re: Can anyone give me the reasons the OT ppl think we should be sending billions to Ukraine?

I can tell you why I think we should. I’m not an “OT ppl” though.

There has never been a time, in the last couple of thousand years, in which the great powers of the world have not been in battles of territory and extinction. Now is no different. In 1989 an obvious existential struggle between the USSR and the USA seemed to come to an end. It did not. It paused, but has been reconstituted by Putin. Instead of Marxism being the animating principle of modern Russia and China, it is simple authoritarianism married to nationalism.

These two powers are struggling purposefully to expand their zone of influence. If you think that is a problem for over there, and not our business, you are wrong. China’s Belt and Roads initiative is a clear attempt to gain power of commerce over countries in Latin America, Africa and Arabia. Russia is trying to reconstitute as much of their eastern empire as they can.

If we mind our own business, while they clearly are not minding theirs, they will gobble up all of Ukraine, then start on Kazakhstan, Armenia, Azerbaijan, and if successful, they will start on the Baltics. They are doing what authoritarians do — conquering as much as they can. When they invaded Crimea Obama did nothing. Some of us predicted this would lead them to try again, and here we are. If we don’t stop them now there will be a later, and each later makes it more difficult and expensive. We should have met Putin in Crimea. Had we done so, it would have been much cheaper and we would not have the current mess.

I want to point out that the two or three hundred billion this will cost is not an enormous amount of money. However, it should be shared by the Europeans, at least equally.

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Instead of Marxism being the animating principle of modern Russia and China, it is simple authoritarianism

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That’s the democrat party right there. Marxism enforced with authoritarianism.

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We're just going to pretend Zelensky hasn't been shutting down Orthodox churches all over Ukraine, even forcibly removing churchgoers?

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That's the most offensive lie that Russian propagandists have put out there.

Zelensky has not shut down one church. Period.

What Zelensky HAS done is take government-owned church buildings and transfer the church authority for those buildings from the RUSSIAN Orthodox Church to the UKRAINIAN Orthodox Church. It's something that should have been done years ago, honestly.

The Russian Orthodox Church was one of the main ways, along with bribes and corruption (when people talk about corruption in Ukraine, they need to recognize that most of it came from Russia) that Russia used to control Ukraine.

Russian Orthodox Church Patriarch Kirill was a KGB agent during Soviet times, as almost all high officials of the ROC were. The USSR was officially an atheist state, and any expression of religion was tightly controlled.

It's the same now. Kirill has a close relationship with the FSB, and so he naturally has endorsed the Russian invasion, and ROC priests inside Ukraine have been exposed several as spies or as otherwise working for Russia.

That's why Russia STILL engages in religious persecution: religion is a means of control.

Many people don't seem to know that the Ukrainian Orthodox Church did not gain official Orthodox recognition by the Patriarch of Constantinople until 2019. It was the action of the official Ukrainian Orthodox Church in separating itself from Russian control and gaining its independence that infuriated Putin and was a leading cause of the invasion.

The desire for control is why, when Russia took much of the Luhansk region in the 2014 conflict, they forcibly closed all 42 Baptist churches in the area. Baptists today face severe persecution in occupied Ukraine, as Russian troops have interrupted services and dragged pastors off for interrogation.

Here's a story of a Pentecostal pastor and his son who were tortured and murdered by invading Russians.

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Release International’s partner in Ukraine, ‘Pavel’ says Anatoliy was a deacon and preacher at a Pentecostal church in the city of Nova Kakhova, which is close to Kherson.

According to Pavel, when the Russian troops arrested them, the soldiers claimed: ‘Your church has no right to exist, as it has connections with America and other western countries.’

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As a Baptist myself who knows other Baptists who have worked in Ukraine, the issues of religious freedom and persecution are the main reasons that I actually care so much about the war.

It's twisted and demonic to claim that Zelensky is engaging in religious persecution, when the reverse is the case.

This board:

1) Russia is no threat to the US.

2) Our support of Ukraine risks making Putin desperate and using nukes against us.

Y'all should decide. Because I think that y'all actually are smart enough to realize that Russia is a threat to the US, and allowing it to conquer a neighbor and become even stronger would be terrible for our long-term security.

Overly emotional bleeding heart liberals.

They always believe throwing money fixes any problem.

If you put it to a vote, the entire country would collectively tell Ukraine to get fricked.

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This board: 1) Russia is no threat to the US. 2) Our support of Ukraine risks making Putin desperate and using nukes against us. Y'all should decide.

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Those two aren’t mutually exclusive you moron.

And JJJJimmy isn't the only anti-Semite in here. Again, let's be real: a number of you oppose aid to Ukraine because Zelensky is a Jew.

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Can anyone give me the reasons the OT ppl think we should be sending billions to Ukraine?

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Because those retards still think this is 1962 and the USSR is the biggest threat to America.

So, your formulation would be:

"Russia is no threat to us, as long as we let it conquer its neighbors and become even stronger and more powerful."

If that makes sense to you, fine.