re: Latest Updates: Russia-Ukraine Conflict

(no message)

(no message)

quote:

---

Then why does this thread call me a Putin supporter when I’ve done nothing but bash the guy?

---

Because you are pretending that US involvement alone is driving this conflict, and bash the US far more for sending aid when most of that aid hasn't even been doled out, all without understanding anything about that aid, despite repeated attempts by other posters to show you. You literally compared some mild Ukrainian propaganda to Goebbals Nazi propaganda, without even addressing the entirely different contexts. That's another example of your either/or mentality as well. You could be critical of Ukrainian propaganda without any reference to any historical situation at all, but you can't seem to help yourself because you seem to situate yourself alongside great historical events rather than describe your real position, as a complete bystander.

quote:

---

Both y’all and the Poliboard refuse to believe there is a third option to condemn Russia but also know we can’t go really any further than we are right now without risking escalation or continue bleeding us dry.

---

There are certainly more than three options. I can think of several possible scenarios. And again, the escalation is Russia's alone. They were the ones who invaded, they were the ones who brought up nuclear weapons, and they are the ones who are desperate to secure their gains. What you can't seem to understand is that oftentimes in geopolitics, there is just a series of difficult, intractable situations with no easy option. That you value your convenience over anything else isn't a good metric for operating in the geopolitical world as it is. For example, you keep saying that average Europeans won't stand for increased energy prices. But you seem to continually fail to acknowledge that Russia is the responsibile party, and that by ceding the energy convenience argument, you give Russia even more leverage with respect to energy. Given how they have behaved, suddenly acting like they won't manipulate that leverage is so short-sighted that it beggars belief. You need to understand the externalities of the many possible future scenarios, because that should directly inform what countries do geopolitically.

The point is that everything you cite is pure bullcrap. So you are translating Wu Tang Clan these days after being fired from lack of business acumen?

quote:

---

Sign in Britain right now:

---

OML will believe anything that confirms his bias without checking

quote:

---

A picture of a billboard in Manchester, England, telling Britons they’ll be cold this winter because Ukrainians are more in need has been digitally altered. The doctored image has been viewed by thousands of people on social media (here , here and here), having been used to criticise Britain’s support for Ukraine amidst the latter’s conflict with Russia (read more nS8N2ZH0F0 ).

---

quote:

---

An unedited version of the original image reveals the billboard neither carried the message nor the Ukrainian flag. Rather, it displayed multiple posters advertising music events around Manchester and can be found on the website of British advertising agency KMS Media (here and www.kms-media.co/what-we-do ). Analysis using the FotoForensics tool also shows how the image was doctored (here ).

---

(no message)

quote:

---

Again, would this war continue without US involvement?

---

What an ignorant and small minded question, by these politards, who think the US is solely responsible for what’s going on. Didn’t mean to call the OP ignorant here.

Trump is both right here while also being a little myopic, or rather, not understanding Russia's overall aim, in which they have been explcit. Their aim is to undermine the American-Atlantic alliances, which directly involves US interests.

On a surface level, it might not seem to involve us directly, but the US also paid for those alliances in blood and should not sacrifice them. The other thing that Trump didn't address was why Germany was wealthy, and why both the US and other Western European allies were hesitant to allow West Germany to rebuild their armed forces. The Allied powers gutted West German industrial capacity to build its own arms, which proved unpopular.

After the USSR tested its first nuclear weapon, the US reversed course and attempted to rebuild the West German military but with limited domestic arms support. For that reason, as well as heavy US investment, the introduction of a new currency, and wide-spread free-market economic liberalization, West Germany was able to increase their per capita GDP by four times by 1990. In other words, the US having a large say in West German rearmament gave West Germany a strong degree of economic power without excessive defense spending that would otherwise have occurred, due to the fact that West Germany had a direct rival in East Germany, and thus would have spent a large portion of its domestic product in order to provide itself with a degree of security.

Indeed, West German rearmament was key in Western and Central European economic integration, which allowed for an economic union which completely obliterated all old geopolitical rivalries.

For some reason, those facts of history are forgotten when we discuss Europe today, and people seem willing to let their misunderstanding of sovereign debt (i.e. that a sovereign nation can default on obligations they themselves create) to guide them in geopolitics when the scale of geopolitics is much much longer than most sovereign debt issues. The money that the US already spent investing in Europe, the amount of blood we sacrificed there, and the amount of blood we've sacrificed since then means nothing to you, so laser-focused on your particular misunderstanding of debt that the only important thing is your version of austerity, despite austerity's own discontents. Again, it is so short-sighted and stupid that it should give you pause, which I know it won't.

The sentiment. I saw the question, and thought you were the one making the argument, that the US’s involvement is keeping this war going.

I need to read all the discussions leading up to a post, instead of just butting in. I didn’t mean to call you ignorant.