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Isn’t that our current goal? (Our meaning NATO/Ukraine.) Sounds like we’re getting the closer to our mission accomplished moment.

JumpCrisscross 4y ago
> Isn’t that our current goal? (Our meaning NATO/Ukraine.) No. It's to get Russia out of Ukraine. Cleaning up a failed nuclear state is in nobody's interest.
- ningunoynadie 4y ago
  How do we juxtapose this with countless South American, Asian, Middle East, African coups with seen over the decades from the US? Seems in the play book, overthrow of unfriendly regime by any means.
  - warinukraine 4y ago
    [flagged]
  - Armisael16 4y ago
    They weren’t nuclear states.
- birdyrooster 4y ago
  Putins plan is to stay in power and/or unaccountable until death by any means necessary and I think the sacrifice of Russia’s stability is a small price for him.
- yucky 4y ago
  This is not what the US Secretary of Defense says - https://www.cnn.com/2022/04/25/politics/biden-administration-russia-strategy/index.html https://www.cnn.com/2022/04/25/politics/biden-administration...
- 2devnull 4y ago
  And then what? I sincerely believe McFaul isn’t able to think of the next step. He is thinking deontologically just as Putin (and I dare say the Russian people too) are thinking about survival. It would be good to think of the long term consequences of any foreseeable outcome. Hopefully it all goes well: Putin falls and is replaced by an internationalist. Frankly the Afghanistan debacle has caused me to doubt the wisedom and capacity for longer term thinking of the American political-military leadership. Hubris damns us all.
warinukraine 4y ago
No, the goal of NATO is to unite together smaller countries, so that Russia can't as easily pick them off as the czarist Russian Empire, then the Soviet Union, then the Russian Federation. It's easy to get confused given their strong propaganda, but if you want to be dispassionate about the subject, this isn't a recent development, it goes back 300 years before NATO. As a european, I'm glad that NATO is backing Ukraine, otherwise it might've been going the way of Georgia or Chechnia just to mention a couple in recent times.
WeylandYutani 4y ago
Hardly, we need a regime that can extract and sell us their resources.
- avmich 4y ago
  Less and less, as we switch to other resources or other sources of them.
  - JumpCrisscross 4y ago
    > as we switch to other resources or other sources of them Russia is a major producer of cobalt, nickel, copper, molybdenum, bauxite and uranium [1]. [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mining_industry_of_Russia https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mining_industry_of_Russia
    - avmich 4y ago
      Oh, thank you, I know. Interesting that I would consider one of the major articles is Russia's educated emigrants, but that's another matter.
joecot 4y ago
While I of course condemn Russia invading, and support the US and NATO funding Ukraine's defense, a very cynical read of the situation would conclude exactly this. US and NATO diplomats were crystal clear that after the USSR's fall, the former Soviet states should not be invited into NATO. And later that they should not be invited into the EU. Even with USSR gone, they were in Russia's sphere of influence, and making those overtures would be provocative. The US pushing for a military alliance with Ukraine is what initially set Putin on trying to take control of Ukraine. That is a mighty long border to share with a US ally. Everything went downhill from there. So a very, very cynical read of this situation would be that the US and NATO goaded this war specifically so that Putin would play his hand, and the entire world would watch as Russia crumbled. That their entire military was a front for crumbling soviet era technology and resources. The problem with building a society where the powerful steal everything not nailed down is that they also do that to the military. US and NATO intelligence likely knew this. And given how brazenly the US and NATO have supported Ukraine through this, I would also hazard a guess that they know that most if not all of Russia's nukes won't actually fly. EDIT since multiple responses have asked about a source[1] on the nato comment: > The present crisis has its roots in a long-brewing contest over Ukraine’s geopolitical alignment. After the Soviet Union collapsed, Ukraine became independent but for decades joined neither with Russia nor with the West. The United States, for its part, expanded its NATO alliance but initially sidestepped Ukraine. It recognized that Russia, sharing deep ties and a 1,426-mile land border with Ukraine, might oppose such a move by force. “Ukrainian entry into NATO is the brightest of all redlines for the Russian elite (not just Putin),” William J. Burns, then U.S. ambassador to Russia and current CIA director, cabled from Moscow in 2008. “I have yet to find anyone who views Ukraine in NATO as anything other than a direct challenge to Russian interests.” > Later that year, however, President George W. Bush pressured NATO to pledge that Ukraine and Georgia “will become members of NATO.” Although momentum toward membership stalled for multiple reasons, Ukraine pursued an association agreement with the European Union that moved more quickly. When, in 2014, Ukraine’s Revolution of Dignity replaced a Russian-oriented government with a pro-Western one, Russia swiftly annexed Crimea, home to its Black Sea naval base, and backed separatists in eastern Ukraine. 1. https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/2021/12/23/ukraine-taiwan-red-lines/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/2021/12/23/ukraine-ta...
- 4y ago

JumpCrisscross 4y ago

> Isn’t that our current goal? (Our meaning NATO/Ukraine.) No. It's to get Russia out of Ukraine. Cleaning up a failed nuclear state is in nobody's interest.

ningunoynadie 4y ago
How do we juxtapose this with countless South American, Asian, Middle East, African coups with seen over the decades from the US? Seems in the play book, overthrow of unfriendly regime by any means.
- warinukraine 4y ago
  [flagged]
- Armisael16 4y ago
  They weren’t nuclear states.
birdyrooster 4y ago
Putins plan is to stay in power and/or unaccountable until death by any means necessary and I think the sacrifice of Russia’s stability is a small price for him.
yucky 4y ago
This is not what the US Secretary of Defense says - https://www.cnn.com/2022/04/25/politics/biden-administration-russia-strategy/index.html https://www.cnn.com/2022/04/25/politics/biden-administration...
2devnull 4y ago
And then what? I sincerely believe McFaul isn’t able to think of the next step. He is thinking deontologically just as Putin (and I dare say the Russian people too) are thinking about survival. It would be good to think of the long term consequences of any foreseeable outcome. Hopefully it all goes well: Putin falls and is replaced by an internationalist. Frankly the Afghanistan debacle has caused me to doubt the wisedom and capacity for longer term thinking of the American political-military leadership. Hubris damns us all.

warinukraine 4y ago

No, the goal of NATO is to unite together smaller countries, so that Russia can't as easily pick them off as the czarist Russian Empire, then the Soviet Union, then the Russian Federation. It's easy to get confused given their strong propaganda, but if you want to be dispassionate about the subject, this isn't a recent development, it goes back 300 years before NATO. As a european, I'm glad that NATO is backing Ukraine, otherwise it might've been going the way of Georgia or Chechnia just to mention a couple in recent times.

WeylandYutani 4y ago

Hardly, we need a regime that can extract and sell us their resources.

avmich 4y ago
Less and less, as we switch to other resources or other sources of them.
- JumpCrisscross 4y ago
  > as we switch to other resources or other sources of them Russia is a major producer of cobalt, nickel, copper, molybdenum, bauxite and uranium [1]. [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mining_industry_of_Russia https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mining_industry_of_Russia
  - avmich 4y ago
    Oh, thank you, I know. Interesting that I would consider one of the major articles is Russia's educated emigrants, but that's another matter.

joecot 4y ago

While I of course condemn Russia invading, and support the US and NATO funding Ukraine's defense, a very cynical read of the situation would conclude exactly this. US and NATO diplomats were crystal clear that after the USSR's fall, the former Soviet states should not be invited into NATO. And later that they should not be invited into the EU. Even with USSR gone, they were in Russia's sphere of influence, and making those overtures would be provocative. The US pushing for a military alliance with Ukraine is what initially set Putin on trying to take control of Ukraine. That is a mighty long border to share with a US ally. Everything went downhill from there. So a very, very cynical read of this situation would be that the US and NATO goaded this war specifically so that Putin would play his hand, and the entire world would watch as Russia crumbled. That their entire military was a front for crumbling soviet era technology and resources. The problem with building a society where the powerful steal everything not nailed down is that they also do that to the military. US and NATO intelligence likely knew this. And given how brazenly the US and NATO have supported Ukraine through this, I would also hazard a guess that they know that most if not all of Russia's nukes won't actually fly. EDIT since multiple responses have asked about a source[1] on the nato comment: > The present crisis has its roots in a long-brewing contest over Ukraine’s geopolitical alignment. After the Soviet Union collapsed, Ukraine became independent but for decades joined neither with Russia nor with the West. The United States, for its part, expanded its NATO alliance but initially sidestepped Ukraine. It recognized that Russia, sharing deep ties and a 1,426-mile land border with Ukraine, might oppose such a move by force. “Ukrainian entry into NATO is the brightest of all redlines for the Russian elite (not just Putin),” William J. Burns, then U.S. ambassador to Russia and current CIA director, cabled from Moscow in 2008. “I have yet to find anyone who views Ukraine in NATO as anything other than a direct challenge to Russian interests.” > Later that year, however, President George W. Bush pressured NATO to pledge that Ukraine and Georgia “will become members of NATO.” Although momentum toward membership stalled for multiple reasons, Ukraine pursued an association agreement with the European Union that moved more quickly. When, in 2014, Ukraine’s Revolution of Dignity replaced a Russian-oriented government with a pro-Western one, Russia swiftly annexed Crimea, home to its Black Sea naval base, and backed separatists in eastern Ukraine. 1. https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/2021/12/23/ukraine-taiwan-red-lines/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/2021/12/23/ukraine-ta...

4y ago