re: Latest Updates: Russia-Ukraine Conflict

DabosDynasty, @warmonitors is a Russian propaganda account, and that tweet is inaccurate. It takes out of context a quote from a new article in the British paper The Times.

You can read the whole article here: LINK

The relevant quote is:

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August Hanning, a former director of Germany’s foreign intelligence service, argued late last year, however, that several other countries besides Russia could conceivably have had an interest in disabling the pipelines. He named the United States, Ukraine, Poland and Britain. “They all have their reasons,” he said.

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So, not "German investigators" at all, but rather, simple speculation from a former official who has no knowledge of the investigation but is engaging in rank speculation -- and did so over a month ago.

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DabosDynasty, @warmonitors is a Russian propaganda account, and that tweet is inaccurate. It takes out of context a quote from a new article in the British paper The Times.

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Didn’t know that. Thank you for the context.

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Up until this point he's only been on a winning streak.

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Another dictator did the same in Europe in the 30s. They waited too late to oppose him. And remember, initially the Russians were on their side.

The CEO of General Atomics has lost patience with the Biden administration's refusal to send its Gray Eagle or Reaper drones to Ukraine:

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I think the Ukraine land grab in 2014 which was pulled off with little consequences led to the increase in hostilities last year.

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It’s never mentioned, but the weakness Obama showed in 2014 lead to this war being fought now. I’m not saying Obama should have took us to war. But he totally hung Ukraine out to dry and offered no help other than a few pallets of old army blankets. Putin took note of that. Then when Putin saw the weakness in Washington, both in the Pentagon & White House, during the withdrawal from Afghanistan, he realized his time had come.

Russia didn’t go to war last February because of any “immediate threat” from Ukraine. Russia went to war last February because they saw it was the best time, in their opinion, to do so. And the deciding factor was perceived weakness in the West.

It’s the same reason Hitler invade Austria, Czechoslovakia, and Poland. He did it because he thought he could without having to worry about the West.

The lesson to take from this is that it’s only when the West, particularly the US, appears weak, that major land wars in Europe break out.

Those who do not remember the past are condemned to repeat it.

Yep. I’m not saying the IS has to be “world cop”. But neither can we appear weak and feckless on the world stage.

Obama should have clearly done more when Crimea was invaded. The failure to do so, especially in retrospect, is possibly Obama's biggest failure as president.
BUT, we need to be honest in our historic analysis of this decision. Part of the reason Obama was so hesitant to act or threaten to act was that the shock and awe intervention in Iraq, justified by claims of mushroom cloud- generating WMDs had proven to be a farce. This action destabilized the entire Middle East (still does) and cost the US a whole lot of credibility with respect to foreign military interventions. So soon after Iraq, Obama could not have mustered NATO or allied coalition support to credibly restrain Putin in Crimea.

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It’s never mentioned, but the weakness Obama showed in 2014 lead to this war being fought now. I’m not saying Obama should have took us to war. But he totally hung Ukraine out to dry and offered no help other than a few pallets of old army blankets. Putin took note of that.

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Partly true. When Russia invaded and conquered Crimea in 2014 there weren't many options available. Ukraine's military was not trained up to resist and Obama decided that it wasn't worth the deployment of American troops. Both of those conclusions were correct.

But in the intervening years, the US and its allies have assisted in the training and modernization of the Ukrainian military to be a more effective resistance force for when Russia would come back. The conclusion that Russia would likely come for more territory was also correct.

So while we didn't jump in in 2014, that was likely the correct conclusion at the time and under the circumstances. The policy of assistance since that time has also been shown to have been effective.

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The lesson to take from this is that it’s only when the West, particularly the US, appears weak, that major land wars in Europe break out. Those who do not remember the past are condemned to repeat it.

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It has definitely been mentioned that the perceived weakness of the Obama admin. regarding Putin’s land grab of Crimea in 2014 seemed to embolden Putin towards future military actions, such as this war.

And I agree. Which was all the more reason for the Biden admin. to sound the alarm early and share the intelligence of Russia’s plans at the UN before Putin could set the narrative.

And Putin’s under estimating Ukraine and the West’s resolve is a big reason why his advance has ground down to a crawl.