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>> So it's sad to see anyone falling for Putin's lies so easily. (See also Mearshimer.) Mearsheimer can be a bit too convincing for his own good, surely. What

>> So it's sad to see anyone falling for Putin's lies so easily. (See also Mearshimer.) Mearsheimer can be a bit too convincing for his own good, surely. What he has argued that is certainly convincing is that Russia was ready to negotiate a peace at the start of the war, when Russians and Ukrainians met in Belarus and then in Istanbul. If Putin wanted to recreate Imperial Russia, or the Soviet Union, then why would he negotiate for peace? That's Mearsh's argument, which he articulates, e.g. here in Lex Friedman's show (sorry, I couldn't find a better source): https://youtube.com/watch?v=r4wLXNydzeY&t=2684 https://youtube.com/watch?v=r4wLXNydzeY&t=2684 Full transcript here: https://lexfridman.com/john-mearsheimer-transcript/ https://lexfridman.com/john-mearsheimer-transcript/

YeGoblynQueenne 2y ago
[flagged]
- foldr 2y ago
  > security guarantees for Ukraine This is laughable. Russia cannot give any credible security guarantee to a country that it has just invaded! The war has shown precisely that Russia still believes that it has the right to control Ukraine and that any negotiated peace is nothing more than a temporary pause in hostilities in anticipation of a more opportune moment for Russia. Putin is a cypher and no-one really knows exactly why he wants to invade and conquer Ukraine, but as it is enormously plain at this point that he does want to do so, this entails that there is no really workable negotiated settlement.
  - YeGoblynQueenne 2y ago
    >> Russia cannot give any credible security guarantee to a country that it has just invaded! Security guarantees would be provided by Western countries, not only Russia.
    - foldr 2y ago
      Ukraine is in no need of further security guarantees from Western countries save the one guarantee that Russia will never accept: NATO membership. Without that – and the associated obligation to offer a direct military response to Russian aggression – it's difficult to see how any security guarantee could possibly extend beyond what Western countries are already providing. Russia's key conditions for the supposed "deal" that you refer to were that (i) the size of the Ukrainian army would be heavily constrained and that (ii) Russia would have a veto on any response to future aggression against Ukraine. Ukraine rejected the deal because it would have been worthless.
throwawayqqq11 2y ago
> If Putin wanted to recreate Imperial Russia, or the Soviet Union, then why would he negotiate for peace? To distract western military support. To distract offensive\defensive ukrainian plans. To construct a peaceful narrative at home or the war mongering west. To strengthen or pet allies, who mediate. To gain intelligence about the willingness of territorial sacrifice. Would Putin ever publicly admit his grand soviet plan? If no, then how would he behave instead? Consider georgia, chechenia, belarus, etc.
- rtaylorgarlock 2y ago
  Exactly. Both 1st + 2nd order thinking are needed when evaluating the PR efforts of leaders, particularly when their messages go against their actions.
  - Obscurity4340 2y ago
    Can you expand on that a bit more? Sorta get what you're saying but I think I might not have a super coherent sense of what that is
- YeGoblynQueenne 2y ago
  I don't know, maybe? All those sound plausible but then you have to try and justify each of them with some kind of evidence of some sort, otherwise you're just playing the guessing game. Now, I don't like guessing. When Russia entered negotiations the war was clearly not going its way, so the obvious explanation is that Putin wanted to disentangle from it with the least damage to his image as possible. The question is why the negotiations failed, if they were really as advanced as suggested in the articles I linked above. Since the name of Boris Johnson has been brought up (in the context of being one of the Western representatives that told Zelenskiy to drop the deal) I tend to believe that a peace deal failed because at least one side in the negotiations was incompetent fools who should have never made it in power. That the other side is probably the same makes no difference.
  - throwaway8877 2y ago
racional 2y ago
If Putin wanted to recreate Imperial Russia, or the Soviet Union, then why would he negotiate for peace? Because as he keeps saying over and over -- the only "peace" he will accept is one in which his claims to sovereignty on the territories he is currently sitting are recognized by Western powers. This was his core demand during the Istanbul talks, and it's his current demand now (though he's upped it a bit recently to include regime change in Kyiv). For a serial territorial aggressor like the modern Russian state, "peace" is simply another mechanism for arriving that same the desired end state. It's also useful as a propaganda tool, to mollify the opposition to what he's doing ("See, Putin just wants peace -- he even says so!"), get people to start talking about how costly the war is, how the West is the real aggresor and so forth. That's where Mearsheimer et al come in.
- YeGoblynQueenne 2y ago
  That's probably because the wars started by "the West" (US and allies) are significantly more than the wars started by Russia or the USSR. See: vietnam, Korea, Iraq, Afghanistan. Not that Russia is some big supporter of peace, but the US and its allies are the current global bully. And you don't need Mearsheimer to tell you that.
  - racional 2y ago
    So if Russia wants to get to play the top bully too, for a while -- well, we should just cut them some slack and let them have their way for a while? Because fair is fair, right? That seems to be the essence of your argument here. (None of those wars are directly analogous to what Russia is doing to Ukraine right now of course; but never mind that for now).
    - YeGoblynQueenne 2y ago
      Who is "we"? I'm not American. Why should I treat American and Russian aggression differently? And yes, the wars were not directly analogous but the stark reality of the matter is that the US and RUssia are two of the world bullies that are capable of invading anyone they like, and nobody can do anything about it. Again: why should I like one more than the other? Why should anyone, who is not their citizen?
preisschild 2y ago
Because those negotiations werent about peace, but about the surrender of the Ukrainian armed forces and the legal transfer of territory to the agressors. Maersheimer and Chomsky are useful idiots of the Kremlin

YeGoblynQueenne 2y ago

[flagged]

foldr 2y ago
> security guarantees for Ukraine This is laughable. Russia cannot give any credible security guarantee to a country that it has just invaded! The war has shown precisely that Russia still believes that it has the right to control Ukraine and that any negotiated peace is nothing more than a temporary pause in hostilities in anticipation of a more opportune moment for Russia. Putin is a cypher and no-one really knows exactly why he wants to invade and conquer Ukraine, but as it is enormously plain at this point that he does want to do so, this entails that there is no really workable negotiated settlement.
- YeGoblynQueenne 2y ago
  >> Russia cannot give any credible security guarantee to a country that it has just invaded! Security guarantees would be provided by Western countries, not only Russia.
  - foldr 2y ago
    Ukraine is in no need of further security guarantees from Western countries save the one guarantee that Russia will never accept: NATO membership. Without that – and the associated obligation to offer a direct military response to Russian aggression – it's difficult to see how any security guarantee could possibly extend beyond what Western countries are already providing. Russia's key conditions for the supposed "deal" that you refer to were that (i) the size of the Ukrainian army would be heavily constrained and that (ii) Russia would have a veto on any response to future aggression against Ukraine. Ukraine rejected the deal because it would have been worthless.

throwawayqqq11 2y ago

> If Putin wanted to recreate Imperial Russia, or the Soviet Union, then why would he negotiate for peace? To distract western military support. To distract offensive\defensive ukrainian plans. To construct a peaceful narrative at home or the war mongering west. To strengthen or pet allies, who mediate. To gain intelligence about the willingness of territorial sacrifice. Would Putin ever publicly admit his grand soviet plan? If no, then how would he behave instead? Consider georgia, chechenia, belarus, etc.

rtaylorgarlock 2y ago
Exactly. Both 1st + 2nd order thinking are needed when evaluating the PR efforts of leaders, particularly when their messages go against their actions.
- Obscurity4340 2y ago
  Can you expand on that a bit more? Sorta get what you're saying but I think I might not have a super coherent sense of what that is
YeGoblynQueenne 2y ago
I don't know, maybe? All those sound plausible but then you have to try and justify each of them with some kind of evidence of some sort, otherwise you're just playing the guessing game. Now, I don't like guessing. When Russia entered negotiations the war was clearly not going its way, so the obvious explanation is that Putin wanted to disentangle from it with the least damage to his image as possible. The question is why the negotiations failed, if they were really as advanced as suggested in the articles I linked above. Since the name of Boris Johnson has been brought up (in the context of being one of the Western representatives that told Zelenskiy to drop the deal) I tend to believe that a peace deal failed because at least one side in the negotiations was incompetent fools who should have never made it in power. That the other side is probably the same makes no difference.
- throwaway8877 2y ago

racional 2y ago

If Putin wanted to recreate Imperial Russia, or the Soviet Union, then why would he negotiate for peace? Because as he keeps saying over and over -- the only "peace" he will accept is one in which his claims to sovereignty on the territories he is currently sitting are recognized by Western powers. This was his core demand during the Istanbul talks, and it's his current demand now (though he's upped it a bit recently to include regime change in Kyiv). For a serial territorial aggressor like the modern Russian state, "peace" is simply another mechanism for arriving that same the desired end state. It's also useful as a propaganda tool, to mollify the opposition to what he's doing ("See, Putin just wants peace -- he even says so!"), get people to start talking about how costly the war is, how the West is the real aggresor and so forth. That's where Mearsheimer et al come in.

YeGoblynQueenne 2y ago
That's probably because the wars started by "the West" (US and allies) are significantly more than the wars started by Russia or the USSR. See: vietnam, Korea, Iraq, Afghanistan. Not that Russia is some big supporter of peace, but the US and its allies are the current global bully. And you don't need Mearsheimer to tell you that.
- racional 2y ago
  So if Russia wants to get to play the top bully too, for a while -- well, we should just cut them some slack and let them have their way for a while? Because fair is fair, right? That seems to be the essence of your argument here. (None of those wars are directly analogous to what Russia is doing to Ukraine right now of course; but never mind that for now).
  - YeGoblynQueenne 2y ago
    Who is "we"? I'm not American. Why should I treat American and Russian aggression differently? And yes, the wars were not directly analogous but the stark reality of the matter is that the US and RUssia are two of the world bullies that are capable of invading anyone they like, and nobody can do anything about it. Again: why should I like one more than the other? Why should anyone, who is not their citizen?

preisschild 2y ago

Because those negotiations werent about peace, but about the surrender of the Ukrainian armed forces and the legal transfer of territory to the agressors. Maersheimer and Chomsky are useful idiots of the Kremlin