Redbrickbear said:
whiterock said:
Redbrickbear said:
whiterock said:
Redbrickbear said:
whiterock said:
Sam Lowry said:
whiterock said:
ATL Bear said:
whiterock said:
Redbrickbear said:
Turkey will want to open up the refugee pipeline from Syria.
Remember, Crimea and much of southern Ukr (Donbas in particular) were Khanates allied with Ottomans for centuries.
To the extent we talk about Russian nationalism, it's not the only nationalism at play. Turkish nationalism wants the Black Sea as Turkish lake.
The more things change, the more they stay the same.....
Stalin took great lengths to try and remove that issue.
Nothing we could cede to them in an Ukraine War peace settlement will prevent them from cranking up the next operation next door. They've stated it.
If you mean they've stated exactly the opposite, then yes.
You are, not surprisingly, exceedingly poorly informed.
This link: https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2022/02/18/putin-speech-wake-up-call-post-cold-war-order-liberal-2007-00009918
is a fair summary of his speech, here: https://introvertum.com/vladimir-putins-munich-speech-on-february-10-2007-full-text-in-english/
which puts in better perspective:
https://www.reuters.com/world/russia-unveils-security-guarantees-says-western-response-not-encouraging-2021-12-17/
https://www.dw.com/en/russia-demands-nato-leave-eastern-europe-limit-missile-deployment/a-60173879
Russia wants to regain control over its entire former USSR and WP footprint. That they cannot accomplish such in a short period of time does not mean the intention has no bearing on current policy. Quite the opposite. It means the best time to resist is NOW.
They can want to annex the Moon…doesn't mean they can.
Russia has an economy about the size of Italy…yet they are trying to play the military-industrial game with the US-EU (two economic juggernauts).
30% of Russians don't even have indoor toilets.
And Russia's fertility rate is well below replacement with a low life expectancy among males.
Its aging fast and soon will be depopulating.
They don't have the money or the manpower to recreate the USSR or exercise power in that footprint.
Nobody said anything about annexation. The WP wasn't annexed. Crimea was. And the Donbas. But Russia doesn't have to annex a single additional acre of territory to accomplish what it wants. All it has to do is demonstrate that it can destroy a country by outlasting NATO in a grinding, squalid quagmire of a trenches, barbed wire, and desultory artillery barrages. Russia doesn't have to win. It just has to not lose.
We must win the fight we've started.
Or all we do is teach the Eastern European nations that the only thing which can be counted upon is Russia to oulast Nato. Then the entire eastern rim of Nato will begin to question their membership. They will then become a brake on any Nato action at all. That ensures Ukraine will elect a pro-Moscow government, and from there either client state status, or possible anschluss. At that point, all of Eastern Europe will sound like Hungary, or worse. russian Armies rearming right on their borders. Risk of war will be elevated over where it is now. Powder keg.
Stop feeling.
Start thinking.
Appeasement never works.
The tyrants are rarely as strong as they think they are.
Take 'em out while they're weak.
We will never again have this kind of advantage
You are making a lot of assumptions.
Including that Eastern European states now in NATO might want out.
There is no evidence for this.
In fact the Russo-Ukraine war has breathed new life into NATO and given these counties a reason to keep the alliance active and alive.
Governments come and go (in democracies). We can no more take for granted the united NATO we see today than we can green grass in Texas in August. Such things take a lot of work in good circumstances and we do not always have good circumstances.
Who could have possibly predicted a left-wing German government to be more hawkish on Russia policy than it's right wing predecessor?
What endures are interests. Russia has always wanted the things I cite. Russia will always want the things I cite. The only question is, are we going to let them have it? If the administration in Germany is gassing Jews, that might be a fair tradeoff. But when every state west of Russia save one (Belarus) is an aspiring or functioning democracy and Russia is plainly offering autocracy as a superior business model, the answer is a hard no. We do not cede them an inch just because acquiring more territory or influence is in their best interests. Such is not in our best interests. It only strengthens an adversary. It only increases the odds of conflict. It only moves that potential conflict closer to us and key allies. There is no upside w.h.a.t.s.o.e.v.e.r.
.
You admit that nations don't have permanent alliances…what they have is permanent interests.
So you must acknowledge that Russia has permanent and long term interests in Ukraine. No matter what kind of government (Czarist, Communist, democrat, or other wise) rules in Moscow.
What exactly are American permanent and long term interests in Ukraine?
Heck we didn't even start to really bother with the place until Obama's presidency.
The alliances serve the interests. NATO serves ours, does it not?
Russia most certainly has permanent interests in Ukraine. But Russia does not own Ukraine. Russia does not have a right to invade Ukraine or dictate policy in Ukraine, or carve off pieces of Ukraine. Russia has an interest in a friendly, at minimum neutral Ukraine. At the time of Russia's 2014 invasion, Ukraine did not have a hostile policy toward Russia. Ukraine had not hosted any foreign troop deployments on its soil. Nor had Ukraine joined or even applied to join any alliance with other nations hostile to Russian interests. It was Russia who meddled in the Donbas. It was Russia who seized Crimea. And last year, it was Russia which launched a 5-pronged offensive to topple the democratically elected Ukrainian government, install a client state, and carve off pieces of Ukraine into Russia proper. Russia did this because a free, independent, and most importantly democratic Ukraine was a threat to Russian autarky. Russia simply could not abide the clear decision of the Ukrainian people to westernize, to adopt EU cultural and economic models. Russia does not want Eastern Slav world to westernize. They wanted it all to remain part of the Eurasian world to which it has historically belonged (under Russian hegemony).
American permanent and long-term interests in Ukraine are to keep it independent as a buffer state between Russia and the eastern flank of NATO, ideally as a stable, functioning democratic system. What would be best is a Sweden/Finland model of neutral but cooperative toward the west.
It is not in American long-term interests to facilitate continued Russian cultural, political, and economic backwardness by tacitly allowing it a free hand to dominate the Eastern Slavic world, as such would inevitably and significantly strengthen Russian efforts to destabilize NATO. There are few scenarios more nightmarish for US security interests than the collapse of NATO. Ergo, we do care about what happens along the border of Nato. A LOT.
The great truth you ignore is that Russia and NATO actually have common ground - a Ukraine that is stable and independent. Neither side is harmed by that. Both sides benefit from that. But that isn't good enough for Russia, is it.
We don't have permanent bases in the East Europe members of Nato, out of deference to Russia.
But Russia has a right to station its armies in Belarus and Ukraine, whether the peoples of those countries like it or not?
What did you put in that pipe you're smoking?
