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If I may ask... Why do you have so much hatred for the Russian state... A kleptocratic petro-state... but not Saudi Arabia, a vastly worse kleptocratic petro-state without even the pretenses of democracy, that has been commiting Genocide against the people of Yemen for the past 8 years? And which America and the west could bring down in a second by sanctioning?
I really don't get how you can say the current Russian regime is somehow worse than the USSR when the USSr didn't even have the pretense of elections, or any of the basic economic freedoms, that even compromised, the modern Russians takes for granted.
These are really obvious questions.
Russia's a shitty country...but its like 110th out of 200 in the world today in terms of quality... might even crest the top 100.... And the offense that that 110th country might attack the 120th country, when the 120th has been shelling civilians for 8 years and waging war against independent regions...
It is just because Ukraine made fawning noises about the EU and Yemen didn't/wasn't white enough?
When USSR launched the first satellite under Chief Designer Korolev (Ukrainian), many Americans got scared. When Russia wishes to unite (in some way in another) with Ukraine to try making some another scary things this is seen as more menacing than Saudis killing Yemenis with reason rooted in faith differences.
Saudi Arabia currently is only starting to make its own firearms.
There is probably another axis on this. Russians are perceived to be whiter than Saudis and therefore higher standard is applied for them.
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For me?
I am not aware of sympathetic and non-terrible countries fighting with USA. Overall in Middle-East it is quite hard to find sympathetic countries. It is hard to find country where giving them military or political boost would improve things.
My country was repeatedly invaded by Russia and current Russian imperialism is again a direct threat. That is among reasons why Poland accepted over 2 000 000 refugees from Ukraine and gave substantial military and financial support. 230 tanks, 40 IFV, 38 self propelled artillery, including modern Krabs, crowdfounded Bayraktar TB2 and plenty of important but less flashy stuff.
I deeply dislike Saudi Arabia and hard for me to say anything positive about them, but there is nothing actionable I can do there. Unlike in case of Ukraine.
And in case of Ukraine I housed refugees from town shelled by Russian army and donated substantial amount of money to fund killing Russian invaders.
Which country you mean here? Because calling pseuodrepublic in Ukraine "independent regions" is ridiculous.
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This comes rather close to Bulverism, especially given your final question; it reminds me a lot of lines like "Why do care so much about other people's genitals?" that are frequently used to disarm dissenting views in debates around trans issues, implying that someone has scurrilous or questionable motives for their investment in an issue. I will say, though, that I identify strongly as a European, and Russia soldiers squatted on half the old capitals of Europe for a half-century, oppressing, impoverishing, and killing. After throwing off the Soviet yoke and joining the Western bloc, these nations became richer, stronger, and more politically inclusive. Russia, by contrast, has made little to no investment in itself since the fall of the Soviet Union; its economic growth has been almost entirely led by the petrochemical sector, and it has let its excellent scientific and technological gains rot while its physicists went off to work on Wall Street. I would say moreover that it is morally worse to pretend to hold elections and fake the results than to deny them all together; assuming the net result is the same, the former simply adds deceit to coercion.
In any case, that's a sample of my reasons for caring about this conflict. As for Yemen, I know and care very little about the country aside from the fact that it has been fighting civil wars since before I was born, it is extremely poor, and has a crazy high TFR (also that khat use is endemic among men). Whether or not Saudi Arabia wages its war (which in turn involves a complex mix of sectarian and political motives), Yemen is likely to remain an impoverished and dysfunctional place, much like every other Muslim country in the Middle East that doesn't have oil.
But perhaps all of this is indulging your question a bit too much. Rather than turn this into a therapy session, it is clearest and simplest for me to say that as a citizen of the West who identifies with the aims and values of the liberal international order, I see it very clearly as being in our interests to make this war as painful as possible for Russia: we rebut the clearest threat to the LIO this century, we disincentivise China from attacking Taiwan, we weaken a long-term strategic adversary and non-status quo power, we weaken Russia's ability to control its authoritarian and extractive vassal states, we humiliate Russian military might and weaken their ability to compete with the West on arms contract, we reinvigorate the Western alliance and increase NATO's total budget, etc., etc.. By contrast, we should stay as far removed from the war in Yemen as we can without causing permanent damage to our ties to Saudi Arabia, on whom we'll be moderately dependent for another decade or so. After that, I'd be happy to let that particular alliance wither on the vine.
I'd be more sympathetic to the "Liberal democratic order" if it wasn't directly funding and propping up genocide and apartheid in Yemen and Palestine.
Or if the US and UK had vastly more egregiously invaded a country 8000km away who had offered no aggression to them over lies not 20 years ago, causing close to a million deaths and geostrategic instability that probably killed a million more... And then done it all again in Libya in 2012.
I've been keeping score. The modern Russian state is vastly less threatening to the human race in terms of body count than this "Liberal international order"... Which is neither liberal, nor providing order to anyone outside a very select club.
Explain the "apartheid" in Palestine. This is a classic example of a controversial claim made without evidence.
The Palestinians have one government that controls them... Israel yet they are denied citizenship, a vote, and are forced into ghettos where the "pallestinian leadership" which Israel can and does murder at any moment, predates upon them.
Israel is one state, it has been for decades now since Israel has defeated all Palestinian resistance... yet Israel maintains the fiction that there is or ever can be two states because then it doesn't have to grant the pallestinians, who have been born and lived entirely under israelli control, a vote of their own.
There should be a one state solution. One person. one vote. Full Stop.
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As is its as if America denied the native American's any rights as citizens, claiming the reservations were seperate countries, but "invaded" them near weekly to enforce its authority.
Its textbook apartheid. Denying full citizenship to those born within a country on the basis of their heritage.
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Do you think anyone sincerely cares about "the human race in terms of body count"? Do you genuinely personally feel, or think the average other person does, that people you care about and agree with are equal in value to people you don't know or can't stand?
Look, I'm more sympathetic to Russia than the Ukraine. As far as I'm concerned, Russia's obviously more right than Ukraine, and Russia's actions now seem like a justified and inevitable backlash against the West's steadfast refusal to leave them alone. But you know what?
It doesn't actually matter to my life who wins. Every Ukrainian can die and so long as I avoid the news channels I don't watch anyway and the celebrities I don't respect anyway my life changes none. Same if all the Russians go. This is a pissing match across the ocean that doesn't warrant anywhere near the level of emotion the average American displays. I'd like to see Russia win, but if Russia loses, my disappointment will be about a .5 on a scale of 1 to 10. It's just.. not a big deal.
Everyone's outrage over Russia is performative.
Its a big deal if Ukraine wins its shores up the "Liberal international order" another 30 years, and then we live to see the slow role of totalitarianism every western country is headed towards come to fruition. You can see it in Ukraine: Our elites wish they ban opposition parties, opposition press, and then round up their ethnic and political enemies to use as canon fooder just like Zelensky is doing...
If Russia had won quickly and decisively it would have probably broken the western elite, and forced Germany and Co. to pivot towards Russia to secure their energy and econonmic interests... And then the possibility of the global total state would have been impossible.
As it is, if Ukraine wins this war or Russia collapses I shudder at what globohomo might become...
I'm not outraged at Ukraine or the middle-east because of any especial emotional attachment to the people there... I'm outraged because of what it lets us know about what the western and more specifically north American elite will do to us here.
Same way they've been trying to deploy all the tools of the war on terror against dissidents at home, you can bet they'll use all the Zelensky techniques and cite "what those brave Ukrainians did" as a precedent when they wage war on their own population.
Ukraine losing won't stop the west's slide into degeneracy, and Russia winning won't save the west from globohomo, either. Salvation will not come through proxy battles misunderstood as magical omens indicating domestic currents. Even if Russia wins, the fact it's struggling so much makes it clear it's not a real threat, outside a nuclear salvo.
If you want to stop progressives, you gotta stop them at home, not across the sea. If anything, I'm glad even a little bit of their activist attention is harmlessly redirected to the ass end of nowhere.
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I also hate Saudi Arabia, but reserve a special place for Russia because they have no god damned excuse.
They were the second hegemon of the world ready to burst through the Fulda gap, they put a dude into orbit before us. Their spies read our mail at will and their diplomats painted a decent chunk of the world red. They made some fukin WILD speeches in the UN about us and we had to take them seriously, and now what?
Their flaccid dick of an army is getting flattened in Ukraine, their science is just qualcomm with the numbers painted over, their spies are less effective than their facebook trolls, and their diplomacy can't spare a moment from getting clowned on to stop their own putative allies from killing eachother.
I never expected suadia ariabia to be anything but a shitty monarachy with lots of money, but Russia was better and could have been even more better, and instead is what it is.
TL;DR: the Soviet Union falling apart is the worst thing that ever happened to the USA, and I resent it. RIP Gorby, wish you coulda made it work.
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