This weekly roundup thread is intended for all culture war posts. 'Culture war' is vaguely defined, but it basically means controversial issues that fall along set tribal lines. Arguments over culture war issues generate a lot of heat and little light, and few deeply entrenched people ever change their minds. This thread is for voicing opinions and analyzing the state of the discussion while trying to optimize for light over heat.
Optimistically, we think that engaging with people you disagree with is worth your time, and so is being nice! Pessimistically, there are many dynamics that can lead discussions on Culture War topics to become unproductive. There's a human tendency to divide along tribal lines, praising your ingroup and vilifying your outgroup - and if you think you find it easy to criticize your ingroup, then it may be that your outgroup is not who you think it is. Extremists with opposing positions can feed off each other, highlighting each other's worst points to justify their own angry rhetoric, which becomes in turn a new example of bad behavior for the other side to highlight.
We would like to avoid these negative dynamics. Accordingly, we ask that you do not use this thread for waging the Culture War. Examples of waging the Culture War:
-
Shaming.
-
Attempting to 'build consensus' or enforce ideological conformity.
-
Making sweeping generalizations to vilify a group you dislike.
-
Recruiting for a cause.
-
Posting links that could be summarized as 'Boo outgroup!' Basically, if your content is 'Can you believe what Those People did this week?' then you should either refrain from posting, or do some very patient work to contextualize and/or steel-man the relevant viewpoint.
In general, you should argue to understand, not to win. This thread is not territory to be claimed by one group or another; indeed, the aim is to have many different viewpoints represented here. Thus, we also ask that you follow some guidelines:
-
Speak plainly. Avoid sarcasm and mockery. When disagreeing with someone, state your objections explicitly.
-
Be as precise and charitable as you can. Don't paraphrase unflatteringly.
-
Don't imply that someone said something they did not say, even if you think it follows from what they said.
-
Write like everyone is reading and you want them to be included in the discussion.
On an ad hoc basis, the mods will try to compile a list of the best posts/comments from the previous week, posted in Quality Contribution threads and archived at /r/TheThread. You may nominate a comment for this list by clicking on 'report' at the bottom of the post and typing 'Actually a quality contribution' as the report reason.
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
Notes -
The Big Serge has a good overview of the RU-UA war. The TL;DR is that Ukraine has burned through multiple iterations of armaments and is now reduced to begging for active NATO matériel, hence Germany's reticence to send Leopards. One should understand that Europe's and even America's production capacities have atrophied badly over the decades. Losing hundreds of tanks - the number that Ukraine is asking for - isn't something you replenish within a year.
Serge's prediction that Ukraine will lose the war "gradually, then suddenly" seems plausible given Russia's attrition strategy. If we assume that Russia will win this war, then the question needs to be asked.. how much will actually change? Ukraine as a country isn't particularly important and the population is likely to be hostile to Russia, meaning that to integrate it into Russia proper will be difficult if not impossible.
I keep hearing hysterical rhetoric that the West must win this war or... something something bad. It reminds me of the flawed 'domino theory' that was used to justify the Vietnam intervention. While I don't think NATO will ever proceed towards direct intervention á la Vietnam, I can't help but think that too many of the West's elites have trapped themselves rhetorically where Ukraine's importance is overblown for political reasons (so as to overcome domestic opposition towards sending arms) and it has now become established canon in a way that is difficult to dislodge.
In sharp contrast to Russia's, which is on such a fanatical war footing and so replete with materiel that it can afford to throw heavy anti-ship missiles into apartment buildings?
This is a war of attrition alright. Ukraine is not a player in this sense; its only contribution is manpower (plus publicity, such as cringeworthy woke-style attempts to cancel Atomic Heart developers and harass other random Russians online). The competitors are Russia (not even other "Authoritarian Axis" nations, which are increasingly distancing themselves from this clusterfuck) and NATO, with support form NATO-in-all-but-name allies like Japan. The question is: would NATO accept to lose to Russia in a war of attrition, with all that means for its credibility and for viability of major land grabs, or would it rather accept some upfront cost to de-mothball military production lines – that, I should note, may come in handy in a world war against China?
This doesn't look like a hard choice to me.
In the beginning of this war I've translated some Atomic Cherry posts. I think he's still very good. He predicts a major offensive by AFU in 2023, enabled by Western aid. Translation technology is good enough now that I'd rather not waste space here.
Empires usually don't fall by being steam rolled by an enemy. The risk for the American empire isn't Russians steam rolling across the world, it is an inability to maintain the empire. The taliban lost engagement after engagement, but won in the end due to them being too expensive to subdue. The US Marine Corps can't defend feminism in Iraq and fight high intensity wars in the Pacific. Social workers with guns patrolling deserts for years on end are a world away from amphibious jungle operations.
The US military spending in 2005 was 1.5 times the 10 following powers combined, today it is on par with their spending. Meanwhile, the US has much higher spending on wages, a less efficient industrial base, huge costs for pensions, medical care and education and much more expensive logistics as the US wants to retain a global footprint. After 20 years of investing in wars in the middle east the US has never had such old equipment and needs major investments just to keep currrent levels.
Keeping parity with China while China has the world's largest civilian ship building industry, low paid sailors with much higher recruiting standards and sailors that can take the subway home when they reach port is going to be tough for the US with sailors serving halfway around the world. Especially while having most of the logistical responsibility for Ukraine, who are fighting a war with poorly trained troops and a non-existent supply chain for western systems.
The question isn't can the US stop Russia, the question is can the US handle a whole host of simultaneous crises.
Humiliating and economically and molitarily destroying a threat to Western Europe, a major China supporter and potentially crucial resource supplier is handling a whole host of simultaneous crises. Let's stop pretending this doesn't make geopolitical sense.
I suspect they very much can and that Chinese military will not substantially outperform the Russian one, but in any case the materiel going to Ukraine is chump change in comparison to its benefits, whether political or logistical. Everyone is upping their defense budgets; do you think it'd have been such an easy sell without supporting Ukraine?
I wish Western "anti-Interventionists" and such were honest about their beliefs, instead of coming off as two-bit dictator stans with motivated reasoning. What the US is doing now is executing a rational strategy for a soon-to-be total hegemon. This is the birth of the empire; mopping up Taliban will become trivial after these big wars with nuclear-armed sources of systemic interference are done. If you have any real criticism of Pax Americana, do make it.
Look at Marseille, what is the biggest threat to the city? Russians plowing through half of Europe and temporarily holding it for a period of time that will be insignificant in the grand scale of things? Rather, it is globalist interests who want to replace the nations of Europe with a global market run by a handful of financial interests who bombed Libya to pieces and flooded Europe with migrants. The invasion of Iraq was a much bigger threat to Europe than Russia and China ever were. China has no chance whatsoever to actually occupy Europe or North America. It isn't a threat. The main threat is due to the same financial interests who now want another third world war, wrecking their own countries by outsourcing production to China to dump their working class. '
The same globalist interests that opened up for islamic immigration leading to waves of terrorism in the west on top of vast problems with rape, were the same people who's pointless war in Afghanistan caused a surge in the supply of heroin in the west. The war in Afghanistan caused a large wave of migrants, and the war was neatly summarized by NATO troops loading hundreds of migrants onto cargo jets to fly them to people who had nothing to benefit from this war. I am not really pro taliban, but their delivery of karmic justice to the people who cut the heroin price in half in Europe while getting eight people in Sweden stabbed by an Afghan refugee is something I applaud.
The US empire is crumbling which the increased spending on the military shows. Empires require expansion, and there are few good provinces left for the US to incorporate. Meanwhile, the imperial core is withering and the cost of maintaining the empire is surging. The current rhetoric is around increasing spending to defend Taiwan, not to go on some new venture of expansion. Slowed growth with increasing maintnance costs and lower cohesion in the core are solid signs of an empire in decline. Russia and China are not going to steam roll the US just like the British Empire wasn't steamrolled by another power. It simply became impossible to maintain.
The reason empires require expansion is because the parasitic imperial class grows (it takes an interest in the system as a whole to slow this growth and everyone in the system is interested only in maintaining his position in the system - hence, no one checks the growth of the parasitic load). The US empire is mainly a system of parasitism on Americans rather than one where foreign conquest yields returns.
Even the foreign clients are much like domestic USG clients - an excuse to take money from Americans, take a cut and give it to the foreign client in exchange for their main service - hostility to USG enemies (Americans).
This makes the historical comparisons difficult - this is rather a unique historical situation.
Of course the one way that USG actually does collect a benefit from running its empire is that the empire uses dollars and USG controls those and can issue them at will - that acts as a silent tax on the entire empire that can't be evaded.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link