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PaperclipPerfector  9mo ago (text post)   31902 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of July 17, 2023

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Poland must be “reminded” its western territories were “gift from Stalin”, says Putin

Lukashenko claims Poland is trying to annex Ukraine, Wagner troops want to invade

Just a reminder where Putin's eyes are looking at when/if he's done with Ukraine. We've been through this scenario before, where Putin prepared the invasion of Ukraine for 8 years, absolutely in public, never hiding his intentions, always claiming Ukraine is a fake state, ruled by illegitimate regime and must be liberated - and yet everybody was so surprised when the invasion actually happened. And yet, lots of people are lecturing me all the time about how Putin didn't actually want to do any of that and was forced to do it by "Western meddling". I don't expect many people to change any of their conclusions from this round of saber-rattling, and I don't also expect Putin to invade Poland tomorrow (or this year, or anytime before Ukraine situation has resolved one way or another), but the time may come to be oh so surprised again, because literally nothing pointed to this next move by Putin. And I am sure if that happen, the "meddling" will be blamed again. I certainly don't want to see this happening, but as things are going now, I am afraid I might.

I maintain that the KPI Putin effectively optimizes for is genocide of the Russian people, so he will keep antagonizing other parties far beyond what he can realistically afford.

Right now there's nothing in these boomer noises about ancient borders and «gifts», just populist machismo, playing up the sense of historical insult, showing he's boss for the internal audience. However, he will send military to kill some Poles if that can cheaply advance his goals. This is likely to happen, even: the world needs to see that Russians are subhuman, «not even real Slavs», and get crushed by Poles 10 to 1. Why that is necessary is beyond me, but it's been foretold.

Isn’t there quite a bit of chatter from ex-nato generals about Poland intervening in Ukraine? Wasn’t that a few weeks ago?

Perhaps this is in response to that.

I don’t know how likely it is that we see polish military fighting Russians in Ukraine but I reckon it’s a hell of a lot more likely than the speculation you’re putting forth here.

And even if I were to grant you that you’re totally correct here, what are we to do about it? Fund a ukrainian war for the next x years to preempt it? It’s still not worth it.

"""Polish military""" have probably been fighting Russia in Russia as of the Belgorod raid and certainly have been fighting in Ukraine:

https://rmx.news/poland/polish-volunteers-claim-they-participated-in-military-actions-in-russias-belgorod-region/

Now they say they're not Polish military but they would say that, wouldn't they? German volunteers in the Spanish Civil War, Chinese volunteers in the Vietnam War, Russian volunteers in the Korean War... This is standard practice. Special forces are military too and there are plenty of Western special forces in Ukraine: https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/apr/11/up-to-50-uk-special-forces-present-in-ukraine-this-year-us-leak-suggests

Unlike the others though, this isn't in the periphery like Korea or Vietnam. What kind of risks are we taking, for what rewards? A bare minimum of competence for these incredibly reckless manoeuvres would not having the Nuland regime-change plotting tapes be released, or have Merkel keep her trap shut about the Minsk agreement existing just to buy time for Ukraine to arm.

This is just saber rattling for the moment. Putin has used expansionist rhetoric against all former Soviet territories, and it's foolish to think he wouldn't try to reassemble the borders of the USSR if he could. However, Poland is protected by Article 5 which Russia has shown is a red line it won't cross. That said, if anything were to happen to NATO, or if A5's protection were called into question, then the Baltics would almost certainly kiss their independence goodbye, and Poland would likely be in the crossfire next.

Poland was never formally a Soviet territory.

I was using the "Soviet territory" term more broadly. Poland wasn't a part of the USSR specifically, but it was kept in the Warsaw Pact (which were the USSR's client states) at gunpoint.

I don't recall saber rattling against east Germany.

It was a part of the Russian Empire and of the Warsaw Pact. And everything there was considered "Soviet Territory", ask Hungary and Czechoslovakia if you don't believe me.

The Russian empire was a long time ago and also included such thoroughly Russian territories like Alaska and Finland. The "Soviet territory" argument can be applied to east Germany too.

Not too long ago - and Putin thinks himself to be their rightful heir and the person whose destiny is to restore it. Yes, East Germany was part of the Soviet block too, but the historical links to that territory for Russia is virtually non-existant, so right now nobody cares about it and nobody has any designs on it.

This country was not a member of the Soviet Union.

Yeah... That's not Soviet territory...

For what it's worth, the general opinion of many hardcore pro-war Russian commenters that I've seen is quite different. They think that Putin should have launched a full-scale invasion in 2014 but was too cowardly and too dependent on connections with the West to do it, that he was very conflicted about intervening in the DNR/LNR back in 2014 and would have been happy with just Crimea, and that he then spent the next 8 years trying to reach a de-escalation with the West on the matter of Ukraine while failing to take the steps that would have been necessary to prepare the Russian army for a war of this scale. Steps like replacing his loyal cronies with competent leaders, expanding production of drones, and so on. Also that he is too closely connected with oligarchs who own property in the West and send their kids to live there, hence has no desire to enter into a true confrontation with the West and was always hoping that the West would agree to, at most, have a little proxy war with him in Ukraine that would not threaten any serious break in relations.

If this view of things is accurate, I could add as an immediate corollary that last February, Putin was hoping to have a quick shock and awe campaign that would quickly result in Ukraine offering concessions so that the whole thing could get de-escalated and the West would put up with the fait accompli. Which of course deeply misunderstands how ideologically committed Western foreign policy makers are to defending Ukraine, but it would not be the first time that Russians misunderstood the West. In any case, when the shock and awe campaign turned into a clusterfuck, Putin's only choices were either a humiliating withdrawal or to expand things into the full-scale war that he never wanted.

In short, many Russian hawks believe that far from being a careful long term aggressive planner with a strategy for seriously threatening NATO, Putin is actually a cautious and incompetent leader who has never been willing to confront the West in a serious way until he had a bit of a change of heart sometime around 2-3 years ago, but even then was not ready or able to do what it would really take to succeed and instead blundered into the current situation. Now, I am not saying that this view of things is necessarily true. But it is an interesting other perspective on things.

In any case, I think that Poland is almost certainly out of the question. The Russian army has barely managed to take the relatively small parts of Ukraine that it currently controls and simply does not have the strength to take on Poland's military in open combat while at the same time fighting Ukraine. And that is before we even get to the whole matter of NATO's Article 5, which there is close to 100% chance would be invoked if Russia attacked Poland and would mean either a swift defeat of Russia's conventional forces or nuclear war.

All that said, I did not think that Putin would invade last February, nor did I think that the Russian army would be quite as incompetent as they were, so take everything I say about this with a grain of salt.

For what it's worth, the general opinion of many hardcore pro-war Russian commenters that I've seen is quite different. They think that Putin should have launched a full-scale invasion in 2014 but was too cowardly and too dependent on connections with the West to do it, that he was very conflicted about intervening in the DNR/LNR back in 2014 and would have been happy with just Crimea, and that he then spent the next 8 years trying to reach a de-escalation with the West on the matter of Ukraine while failing to take the steps that would have been necessary to prepare the Russian army for a war of this scale.

I am not even pro-war, but that's basically it. What Putin expected from his invasion was something like Prigozhin's mutiny: Russian troops enter Harjkov practically unopposed: police and the SBU are blockaded in their offices until further notice, local ZSU military HQ taken over by the VS RF, ZSU generals seen negotiating with the invasion force commander. The troops drive towards Kijev with no resistance other that some stray aircraft that are quickly shot down and some token ditches cut across the roads.

This was totally doable in 2014 when Ukraine couldn't muster enough troops to kick Girkin and his several hundred men out of Slavânsk. Back then Putin even had a legitimate president he could've installed as his puppet. Even the 2022 invasion would've gone totally different if it was planned not as a triumph, but as an actual war against a determined opponent. Instead of rushing Kijev and Odessa the invading troops could've taken over Harjkov and actually pulled off the encirclement of the Donbass front. Yes, Zelenskij wouldn't have have fled the Winter palace dressed as a woman, but he would've negotiated a quick end to the war.

I blame Covid. Putin is notoriously technically illiterate, his inputs had already been limited to printed summaries his aides prepared and face-to-face meetings. When he retreated to his Covid bunker the meetings dried up: the most important ones went online, which he hates and probably tunes out of, the remaining face-to-face meetings were now limited to meetings with people who could afford to quarantine themselves, that is, no one with an actual job. That's the only explanation I can come up with why someone so notoriously cautious if not cowardly ended up bold enough to threaten NATO and try order a regime change invasion.

The quarantine thing is a very good point, it seems like he was so isolated and made accessing himself personally so difficult (three weeks quarantine or something) that his in-person visitors would have been those who could afford to take huge breaks from their other responsibilities to the extent that they probably had comparatively little influence or information.

In short, many Russian hawks believe that far from being a careful long term aggressive planner with a strategy for seriously threatening NATO, Putin is actually a cautious and incompetent leader who has never been willing to confront the West in a serious way until he had a bit of a change of heart sometime around 2-3 years ago

I largely agree with that (an interesting question may be what exactly happened 2-3 years ago that made him change his mind, but let's leave it alone for now). Putin is pretty cowardly person (remember his 1km table) and he usually attacks when he does not expect serious resistance, and that's what he expected in Ukraine - token resistance and quick settlement. But that ship has sailed and now he is in the action. So the question is - how far he will be willing to take it if he feels his political survival needs more and more bloodshed?

The only part I disagree is that there's no "what it would really take to succeed" - there's no realistic scenario that could "succeed" in a way that the above people mean - i.e. capture most or whole of Ukraine without destroying Russia on the way. The best case scenario is what Putin is rooting for near-term - freezing the current battle lines and keeping what they captured (maybe minus Zaporizhzhya - I don't think anybody wants Russian troops loitering around the biggest atomic power station in Europe) and rearming for the next round, while expecting (quite reasonably, given the history) Ukrainians to start squabbling between themselves and tearing themselves apart in the quest to steal the most of Western "reconstruction" money.

In any case, I think that Poland is almost certainly out of the question. The Russian army has barely managed to take the relatively small parts of Ukraine that it currently controls and simply does not have the strength to take on Poland's military in open combat while at the same time fighting Ukraine.

Oh of course. I imagine the Poland question only become relevant if one of the "peace" plans - involving freezing the current situation and letting Putin withdraw most of the forces from there without losing the territories. And even then it'd take quite a while - it took Putin 8 years to get bold enough to attack Ukraine even after he occupied Crimea.

The Russian army has barely managed to take the relatively small parts of Ukraine that it currently controls and simply does not have the strength to take on Poland's military in open combat while at the same time fighting Ukraine.

You're replying to something JJJ explicitly noted he wasn't saying.

I don't also expect Putin to invade Poland tomorrow (or this year, or anytime before Ukraine situation has resolved one way or another)

But yes, would be pretty stupid to invade a NATO country. Sure, there's the fig-leaf of Wagner/Belarus, but Article 5 still gets invoked, Wagner/Belarus get swatted like a fly (unlikely that they could beat Poland anyway, to be honest), and still no-win for Russia.

But yes, would be pretty stupid to invade a NATO country.

I think it’s fair to say any conventional war would quickly escalate to the nuclear option. Ukraine is a demonstration of that already.

It's possible, but it's not as likely as e.g. Taiwan going nuclear. As Zvi noted a while back:

Both sides now believe (correctly) that NATO has vastly superior conventional forces, and could easily repel a conventional Russian attack on NATO. At worst, Russia could make temporary gains in the Baltics. Thus, I put the chances of NATO dropping the first nuclear weapon at epsilon. NATO has no reason to open Pandora’s box when it can win a conventional war.

Russia also has much more secure second-strike than the PRC would (way more nukes, lots of deep-water ports for boomers, greater distance between the hot war and the ICBMs so alpha-strike is harder), which allows for less of a hair-trigger.

I more or less agree with this. There was an interesting book I read not too long ago, that takes apart the mythology of American military and economic supremacy. But I still prefer living in a context where these rational calculations seem far more distant than reality increasingly suggests they are.

… Also that he is too closely connected with oligarchs who own property in the West and send their kids to live there, hence has no desire to enter into a true confrontation with the West and was always hoping that the West would agree to, at most, have a little proxy war with him in Ukraine that would not threaten any serious break in relations...

I don’t think this narrative is accurate at all.

Putin had connections to the oligarchy during his rise to power. Anyone who would’ve attempted to climb that mountain would’ve had to have dealings of one kind or another with them at some point. There’s no avoiding that. But once he got in, he broke the back of the oligarchy quite thoroughly. Whether you want to say he just replaced it with his own well connected inner circle, is another matter, but that isn’t the point.

Putin never had a desire to annihilate Ukraine and go to war with it. There’s nothing that actually substantiates that, beyond people’s mere speculation. There’s nothing nobody can point to directly that’s the smoking gun which establishes that intent. Victims of the MSM and the American propaganda system loved to go around initially and proclaim, “Putin is losing the war! Their military is overreaching! They’ve overspent themselves!,” but it never dawned on them for even a moment that Putin was never trying to go full Mike Tyson on Ukraine.

The fog of propaganda is ‘dense’. On both sides. I think this comment doesn’t crack through the effort of the west’s attempt to pull the wool over the eyes of its citizens.

My experience as a Western anti-Western foreign policy establishment biased observer of this conflict since ~2013 is that most westerners talking about this conflict aren't just having trouble prodding through a fog of propaganda, but I have trouble believing we're living in the same reality. This was turned up to 11 in February of last year and this community wasn't sparred.

I’m glad it seems that at least some people notice it. It really is astounding.

Victims of the MSM and the American propaganda system loved to go around initially and proclaim, “Putin is losing the war! Their military is overreaching! They’ve overspent themselves!,” but it never dawned on them for even a moment that Putin was never trying to go full Mike Tyson on Ukraine.

It's clearly absurd to think that the current situation is one that Putin wanted. Whatever he was trying to achieve, it wasn't this.

I don't think his desire was to annihilate Ukraine, to be clear. I don't even think his initial goal was to annex Ukraine. I think his desire was to kill Zelensky and install Yanukovych as a friendly leader. Obviously things didn't work out the way he wanted and we're now on plan D or something.

I think his desire was to kill Zelensky and install Yanukovych as a friendly leader.

This isn't supportable.

Putin desperately wanted to kill Zelensky except for the fact that he didn't even attempt a single decapitation strike against Ukraine leadership and still only attacks leadership in direct response to terror attacks against things like the Kerch bridge, much to the chagrin of his main detractors in Russia.

What evidence do you have Putin wanted to do this? He struck freely all over the country in the opening salvo of invasion, but just couldn't be bothered to specifically target leadership, many of which were still in their offices at the time?

What pro-russian or even neutral, non-western sources of information do you use to make your judgements about this conflict?

My evidence is that in the early stages of the invasion, Russian troops advanced on Kiev. My belief is that the goal in doing so was to capture Kiev and seize control of the Ukrainian government. I believe this primarily because it seems like a pretty decent plan if it works.

You seem to be reading me as alleging some kind of assassination plot? I'm not. I'm offering my explanation of the military actions we all saw play out.

You seem to be reading me as alleging some kind of assassination plot?

okay, so you're arguing putin wanted to kill zelensky, but you're not alleging a plot to kill zelensky, but also the 25,000 riot police advancing on Kiev is evidence of your belief putin wanted to kill zelensky but this isn't evidence of a plot to kill zelensky

if it's not you alleging a plot to kill zelensky, then how is it evidence of Putin's desire to kill zelensky?

You're deliberately being obtuse. I'm drawing a distinction between an act of subterfuge and an open assault.

George Bush killed Saddam Hussein, but he did not assassinate Saddam Hussein. Putin intended to kill Zelensky in the exact same way.

I'm not reading into your post some alleged assassination plot, I asked you why you think putin wants to kill zelelensky and your proffered evidence is bad. The reason I don't buy it is because putin has the capacity to kill zelensky and other ukrainian political leadership and simply hasn't. He hasn't even tried. So what you're left arguing is he wants to kill zelensky, but only in a certain way based on evidence a military maneuver you've already admitted would have been smart policy anyway irrelevant of the desire to kill zelensky at all.

I'm deliberately attempting to get you to confront the issues in your own argument, however successful that's been. In any case, thanks for the discussion.

he didn't even attempt a single decapitation strike against Ukraine leadership

What do you mean by "decapitation strike"? Lobbing a lot of rockets at the center of Kiev? First of all, he's not that precise. So he could ruin a lot of buildings, but without precise information about where exactly Zelensky is at certain point of time, it's just pointless. And I guess SVR/FSB aren't good enough to have real-time info like that. Second, most Soviet government buildings were designed with the scenario of "somebody is shooting stuff at our dear leaders" in mind, so even if they hit the right building, that doesn't mean they would kill him. In fact, Ukrainians had several targeted hits on Russian generals, and they frequently survived, either with some wounds or just with the need to change their pants. Third, Putin doesn't have air superiority, and missiles from way afar are vulnerable to interception, and if Ukrainians would concentrate their air defense abilities somewhere, it's near their capital. Fourth, there were strikes on Kiev, but they largely achieved nothing, exactly because Kiev is huge, and Russian targeting abilities are not that good.

There are other options, of course - like sending a small group of special ops operatives to execute the targeted kill. Ukrainians claim they captured several such troops, which of course we can disbelieve, but then we have no real way of claiming there were none, because Russians certainly wouldn't admit something like "we sent our best men to kill Zelensky and failed miserably".

in direct response to terror attacks against things like the Kerch bridge

The word "terror" has meaning. You can't just apply it to any thing you don't like. A strike against a piece of military infrastructure (weapons and material delivery over the bridge has been documented many times) is not "terror" - it's an act of war, and destroying bridges have been performed in war since bridges and war were invented.

What do you mean by "decapitation strike"?

I mean a strike aimed to kill Ukrainian political leadership, i.e., what the above user is claiming to know was Putin's intent. What evidence do you have that Putin was trying to kill Zelensky?

Putin has been pretty successful at killing people in leadership, the examples being in response to the first and second terror attacks on the Kerch bridge. Claiming he just doesn't have the capability to know where someone is precisely at what time to even bother trying at all isn't supported by the fact he has, in fact, demonstrated that ability to try and succeed at just that. He has demonstrated the capacity for very well calibrated strikes, e.g., on the SBU headquarters in response to the Kerch bridge terror attack. And yet, he didn't do that in the opening stage of the war even once. This doesn't support the claim the user was making. If you would like to provide evidence of their claim, I would like to see it.

Third, Putin doesn't have air superiority

Russia may not have air supremacy, but the RUAF does have air superiority over Ukraine with a demonstrated ability to strike at will deep into Ukraine around highly protected targets and even the anti-missile defense clusters of Ukraine itself.

Your claims about Russian capability are simply wrong. They have the demonstrated ability to perform targeted, precise strikes deep in Ukraine which are, at least on paper, heavily protected by anti-missile defense, as well as targeting and killing leadership. What pro-russian or even non-Western neutral source do you get your information from?

Ukrainians claim they captured several such troops, which of course we can disbelieve

yeah, Ukraine also intercepts 135% of the fired missiles despite me being able to watch them being "intercepted" in live video by the targets they were fired at

The word "terror" has meaning

I can use words however I like. Here, I'm using it to describe using a possibly unsuspecting truck driver in a suicide attack on civilian infrastructure with civilians currently traversing it. Something being done in war before doesn't mean it isn't a terror attack. You don't get to claim misuse of a word just because you dislike the connotations or agree with the underlying action.

I can use words however I like.

Yes, congratulations, you discovered technique known as lying, congrats.

civilian infrastructure

Are you now going to claim that military airports are also civilian infrastructure? That bridge is primary military logistic link into occupied areas of Ukraine.

Putin has been pretty successful at killing people in leadership

Like whom?

the examples being in response to the first and second terror attacks on the Kerch bridge

Still not sure who do you mean as "people in leadership" that has been killed. Could you elaborate?

Claiming he just doesn't have the capability to know where someone is precisely at what time to even bother trying at all isn't supported by the fact he has, in fact, demonstrated that ability to try and succeed at just that

At just what?

on the SBU headquarters in response to the Kerch bridge terror attack

Please stop with the abuse of the word "terror".
SBU headquaters is a building. It can't be moved. It's big. And yes, they managed to hit this huge building - even though SBU has nothing to do with attacking bridges and also, the funniest of all, SBU has been revealed to be thoroughly infiltrated with Russian agents (which probably coordinated the strike and that's the reason they were so accurate). But I'm not sure why hitting that building proves anything. Sure, they could hit another building in Kiev. They actually did, several times. So what?

And yet, he didn't do that in the opening stage of the war even once.

He didn't use far strike capabilities in the opening stage of war at all. Because he was planning to a) capture Kiev and other central cities by ground troups quickly and b) achieve air superiority very fast. Only failing to do that, he had to resort to long-distance strikes. Of course, when he planned to capture (or kill, I'm not sure which he preferred) Zelensky, he planned it within the framework of his overall strategy, and by the time his strategy failed, he didn't have any capacity to do it anymore. I'm not sure what you refer to when saying "bother trying at all" - like, just shooting rockets at whatever hoping to hit Zelensky? Well, he's doing that for a year and a half now, at least the first part. I don't think he's actually stupid enough to believe any of them may actually hit Zelensky, so by now that option is closed to him.

I can use words however I like

No you can't, if you want to communicate with others. Otherwise wolves won't be flying the carpet by the grumble over the manatee because the gasket jumps blue ribbon. If you want to communicate with people, you need to use words in common meanings in commonly understood ways. And you actually know that, because you use the word "terror" not randomly. It's not some whim that puts random words in random places. You use it in common meaning to imply something that is factually false - i.e. you are lying. And I have called you out, repeatedly, on this lying - and if you intend to continue lying, I will just conclude that proclaiming known lies is how you prefer to communicate. You can say whatever you want, but you are not entitled to your own facts.

Here, I'm using it to describe using a possibly unsuspecting truck driver in a suicide attack on civilian infrastructure with civilians currently traversing it

You are repeating Russian propaganda claims without any proof to it. Also, it can't be both "suicide" and "unsuspecting" - you need to separate your propaganda. Russian propaganda claims are often self-contradictory, but they rarely do it within the same sentence. And then you are lying again - the bridge is not a "civilian infrastructure", it is being used for military purposes all the time and is a legitimate war target, as anything in Russia connected to the war is (including all industrial infrastructure, all supplies used in war, all airfields and production capacities, etc. are). Civilians being present changes absolutely nothing - civilians can be present anywhere and are commonly used as human shields, including by Russians. This does not turn a military target into a a purely civilian one. We're not talking about kindergarten or a grain storage or a church (which Russians do attack, we have witnessed it just this week). We're talking about major supply artery which is used to carry military supplies. And any civilians that wanted to avoid the area of active warfare had a lot of advance warning. Nobody forces anybody to travel over that bridge, certainly not Ukrainians.

If you want to communicate with people, you need to use words in common meanings in commonly understood ways

the reason you disagree with my use is because you know exactly what I'm communicating, so communication isn't the issue

do you dispute the way I used the word given my description?

if yes, explain how my description, taking it as face value the underlying facts I communicated are true (i.e., turning an innocent driver into a suicide bomber against civilian infrastructure), is an improper use of the word as it's commonly used

if no, this complaint is flatly based on your opinion the underlying facts of what occurred, it doesn't have to do with my use of the wrong word, but with a factual dispute you want to bicker about using Ukraine nonsense while laughably accusing anyone arguing differently of using Russian propaganda

in either case, this is about you simply not liking the connotations and the use in behavior you agree with in a war on behalf of a side you're feel you're on

it's not about "misusing" words, despite you wanting to turn this dialogue into that when it's initially about someone claiming Putin wants to Kill Zelensky

if you're going to ask ppl to support a claim, you should lead by example instead of what appears to be trying to set yourself up to be some sort of lazy arbiter who chooses the null hyp and then demands others have some sort obligation to proof it wrong or it remains

More comments

Whatever he was trying to achieve, it wasn't this.

True, and I agree with that. But that argument has a very small payload, and I don’t accept that framing of the issue. I think if you look at it more through a geopolitical and International Relations (IR) lens, ask yourself what Putin should’ve done if you were in his situation. I can’t think of a good decision to make either, but his hands were tied.

I think his desire was to kill Zelensky and install Yanukovych as a friendly leader. Obviously things didn't work out the way he wanted and we're now on plan D or something.

Did you know that Yanukovych was the democratically elected President of Ukraine before the western backed Maidan coup happened?

I can’t think of a good decision to make either, but his hands were tied.

No, they were not. But Russia refused to accept that it is not a superpower.

But Russia refused to accept that it is not a superpower.

That’s not what the Minsk Accords were about.

Given what happened in the up to the coup', the rampant corruption within the Ukrainian government widely acknowledged interference on the part of the Russian foreign service, and prominant journalist's and opposition candidates getting "disappeared" etc... does anyone here actually believe that Yanukovych's election was anything more than a fig leaf

I wouldn't throw election safety stones in American houses.

Thats the joke.

This is your evidence that he wasn’t democratically elected?

I think if you look at it more through a geopolitical and International Relations (IR) lens, ask yourself what Putin should’ve done if you were in his situation. I can’t think of a good decision to make either, but his hands were tied.

I don't believe for a second that this was an inevitable war forced on a reluctant Putin. He had choices at every point - the most important of course being the choice to invade Ukraine, which he could have simply not done. Now, he may have decided that war was the best path forward for his interests - and maybe that was even a rational decision based on the information he had at the time. He certainly wouldn't have been alone in thinking that Ukraine would not be able to put up much of a fight. But I highly suspect that if he had known the path that the future would take, he would have chosen differently.

His hands were not tied. He made a decision - and it was the wrong decision.

Did you know that Yanukovych was the democratically elected President of Ukraine before the western backed Maidan coup happened?

Yes. I'm also extremely confident he no longer has popular support in Ukraine.

I don't believe for a second that this was an inevitable war forced on a reluctant Putin.

nor was the kiev coup (the second one in 2 decades) against a legitimately elected president some sort of inevitable action

framing these sorts of things as if the US & satrapies' behavior is some sort of natural, inevitable event and the only agent here was Putin is disingenuous

He made a decision - and it was the wrong decision

no, I doubt he would have made a different decision at least on the general question of whether a direct physical confrontation with Ukraine was necessary or not

Yes. I'm also extremely confident he no longer has popular support in Ukraine.

how would you know? political opposition is banned in Ukraine and mild criticisms of the war effort at the very least earn people a visit from the secret police and a humiliating beatdown which is filmed and posted to the internet

framing these sorts of things as if the US & satrapies' behavior is some sort of natural, inevitable event and the only agent here was Putin is disingenuous

I have made no such claim or implication and it is disingenuous of you to say that I have. My view is that there are a lot of people with meaningful agency. Putin, Obama, Biden, Yanukovych, Zelensky, and many, many more people all have made many different decisions that have all combined to lead us where we are now.

I am not arguing that Putin is the only person in this situation with agency. I am arguing that he is a person with agency - and in particular, it was his decision to begin this war.

how would you know? political opposition is banned in Ukraine and mild criticisms of the war effort at the very least earn people a visit from the secret police and a humiliating beatdown which is filmed and posted to the internet

It's my assessment that Putin is currently extremely unpopular among Ukrainians, and that Yanukovych is perceived as being aligned with Putin. Do you think I'm wrong?

it is disingenuous of you to say that I have

when anyone in this discussion talks about the behavior of not-russians, you turn the convo back to the russians and insist on discussing the agency of the russians and what they didn't "have to do,"

perhaps this pattern of framing was unintentionally, but what it does is remove context of actions of any party in the conflict

no, Putin isn't the only actor who caused the war anymore than a person who is badgered and bullied and eventually fights back is the person who "decided" to start a fight

Ukraine didn't have to bomb ethnic russians for 8 years killing 15,000 of them, Ukraine didn't have to ignore the minsk agreement or the minsk II accords

It's my assessment that Putin is currently extremely unpopular among Ukrainians, and that Yanukovych is perceived as being aligned with Putin. Do you think I'm wrong?

Ukraine was in a civil war with a large part of "Ukrainians," wanting to be inducted into the Russian Federation, so no Putin isn't currently "extremely unpopular" among "Ukrainians" and he wasn't "extremely unpopular" in 2014 when the western-caused violent coup happened which caused the civil war to begin with

this is another example of your framing, unintentional or not

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I don't believe for a second that this was an inevitable war forced on a reluctant Putin.

How do you choose to interpret the Minsk Accords? If the west is unwilling to respect your security concerns. The problem I see in your logic is that it fails to take the Russia side of the equation seriously. This is why I ask you the same question the pro-western side can’t answer either. Given the events leading up to the crisis, if you were Putin, what would you have done?

Yes. I'm also extremely confident he no longer has popular support in Ukraine.

Interesting that you seem to suggest coups can be justified in light of this logic. It wouldn’t surprise me why the west would believe it. That’s the inherent nature of political hypocrisy and duplicity. But it’s also good to know that disputing democratic elections is now in vogue if the vote goes the wrong way. The US proved that when it disputed the results of the people in Donetsk and Luhansk.

If the west is unwilling to respect your security concerns.

If Russia would invade and conquer Spain they would complain about security concerns posed by Portugal.

Russia's problem is that they want to be treated as superpower. They are not. That is why West refused to treat their demands seriously (and they demanded for example demilitarization of Poland and similar nonstarters).

Given the events leading up to the crisis, if you were Putin, what would you have done?

Try to unfuck Russia. Starting from stealing less.

Definitely avoid speedrunning population collapse in Ukraine and Russia by increasing scope of ongoing war.

Interesting that you seem to suggest coups can be justified in light of this logic.

Yes, for example I am 100% fine with couping genocidal leaders, also when they were elected as long as there is plausible less murderous alternative. (note: not claiming that this specific one was genocidal, just giving a clear example where it would be blatantly correct if alternatives were exhausted)

I am not treating democracy procedures as the highest virtue. Note that in this specific cases current ruler had no support from population. Whether Maidan was a coup or not is an interesting question BTW.

If Russia would invade and conquer Spain they would complain about security concerns posed by Portugal.

If the Warsaw Pact incorporated Mexico and Canada, the US would complain about being surrounded by an encroaching military alliance.

Russia's problem is that they want to be treated as superpower. They are not. That is why West refused to treat their demands seriously (and they demanded for example demilitarization of Poland and similar nonstarters).

No. No, they really don’t.

Try to unfuck Russia. Starting from stealing less.

What do you think the Minsk Accords were? This is about right up there with thinking if Putin just spent a little more money on domestic social programs, NATO wouldn’t try to expand into Ukraine.

Yes, for example I am 100% fine with couping genocidal leaders.

And what’s your empirical evidence for this?

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If Russia would invade and conquer Spain they would complain about security concerns posed by Portugal.

Ukraine isn't Spain and wanting your security concerns to be respected w/re to a country which is on your border and <300mi from your capital isn't demanding someone pretend you're a superpower, but pretend you're a country with any sovereignty whatsoever, something which is clearly a bridge too far for the US and its satrapies.

there is no serious argument that Russia, or any country, doesn't have legitimate security concerns in what happens in the country directly on its border and arguing a country claiming such is akin to demanding the world treat them as a superpower is nonsense

Try to unfuck Russia. Starting from stealing less.

are you under the impression that Russia is not far more unfucked now under Putin than before he came to power?

Definitely avoid speedrunning population collapse in Ukraine and Russia by increasing scope of ongoing war.

Russia swallowing up over 10,000,000 ethnic russians seems to be a good strategy to stave off population collapse

What pro-russian or at least neutral, non-Western sources of information do you use to form your opinion about this topic?

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How do you choose to interpret the Minsk Accords? If the west is unwilling to respect your security concerns. The problem I see in your logic is that it fails to take the Russia side of the equation seriously. This is why I ask you the same question the pro-western side can’t answer either. Given the events leading up to the crisis, if you were Putin, what would you have done?

As Putin, I would understand that the west has no interest in respecting any particular commitment towards me and has a long term interest in weakening me and my regime. I would see it as a priority to maintain and build as much strength as possible to deter and combat attacks both overt and covert.

I don't know for sure what I would have done in Putin's shoes because I don't know what information he had in front of him. But as a matter of personality I tend to see war as a last resort and to be relatively risk-averse, so it's quite likely I would not have invaded. I would weight the downside risk of an outcome like the one that has occurred - or others that would be very different but also negative - more heavily than he did.

Interesting that you seem to suggest coups can be justified in light of this logic.

Not at all what I said - we could argue about whether or not Euromaidan was justified but that's not the point I was making. I was saying that Putin installing him as leader of Ukraine now would go against the will of Ukrainians now. Whether or not they wanted him to be PM back in 2014 has nothing to do with that.

The first half of this seems very much at odds with how I read your last post. The last part about Euromaidan I don’t see what relevance there is in the way you’re responding to it.

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Sure Putin would want Poland. But I think it’s beyond clear that Poland couldn’t be conquored by Russia. If the west suddenly went full pacifists then at most Russia could pick off like some Estonia and Baltics.

But I think it’s beyond clear that Poland couldn’t be conquored by Russia

Whole Poland? Probably not, at least not in the near future. But some borderline territories, for starters? Say, the corridor leading to Königsberg, now known as Kaliningrad? Why not. Do you imagine President Ocasio-Cortez sending the best US troops into the harm's way to defend places with names like Szypliszki and Stańczyki, which no CNN commentator could even pronounce - especially if it comes with the risk of global nuclear war? I think a lot of people would object to that.

The CNN commentators certainly learned to pronounce Kharkiv and Bakhmut.

Dude, yes.

The rules based international order is totally a soc-dem jam, they are all about that shit.

AOC isn’t really a generic European SocDem, Secretary of State Ilhan Omar would call supporting Poland “helping racist white people over supporting Black and Brown racialized bodies at home”.

Of course, President AOC is rather unlikely to come to pass (and if it did then, like Trump, her power would be very much limited).

Poland has one of the strongest conventional militaries in Europe, other major European powers have a strong interest in Russia not attacking NATO countries, etc. It’s very clear that Russia loses in a direct NATO-Ru conventional war, and I think it only marginally less clear they lose in a war where the US doesn’t show up. Even if the USA sits out, Finland+Poland have a pretty good shot at beating back Russia on their own, and France, Germany, the UK, etc have strong motivations to send their armies off to war even if we don’t.

Yes, I can very easily imagine a President Ocasio-Cortez doing exactly that. I find it much harder to imagine her saying no to all the people that would be insisting that America stand by its alliances.

Do you imagine President Ocasio-Cortez sending the best US troops into the harm's way to defend places with names like Szypliszki and Stańczyki, which no CNN commentator could even pronounce - especially if it comes with the risk of global nuclear war? I think a lot of people would object to that.

I think for the millions of Americans with Polish ancestry those aren't just unpronounceable names, but places they would be more than willing to fight and die to protect, whether as part of an official intervention or as part of volunteer brigades. That's not to mention the fact that the Polish army is better equipped and better trained than the Ukrainians were at the start of the invasion last year, they would be facing a thoroughly depleted and less motivated Russian military, and there are already thousands of US soldiers present in the country who would probably get hit in the crossfire at the start of an attack and trigger demands for retaliation.

If they're struggling against a basket case like Ukraine they definitely can't take on Poland. The US already has troops stationed there and I'm sure Poland would get at least as much equipment as we're sending Ukraine but probably much more. I don't think it would matter much who the president is, there would be overwhelming bipartisan support to intervene.

Also, NATO isn't just the US. Even if the USA ignores its treaty obligations because ASB, there's still Britain/France/Germany.

It's hard to see Germany lifting a finger to defend Poland without the US in the mix. The only country Poland has more bad blood with is Russia.

Even if there wasn’t decades of cooperation, treaties, and well, friendship, between Poland and Germany, the germans would be shooting themselves in the foot by leaving poland to putin. French strategists like to say that ‘France is an island now’ – meaning there is no realistic scenario where its neighbours invade her. Island status is very valuable, and it is attained by most EU countries. At some point you do run into hostile neighbours though. Poland and Finland are the moat securing the rest, and germany has no desire to take their place.

Even a few fighter jets would stop any Russian advance in it's tracks. I also can't understand how you think the NATO treaty isn't sacrosanct. It is the new religion of the West. Where once mighty Rome and then the Sacred Church stood, now NATO takes their place.

In a situation where the US wasn't honoring its treaty obligations, the NATO treaty clearly would not be sacrosanct.

And if my Grandmother had wheels she'd be a bicycle.

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The only country Poland has more bad blood with is Russia.

For start that is likely Belarus right now.

There is no ill will against Poland in Germany by and large. Apathy and condescension, yes, but no bad blood. The people from the former eastern territories are dead or soon will be and their descendants don't recognize themselves as such, so basically no one has any real historical grievance against Poland. Negative feelings are reserved for admonishing Poles about LGBT rights or abortion.

There'd be little enthusiasm among the general populace, but if Poland asked and genuinely needed assistance the German government would definitely send help. NATO commitments and ethics aside, they would do it for the sole reason of it being an excellent addition to the post-WW2 German national mythos.

If we're defending Ukraine, we'll definitely defend Poland. It's not even "pro-Poland" (though I'm not sure where you're getting 'bad blood' from; I'm not seeing that in the German media offhand). But Germany is pretty thoroughly committed to the idea of the EU and an attack on one is obviously an attack on all.

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