re: Latest Updates: Russia-Ukraine Conflict

I read that 42 seats were lost. Not sure if real or significant

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dislike all of you and if WWIII starts I genuinely hope that someone you care for gets sent to Ukraine.

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You've got a lot of problems

Completely different that the leadership and administration of the EU.

Sort of like the congressional district which kept re-electing a congresscritter even though they all knew he was nuts, he brought home the bacon in a huge way. I give you Ron Paul.

LINK

Now, let’s look at the party of Theodore Roosevelt, Eisenhower and Ronald Reagan—and how its growing isolationist bloc is turning against America’s clear-eyed opposition to Kremlin dictators and shirking our long-held commitment to democracies under assault.

In his 1981 inaugural, President Ronald Reagan declared: “To those neighbors and allies who share our freedom, we will strengthen our historic ties and assure them of our support and firm commitment…No weapon in the arsenals of the world is so formidable as the will and moral courage of free men and women.”

In the months that followed, he used the bully pulpit to educate the American people—reminding us that “support for freedom fighters is self-defense” and “is tied to our own security,” that “spending for defense is investing in things that are priceless: peace and freedom,” that “we cannot play innocents abroad in a world that’s not innocent.” And he challenged the American people to “stand by our democratic allies” and “not break faith with those who are risking their lives on every continent…to defy Soviet-supported aggression and secure rights which have been ours from birth.”

In various ways—technological assistance, covert aid, weapons shipments, aid for civil society, timely military deployments and shows of force—what came to be called the Reagan Doctrine would aid anti-Kremlin forces and democratic movements resisting aggression in Central America, the Caribbean, Poland, Africa and, of course, Afghanistan. Taking his cues from Reagan, CIA Director William Casey coldly ordered his deputies to “go out and kill me 10,000 Russians until they give up.” Working with indigenous and regional forces, the CIA did that and then some. The Red Army lost 15,000 dead and 35,000 wounded in Afghanistan.

In short, Reagan would today be leading the effort to arm democratic Ukraine in its war of self-defense against Kremlin aggression. His motivations would be twofold.

As an idealist, Reagan believed deeply in freedom, in America’s role in advancing freedom, in America’s responsibility to stand with those willing to stand up to aggression. Thus, Reagan would support Ukraine because Ukraine is fighting for freedom.

Reagan also was a skillful practitioner of hard-nosed realpolitik. Consider his unswerving commitment to “peace through strength,” ruthless proxy war against Moscow in Afghanistan, military buildup that amounted to economic warfare, missile deployments in Europe, naval engagements in the Mediterranean and Persian Gulf. Thus, Reagan would support Ukraine with military aid because doing so leverages and exploits a Kremlin miscalculation, weakens Russia’s tyranny, grinds down Moscow’s military capabilities, and advances America’s interests—all at minimal cost in American treasure and none in American blood.

The Republican Party’s commitment to the Reagan Doctrine and support for freedom movements defined it for the better part of four decades.

But today, just 35 percent of self-identified Republicans support military aid for democratic Ukraine in its war of self-defense, with 75 percent of Republicans who support former President Donald Trump opposing Ukraine aid. Some high-profile Republicans are using their platform to slur Ukraine’s president and claim Ukraine is not democratic. Some have stooped to parroting Kremlin misinformation. Others use Russian propaganda to rationalize a kind of isolationism that ignores the most basic lessons of history.

Reagan dismantled the Kremlin’s empire and set in motion a train of events that reversed centuries of Russian aggression. Yet a throbbing bloc within his party now opposes the core tenets of the Reagan Doctrine and shrugs at naked Russian aggression, imperialism and crimes against humanity.

Costs
Isolationists of both the far-left and far-right often talk about the costs of international leadership and global engagement—and they are indeed high—but never about the costs of isolation or disengagement, which are higher: Pearl Harbor in 1941; Korea in 1950; post-Soviet Afghanistan, which birthed the Taliban, which provided safe haven to al-Qaeda, which maimed Manhattan; Iraq in 2011, which spawned ISIS and reopened the Pandora’s Box of chemical warfare; Afghanistan in 2021, which is even now birthing another generation of nightmares.

“In each cycle of retreat,” former National Security Council official Henry Nau observes, America “leaves the world at its own peril.”

Moreover, there are benefits to global engagement—benefits the isolationists fail to consider: It was U.S. leadership and engagement that rolled back a dark age of fascist totalitarianism. It was U.S. leadership and engagement during the Cold War that protected free government, rehabilitated Japan, midwifed Israel’s democracy, and rescued South Korea and West Germany from the prison yard of communism. It was U.S. leadership and engagement after the Cold War that transformed Europe from armed camps into a continent “whole and free.” It was U.S. leadership and engagement on the global stage that prevented a second 9/11, forced the enemy to expend finite resources on survival, and pushed the battlefront away from our shores.

Indeed, it is U.S. leadership and engagement that has prevented great-power war—and all its unthinkable consequences—for almost 80 years. As Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin reminds us, “Sometimes our greatest achievements are the bad things we stop from happening.”

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SirWinston

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All they did was reduce the conscription age from 27 to 25 and remove some exemptions. They can add another 250,000 men by doing the same thing next year.

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This is not coherent. I think you meant to say they went from 25 to 27. And I think the 250k number is also a little iffy.

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Name one objective that the Russian army actually accomplished.

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They took over half the country, and all the US aid and weapons hasn't done a damn thing to stop it.

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This is not coherent. I think you meant to say they went from 25 to 27. And I think the 250k number is also a little iffy.

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No. I said it correctly. And you obviously have no idea what you're talking about. But I will provide you a link:

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Ukraine lowered its draft-eligible age for men from 27 to 25 on Wednesday, reflecting the strain that more than two years of war with Russia has put on its military and the need to infuse its depleted ranks with new conscripts.

President Volodymyr Zelenskyy signed three bills into law aimed at strengthening the country’s beleaguered forces, which are trying to hold the front lines in fighting that has sapped Ukraine’s ranks and stores of weapons and ammunition.

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LINK

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hey took over half the country, and all the US aid and weapons hasn't done a damn thing to stop it.

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Holy shite.

They took 19% of the country, And the US weapons are exactly what prevented them from taking the entire country.

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This is not coherent.

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Delicious irony coming from someone who has the conscription law backwards, and who thinks that 19% is over half.

If you don't know what you're talking about, try not to make such a complete arse of yourself.

How long before this guy starts talking about Hunter Biden in Ukraine, or biolabs in Ukraine? I give it 20 minutes.

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Ukraine lowered its draft-eligible age for men from 27 to 25 on Wednesday, reflecting the strain that more than two years of war with Russia has put on its military and the need to infuse its depleted ranks with new conscripts.

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This is a question, how do you increase ranks by shrinking the conscription parameters?

If you don't think it's correct, post your own.