LIB,MR BEARS said:
whiterock said:
trey3216 said:
whiterock said:
Redbrickbear said:
Are there conspiracies? Of course. Are all of these? I really doubt it. I believe there is some opportunism involved, such as the Maine. Some propaganda like WMD. Lusitania was carrying munitions, which would make it a target.
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I just think people mistake opportunism for conspiracy. The only 2 I know of was Watergate and Iran-Contra, they are proven.
Yep. WMD was a lot of propaganda, but also had some truth to it (even if it was old truth). We know for a fact Saddam had WMD's because he killed nearly a million of his own countrymen with them in the 80's. Could those have been transported to Syria and other locales prior to our invasion in '03? Absolutely. Do I think GWB is the devil because he believed the intelligence briefed to him by an extremely trustworthy former General as well as his VP? Absolutely not.
Sounds like a good summation of reasons not to trust the unaccountable intelligence services.
y'all are talking about my era here. I saw all that reporting. Given what we knew to be obviously true (Saddam made them, used them, had them, etc...was talking to AQ specifically about them, and was still trying to buy raw materials around the world), what we did not know (no direct access to the program), and that they were still pulling body parts out of the WTC rubble, 43 had no choice but to take Saddam out.
That was the default position any analyst would have to take (had, them, used them, etc....).
To change status quo assessment, one would need a credible stream of well-sourced intel saying otherwise.
We did not have that.
The idiom would be to take out all the furniture in the Oval Office except the desk. Fill the room with stacks of paper chest high. On the desk, set a manila folder with a couple dozen pieces of paper inside. Those stacks out on the floor were all the reports about acquiring materials, using them on his own people, his manufacturing capabilities, etc.... That manila folder on the desk said "he destroyed his inventory during first gulf war to deny evidence should he get tried for war crimes."
That's it.
Slam dunk analysis.
Rogue regime with WMDs, engaging in state terror operations against the USA (I was part of a "Meritoriius Unit" award for stopping one), and staring to consider helping AQ.
We should stop plowing the oceans on this.
We knew plenty enough to make a policy decision.
We made the right one.
The slam dunk became a curveball.
When has not addressing a dictator or aggressive nations ever resulted in saving lifes? At some point we, the Western/1st World, will end up having to confront those nations that do not respect sovereignty . The longer you wait the more of our people that will end up dying. Ignoring or appeasement does not work. Saying we are staying out will result in a worst scenario later. Dealing with Putin in Ukraine, is better than dealing with him in the Baltics, Finland or Poland. Dealing with China now, is better than dealing with them in Taiwan or Korea.
I know we disagree on this, but I don't see how yours and Canada's view creates a better situation down the line. I actually see a self-fulfilling prophecy of more US troops being involved in dying by not engaging early.
exactly.
The moment Putin consolidates Ukraine, the process repeats in Poland......destabilization, usurpation, etc..... Might take a decade or two to crescendo. But as long as Kaliningrad exists, Russis will strive for a land bridge. And success of such policy will collapse Nato. Zero sum.
There is no better defense against that scenario than an independent Ukraine.
Ergo the current conflict.
I see where you are coming from but simply disagree.
1. Putin and Russia are simply incapable of actually taking Ukraine. Militarily they just don't have the power to do it. At best they might be able to hold on to some oblasts in the east that are already Russian speaking. And its very possible they will get beaten and driven out of there even.
2. But lets say they did and in some domino effect Poland or Slovakia were the next target. That is why we have NATO. Those countries (unlike Ukraine) are in NATO and an attack on them would mean war against the USA, Britain, France, Germany, Turkey, and the other 25 nations in the alliance. Russia would be crushed in such a conflict.
1. They can definitely take it. Eventually, 150m overwhelms 50m. Had Kiev fallen, they'd already have it. Had we not stepped forward with hundreds of billions of dollars in military aid, they'd already have it. Sure, they'd have an insurgency, but that'd take many, many years to succeed, and might never succeed. Look at Grozny. Russia will do the brutal things it takes to make insurgencies die by means other than losing the battel for hearts & minds. Simply amazing to be where we are at the moment. Which is why I critique Biden regime. Need to roll up the Russian lines and re-establish Ukrainian sovereignty before Russia mobilizes, which has already happened, so we are still behind.....
2. You misinterpret the scenario I laid out. Of course they will not invade Poland or Slovakia. But they can start to meddle in domestic politics and get pro-Moscow regimes elected, which would always be a threat to withdraw from Nato, etc.....
Russia will not invade a Nato nation.
Russia will seek to politically destabilize a Nato nation, causing a crisis in Nato.
Yes, all of that would be years down the road. But if we let Russia have & digest Ukraine, we have no doubt that will be the next chapter. And Poland will be the first target - land bridge to Kaliningrad.
They can't take it now. They might could have 8 months ago, but not now. They've lost too much equipment and don't have the productive capacity to replace it. The guys getting mobilized are having to start GoFundMe's to crowd source their equipment to take to war because the army is not supplying it to them. They're going to get mowed down in catastrophic fashion right now due to the technological and "defend the homeland" advantage that Ukraine has.
Russia needed 1mm troops from the outset to take Ukraine. They sent 180,000. They're now at 60k+ dead and almost 150k injured/maimed. And that was their trained troops. So now they're going to send in a bunch of untrained guys from 18-60 years old with no equipment, no winter gear, and no food into a war against an enemy that won't think twice to mow them down like a hayfield.
Lots of good stuff there, and certainly accurate for a 6-12 month time frame.
But. In a long term war of attrition, Ukraine is at enormous disadvantages. Time is not on their side. They need to WIN it....to drive Russia out of Donbas and recapture the Crimea in that 6-12 month time frame -- to end it, a crushing defeat of Russia to force them to sue for peace.
Here's their problem: UKR is totally dependent on the US taxpayer for the money and munitions to do that. In addition, US policymakers will use that dependency to place limits on how far/fast UKR can go to win back all their territory (to avoid escalation scenarios). If/when NATO support starts to falter, the cost goes up for the US. If/when domestic politics punishes Dems in general, cost goes up for Biden admin. If the mid-terms end up as bad for them as it should, the Admin will start getting pressure from Dems to scale back commitments.
Russia has one advantage, one thing it does almost better than any nation on earth to fall back on - the ability to suffer enormously and stay in the fight. Even if UKR drive Russia totally back to pre-2014 levels.....Russia will keep leaning....keep lobbing artillery.....to outlast western resolve to resist. And the costs for UKR will keep rising....keep bleeding....keep dying. Russia did those referenda more than anything else to give itself moral authority to keep coming back for the Donbas....forever.
Long term is pretty bleak for UKR as long as Putin regime is in power.
That's why they applied again for NATO membership last week with such fanfare. The real message they were sending was "either let us win this or let us into NATO." And they have a point. What good does it do to negotiate a solution that leaves Russian troops on UKR soil? It's just a cease fire that lets them rearm. Let UKR win and become strong enough to forge its own destiny (so that it doesn't need NATO). If not, then just pony up the alliance for the long-term.
I'm among the hawkish here.
But reality is reality.
50m can only beat 150m in a lightning war.
the longer the fight goes, the more the scenarios start tipping toward 150m
regarding your last paragraph, the VC and the Majuhideen say hello.
We did not get beat. We quit. Could still be in both places. We have the money and the population to turn them into the 51st and 52nd states,
if we wanted to.
But we don't.
And we didn't.
It's not who we are.
(insert Sun Tzu quote here).
Know yourself: We do not conquer people. Not in our DNA.
The lesson: Be careful picking battles, most especially the ones you do not have the stomach to win.
Russia does not have our problem. They really don't care about the rights of anyone or anything. They only care about what is good for Mother Russia. They have none of our romantic notions about self-determination, liberty, democracy, etc...... It's a very old way of viewing the world. The big take what they want from the small. That's why we should make damned sure that Russia pays dearly, enough to face existential risk, if it wants to actually own Ukr via a campaign to reduce to rubble all cities which do not surrender. That, my friend, is not modernity. That's Batu Khan and the Golden Horde.
And no, Nato did not force Putin into acting like Batu Khan and the Golden Horde.
Sure, we can deride the liberal order. Like any order, it has its vanities and hypocrisies. But is far preferable to anything the 10th century had to offer. And that's what Russian policy in Ukraine proposes....a return to the middle ages. No one should, and no one will go gently into that good night. Putin should understand his best case scenario is to lose all the Ukrainian territory he currently occupies and retain basing rights at Sebastopol, and that the price of making Kiev actually fight to take back every square inch of its territory is to see at anchor in Sebastopol a new Ukrainian Navy which dominates the Black Sea.
Putin started his war on "desire for gain" calculations.
Putin will only end his war on "fear of loss" calculations.
We have to make him be more worried about ending the war in a worse position than desirous of ending it in a better position. He must be made to cut his losses. That's why we saw a US general float the idea of sinking the Black Sea fleet (in response to a Russian threat to use nukes). You see, Russia doesn't need Sebastopol if it doesn't have a Black Sea fleet......
