20 Dec 22
@phranny saidIt's hardly "cheap" for Ukraine.
Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain tried to appease Hitler and look how that ended. Giving Ukraine weapons short of the nuclear variety is a cheap way for the West to halt Putin before he grabs more of Eastern Europe, which is his goal. Ukraine deservers our support.
@no1marauder saidI totally agree. But they are fighting for their freedom. That is never cheap.
It's hardly "cheap" for Ukraine.
20 Dec 22
@no1marauder said“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”
It takes a remarkably high level of paranoia + historical ignorance to keep making the "Putin=Hitler" argument.
George Santayana (1863-1952), Reason in Common Sense, The Life of Reason, Vol.1,
20 Dec 22
@phranny said"Those that remember the scams of the past like to repeat them."
“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”
George Santayana (1863-1952), Reason in Common Sense, The Life of Reason, Vol.1,
Metal Brain
https://www.nbcnews.com/think/opinion/ukraine-has-nazi-problem-vladimir-putin-s-denazification-claim-war-ncna1290946
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ukrainian_collaboration_with_Nazi_Germany
28 Dec 22
@phranny saidUkraine cannot win. They are just tools to weaken Russia down to the last Ukraine. It is an outspending game. The USA has the world reserve currency. That means we can out spend them, but only to the detriment of domestic social programs. Americans will notice soon.
I totally agree. But they are fighting for their freedom. That is never cheap.
29 Dec 22
Kissinger calls the idea which prevails in some warmongering circles of defeating Russia militarily and then splitting it up unwise, frivolous and dangerous.
“The preferred outcome for some is a Russia rendered impotent by the war. I disagree. For all its propensity to violence, Russia has made decisive contributions to the global equilibrium and to the balance of power for over half a millennium. Its historical role should not be degraded.”
A “dissolution of Russia” or a total weakening could turn the largest country in the world “into a contested vacuum”. Given the large number of nuclear weapons, the result would be an extremely dangerous powder keg, where other countries “might seek to expand their claims by force”.
Moreover, such a defeat is far from obvious. Russia’s military setbacks “have not eliminated its global nuclear reach, enabling it to threaten escalation in Ukraine”. Or as they say in Dutch: ‘a cornered cat can make strange jumps.
https://www.globalresearch.ca/henry-kissinger-warns-against-new-world-war/5803273
@no1marauder saidI’m not making the Putin=Hitler argument I’m saying you cannot appease an expansionist power that is surrounded by settled sovereign states.
It takes a remarkably high level of paranoia + historical ignorance to keep making the "Putin=Hitler" argument.
Germany in the late thirties is a perfect comparison for Russia right now. It takes an astronomical level of denial and / or obtuseness not to recognise that.
29 Dec 22
@kevcvs57 saidIt is NATO that expanded. It is the USA that expanded by coup. Russia is just taking back their old colony like the USA tried to do with Cuba. Everybody does it. It is the new normal.
I’m not making the Putin=Hitler argument I’m saying you cannot appease an expansionist power that is surrounded by settled sovereign states.
Germany in the late thirties is a perfect comparison for Russia right now. It takes an astronomical level of denial and / or obtuseness not to recognise that.
29 Dec 22
@metal-brain saidNo you halfwit NATO did not expand into anyone’s sovereign territory!
It is NATO that expanded. It is the USA that expanded by coup. Russia is just taking back their old colony like the USA tried to do with Cuba. Everybody does it. It is the new normal.
Other sovereign states voluntarily joined for the purpose of mutual defence many of whom had been occupied by an imperial Russia from 1945 to the collapse of the Moscow based empire in the late eighties / early nineties.
It’s very clear that Putin wants to reestablish that empire and NATO’s reason for existence is the repulsion and containment of imperial Russia, this conflict has proved that nato has no intention of attacking Russia but it is perfectly entitled to assist anyone in the region to defend themselves against Moscows westward expansion.
All Russia had to do was stay within its borders and they would have been left in peace to spend all that oil money on developing themselves into a European powerhouse, instead the Putin regime acted like thieves and plundered their own countries resources and spent the money on baubles and trophy wives.
29 Dec 22
@kevcvs57 saidI'm not making the Putin-Hitler argument, I'm just saying Russian foreign policy now is identical to Nazi Germany in the 30s!
I’m not making the Putin=Hitler argument I’m saying you cannot appease an expansionist power that is surrounded by settled sovereign states.
Germany in the late thirties is a perfect comparison for Russia right now. It takes an astronomical level of denial and / or obtuseness not to recognise that.
That's pretty absurd; did you ever glance at Mein Kampf?
Putin's been awful slow in implementing this supposed plan of his to conquer all of what was the Soviet Union and all of Eastern Europe too.
It takes remarkable levels of paranoia and historical ignorance to make the argument you are making.
29 Dec 22
1 edit
@kevcvs57 saidI'm confused; if the raison d'etre of NATO was "containing imperial Russia" what the heck was it doing meddling in Balkan Civil wars and helping the US occupy Iraq and Afghanistan?
No you halfwit NATO did not expand into anyone’s sovereign territory!
Other sovereign states voluntarily joined for the purpose of mutual defence many of whom had been occupied by an imperial Russia from 1945 to the collapse of the Moscow based empire in the late eighties / early nineties.
It’s very clear that Putin wants to reestablish that empire and NATO’s reason for e ...[text shortened]... thieves and plundered their own countries resources and spent the money on baubles and trophy wives.
What did any of those military operations directed at sovereign states have to do with the mutual defense of NATO states (like Canada for instance) from imperial Russia?
29 Dec 22
@no1marauder saidWe were de-Sovietifying Afghanistan
I'm confused; if the raison d'etre of NATO was "containing imperial Russia" what the heck was it doing meddling in Balkan Civil wars and helping the US occupy Iraq and Afghanistan?
What did any of those military operations directed at sovereign states have to do with the mutual defense of NATO states (like Canada for instance) from imperial Russia?
29 Dec 22
@athousandyoung saidI thought the Taliban had already done that.
We were de-Sovietifying Afghanistan