet? If that's the case, NATO might as well send preemptive strikes (nukes, etc..) to avoid that scenario or probably Russia could foresee that and strike first since they are currently at war. The US was looking to buy petroleum from Venezuela. The same Venezuela they were vehemently criticizing and putting economic sanctions because of the ongoing dictatorship over there. This war is more complex than we think. The world is already in a second cold war and now we have to blocks: the West (US and the EU) vs The East (China and Russia). We are at "...hard times make strong men..." Cycle now.

hash872 4y ago

1. 'The West' wasn't hubristic, Europe was. The US has been telling Europe to get off of Russian gas & oil for decades, under multiple administrations. Both parties have been extremely clear about this for over two decades now. 'I'm astounded at how many people continue to live in the 3rd fantasy of believing Ukraine could somehow "defeat" Russia while still avoiding WW3' 2. The US lost in Vietnam without using nukes. Even more relevant, the USSR lost in Afghanistan without using them! I believe Pakistan has lost 3 straight wars to its arch-enemy, with no nuclear weapons being used. If we follow your logic to its conclusion, Russia can annex Poland, Lithuania, Germany, France, and so on, and at every step of the way we'd say 'well we can't defeat Russia or else they'll use nukes'. They'd be able to conquer.... everything this way. This seems bad? Would you like to live in this world?

hgazx 4y ago
> The US has been telling Europe to get off of Russian gas & oil for decades, under multiple administrations Yeah and buy American liquefied gas instead. Thanks but no thanks.
- redeeman 4y ago
  but perhaps we could have had the foresight to do something else? its time to admit that our elected, due in no small part to the electorate, have not been very smart, and have basically fucked up. again. This is allowed because the regular joe is sedated with crappy television, gorging in grotesk amounts of crappy food, and washing it down with unlimited amounts of beer. at no point does the average european (or american) care at all about what happens
- tim333 4y ago
  Not all of Europe was like that. Lithuania built LNG facilities and now can get by with no Russian gas and supply part of Poland too.
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
MrRiddle 4y ago

hourago 4y ago

Europe did not believe to be omnipotent but they just though that Russia could be trusted. Putin has thrown away a great deal looking for personal glory at the cost of Russia's future. Did you believed that Russia was going to get Ukrainian territory easily, Putin thought that also. > What is your end game? Too avoid repeating the same mistake that with Hitler. Give Putin more territory and he will need hungry for even more. This may end the war now instead of encouraging further fights.

realcertify 4y ago

Absolutely agree. And one more thing that looked incomprehensible just a short while ago was that Russia could completely shut down the gas flow to Europe (Russia needs money for the war in the end, so why would it do it?). However it seems quite a possible scenario as of now. Stakes became quite high, and unfortunately very little (if any) work is carried to stop the conflict and start negotiations.

poisonborz 4y ago

> Ukraine could somehow "defeat" Russia while still avoiding WW3 Why? These kind of cold-war era proxy wars happened throughout history. One big power makes a move directly or indirectly, while the other side will be supported indirectly by other powers. It becomes a pure resource war, and no party has a reason to escalate it beyond the conflict zone. Russia has no reason to open new fronts even if NATO props the war zone, or covertly supports sabotage attacks within Russia's border - the same way the US or China fights proxy wars, based on success, they take it or leave it (for the time). Ukraine is a long term strategic investment for Russia, not a life and death struggle.

_xnmw 4y ago
This is not a proxy war. Russia is involved directly on its border. A proxy war is in a far off land.
- dreig 4y ago
  Afghanistan was on the border of USSR. Why was that a proxy war and this one isn't?
  - _xnmw 4y ago
    USSR is not Russia. Afghanistan was a not a "core interest" or existential threat to any of the USSR nations. If we use the Afghanistan analogy, Ukraine is on the border of NATO too. Interestingly, then NATO would be the overextended multinational entity trying to expand even further in this scenario. If we expect an "Afghanistan" scenario to repeat itself, then logically one would expect NATO to collapse.
    - dreig 4y ago
      I was not saying that USSR is Russia. In earlier comment you said: "Vietnam and Afghanistan .... Those were pure proxy wars. This is not a proxy war, it is a direct hot war." And here you wrote: "This is not a proxy war. Russia is involved directly on its border. A proxy war is in a far off land." And I was saying that Afghanistan was not a far off land, it was on the border, so your two usages of "proxy war" weren't consistent. Sorry, I don't understand your second paragraph, I was not trying to draw an analogy with USSR and Afghanistan. As I understand, your argument is instead that: "Afghanistan was not important to USSR, so USSR did not consider using nuclear weapons then", while "Ukraine is a core interest of Russia, so it will rather start a nuclear war (and risk destruction of the world) rather than back down and return to the positions before Feb 24th." I don't know if this statement is as obviously correct as it may seem to you. Certainly many believe that Russia is not willing to self-destruct to stand the ground here.

throwrqX 4y ago

It could definitely be changed in years if there was sufficient will to do it, unfortunately there isn't because despite all the drama nothing has really changed except prices have gone up a bit. If people started going after politicians and CEOs with violence I am sure they would figure out a way soon enough. I definitely agree about American hubris though, they had the opportunity in the 1940s to use nuclear weapons against the Soviets to prevent them from getting nuclear weapons but the risk avoiders and pacifists won out, those who thought America would win without war because they were under God or because their system was better or something of those ideals. I guess that ultimately was true and it did potentially save lots of lives but culturally & militarily speaking I don't see modern Russia being much different from the USSR. Whether you consider that Ukraine can 'win' the war depends on your definition of 'win'. They could certainly stop them from taking any more than what they currently have, perhaps even take back significant parts of Ukraine, but it would require much more military support than is currently given. The US seems content on draining Russia without really having them lose much of the territory they have gained. I am not quite sure why people think you could just 'settle' with Russia. Settling would only happen when Putin wants it to happen, and from his own speeches and writings it is clear he wants to restore Russia to how the USSR was geopolitically. I remember even 5 years ago some Russian military guys I knew who would joke about one day being able to have a second try of mass raping German and Polish women (WW2 being the first) so in my view I doubt settling would do much except delay further ambition of Putin. I very much doubt that Putin would be willing to go to WW3 over Ukraine though no matter how many military defeats he had in Ukraine, he isn't stupid and Ukraine isn't worth that much.

rasz 4y ago

> What is your endgame here? Im affraid the person you directed this question to (putler) doesnt read HN. Russian win in Ukraine means more attacks in the future.

martythemaniak 4y ago

I remember you, the day before the war started, you bet me $25 that there would be no war (https://news.ycombinator.com/threads?id=martythemaniak&next=30449912#30430805 https://news.ycombinator.com/threads?id=martythemaniak&next=...). I'm glad you're alive and there's obviously no need to settle that bet, but despite everything you've been through, your understanding of the situation has not improved. First, the Americans warned everybody that Russia would attack on Feb 16 and they were widely mocked for it... for a week. Second, there is no "settling". Ukraine could either be a puppet state with all its leaders, laws and policies decided and picked by Moscow, or it can be a normal country. This was never about Russia getting the Donbas and Crimea and you could not have assuaged Putin by giving him this. Sadly this will take a while, but Russia will lose this war the way they lost Afghanistan, Poland, Japan and countless other wars.

vfclists 4y ago
Ukraine cannot win this war unless it turns into a war between Russia and NATO, not Russia and Ukraine, with NATO troops and weapons entering the war on Ukraine's side. This war will continue unless the Ukrainian govt decides to sue for peace and enter negotiations with Russia. This war is really about Russia telling the US and NATO to go F themselves. Putin is done with those "b**ches." The purpose of prolonging this war through military support is to draw Ukraine into the remit of the West as they will be indebted in one way or another to the West if they "win" this war. That part is already done. The question is whether a defeat of Russia will allow that to be realized. Ukraine's best bet now is to get rid of the Zelensky regime and replace it with one ready to enter into negotiations. If the West will not enter the war directly then the war is lost as far is Ukraine is concerned.
- int_19h 4y ago
  Zelensky has been ready for negotiations since day 1. The problem is that when Russia talks about "negotiations", what they seem to mean is complete surrender. Zelensky rightly rejects that, along with >80% of the Ukrainian population.
- _kbh_ 4y ago

baybal2 4y ago

tomjen3 4y ago

Oh for the love of god or whatever, Russia likes to think it’s a world power. It couldn’t fucking take kiev, so calling it a regional power is already pandering.

tim333 4y ago

Endgame sorta: Ukraine gets the military advantage and pushes the Russians back, maybe to the Feb 23 line, maybe more. Russia gets fed up like they did in Afghanistan, or the American/French did in Vietnam. A ceasefire is had and things kind of go back to normal. Later maybe we'll get a more moderate government in Russia and they'll give up the neo fascist dictatorship thing?