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Russia's invasion of Ukraine is pretty low on civ casualties. Look at Gaza, or the Iraq/Vietnam invasions compare numbers (civ casualties AND time it took) and

by cies 3y ago

Russia's invasion of Ukraine is pretty low on civ casualties. Look at Gaza, or the Iraq/Vietnam invasions compare numbers (civ casualties AND time it took) and then draw conclusions on the use of the word genocide. I also would abstain from using "russians" (or USAers, or Israelis) when referring to actions of the respective govts. Keeps the discussion cleaner of generalizations wrt people that may totally not support their govt's actions.

kranke155 3y ago
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine currently suffers from severe undercount. The RF forces sieged Mariopol like a medieval city at the start of the war, creating large scale suffering. Afaik there was no water or power and people were melting ice for water. The civilian casualties on the Ukraine war are at least 100,000+ maybe a multiple of that number.
- chiefalchemist 3y ago
  While we're on the subject of "under-counting", there is no official count of the number of civilians killed during the US Gov's invasion of Iraq. No sense counting what you don't want to know and don't want to be accounted for? US voters / citizens certainly don't care. Independent sources put it at 100,000+. I've randomly read 2x to 3x that but 100k+ is bad enough. https://watson.brown.edu/costsofwar/costs/human/civilians/iraqi https://watson.brown.edu/costsofwar/costs/human/civilians/ir...
  - meeuwer 3y ago
    Whatever the number, it was “worth it”. https://youtu.be/RM0uvgHKZe8 https://youtu.be/RM0uvgHKZe8
    - CrzyLngPwd 3y ago
      Ugh, she was vile.
  - oddmiral 3y ago
    There is official count of number of civilians murdered by Soviets in 1932-1934 by hunger (Holodomor) - 7 millions as declared by Russian Duma on 02.04.2008. However, these are adults only, because children deaths are not counted at that time. With school-age children, for which records are stored, number raises to 10.5 million. Number of under school age children died because of artificial hunger in 1932-1934 is still unknown. I hope, this will help to calculate number of deaths in Iraq.
    - raincole 3y ago
      > I hope, this will help to calculate number of deaths in Iraq. It won't and there is not reason to think it will. It was a completely different situation. So keep your hopes to yourself.
      - oddmiral 3y ago
        Yep, it's an example of whataboutism.
bolobo 3y ago
I am sorry but Genocide is not about actually killing people, it is about "acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group", which includes "killing members of the group, causing them serious bodily or mental harm, imposing living conditions intended to destroy the group, preventing births, and forcibly transferring children out of the group" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genocide https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genocide) Russia is doing textbook genocide by "reeducating" ukrainians childrens: https://press.un.org/en/2023/sc15395.doc.htm https://press.un.org/en/2023/sc15395.doc.htm > Russian Federation agents have taken at least 19,546 children to that country from Ukraine since 18 February 2022. Among other violations, Russian Federation citizenship is imposed on them, and they are forbidden to speak and learn the Ukrainian language or preserve their Ukrainian identity
- cies 3y ago
  Sorry, genocide is not bringing people to safe and allowing them school. If Putin wanted maximum death of Ukrainians he would carpet bomb big Ukrainian cities (like the US+allies did in Iraq, Vietnam, Japan, Germany, ...) This war --as bad as it is-- is nothing close to some of the worst wars we've seen in the last 100 years.
  - dataworm 3y ago
    He did carpet bomb a big Ukrainian city, Mariupol, the russians have completely destroyed it and killed most of its residents. The only reason he hasn't carpet bombed other big Ukrainian cities is because his bombers would get shot down by air defence systems.
  - tpm 3y ago
    > genocide is not bringing people to safe and allowing them school Stealing children actually meets the definition of genocide.
peppermint_gum 3y ago
If you watch combat footage from eastern Ukraine, you will learn that many frontline towns and villages have been completely leveled by artillery. See for example[1]. And I don't have to mention Bucha[2] and other war crimes. The relatively low civilian casualty count isn't because "Russians are so noble", but because: 1. Frontlines are static, giving civilians plenty of time to evacuate 2. Civilians actually have where to evacuate, Ukraine is big and covered by an extremely dense air defense network. Women and children can also freely go to the EU. 3. Ukraine has received an unprecedented amount of humanitarian aid. [1] - https://old.reddit.com/r/CombatFootage/comments/ublj5l/luhansk_peoples_republic_troops_in_novotoshkivske/ https://old.reddit.com/r/CombatFootage/comments/ublj5l/luhan... [2] - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IrGZ66uKcl0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IrGZ66uKcl0
- cies 3y ago
  Villages being leveled is different from genocide. And Ukraine screeming genocide is also different from actual genocide. Genocide needs numbers and the number are not there in Ukraine's case. > The relatively low civilian casualty count isn't because "Russians are so noble" I was not arguing their nobility, I was saying the word genocide may have been to easily used in Ukraine's case.
  - tpm 3y ago
    > Genocide needs numbers Genocide does not need numbers, genocide is defined in international law and that definition has to be met. It's currently being investigated by a number of organizations: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allegations_of_genocide_of_Ukrainians_in_the_Russian_invasion_of_Ukraine https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allegations_of_genocide_of_Ukr...
  - arp242 3y ago
    Given that Russia has literally genocided huge parts of the Ukrainian population in the recent past, it's not such a far-fetched or unreasonable. There is a lot of history here that you're ignoring. But maybe those millions of people were also not a "real genocide". And the Jews should also calm down when people start shouting Heil Hitler. Or the blacks when people start talking about lynchings. At any rate, whether it is or isn't "genocide" or whether it is or isn't "low on civ casualties" isn't important. It's a stupid invasion and every single casualty is a murder. Whether you want to classify this as "genocide" is a mostly unimportant semantic matter that distracts from the real issue.
agmater 3y ago
Genocide != Civilian casualties. Genocide is about the extermination of a people. Anders Puck Nielsen just made a good video on this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L9n77DPJ7AE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L9n77DPJ7AE
- cies 3y ago
  > Genocide is about the extermination of a people. Thus resulting a lot of civ casualties. If it's genocide is for ever up to debate. Civ casualties are usually not that debatable. Without a large number (%) of civ deaths in some place there cannot be a genocide.
  - agmater 3y ago
    It can still be genocide without murder. Things like preventing childbirth or deporting/stealing children (like what Putin is wanted for) also fall under genocide. For the most part "mass murder" and "genocide" have a lot of overlap. But it's not the same crime.
oddmiral 3y ago
1) Russian is declared a terrorist state[1] 2) Number of civilian causalities is unknown, because part of territory is under occupation. However, excavation of mass-graves on liberated territories shows that Russians are ready to kill few percents of population. [2] 3) Ukrainian air defense is in much better shape now, so hundreds of Russians missiles are shot in flight. Russians are bombing civilians in cities with cassette bombs from the start of war[3], so low numbers of causalities is caused by good defense, not by good will of terrorist state which performs genocide of Ukrainians right now. [1]: https://www.europarl.europa.eu/news/en/press-room/20221118IPR55707/european-parliament-declares-russia-to-be-a-state-sponsor-of-terrorism https://www.europarl.europa.eu/news/en/press-room/20221118IP... [2]: https://www.space.com/ukraine-mass-grave-bucha-satellite-photos https://www.space.com/ukraine-mass-grave-bucha-satellite-pho... [3]: https://www.hrw.org/video-photos/interactive/2023/02/21/death-at-the-station/russian-cluster-munition-attack-in-kramatorsk https://www.hrw.org/video-photos/interactive/2023/02/21/deat...
bionsystem 3y ago
Hamas is using civilians as human shields pretty much literally. They set this war up so that there is as much civilian casualties as possible on their side to claim it's a genocide. In this particular case, Hamas has a written constitution claiming the destruction of Israel and the jewish people ; Hamas ARE the genociders, despite being the weak army in this war. Ukraine is NOT using its population as human shields. There is no evidence of that. So every civil casualties that Russian inflicts on Ukrainians (which includes destroying infrastructure, sieging cities and deporting children, among other things like what happened in Butcha) is deliberate.
- bigfudge 3y ago
  To open: I am not apologising for what Hamas has done at all. I think their actions are revolting. Whatever your view of the history of the region, the aim to eliminate Israel as a Jewish state is unrealistic, extreme and counterproductive. Nonetheless, I do find the claim they are using human shields as interesting. Whatever you think of Hamas' aims and methods (and I strongly disapprove of both), Palestinians engaged in conflict are by necessity fighting a guerrilla war against an occupying power. No, Israel is not in direct control of Gaza -- but it does have the capacity to use overwhelming force against any part of it, so it might as well be for the purposes of fighting a war. Let's assume we are not pacifists and we think armed struggle is _sometimes_ justified (as do both the US and Israel). From the perspective of someone who viewed the establishment of Israel as illegitimate, and the occupation of Gaza unlawful, and Israel's action in Gaza and the West Bank as immoral, what would be the right course of action here? From that perspective it might seem reasonable to plan and carry out sabotage against Israeli forces (I know that is not all Hamas have done -- they have also murdered civilians, but this is irrelevant to this argument). There were many resistance movements in the 20th century that are now approved-of by Israel and allies. Was it illegitimate for French resistance fighters (for example) to plan attacks from civilian villages and hide weapons in farmhouses etc? This accusation of using human shields (which predates the current conflict) sometimes strikes me is part of a process to 'other' the Palestinian cause and render it a priori illegitimate, which does't help anyone. Edit: I recognise this post could upset some people at the moment. It's really not my intention. It's posed as a genuine question and something for us all to reflect on. I might be wrong/misguided but interested to discuss.
ponector 3y ago
[flagged]
- brabel 3y ago
  Do you believe they bombed the theater because they were actively trying to kill Ukrainian children? You know , people tend to believe the "other side" is so evil that they probably actually believe shit like this. That's the kind of belief that makes people think that all means justify the end and why we have wars that kill hundreds of thousands in the first place... if you saw people from the other side as just normal people like you and me you would probably understand that there's a lot more about that story that you and I will not know in a long time, if ever.
  - dataworm 3y ago
    russian soldiers are evil nazis, not normal people. Most of the russian population supports the invasion, destruction of Ukrainian cities and killing of Ukrainian children.
    - brabel 3y ago
      And where did you learn that? My wife is Ukrainian and knows lot of Russians and Belarussians (they're neighbours after all, and no they don't all hate each other!!), they watch each other TV shows and like mostly the same singers (they understand each other pretty well)... a lot of the biggest Ukrainian singers go to live and work in Russia (though obviously they're now being criticized heavily in Ukraine when they choose to stay). You don't seem to have any idea what you're talking about.
      - klibertp 3y ago
        Don't bother. Seriously. You won't convince anyone irrational enough to generalize hundreds of thousands of people into "russian soldiers are evil nazis, not normal people" with rational arguments. The only way to convince such people (that peace is better than killing) is to subject them to long-term, consistent propaganda, but... The only forces capable of doing that are interested in pretty much exactly the opposite outcome. War is bad. Killing people, whoever they are, is wrong - and all people are just regular humans. There are no monsters, no "evil nazis" in reality, outside of fiction and propaganda. However, understanding that takes effort, and runs counter to many of the incentives built into human psychology. Like you, I believe there's "a lot more to the story." I feel so helpless, knowing that I have no choice but to sit and watch all the atrocities happening all around the world because almost nobody is interested in stopping them. People who happily support the killing (of the "other side" only, of course) are the biggest reason this keeps happening. Since they're impossible to convince, these things are bound to continue.
dataworm 3y ago
That your comment is neither flagged or downvoted, while some supporting Ukraine are downvoted or both, shows whose side HN is on. Very sad.

by cies 3y ago

kranke155 3y ago

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine currently suffers from severe undercount. The RF forces sieged Mariopol like a medieval city at the start of the war, creating large scale suffering. Afaik there was no water or power and people were melting ice for water. The civilian casualties on the Ukraine war are at least 100,000+ maybe a multiple of that number.

chiefalchemist 3y ago
While we're on the subject of "under-counting", there is no official count of the number of civilians killed during the US Gov's invasion of Iraq. No sense counting what you don't want to know and don't want to be accounted for? US voters / citizens certainly don't care. Independent sources put it at 100,000+. I've randomly read 2x to 3x that but 100k+ is bad enough. https://watson.brown.edu/costsofwar/costs/human/civilians/iraqi https://watson.brown.edu/costsofwar/costs/human/civilians/ir...
- meeuwer 3y ago
  Whatever the number, it was “worth it”. https://youtu.be/RM0uvgHKZe8 https://youtu.be/RM0uvgHKZe8
  - CrzyLngPwd 3y ago
    Ugh, she was vile.
- oddmiral 3y ago
  There is official count of number of civilians murdered by Soviets in 1932-1934 by hunger (Holodomor) - 7 millions as declared by Russian Duma on 02.04.2008. However, these are adults only, because children deaths are not counted at that time. With school-age children, for which records are stored, number raises to 10.5 million. Number of under school age children died because of artificial hunger in 1932-1934 is still unknown. I hope, this will help to calculate number of deaths in Iraq.
  - raincole 3y ago
    > I hope, this will help to calculate number of deaths in Iraq. It won't and there is not reason to think it will. It was a completely different situation. So keep your hopes to yourself.
    - oddmiral 3y ago
      Yep, it's an example of whataboutism.

bolobo 3y ago

I am sorry but Genocide is not about actually killing people, it is about "acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group", which includes "killing members of the group, causing them serious bodily or mental harm, imposing living conditions intended to destroy the group, preventing births, and forcibly transferring children out of the group" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genocide https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genocide) Russia is doing textbook genocide by "reeducating" ukrainians childrens: https://press.un.org/en/2023/sc15395.doc.htm https://press.un.org/en/2023/sc15395.doc.htm > Russian Federation agents have taken at least 19,546 children to that country from Ukraine since 18 February 2022. Among other violations, Russian Federation citizenship is imposed on them, and they are forbidden to speak and learn the Ukrainian language or preserve their Ukrainian identity

cies 3y ago
Sorry, genocide is not bringing people to safe and allowing them school. If Putin wanted maximum death of Ukrainians he would carpet bomb big Ukrainian cities (like the US+allies did in Iraq, Vietnam, Japan, Germany, ...) This war --as bad as it is-- is nothing close to some of the worst wars we've seen in the last 100 years.
- dataworm 3y ago
  He did carpet bomb a big Ukrainian city, Mariupol, the russians have completely destroyed it and killed most of its residents. The only reason he hasn't carpet bombed other big Ukrainian cities is because his bombers would get shot down by air defence systems.
- tpm 3y ago
  > genocide is not bringing people to safe and allowing them school Stealing children actually meets the definition of genocide.

peppermint_gum 3y ago

If you watch combat footage from eastern Ukraine, you will learn that many frontline towns and villages have been completely leveled by artillery. See for example[1]. And I don't have to mention Bucha[2] and other war crimes. The relatively low civilian casualty count isn't because "Russians are so noble", but because: 1. Frontlines are static, giving civilians plenty of time to evacuate 2. Civilians actually have where to evacuate, Ukraine is big and covered by an extremely dense air defense network. Women and children can also freely go to the EU. 3. Ukraine has received an unprecedented amount of humanitarian aid. [1] - https://old.reddit.com/r/CombatFootage/comments/ublj5l/luhansk_peoples_republic_troops_in_novotoshkivske/ https://old.reddit.com/r/CombatFootage/comments/ublj5l/luhan... [2] - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IrGZ66uKcl0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IrGZ66uKcl0

cies 3y ago
Villages being leveled is different from genocide. And Ukraine screeming genocide is also different from actual genocide. Genocide needs numbers and the number are not there in Ukraine's case. > The relatively low civilian casualty count isn't because "Russians are so noble" I was not arguing their nobility, I was saying the word genocide may have been to easily used in Ukraine's case.
- tpm 3y ago
  > Genocide needs numbers Genocide does not need numbers, genocide is defined in international law and that definition has to be met. It's currently being investigated by a number of organizations: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allegations_of_genocide_of_Ukrainians_in_the_Russian_invasion_of_Ukraine https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allegations_of_genocide_of_Ukr...
- arp242 3y ago
  Given that Russia has literally genocided huge parts of the Ukrainian population in the recent past, it's not such a far-fetched or unreasonable. There is a lot of history here that you're ignoring. But maybe those millions of people were also not a "real genocide". And the Jews should also calm down when people start shouting Heil Hitler. Or the blacks when people start talking about lynchings. At any rate, whether it is or isn't "genocide" or whether it is or isn't "low on civ casualties" isn't important. It's a stupid invasion and every single casualty is a murder. Whether you want to classify this as "genocide" is a mostly unimportant semantic matter that distracts from the real issue.

agmater 3y ago

Genocide != Civilian casualties. Genocide is about the extermination of a people. Anders Puck Nielsen just made a good video on this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L9n77DPJ7AE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L9n77DPJ7AE

cies 3y ago
> Genocide is about the extermination of a people. Thus resulting a lot of civ casualties. If it's genocide is for ever up to debate. Civ casualties are usually not that debatable. Without a large number (%) of civ deaths in some place there cannot be a genocide.
- agmater 3y ago
  It can still be genocide without murder. Things like preventing childbirth or deporting/stealing children (like what Putin is wanted for) also fall under genocide. For the most part "mass murder" and "genocide" have a lot of overlap. But it's not the same crime.

oddmiral 3y ago

1) Russian is declared a terrorist state[1] 2) Number of civilian causalities is unknown, because part of territory is under occupation. However, excavation of mass-graves on liberated territories shows that Russians are ready to kill few percents of population. [2] 3) Ukrainian air defense is in much better shape now, so hundreds of Russians missiles are shot in flight. Russians are bombing civilians in cities with cassette bombs from the start of war[3], so low numbers of causalities is caused by good defense, not by good will of terrorist state which performs genocide of Ukrainians right now. [1]: https://www.europarl.europa.eu/news/en/press-room/20221118IPR55707/european-parliament-declares-russia-to-be-a-state-sponsor-of-terrorism https://www.europarl.europa.eu/news/en/press-room/20221118IP... [2]: https://www.space.com/ukraine-mass-grave-bucha-satellite-photos https://www.space.com/ukraine-mass-grave-bucha-satellite-pho... [3]: https://www.hrw.org/video-photos/interactive/2023/02/21/death-at-the-station/russian-cluster-munition-attack-in-kramatorsk https://www.hrw.org/video-photos/interactive/2023/02/21/deat...

bionsystem 3y ago

Hamas is using civilians as human shields pretty much literally. They set this war up so that there is as much civilian casualties as possible on their side to claim it's a genocide. In this particular case, Hamas has a written constitution claiming the destruction of Israel and the jewish people ; Hamas ARE the genociders, despite being the weak army in this war. Ukraine is NOT using its population as human shields. There is no evidence of that. So every civil casualties that Russian inflicts on Ukrainians (which includes destroying infrastructure, sieging cities and deporting children, among other things like what happened in Butcha) is deliberate.

bigfudge 3y ago
To open: I am not apologising for what Hamas has done at all. I think their actions are revolting. Whatever your view of the history of the region, the aim to eliminate Israel as a Jewish state is unrealistic, extreme and counterproductive. Nonetheless, I do find the claim they are using human shields as interesting. Whatever you think of Hamas' aims and methods (and I strongly disapprove of both), Palestinians engaged in conflict are by necessity fighting a guerrilla war against an occupying power. No, Israel is not in direct control of Gaza -- but it does have the capacity to use overwhelming force against any part of it, so it might as well be for the purposes of fighting a war. Let's assume we are not pacifists and we think armed struggle is _sometimes_ justified (as do both the US and Israel). From the perspective of someone who viewed the establishment of Israel as illegitimate, and the occupation of Gaza unlawful, and Israel's action in Gaza and the West Bank as immoral, what would be the right course of action here? From that perspective it might seem reasonable to plan and carry out sabotage against Israeli forces (I know that is not all Hamas have done -- they have also murdered civilians, but this is irrelevant to this argument). There were many resistance movements in the 20th century that are now approved-of by Israel and allies. Was it illegitimate for French resistance fighters (for example) to plan attacks from civilian villages and hide weapons in farmhouses etc? This accusation of using human shields (which predates the current conflict) sometimes strikes me is part of a process to 'other' the Palestinian cause and render it a priori illegitimate, which does't help anyone. Edit: I recognise this post could upset some people at the moment. It's really not my intention. It's posed as a genuine question and something for us all to reflect on. I might be wrong/misguided but interested to discuss.

ponector 3y ago

[flagged]

brabel 3y ago
Do you believe they bombed the theater because they were actively trying to kill Ukrainian children? You know , people tend to believe the "other side" is so evil that they probably actually believe shit like this. That's the kind of belief that makes people think that all means justify the end and why we have wars that kill hundreds of thousands in the first place... if you saw people from the other side as just normal people like you and me you would probably understand that there's a lot more about that story that you and I will not know in a long time, if ever.
- dataworm 3y ago
  russian soldiers are evil nazis, not normal people. Most of the russian population supports the invasion, destruction of Ukrainian cities and killing of Ukrainian children.
  - brabel 3y ago
    And where did you learn that? My wife is Ukrainian and knows lot of Russians and Belarussians (they're neighbours after all, and no they don't all hate each other!!), they watch each other TV shows and like mostly the same singers (they understand each other pretty well)... a lot of the biggest Ukrainian singers go to live and work in Russia (though obviously they're now being criticized heavily in Ukraine when they choose to stay). You don't seem to have any idea what you're talking about.
    - klibertp 3y ago
      Don't bother. Seriously. You won't convince anyone irrational enough to generalize hundreds of thousands of people into "russian soldiers are evil nazis, not normal people" with rational arguments. The only way to convince such people (that peace is better than killing) is to subject them to long-term, consistent propaganda, but... The only forces capable of doing that are interested in pretty much exactly the opposite outcome. War is bad. Killing people, whoever they are, is wrong - and all people are just regular humans. There are no monsters, no "evil nazis" in reality, outside of fiction and propaganda. However, understanding that takes effort, and runs counter to many of the incentives built into human psychology. Like you, I believe there's "a lot more to the story." I feel so helpless, knowing that I have no choice but to sit and watch all the atrocities happening all around the world because almost nobody is interested in stopping them. People who happily support the killing (of the "other side" only, of course) are the biggest reason this keeps happening. Since they're impossible to convince, these things are bound to continue.

dataworm 3y ago

That your comment is neither flagged or downvoted, while some supporting Ukraine are downvoted or both, shows whose side HN is on. Very sad.