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naraburns  nihil supernum  6mo ago (text post)   29917 thread views

Israel-Gaza Megathread #2

This is a refreshed megathread for any posts on the conflict between (so far, and so far as I know) Hamas and the Israeli government, as well as related geopolitics. Culture War thread rules apply.

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I'll abuse the "related geopolitics" rule and ask:

Let's imagine you're Vladimir Putin and you learn that the US and the EU will stop sending arms to Ukraine and concentrate on Israel for the next few years. Zelensky knows that as well and starts testing the idea of peace negotiations. How much do you demand?

On the one hand, any agreement that is not enforced by boots on the ground is worthless, so asking for no NATO, no anti-Russian censorship, no rehabilitation of WWII collaborators is useless. On the other hand, if you ask for additional territorial concessions, you'll get to pacify many more people that hate your guts, plus the ZSU can go molon lave while they still have materiel and force you to actually come and take it.

So, how much is not too much?

Assuming that scenario, you take as much territory as you can while still getting an agreement, and then you implement a campaign of soft ethnic cleansing and population transfer. Make it shitty and annoying to be a Ukrainian in what is now going to be Southwest Russia. Make it terrifically easy and trivial to get a bus, train, or plane out of there. Make it impossible to return. Build a defensive line in the most defensible terrain, being prepared to sacrifice indefensible portions of your new territory if/when there is another round of fighting.

Would that really be necessary? There's millions of Ukrainians who already lived within Russia's pre-2014 borders, and unless I'm very much mistaken I've not heard of much repression or resistance from them.

Well I don’t know for sure. But if you are worried about guerrilla warfare then you’re going to need some level of repression.

Maybe i'm a bit naive here but what exactly are they going to be repressing? Both sides speak the same language, have roughly the same genetic makeup, eat the same foods, have the same religion. What are they going to be repressing? Waving the flag? Wearing blue jeans?

Loyalty to the Ukraine regime? Obviously?

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