RMF5630 said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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RMF5630 said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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RMF5630 said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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RMF5630 said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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RMF5630 said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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RMF5630 said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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RMF5630 said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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RMF5630 said:

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whiterock said:

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Sam Lowry said:

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whiterock said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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[The United States has committed itself to expanding NATO to Russia's borders. NATO, of course, stands for "North Atlantic Treaty Organization." A nave onlooker might ask why countries like Bulgaria, Finland, and Poland would be included in such a treaty. The answer is pretty simple: NATO has nothing to do with the North Atlantic. It is an anti-Russian military alliance.

Russia knew (or, rather, knows) that Ukraine has been courting both the European Union and NATO. Kiev wants to unite itself politically, economically, and militarily to the West. That would mean the United States has a right to place more troops and artillery on Russia's border. Russia didn't like that, and so it lashed out.
But the question is why does the United States want to put troops and artillery on Russia's border? Why has it maintained and, indeed, expanded this anti-Russian alliance, even though its original objective (i.e., the destruction of the Soviet Union) has been accomplished?

Our leaders have been clear on that point. To quote Richard Moore, the current chief of MI6: "With the tragedy and destruction unfolding so distressingly in Ukraine, we should remember the values and hard-won freedoms that distinguish us from Putin, none more than LGBT+ rights."
This isn't Kremlin disinformation. These are the words coming from the horse's mouth. We hate Russia because they are mean to the gays.
Deacon Nicholas Kotar, the great novelist and translator, gave a wider view:

Quote:

---

What the Russian government is doing is setting a red line to the spread of NGO-style liberal democracy. And Ukraine, unfortunately, has been a buffer zone, and a kind of test-case, for the spread, not of a political system, but of a system of values, that is espoused by the elites only....The problem is that with all these colored revolutions, no matter how you look at it, the thing that comes in together with the money is an insistence, unfortunately, on the adoption of the Western liberal cultural milieu. It happened in Georgia, it happened in Ukraine, it happened everywhere.

---

Ultimately, this isn't about Russia. It's not even about Ukraine. It's about us. Western elites want us to believe that the triumph of "NGO-style liberal democracy" is inevitable everywhere. But it's not. Russia is living proof of that.]

---

By contrast, when NATO expanded into the former Warsaw Pact nations and the Baltics, no permanent bases with standing maneuver units were stationed there.

---

Again, this is not true. Poland hosts both the forward command of the Army V Corps, first announced in 2020, and the "semi-permanent" headquarters of the 3rd Armored Brigade Combat Team of the 4th Infantry Division, which has been there since 2017 (and also has a rotational presence in Estonia and Latvia).

---

and what you say is true, but misleading. A forward command post is not a combat unit. There are no permanent bases with combat units permanently stationed in the former Warsaw Pact countries, out of deference to Russian sensitivities. the F-16s on Combat Air Patrol over Romania are permanently stationed in Germany and Italy. Those aircraft were maintained and fueled from their home bases. Yes, they landed on a "Nato airbase" in Romania. But the fuel, the refueling tankers, cargo flights of spare parts, etc....took off every few hours from home base back in Italy and Germany. ....because we do not permanently station combat aircraft in Romania, out of deference to Russia. We do, however, maintain the infrastructure in fmr WP countries to quickly receive those aircraft if/when needed. But they "live" in Germany and Italy. (and those bases in Germany and Italy had to bring in aircraft (mostly F-35s and F-15s) from elsewhere in the DOD to fulfill the mission of those F-16's sent to Romania.)

So my statement is both correct and true. We have no permanent stationing of combat units in fmr WP.

Out of deference to Russia.

Who invaded Ukraine anyway.

So what did that deference buy us?

Nothing.

It demonstrated weakness.

Russia exploited it.

Need to station armored divisions and combat aircraft in fmr WP nations soon.

To avoid showing further weakness to Russia.

---

They say that like it is a bad thing. I think it is great that we are getting permanent bases in Poland. If Germany doesn't want us, Poland sure does... Same with the Baltics.

---

There is no evidence of that.

The Germans love the injection of cash that U.S. imperial bases provide....and love the free protection.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/aug/02/removal-of-us-troops-from-germany-will-gravely-affect-local-communities

[Simply not OK': removal of US troops worries German communities.
Politicians say withdrawal of up to 12,000 soldiers will hurt local economy and makes little strategic sense]

---

Poll: Germans Want US Troops and Nuclear Weapons to Leave Country (businessinsider.com)


There are more. But, amazing how the attitude changed when the Tanks rolled into Ukraine. US aint' so bad...

---

They also want to live without using coal power but also without building any more nuclear reactors.

I doubt the German leadership would ever actual try and remove US troops. And as you said if they were foolish enough to do that then Poland would be more than happy to have the huge injection of cash.

---

Not only cash, presence.

---

eh....the cash would be 90% of the attraction

---

2 years ago, maybe since Ukraine... Deterrence plays a big part, especially the newer NATO members on the frontier with Russia.I know don't tell me, that is not the real reason. Right? Is anything EVER as it seems or what the data shows? According to this site, no. There is always an "inside" reason that only the truly educated or well connected know!


Permanent deterrence: Enhancements to the US military presence in North Central Europe - Atlantic Council

---

Are we back to the idea that Russia is gonna attempt to roll their tanks into Warsaw again?

You and whiterock have to make up your minds. Is Russia this massively powerful military force that is about to expand deep into Central Europe....or is it a corrupt demographically declining nation that can not even force its will on a deeply corrupt and poor Ukraine?

It can't be bot

---

You know there is a reason Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania, Poland and now Finland are all joining NATO, basically anyone that borders Russia wants to join NATO! Russia.

There are so many Nations looking to join NATO that there is a multi-year process to get in. Yet, NATO and the US are bad? You don't see an inconsistency there, huh?

---

It does not bode well for your argument that you make to literally make up statements and attribute them to me.

I never said NATO and the USA are bad.

What people have questioned if is pushing NATO up to the very borders of Russia is in the best interest of average Americans and Europe in general.

---

Well, if NATO is a defensive organization to protect Europe it makes sense to include everything up to the borders of those that are prone to invade. Or, you get a Ukraine situation. What is the point of the organization if it can't accommodate a modern map?

And you and others on here have made the argument of how bad and "empire-building" US and NATO are. You are pro-Russia, I see nothing in the last 100 years that indicates that Russia has been a positive force or earned the benefit of the doubt. Ukraine should have been in NATO in 2013, if for no other reason to prevent Russia from invading, which they are prone to do.

---

What is the point of a defensive organization meant to prevent war...expanding endlessly to the point that war becomes inevitable?

You're argument is weak from the get go. Not to mention never seems to ask what is in the interest of the actual America people. But our sons lives on the line for Latvia and Bulgaria do NOT benefit us at all.

And Ukraine was not going to be in NATO back in 2013 because it had to get the approval of its actual voters.....you know the people you want to exclude. 1/3rd of the country was/is ethnic Russian and did not want to be in an anti-western Russian alliance that would only inflame the situation with its large neighbor.

You don't like that democratic outcome...just like our leaders in D.C. don't like democracy when it gets in the way of their plans...but its still a fact.

It took a coup d'etat in 2014 to set Ukraine on the path to NATO membership.

---

How is it weak? Poland, Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania and Romania got freedom from Russia, the first thing they did was join NATO for protection from Russia. What the hell does that tell you? I can't believe you are supporting a guy that routinely rolls tanks. Georgia, Chechnya, Ukraine, Crimea. Of course they want to join NATO. As for NATO, it was sound strategy to accept them.

---

They already had freedom from Russia...technically freedom from the Communist USSR.

Remember that it was Yeltsin and Russia voting to secede from the USSR that killed it

And you have no proof that Russia wants to invade and take over Poland or Romania...that is insane to even argue.

Not to mention if a country wants to join NATO it has to be evaluated for how that will help the American people. Poland make sense....the baltic states or Romania far less.

But in the end the 2004 expansion of NATO already happened...its spilt milk at this point.

---

Of course they don't want to invade Poland and Romania, they would have to deal with NATO.

If you are the true humanist you clam and want peace, the quickest way to peace is make Ukraine a NATO member. If Ukraine was in NATO when the Baltics and Poland came in, no invasion. Crimea is still part of Ukraine. Capitulation leads to war and massive death.

---

Russia is so backward and so incompetent in its military that it could not invade and take Poland or Romanian even if they were not in NATO.

Not to mention they don't even want to do that.

You are under the fantasy and delusion that the Russia of 2023 is the USSR of 1953

trey3216 said:

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Sam Lowry said:

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whiterock said:

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Sam Lowry said:

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whiterock said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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whiterock said:

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Osodecentx said:

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Sam Lowry said:

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How the United States was transformed from guardian to spoiler of the postwar international order. An excellent summary from Harper's magazine.

Quote:

---

Why Are We in Ukraine?
On the dangers of American hubris
by Benjamin Schwarz, Christopher Layne

From the early Nineties, when Washington first raised the idea of NATO expansion, until 2008, when the U.S. delegation at the NATO summit in Bucharest advocated alliance membership for Ukraine and Georgia, U.S.-Russian exchanges were monotonous. While Russians protested Washington's NATO expansion plans, American officials shrugged off those protests--or pointed to them as evidence to justify still-further expansion. Washington's message to Moscow could not have been clearer or more disquieting: Normal diplomacy among great powers, distinguished by the recognition and accommodation of clashing interests--the approach that had defined the U.S.-Soviet rivalry during even the most intense stretches of the Cold War--was obsolete. Russia was expected to acquiesce to a new world order created and dominated by the United States.

The radical expansion of NATO's writ reflected the overweening aims that the end of the Cold War enabled Washington to pursue. Historically, great powers tend to focus pragmatically on reducing conflict among themselves. By frankly recognizing the realities of power and acknowledging each other's interests, they can usually relate to one another on a businesslike basis. This international give-and-take is bolstered by and helps engender a rough, contextual understanding of what's reasonable and legitimate--not in an abstract or absolute sense but in a way that permits fierce business rivals to moderate and accede to demands and to reach deals. By embracing what came to be called its "unipolar moment," Washington demonstrated--to Paris, Berlin, London, New Delhi, and Beijing, no less than to Moscow--that it would no longer be bound by the norms implicit in great power politics, norms that constrain the aims pursued as much as the means employed. Those who determine U.S. foreign policy hold that, as President George W. Bush declared in his second inaugural address, "the survival of liberty in our land increasingly depends on the success of liberty in other lands." They maintain, as President Bill Clinton averred in 1993, that the security of the United States demands a "focus on relations within nations, on a nation's form of governance, on its economic structure."

Whatever one thinks of this doctrine, which prompted Secretary of State Madeleine Albright to dub America "the indispensable nation"--and which Gorbachev said defined America's "dangerous winner's mentality"--it lavishly expanded previously established conceptions of security and national interest. In its crusading universalism, it could be regarded by other states, with ample supporting evidence, as at best recklessly meddlesome and at worst messianically interventionist. Convinced that its national security depended on the domestic political and economic arrangements of ostensibly sovereign states--and therefore defining as a legitimate goal the alteration or eradication of those arrangements if they were not in accord with its professed ideals and values--the post-Cold War United States became a revolutionary force in world politics.

https://harpers.org/archive/2023/06/why-are-we-in-ukraine/

---

---

Good article, difficult questions. I don't know the answer

---

Again, we see the isolationist argument that we caused a war in which we had no interest. Both are patently false premises. Russia would have NEVER invaded or usurped Ukraine if Nato hadn't been meddling? Pfft. If NATO hadn't expanded eastward, Russia would have expanded westward. The issue at hand is merely about where the razor wire will be strung. NATO was slow, deliberate, and cautious in its move eastward, out of deference to Russia. And it is instructive that EVERYONE (except Belarus) wants to be on the west side of the wire.

---

You continue to use the propagandist term of "isolationist"....and of course non-intervention and not engaging in war mongering adventurism is of course not the same as isolationism.

We are the major economic power on earth and have a two ocean navy along with bases in 80+ countries and territories around the world. No one has even said we should dismantle those fleets or bases.

What people have said is that we should not get involved in bloody conflicts that we have no vital interest in or that do not involved a ally of the USA. Ukraine is not a NATO ally.

And your argument that Russia (with a poverty level and per captia GDP like Mexico) is going to expand Westward is laughable...and then you contradict yourself by saying correctly that no one wants join them.....so then how can they expand Westward? Talk about grasping for reasons to get into a conflict with a nuclear power...fantasies of "imminent expansion into the West" lol

---

Russia doesn't have to invade and defeat NATO, as your analysis presumes. Russia will try to undermine it from within, facilitated by gunboat diplomacy on NATO borders to make all players in the frontline states be more cautious in their pro-Nato/anti-=Russia policies. Then. One election. One coup. And we will have the prospect of Russia and Nato poised on opposite borders of a Nato state preparing to come to the rescue of a new government calling for help. THAT is something to lose sleep over, friend. And the only way to prevent it is to keep Russian armies IN RUSSIA.

---

Russia had a similar predicament in Ukraine. Had we admitted such an unstable country to membership in NATO, and its government decided to take Crimea, Russia would have found itself at war without having lifted a finger.

---

I have spoken often about the risks of admitting politically unstable states to Nato. Nato itself recognizes that risk. That's why it has not admitted Ukraine to membership, and only elevated it to partner status in 2020 (joining several other countries - Sweden, Finland, Australia, Jordan, Georgia). NATO is signaling unwavering support for Ukraine, as link demonstrates:
https://news.yahoo.com/nato-elevate-ukraine-partner-status-212000077.html
Some of that is genuine, and some of that is diplomatic posturing to keep up pressure on Russia....to force them to the table before the entirety of Ukraine slips away.

The Russian invasion of Ukraine unfortunately may well result in a faster-track to Ukraine Nato membership. I would prefer to put that off until after the war is won and we have a chance to observe a couple of election cycles, to ensure Ukraine can demonstrate that it is capable of peaceful transition to power. But Russia's weakness and looming defeat will be a powerful enticement to expand, which in retrospect perhaps should have been done 30 years ago when Russia was too weak to resist it.

Nato is itself engaging in mission creep, from a defense of Western Europe from Soviet attack, to a defense of democracy from attacks by autocracy. The admission of Jordan and Australia would be your clue.

---

"Democracy," i.e. recycled Marxism warmed over by Western NGOs and served to an ungrateful populace.

Russia doesn't need to be dragged into modernity. They've been there already.

---

Where in the hell has Russia been modern?

---

For most of the 20th century, Russia experienced the cold brutality of modernity in a way that few of us have. Before that they experienced the same decadence, depravity, crime, and instability we see in the West today, leading predictably to resentment, rebellion, and tyranny. They're trying their best to recover and rebuild. The last thing they need to do is import a suicidal anti-culture from the West.

RMF5630 said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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RMF5630 said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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RMF5630 said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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RMF5630 said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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RMF5630 said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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RMF5630 said:

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whiterock said:

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Sam Lowry said:

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whiterock said:

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Redbrickbear said:

---

[The United States has committed itself to expanding NATO to Russia's borders. NATO, of course, stands for "North Atlantic Treaty Organization." A nave onlooker might ask why countries like Bulgaria, Finland, and Poland would be included in such a treaty. The answer is pretty simple: NATO has nothing to do with the North Atlantic. It is an anti-Russian military alliance.

Russia knew (or, rather, knows) that Ukraine has been courting both the European Union and NATO. Kiev wants to unite itself politically, economically, and militarily to the West. That would mean the United States has a right to place more troops and artillery on Russia's border. Russia didn't like that, and so it lashed out.
But the question is why does the United States want to put troops and artillery on Russia's border? Why has it maintained and, indeed, expanded this anti-Russian alliance, even though its original objective (i.e., the destruction of the Soviet Union) has been accomplished?

Our leaders have been clear on that point. To quote Richard Moore, the current chief of MI6: "With the tragedy and destruction unfolding so distressingly in Ukraine, we should remember the values and hard-won freedoms that distinguish us from Putin, none more than LGBT+ rights."
This isn't Kremlin disinformation. These are the words coming from the horse's mouth. We hate Russia because they are mean to the gays.
Deacon Nicholas Kotar, the great novelist and translator, gave a wider view:

Quote:

---

What the Russian government is doing is setting a red line to the spread of NGO-style liberal democracy. And Ukraine, unfortunately, has been a buffer zone, and a kind of test-case, for the spread, not of a political system, but of a system of values, that is espoused by the elites only....The problem is that with all these colored revolutions, no matter how you look at it, the thing that comes in together with the money is an insistence, unfortunately, on the adoption of the Western liberal cultural milieu. It happened in Georgia, it happened in Ukraine, it happened everywhere.

---

Ultimately, this isn't about Russia. It's not even about Ukraine. It's about us. Western elites want us to believe that the triumph of "NGO-style liberal democracy" is inevitable everywhere. But it's not. Russia is living proof of that.]

---

By contrast, when NATO expanded into the former Warsaw Pact nations and the Baltics, no permanent bases with standing maneuver units were stationed there.

---

Again, this is not true. Poland hosts both the forward command of the Army V Corps, first announced in 2020, and the "semi-permanent" headquarters of the 3rd Armored Brigade Combat Team of the 4th Infantry Division, which has been there since 2017 (and also has a rotational presence in Estonia and Latvia).

---

and what you say is true, but misleading. A forward command post is not a combat unit. There are no permanent bases with combat units permanently stationed in the former Warsaw Pact countries, out of deference to Russian sensitivities. the F-16s on Combat Air Patrol over Romania are permanently stationed in Germany and Italy. Those aircraft were maintained and fueled from their home bases. Yes, they landed on a "Nato airbase" in Romania. But the fuel, the refueling tankers, cargo flights of spare parts, etc....took off every few hours from home base back in Italy and Germany. ....because we do not permanently station combat aircraft in Romania, out of deference to Russia. We do, however, maintain the infrastructure in fmr WP countries to quickly receive those aircraft if/when needed. But they "live" in Germany and Italy. (and those bases in Germany and Italy had to bring in aircraft (mostly F-35s and F-15s) from elsewhere in the DOD to fulfill the mission of those F-16's sent to Romania.)

So my statement is both correct and true. We have no permanent stationing of combat units in fmr WP.

Out of deference to Russia.

Who invaded Ukraine anyway.

So what did that deference buy us?

Nothing.

It demonstrated weakness.

Russia exploited it.

Need to station armored divisions and combat aircraft in fmr WP nations soon.

To avoid showing further weakness to Russia.

---

They say that like it is a bad thing. I think it is great that we are getting permanent bases in Poland. If Germany doesn't want us, Poland sure does... Same with the Baltics.

---

There is no evidence of that.

The Germans love the injection of cash that U.S. imperial bases provide....and love the free protection.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/aug/02/removal-of-us-troops-from-germany-will-gravely-affect-local-communities

[Simply not OK': removal of US troops worries German communities.
Politicians say withdrawal of up to 12,000 soldiers will hurt local economy and makes little strategic sense]

---

Poll: Germans Want US Troops and Nuclear Weapons to Leave Country (businessinsider.com)


There are more. But, amazing how the attitude changed when the Tanks rolled into Ukraine. US aint' so bad...

---

They also want to live without using coal power but also without building any more nuclear reactors.

I doubt the German leadership would ever actual try and remove US troops. And as you said if they were foolish enough to do that then Poland would be more than happy to have the huge injection of cash.

---

Not only cash, presence.

---

eh....the cash would be 90% of the attraction

---

2 years ago, maybe since Ukraine... Deterrence plays a big part, especially the newer NATO members on the frontier with Russia.I know don't tell me, that is not the real reason. Right? Is anything EVER as it seems or what the data shows? According to this site, no. There is always an "inside" reason that only the truly educated or well connected know!


Permanent deterrence: Enhancements to the US military presence in North Central Europe - Atlantic Council

---

Are we back to the idea that Russia is gonna attempt to roll their tanks into Warsaw again?

You and whiterock have to make up your minds. Is Russia this massively powerful military force that is about to expand deep into Central Europe....or is it a corrupt demographically declining nation that can not even force its will on a deeply corrupt and poor Ukraine?

It can't be bot

---

You know there is a reason Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania, Poland and now Finland are all joining NATO, basically anyone that borders Russia wants to join NATO! Russia.

There are so many Nations looking to join NATO that there is a multi-year process to get in. Yet, NATO and the US are bad? You don't see an inconsistency there, huh?

---

It does not bode well for your argument that you make to literally make up statements and attribute them to me.

I never said NATO and the USA are bad.

What people have questioned if is pushing NATO up to the very borders of Russia is in the best interest of average Americans and Europe in general.

---

Well, if NATO is a defensive organization to protect Europe it makes sense to include everything up to the borders of those that are prone to invade.

---

On the contrary, it makes sense to have a buffer.

Redbrickbear said:

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RMF5630 said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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RMF5630 said:

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Redbrickbear said:

---

RMF5630 said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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RMF5630 said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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RMF5630 said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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RMF5630 said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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RMF5630 said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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RMF5630 said:

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whiterock said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

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whiterock said:

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Redbrickbear said:

---

[The United States has committed itself to expanding NATO to Russia's borders. NATO, of course, stands for "North Atlantic Treaty Organization." A nave onlooker might ask why countries like Bulgaria, Finland, and Poland would be included in such a treaty. The answer is pretty simple: NATO has nothing to do with the North Atlantic. It is an anti-Russian military alliance.

Russia knew (or, rather, knows) that Ukraine has been courting both the European Union and NATO. Kiev wants to unite itself politically, economically, and militarily to the West. That would mean the United States has a right to place more troops and artillery on Russia's border. Russia didn't like that, and so it lashed out.
But the question is why does the United States want to put troops and artillery on Russia's border? Why has it maintained and, indeed, expanded this anti-Russian alliance, even though its original objective (i.e., the destruction of the Soviet Union) has been accomplished?

Our leaders have been clear on that point. To quote Richard Moore, the current chief of MI6: "With the tragedy and destruction unfolding so distressingly in Ukraine, we should remember the values and hard-won freedoms that distinguish us from Putin, none more than LGBT+ rights."
This isn't Kremlin disinformation. These are the words coming from the horse's mouth. We hate Russia because they are mean to the gays.
Deacon Nicholas Kotar, the great novelist and translator, gave a wider view:

Quote:

---

What the Russian government is doing is setting a red line to the spread of NGO-style liberal democracy. And Ukraine, unfortunately, has been a buffer zone, and a kind of test-case, for the spread, not of a political system, but of a system of values, that is espoused by the elites only....The problem is that with all these colored revolutions, no matter how you look at it, the thing that comes in together with the money is an insistence, unfortunately, on the adoption of the Western liberal cultural milieu. It happened in Georgia, it happened in Ukraine, it happened everywhere.

---

Ultimately, this isn't about Russia. It's not even about Ukraine. It's about us. Western elites want us to believe that the triumph of "NGO-style liberal democracy" is inevitable everywhere. But it's not. Russia is living proof of that.]

---

By contrast, when NATO expanded into the former Warsaw Pact nations and the Baltics, no permanent bases with standing maneuver units were stationed there.

---

Again, this is not true. Poland hosts both the forward command of the Army V Corps, first announced in 2020, and the "semi-permanent" headquarters of the 3rd Armored Brigade Combat Team of the 4th Infantry Division, which has been there since 2017 (and also has a rotational presence in Estonia and Latvia).

---

and what you say is true, but misleading. A forward command post is not a combat unit. There are no permanent bases with combat units permanently stationed in the former Warsaw Pact countries, out of deference to Russian sensitivities. the F-16s on Combat Air Patrol over Romania are permanently stationed in Germany and Italy. Those aircraft were maintained and fueled from their home bases. Yes, they landed on a "Nato airbase" in Romania. But the fuel, the refueling tankers, cargo flights of spare parts, etc....took off every few hours from home base back in Italy and Germany. ....because we do not permanently station combat aircraft in Romania, out of deference to Russia. We do, however, maintain the infrastructure in fmr WP countries to quickly receive those aircraft if/when needed. But they "live" in Germany and Italy. (and those bases in Germany and Italy had to bring in aircraft (mostly F-35s and F-15s) from elsewhere in the DOD to fulfill the mission of those F-16's sent to Romania.)

So my statement is both correct and true. We have no permanent stationing of combat units in fmr WP.

Out of deference to Russia.

Who invaded Ukraine anyway.

So what did that deference buy us?

Nothing.

It demonstrated weakness.

Russia exploited it.

Need to station armored divisions and combat aircraft in fmr WP nations soon.

To avoid showing further weakness to Russia.

---

They say that like it is a bad thing. I think it is great that we are getting permanent bases in Poland. If Germany doesn't want us, Poland sure does... Same with the Baltics.

---

There is no evidence of that.

The Germans love the injection of cash that U.S. imperial bases provide....and love the free protection.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/aug/02/removal-of-us-troops-from-germany-will-gravely-affect-local-communities

[Simply not OK': removal of US troops worries German communities.
Politicians say withdrawal of up to 12,000 soldiers will hurt local economy and makes little strategic sense]

---

Poll: Germans Want US Troops and Nuclear Weapons to Leave Country (businessinsider.com)


There are more. But, amazing how the attitude changed when the Tanks rolled into Ukraine. US aint' so bad...

---

They also want to live without using coal power but also without building any more nuclear reactors.

I doubt the German leadership would ever actual try and remove US troops. And as you said if they were foolish enough to do that then Poland would be more than happy to have the huge injection of cash.

---

Not only cash, presence.

---

eh....the cash would be 90% of the attraction

---

2 years ago, maybe since Ukraine... Deterrence plays a big part, especially the newer NATO members on the frontier with Russia.I know don't tell me, that is not the real reason. Right? Is anything EVER as it seems or what the data shows? According to this site, no. There is always an "inside" reason that only the truly educated or well connected know!


Permanent deterrence: Enhancements to the US military presence in North Central Europe - Atlantic Council

---

Are we back to the idea that Russia is gonna attempt to roll their tanks into Warsaw again?

You and whiterock have to make up your minds. Is Russia this massively powerful military force that is about to expand deep into Central Europe....or is it a corrupt demographically declining nation that can not even force its will on a deeply corrupt and poor Ukraine?

It can't be bot

---

You know there is a reason Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania, Poland and now Finland are all joining NATO, basically anyone that borders Russia wants to join NATO! Russia.

There are so many Nations looking to join NATO that there is a multi-year process to get in. Yet, NATO and the US are bad? You don't see an inconsistency there, huh?

---

It does not bode well for your argument that you make to literally make up statements and attribute them to me.

I never said NATO and the USA are bad.

What people have questioned if is pushing NATO up to the very borders of Russia is in the best interest of average Americans and Europe in general.

---

Well, if NATO is a defensive organization to protect Europe it makes sense to include everything up to the borders of those that are prone to invade. Or, you get a Ukraine situation. What is the point of the organization if it can't accommodate a modern map?

And you and others on here have made the argument of how bad and "empire-building" US and NATO are. You are pro-Russia, I see nothing in the last 100 years that indicates that Russia has been a positive force or earned the benefit of the doubt. Ukraine should have been in NATO in 2013, if for no other reason to prevent Russia from invading, which they are prone to do.

---

What is the point of a defensive organization meant to prevent war...expanding endlessly to the point that war becomes inevitable?

You're argument is weak from the get go. Not to mention never seems to ask what is in the interest of the actual America people. But our sons lives on the line for Latvia and Bulgaria do NOT benefit us at all.

And Ukraine was not going to be in NATO back in 2013 because it had to get the approval of its actual voters.....you know the people you want to exclude. 1/3rd of the country was/is ethnic Russian and did not want to be in an anti-western Russian alliance that would only inflame the situation with its large neighbor.

You don't like that democratic outcome...just like our leaders in D.C. don't like democracy when it gets in the way of their plans...but its still a fact.

It took a coup d'etat in 2014 to set Ukraine on the path to NATO membership.

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How is it weak? Poland, Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania and Romania got freedom from Russia, the first thing they did was join NATO for protection from Russia. What the hell does that tell you? I can't believe you are supporting a guy that routinely rolls tanks. Georgia, Chechnya, Ukraine, Crimea. Of course they want to join NATO. As for NATO, it was sound strategy to accept them.

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They already had freedom from Russia...technically freedom from the Communist USSR.

Remember that it was Yeltsin and Russia voting to secede from the USSR that killed it

And you have no proof that Russia wants to invade and take over Poland or Romania...that is insane to even argue.

Not to mention if a country wants to join NATO it has to be evaluated for how that will help the American people. Poland make sense....the baltic states or Romania far less.

But in the end the 2004 expansion of NATO already happened...its spilt milk at this point.

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Of course they don't want to invade Poland and Romania, they would have to deal with NATO.

If you are the true humanist you clam and want peace, the quickest way to peace is make Ukraine a NATO member. If Ukraine was in NATO when the Baltics and Poland came in, no invasion. Crimea is still part of Ukraine. Capitulation leads to war and massive death.

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Russia is so backward and so incompetent in its military that it could not invade and take Poland or Romanian even if they were not in NATO.

Not to mention they don't even want to do that.

You are under the fantasy and delusion that the Russia of 2023 is the USSR of 1953

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Strong alliances keep the peace. Weak or incomplete alliances promote law. It doesn't matter what their capabilities are, only what their insane leader thinks it is.

Redbrickbear said:

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RMF5630 said:

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Obviously not to defend Australian democracy, since partner status entails no such commitment on our part. I'm sure it was meant to provide our operations with financial and other assistance, as well as give us bragging rights to a bigger "international coalition."

A much better question is why we're considering member status for Ukraine, a notoriously corrupt regime known for ethnic, religious, and political persecutions. Defending democracy is hardly a plausible explanation there, either.

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Why is it so bad to admit nations that want to join the Western Economy and have security? Why do they have to pass some moral barometer to be worthy? Being strategically located is not enough? Having more Ag land than the rest of Europe combined doesn't count?

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It's not entirely an either/or choice between participating in the Western economy and the Russian economy. To the extent that it is a choice, Russia has interests in Ukraine which were undisputed at the time NATO was formed. Those interests didn't disappear with the Soviet Union. Both Russia and the West have made offers to Ukraine. Ukraine was prepared to accept what it considered a better deal from Russia. The 2014 coup changed that, and now of course we recognize the post-coup policy as the only legitimate one. Quite convenient for us, but there's more to it than we like to pretend.

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As US citizens, shouldn't that be a good thing that is convenient for us and works out?

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Probably depends on if you are in a position to capitalize financially on the USA adding another province-vassal to the empire.

For instance out sourcing our manufacturing base made some Americans insanely wealthy…and impoverished millions more working class men and women.

Mixed bag in the end

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Wait a minute. Nations going from Russian-based economic system to the EU/US/Japanese based economic system do much better and the quality of life goes up. So, how is the US "adding another province-vassal" bad for the province-vassal state? You are telling us that Latvia, Lithiuania, Estonia, Poland, Romania, and all the rest were better off under Russia's grip? Venezuela is a better place now??? North Korea is a better qualit of life than South Korea? Who are you trying to kid?

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if we are to call the American-led liberal order an empire, it would be the first voluntary empire in the world which every single member begged to join, in which not a single member had to be invaded to join.

Red: The "empire" jargon is straight-up Russian agitprop.

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[The Oxford dictionary defines empire as: 'Paramount influence, absolute sway, supreme command or control'; how suiting such terminology is to define the current disposition of the United States. Over the past century the U.S. has risen to be the undisputed world power, with its tentacles of influence sprawled across the globe, leaving almost no state untouched.]

https://www.e-ir.info/2009/05/28/the-united-states-global-empire/

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I think you are confusing protecting trade with empire. I would counter by saying the Roman Alliances could not go against Rome or leave if they chose. In addition, many of these areas felt occupied. Name one Nation in NATO, in Asia or elsewhere that has to go with US demands.

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Buddy...we had a war in 1861 that killed close to 700,000+ people when 11 American States tried to leave.

Even if you draw a distinction between American States and Allied foreign States....nothing over the past 40 years has given us any indication that the USA powers that be would allow say Poland to leave the Western sphere and enter into the Russian sphere.

Or would allow say S. Korea to leave the Western bloc and enter the orbit of Red China.

The Empire of the USA is a fact....how you feel about it is up to you.

p.s.

The Roman empire was build and trade and trust...the same as the modern USA empire. That is part of what made/makes both so strong. Far stronger than its competitors.

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You are so full of it. Comparing the Civil War to Roman expansion? Yeah, Judea, Gaul and Egypt were comparable to South Caroline, Virginia and Florida?

Rome was build with trust?

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p.s.

A multi-ethnic, multi-linguist empire that spanned an enormous 5 million square kilometres and spanned from London to Babylon could not have been built and sustained over the centuries on mere conquest alone.

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It was built on conquest.

It was maintained with de-centralized administrative structures coerced by military power.

To say that it was built and maintained on trust is flatly, demonstrably, woefully, ahistorically wrong.

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Madden discusses this.

The Empire in the West was built on conquest (pushing out or dominating less advanced peoples like the Celts and Germanics)...while in the more advanced and rich East the power of Rome was build on trade, alliance, and a reputation of Trust.

This has similarities to the modern USA (pushing out/pacifying the red Indians to the West...enrolling allies among the advanced States of Europe and East Asia)

Again Roman policy in the East was very different from its policy in the wild & untamed West.

For instance:

Bithynia (in modern Turkey) joined the empire and was not conquer for instance

[King Nicomedes IV of Bithynia died and, hoping to secure his kingdom from further Pontic aggression, bequeathed his entire kingdom to Rome. The Senate immediately voted to accept the kingdom as a province]

[In Egypt the Ptolemaic dynasty requested Roman troops be stationed in Egypt and that the Kingdom be enrolled as Roman allies.]

Many such cases

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none of that is inconsistent with my post.

Every nation boundering Rome had a choice to make: trade/ally with Rome, or be conquered by Rome.

In more specific terms, a King on the periphery of Rome could choose to ally with Rome, with risks of losing some sovereignty to Rome as well as inviting invasion by enemies of Rome. So the King had to choose which snake to sleep with. And the snake was the armies of the competing powers. Who could best protect the King? If the King made the wrong choice, he and his seed would be at risk of extermination, to be replaced by a competing bloodline, setting up for the sitting King a long road back to power that wiggled thru life in exile begging for an army to go restore his bloodline.

And throughout it all, the stick was.....THE ROMAN LEGION.

That is not how the American foreign policy apparatus works. No one is forced to join. No one is forced to stay. And no one gets to "join" the American Republic, no matter what.


There are indeed some broad aspects of Rome and America where dynamics are similar. But in no sense is American an "empire" as was "Rome." Too many dissimilarities, and certainly not as alleged by critics of US policy toward Ukraine.

That template plays itself out over

RMF5630 said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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RMF5630 said:

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whiterock said:

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Sam Lowry said:

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whiterock said:

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[The United States has committed itself to expanding NATO to Russia's borders. NATO, of course, stands for "North Atlantic Treaty Organization." A nave onlooker might ask why countries like Bulgaria, Finland, and Poland would be included in such a treaty. The answer is pretty simple: NATO has nothing to do with the North Atlantic. It is an anti-Russian military alliance.

Russia knew (or, rather, knows) that Ukraine has been courting both the European Union and NATO. Kiev wants to unite itself politically, economically, and militarily to the West. That would mean the United States has a right to place more troops and artillery on Russia's border. Russia didn't like that, and so it lashed out.
But the question is why does the United States want to put troops and artillery on Russia's border? Why has it maintained and, indeed, expanded this anti-Russian alliance, even though its original objective (i.e., the destruction of the Soviet Union) has been accomplished?

Our leaders have been clear on that point. To quote Richard Moore, the current chief of MI6: "With the tragedy and destruction unfolding so distressingly in Ukraine, we should remember the values and hard-won freedoms that distinguish us from Putin, none more than LGBT+ rights."
This isn't Kremlin disinformation. These are the words coming from the horse's mouth. We hate Russia because they are mean to the gays.
Deacon Nicholas Kotar, the great novelist and translator, gave a wider view:

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What the Russian government is doing is setting a red line to the spread of NGO-style liberal democracy. And Ukraine, unfortunately, has been a buffer zone, and a kind of test-case, for the spread, not of a political system, but of a system of values, that is espoused by the elites only....The problem is that with all these colored revolutions, no matter how you look at it, the thing that comes in together with the money is an insistence, unfortunately, on the adoption of the Western liberal cultural milieu. It happened in Georgia, it happened in Ukraine, it happened everywhere.

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Ultimately, this isn't about Russia. It's not even about Ukraine. It's about us. Western elites want us to believe that the triumph of "NGO-style liberal democracy" is inevitable everywhere. But it's not. Russia is living proof of that.]

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By contrast, when NATO expanded into the former Warsaw Pact nations and the Baltics, no permanent bases with standing maneuver units were stationed there.

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Again, this is not true. Poland hosts both the forward command of the Army V Corps, first announced in 2020, and the "semi-permanent" headquarters of the 3rd Armored Brigade Combat Team of the 4th Infantry Division, which has been there since 2017 (and also has a rotational presence in Estonia and Latvia).

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and what you say is true, but misleading. A forward command post is not a combat unit. There are no permanent bases with combat units permanently stationed in the former Warsaw Pact countries, out of deference to Russian sensitivities. the F-16s on Combat Air Patrol over Romania are permanently stationed in Germany and Italy. Those aircraft were maintained and fueled from their home bases. Yes, they landed on a "Nato airbase" in Romania. But the fuel, the refueling tankers, cargo flights of spare parts, etc....took off every few hours from home base back in Italy and Germany. ....because we do not permanently station combat aircraft in Romania, out of deference to Russia. We do, however, maintain the infrastructure in fmr WP countries to quickly receive those aircraft if/when needed. But they "live" in Germany and Italy. (and those bases in Germany and Italy had to bring in aircraft (mostly F-35s and F-15s) from elsewhere in the DOD to fulfill the mission of those F-16's sent to Romania.)

So my statement is both correct and true. We have no permanent stationing of combat units in fmr WP.

Out of deference to Russia.

Who invaded Ukraine anyway.

So what did that deference buy us?

Nothing.

It demonstrated weakness.

Russia exploited it.

Need to station armored divisions and combat aircraft in fmr WP nations soon.

To avoid showing further weakness to Russia.

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They say that like it is a bad thing. I think it is great that we are getting permanent bases in Poland. If Germany doesn't want us, Poland sure does... Same with the Baltics.

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There is no evidence of that.

The Germans love the injection of cash that U.S. imperial bases provide....and love the free protection.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/aug/02/removal-of-us-troops-from-germany-will-gravely-affect-local-communities

[Simply not OK': removal of US troops worries German communities.
Politicians say withdrawal of up to 12,000 soldiers will hurt local economy and makes little strategic sense]

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Poll: Germans Want US Troops and Nuclear Weapons to Leave Country (businessinsider.com)


There are more. But, amazing how the attitude changed when the Tanks rolled into Ukraine. US aint' so bad...

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They also want to live without using coal power but also without building any more nuclear reactors.

I doubt the German leadership would ever actual try and remove US troops. And as you said if they were foolish enough to do that then Poland would be more than happy to have the huge injection of cash.

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Not only cash, presence.

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eh....the cash would be 90% of the attraction

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2 years ago, maybe since Ukraine... Deterrence plays a big part, especially the newer NATO members on the frontier with Russia.I know don't tell me, that is not the real reason. Right? Is anything EVER as it seems or what the data shows? According to this site, no. There is always an "inside" reason that only the truly educated or well connected know!


Permanent deterrence: Enhancements to the US military presence in North Central Europe - Atlantic Council

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Are we back to the idea that Russia is gonna attempt to roll their tanks into Warsaw again?

You and whiterock have to make up your minds. Is Russia this massively powerful military force that is about to expand deep into Central Europe....or is it a corrupt demographically declining nation that can not even force its will on a deeply corrupt and poor Ukraine?

It can't be bot

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You know there is a reason Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania, Poland and now Finland are all joining NATO, basically anyone that borders Russia wants to join NATO! Russia.

There are so many Nations looking to join NATO that there is a multi-year process to get in. Yet, NATO and the US are bad? You don't see an inconsistency there, huh?

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It does not bode well for your argument that you make to literally make up statements and attribute them to me.

I never said NATO and the USA are bad.

What people have questioned if is pushing NATO up to the very borders of Russia is in the best interest of average Americans and Europe in general.

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Well, if NATO is a defensive organization to protect Europe it makes sense to include everything up to the borders of those that are prone to invade. Or, you get a Ukraine situation. What is the point of the organization if it can't accommodate a modern map?

And you and others on here have made the argument of how bad and "empire-building" US and NATO are. You are pro-Russia, I see nothing in the last 100 years that indicates that Russia has been a positive force or earned the benefit of the doubt. Ukraine should have been in NATO in 2013, if for no other reason to prevent Russia from invading, which they are prone to do.

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What is the point of a defensive organization meant to prevent war...expanding endlessly to the point that war becomes inevitable?

You're argument is weak from the get go. Not to mention never seems to ask what is in the interest of the actual America people. But our sons lives on the line for Latvia and Bulgaria do NOT benefit us at all.

And Ukraine was not going to be in NATO back in 2013 because it had to get the approval of its actual voters.....you know the people you want to exclude. 1/3rd of the country was/is ethnic Russian and did not want to be in an anti-western Russian alliance that would only inflame the situation with its large neighbor.

You don't like that democratic outcome...just like our leaders in D.C. don't like democracy when it gets in the way of their plans...but its still a fact.

It took a coup d'etat in 2014 to set Ukraine on the path to NATO membership.

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How is it weak? Poland, Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania and Romania got freedom from Russia, the first thing they did was join NATO for protection from Russia. What the hell does that tell you? I can't believe you are supporting a guy that routinely rolls tanks. Georgia, Chechnya, Ukraine, Crimea. Of course they want to join NATO. As for NATO, it was sound strategy to accept them.

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They already had freedom from Russia...technically freedom from the Communist USSR.

Remember that it was Yeltsin and Russia voting to secede from the USSR that killed it

And you have no proof that Russia wants to invade and take over Poland or Romania...that is insane to even argue.

Not to mention if a country wants to join NATO it has to be evaluated for how that will help the American people. Poland make sense....the baltic states or Romania far less.

But in the end the 2004 expansion of NATO already happened...its spilt milk at this point.

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Of course they don't want to invade Poland and Romania, they would have to deal with NATO.

If you are the true humanist you clam and want peace, the quickest way to peace is make Ukraine a NATO member. If Ukraine was in NATO when the Baltics and Poland came in, no invasion. Crimea is still part of Ukraine. Capitulation leads to war and massive death.

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Russia is so backward and so incompetent in its military that it could not invade and take Poland or Romanian even if they were not in NATO.

Not to mention they don't even want to do that.

You are under the fantasy and delusion that the Russia of 2023 is the USSR of 1953

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Strong alliances keep the peace. Weak or incomplete alliances promote law. It doesn't matter what their capabilities are, only what their insane leader thinks it is.

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How does poor, broke, and demographically declining Bulgaria make the alliance strong?

You assumption is that reckless expansion is a sure sign of strength

Sam Lowry said:

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whiterock said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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RMF5630 said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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RMF5630 said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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RMF5630 said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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You think there is more reason to expand NATO into the east today than in 1990? What?

You think modern Russia is more of a threat than the super power that was the USSR?

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Why does Russia have to be a threat for NATO to add nations that are like minded, want to join the EU and want freedom that security brings? Is Russia being a threat the only reason NATO can add? Or a nation that wants t o join NATO can join?

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What common values and "like mindedness" do you think Britain, France, Albania, Canada, Romania, Portugal, Croatia, Turkey, Estonia, Greece, and the USA have?

The "liked mindedness" idea becomes even more hilarious when you look at the government of Turkey and its neo-Ottoman/semi-Islamist autocratic leader Erdogan and the post-national liberal governments of places like Canada.

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And what was Turkey's Government like when they joined? Turkey is also a top 20ish economy and very Capitalist. Even if not, what is wrong with joining for security? You know the real world is not just meet all three or NO.

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In 1952 Turkey had a Kemalist government (same type of guys who mass murdered the Christian Armenians and Assyrian Christians during world war I)

Also committed the anti-Greek Christian pogroms that destroyed the native Greeks of Istanbul who had been there since the time of Constantine the great.


[In 67 September 1955 an anti-Greek pogrom was orchestrated in Istanbul by the Turkish military's Tactical Mobilization Group. The events were triggered by the news that the Turkish consulate in Thessaloniki, north Greece the house where Mustafa Kemal Atatrk was born in 1881 had been bombed the day before. A bomb planted by a Turkish usher of the consulate, who was later arrested and confessed, incited the events. The Turkish press conveying the news in Turkey was silent about the arrest and instead insinuated that Greeks had set off the bomb. Over a dozen people died during or after the pogrom as a result of beatings and arson. Jews, Armenians and others were also harmed. In addition to commercial targets, the mob clearly targeted property owned or administered by the Greek Orthodox Church. 73 churches and 23 schools were vandalized, burned or destroyed, as were 8 asperses and 3 monasteries.

The pogrom greatly accelerated emigration of ethnic Greeks from Turkey, and the Istanbul region in particular. The Greek population of Turkey declined from 119,822 persons in 1927, to about 7,000 by 1978. In Istanbul alone, the Greek population decreased from 65,108 to 49,081 between 1955 and 1960.]

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So Turkey should be out. The Baltics? Out. Finland, Sweden, Poland, Czech, Eastern Part of Germany, Australia, Romania... Basically, all of NATO should be disbanded and the US maybe pay reparations to most of the world while we are at it? How about adding Texas, NM, AZ and CA to give back to Mexico? Would giving AK to the Russians make up for all the harm we have done? HI needs to be reverted to a Kingdom, throw in the 7th Fleet to make up. That cover it? I am sure if you think about it there is someone else the US has harmed that we can pay. Maybe just dissolve the US. Would that suffice?


There is absolutely NOT ONE THING that NATO and US has done well according to you guys.

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Well of course that is a lie and no one on this thread ever said that.

NATO was a necessary military alliance to stop the spread of Communism and the massive socialist empire called the USSR. The communists being backed up by the Red Army that had 400 division stationed in Europe, 25,000 tanks, and 45,000 nukes. Along with 8 other Warsaw pact countries under communist rule with their armies.

The USSR and the Warsaw pact are now long long gone.

https://www.foreignexchanges.news/p/nato-has-outlived-its-usefulness
[In many ways, NATO was wildly successful in its time. But that time is over, and now it should be dismantled...

The decision to keep NATO operating after the Cold War ensured that it functioned as support for the US hegemon. During the Cold War, as NATO's website proudly affirms, the organization's "forces were not involved in a single military engagement." Instead, to borrow the historian Walter LaFeber's phrasing, NATO was mainly used "as a means to deal with more immediate problems [than a Soviet invasion]the integration of the Federal Republic of Germany into the West, the easing of Franco-German hatreds, the anchoring of a Great Britain tossed between continental and Atlantic-Commonwealth interests," and other intra-North Atlantic concerns. It was primarily a tool of integration.

But once the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, NATO rapidly became an arm of the US Empire. Or as NATO's website benignly puts it, with "changing conditions came new responsibilities. From being an exclusively defensive alliance for nearly half a century, NATO began to assume an increasingly proactive role within the international community." It participated in the Gulf War; the conflicts that rent the former Yugoslavia; the War on Terror; the Afghanistan War; and the Iraq War, to name only a few of its contributions. Indeed, by early 2021, NATO was partaking in operations in Afghanistan, Kosovo, the Mediterranean, Africa, and elsewhere.

The alliance has also grown to thirty members, and now includes many nations that were once in the Soviet sphere of influence, like Albania, Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and Romania. Unsurprisingly, the organization's wanton expansion into Eastern Europe has provoked Russia imagine how US decision-makers would have felt had Canada or Mexico joined the Warsaw Pact and NATO has been a useful foil for Russian President Vladimir Putin, helping him justify his revanchist foreign policy.

As this all suggests, there are significant drawbacks to NATO's continuing existence.]

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Doesn't the Russian invasion of Ukraine demonstrate that oldest Russian desires for empire are alive and well?

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No, not really. Russia's position isn't what it was during the time of the czars or the empire. It's not even what it was during the Cold War, when their forces were massed across from NATO with clear paths of attack. To say Russia will always do such-and-such because that's what they did centuries ago is meaningless. It's just another way of saying you don't like or trust Russia.

The explanation for the Ukraine war is in recent history, and it's all too obvious. They're doing what any great power would do in their situation.

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They literally ****ing did it 16 months ago and you're in here saying they're not in the same position. My good man, you're a special kind of special

trey3216 said:

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Sam Lowry said:

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whiterock said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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RMF5630 said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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RMF5630 said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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RMF5630 said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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You think there is more reason to expand NATO into the east today than in 1990? What?

You think modern Russia is more of a threat than the super power that was the USSR?

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Why does Russia have to be a threat for NATO to add nations that are like minded, want to join the EU and want freedom that security brings? Is Russia being a threat the only reason NATO can add? Or a nation that wants t o join NATO can join?

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What common values and "like mindedness" do you think Britain, France, Albania, Canada, Romania, Portugal, Croatia, Turkey, Estonia, Greece, and the USA have?

The "liked mindedness" idea becomes even more hilarious when you look at the government of Turkey and its neo-Ottoman/semi-Islamist autocratic leader Erdogan and the post-national liberal governments of places like Canada.

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And what was Turkey's Government like when they joined? Turkey is also a top 20ish economy and very Capitalist. Even if not, what is wrong with joining for security? You know the real world is not just meet all three or NO.

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In 1952 Turkey had a Kemalist government (same type of guys who mass murdered the Christian Armenians and Assyrian Christians during world war I)

Also committed the anti-Greek Christian pogroms that destroyed the native Greeks of Istanbul who had been there since the time of Constantine the great.


[In 67 September 1955 an anti-Greek pogrom was orchestrated in Istanbul by the Turkish military's Tactical Mobilization Group. The events were triggered by the news that the Turkish consulate in Thessaloniki, north Greece the house where Mustafa Kemal Atatrk was born in 1881 had been bombed the day before. A bomb planted by a Turkish usher of the consulate, who was later arrested and confessed, incited the events. The Turkish press conveying the news in Turkey was silent about the arrest and instead insinuated that Greeks had set off the bomb. Over a dozen people died during or after the pogrom as a result of beatings and arson. Jews, Armenians and others were also harmed. In addition to commercial targets, the mob clearly targeted property owned or administered by the Greek Orthodox Church. 73 churches and 23 schools were vandalized, burned or destroyed, as were 8 asperses and 3 monasteries.

The pogrom greatly accelerated emigration of ethnic Greeks from Turkey, and the Istanbul region in particular. The Greek population of Turkey declined from 119,822 persons in 1927, to about 7,000 by 1978. In Istanbul alone, the Greek population decreased from 65,108 to 49,081 between 1955 and 1960.]

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So Turkey should be out. The Baltics? Out. Finland, Sweden, Poland, Czech, Eastern Part of Germany, Australia, Romania... Basically, all of NATO should be disbanded and the US maybe pay reparations to most of the world while we are at it? How about adding Texas, NM, AZ and CA to give back to Mexico? Would giving AK to the Russians make up for all the harm we have done? HI needs to be reverted to a Kingdom, throw in the 7th Fleet to make up. That cover it? I am sure if you think about it there is someone else the US has harmed that we can pay. Maybe just dissolve the US. Would that suffice?


There is absolutely NOT ONE THING that NATO and US has done well according to you guys.

---

Well of course that is a lie and no one on this thread ever said that.

NATO was a necessary military alliance to stop the spread of Communism and the massive socialist empire called the USSR. The communists being backed up by the Red Army that had 400 division stationed in Europe, 25,000 tanks, and 45,000 nukes. Along with 8 other Warsaw pact countries under communist rule with their armies.

The USSR and the Warsaw pact are now long long gone.

https://www.foreignexchanges.news/p/nato-has-outlived-its-usefulness
[In many ways, NATO was wildly successful in its time. But that time is over, and now it should be dismantled...

The decision to keep NATO operating after the Cold War ensured that it functioned as support for the US hegemon. During the Cold War, as NATO's website proudly affirms, the organization's "forces were not involved in a single military engagement." Instead, to borrow the historian Walter LaFeber's phrasing, NATO was mainly used "as a means to deal with more immediate problems [than a Soviet invasion]the integration of the Federal Republic of Germany into the West, the easing of Franco-German hatreds, the anchoring of a Great Britain tossed between continental and Atlantic-Commonwealth interests," and other intra-North Atlantic concerns. It was primarily a tool of integration.

But once the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, NATO rapidly became an arm of the US Empire. Or as NATO's website benignly puts it, with "changing conditions came new responsibilities. From being an exclusively defensive alliance for nearly half a century, NATO began to assume an increasingly proactive role within the international community." It participated in the Gulf War; the conflicts that rent the former Yugoslavia; the War on Terror; the Afghanistan War; and the Iraq War, to name only a few of its contributions. Indeed, by early 2021, NATO was partaking in operations in Afghanistan, Kosovo, the Mediterranean, Africa, and elsewhere.

The alliance has also grown to thirty members, and now includes many nations that were once in the Soviet sphere of influence, like Albania, Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and Romania. Unsurprisingly, the organization's wanton expansion into Eastern Europe has provoked Russia imagine how US decision-makers would have felt had Canada or Mexico joined the Warsaw Pact and NATO has been a useful foil for Russian President Vladimir Putin, helping him justify his revanchist foreign policy.

As this all suggests, there are significant drawbacks to NATO's continuing existence.]

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Doesn't the Russian invasion of Ukraine demonstrate that oldest Russian desires for empire are alive and well?

---

No, not really. Russia's position isn't what it was during the time of the czars or the empire. It's not even what it was during the Cold War, when their forces were massed across from NATO with clear paths of attack. To say Russia will always do such-and-such because that's what they did centuries ago is meaningless. It's just another way of saying you don't like or trust Russia.

The explanation for the Ukraine war is in recent history, and it's all too obvious. They're doing what any great power would do in their situation.

---

They literally ****ing did it 16 months ago and you're in here saying they're not in the same position. My good man, you're a special kind of special

---

Not every military operation is empire-building, at least not according to the minds assembled here. See for example every invasion ever perpetrated by the oh-so-not-imperial USA.

Sam Lowry said:

---

trey3216 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

whiterock said:

---

Redbrickbear said:

---

RMF5630 said:

---

Redbrickbear said:

---

RMF5630 said:

---

Redbrickbear said:

---

RMF5630 said:

---

Redbrickbear said:

---

You think there is more reason to expand NATO into the east today than in 1990? What?

You think modern Russia is more of a threat than the super power that was the USSR?

---

Why does Russia have to be a threat for NATO to add nations that are like minded, want to join the EU and want freedom that security brings? Is Russia being a threat the only reason NATO can add? Or a nation that wants t o join NATO can join?

---

What common values and "like mindedness" do you think Britain, France, Albania, Canada, Romania, Portugal, Croatia, Turkey, Estonia, Greece, and the USA have?

The "liked mindedness" idea becomes even more hilarious when you look at the government of Turkey and its neo-Ottoman/semi-Islamist autocratic leader Erdogan and the post-national liberal governments of places like Canada.

---

And what was Turkey's Government like when they joined? Turkey is also a top 20ish economy and very Capitalist. Even if not, what is wrong with joining for security? You know the real world is not just meet all three or NO.

---

In 1952 Turkey had a Kemalist government (same type of guys who mass murdered the Christian Armenians and Assyrian Christians during world war I)

Also committed the anti-Greek Christian pogroms that destroyed the native Greeks of Istanbul who had been there since the time of Constantine the great.


[In 67 September 1955 an anti-Greek pogrom was orchestrated in Istanbul by the Turkish military's Tactical Mobilization Group. The events were triggered by the news that the Turkish consulate in Thessaloniki, north Greece the house where Mustafa Kemal Atatrk was born in 1881 had been bombed the day before. A bomb planted by a Turkish usher of the consulate, who was later arrested and confessed, incited the events. The Turkish press conveying the news in Turkey was silent about the arrest and instead insinuated that Greeks had set off the bomb. Over a dozen people died during or after the pogrom as a result of beatings and arson. Jews, Armenians and others were also harmed. In addition to commercial targets, the mob clearly targeted property owned or administered by the Greek Orthodox Church. 73 churches and 23 schools were vandalized, burned or destroyed, as were 8 asperses and 3 monasteries.

The pogrom greatly accelerated emigration of ethnic Greeks from Turkey, and the Istanbul region in particular. The Greek population of Turkey declined from 119,822 persons in 1927, to about 7,000 by 1978. In Istanbul alone, the Greek population decreased from 65,108 to 49,081 between 1955 and 1960.]

---

So Turkey should be out. The Baltics? Out. Finland, Sweden, Poland, Czech, Eastern Part of Germany, Australia, Romania... Basically, all of NATO should be disbanded and the US maybe pay reparations to most of the world while we are at it? How about adding Texas, NM, AZ and CA to give back to Mexico? Would giving AK to the Russians make up for all the harm we have done? HI needs to be reverted to a Kingdom, throw in the 7th Fleet to make up. That cover it? I am sure if you think about it there is someone else the US has harmed that we can pay. Maybe just dissolve the US. Would that suffice?


There is absolutely NOT ONE THING that NATO and US has done well according to you guys.

---

Well of course that is a lie and no one on this thread ever said that.

NATO was a necessary military alliance to stop the spread of Communism and the massive socialist empire called the USSR. The communists being backed up by the Red Army that had 400 division stationed in Europe, 25,000 tanks, and 45,000 nukes. Along with 8 other Warsaw pact countries under communist rule with their armies.

The USSR and the Warsaw pact are now long long gone.

https://www.foreignexchanges.news/p/nato-has-outlived-its-usefulness
[In many ways, NATO was wildly successful in its time. But that time is over, and now it should be dismantled...

The decision to keep NATO operating after the Cold War ensured that it functioned as support for the US hegemon. During the Cold War, as NATO's website proudly affirms, the organization's "forces were not involved in a single military engagement." Instead, to borrow the historian Walter LaFeber's phrasing, NATO was mainly used "as a means to deal with more immediate problems [than a Soviet invasion]the integration of the Federal Republic of Germany into the West, the easing of Franco-German hatreds, the anchoring of a Great Britain tossed between continental and Atlantic-Commonwealth interests," and other intra-North Atlantic concerns. It was primarily a tool of integration.

But once the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, NATO rapidly became an arm of the US Empire. Or as NATO's website benignly puts it, with "changing conditions came new responsibilities. From being an exclusively defensive alliance for nearly half a century, NATO began to assume an increasingly proactive role within the international community." It participated in the Gulf War; the conflicts that rent the former Yugoslavia; the War on Terror; the Afghanistan War; and the Iraq War, to name only a few of its contributions. Indeed, by early 2021, NATO was partaking in operations in Afghanistan, Kosovo, the Mediterranean, Africa, and elsewhere.

The alliance has also grown to thirty members, and now includes many nations that were once in the Soviet sphere of influence, like Albania, Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and Romania. Unsurprisingly, the organization's wanton expansion into Eastern Europe has provoked Russia imagine how US decision-makers would have felt had Canada or Mexico joined the Warsaw Pact and NATO has been a useful foil for Russian President Vladimir Putin, helping him justify his revanchist foreign policy.

As this all suggests, there are significant drawbacks to NATO's continuing existence.]

---

Doesn't the Russian invasion of Ukraine demonstrate that oldest Russian desires for empire are alive and well?

---

No, not really. Russia's position isn't what it was during the time of the czars or the empire. It's not even what it was during the Cold War, when their forces were massed across from NATO with clear paths of attack. To say Russia will always do such-and-such because that's what they did centuries ago is meaningless. It's just another way of saying you don't like or trust Russia.

The explanation for the Ukraine war is in recent history, and it's all too obvious. They're doing what any great power would do in their situation.

---

They literally ****ing did it 16 months ago and you're in here saying they're not in the same position. My good man, you're a special kind of special

---

Not every military operation is empire-building, at least not according to the minds assembled here. See for example every invasion ever perpetrated by the oh-so-not-imperial USA.

---

so the stated goal per Russian state tv of wiping a nationality, language, and nation off the map along with the rape and plunder of its assets doesn't count as empire building to your regarded ass?

trey3216 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

trey3216 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

whiterock said:

---

Redbrickbear said:

---

RMF5630 said:

---

Redbrickbear said:

---

RMF5630 said:

---

Redbrickbear said:

---

RMF5630 said:

---

Redbrickbear said:

---

You think there is more reason to expand NATO into the east today than in 1990? What?

You think modern Russia is more of a threat than the super power that was the USSR?

---

Why does Russia have to be a threat for NATO to add nations that are like minded, want to join the EU and want freedom that security brings? Is Russia being a threat the only reason NATO can add? Or a nation that wants t o join NATO can join?

---

What common values and "like mindedness" do you think Britain, France, Albania, Canada, Romania, Portugal, Croatia, Turkey, Estonia, Greece, and the USA have?

The "liked mindedness" idea becomes even more hilarious when you look at the government of Turkey and its neo-Ottoman/semi-Islamist autocratic leader Erdogan and the post-national liberal governments of places like Canada.

---

And what was Turkey's Government like when they joined? Turkey is also a top 20ish economy and very Capitalist. Even if not, what is wrong with joining for security? You know the real world is not just meet all three or NO.

---

In 1952 Turkey had a Kemalist government (same type of guys who mass murdered the Christian Armenians and Assyrian Christians during world war I)

Also committed the anti-Greek Christian pogroms that destroyed the native Greeks of Istanbul who had been there since the time of Constantine the great.


[In 67 September 1955 an anti-Greek pogrom was orchestrated in Istanbul by the Turkish military's Tactical Mobilization Group. The events were triggered by the news that the Turkish consulate in Thessaloniki, north Greece the house where Mustafa Kemal Atatrk was born in 1881 had been bombed the day before. A bomb planted by a Turkish usher of the consulate, who was later arrested and confessed, incited the events. The Turkish press conveying the news in Turkey was silent about the arrest and instead insinuated that Greeks had set off the bomb. Over a dozen people died during or after the pogrom as a result of beatings and arson. Jews, Armenians and others were also harmed. In addition to commercial targets, the mob clearly targeted property owned or administered by the Greek Orthodox Church. 73 churches and 23 schools were vandalized, burned or destroyed, as were 8 asperses and 3 monasteries.

The pogrom greatly accelerated emigration of ethnic Greeks from Turkey, and the Istanbul region in particular. The Greek population of Turkey declined from 119,822 persons in 1927, to about 7,000 by 1978. In Istanbul alone, the Greek population decreased from 65,108 to 49,081 between 1955 and 1960.]

---

So Turkey should be out. The Baltics? Out. Finland, Sweden, Poland, Czech, Eastern Part of Germany, Australia, Romania... Basically, all of NATO should be disbanded and the US maybe pay reparations to most of the world while we are at it? How about adding Texas, NM, AZ and CA to give back to Mexico? Would giving AK to the Russians make up for all the harm we have done? HI needs to be reverted to a Kingdom, throw in the 7th Fleet to make up. That cover it? I am sure if you think about it there is someone else the US has harmed that we can pay. Maybe just dissolve the US. Would that suffice?


There is absolutely NOT ONE THING that NATO and US has done well according to you guys.

---

Well of course that is a lie and no one on this thread ever said that.

NATO was a necessary military alliance to stop the spread of Communism and the massive socialist empire called the USSR. The communists being backed up by the Red Army that had 400 division stationed in Europe, 25,000 tanks, and 45,000 nukes. Along with 8 other Warsaw pact countries under communist rule with their armies.

The USSR and the Warsaw pact are now long long gone.

https://www.foreignexchanges.news/p/nato-has-outlived-its-usefulness
[In many ways, NATO was wildly successful in its time. But that time is over, and now it should be dismantled...

The decision to keep NATO operating after the Cold War ensured that it functioned as support for the US hegemon. During the Cold War, as NATO's website proudly affirms, the organization's "forces were not involved in a single military engagement." Instead, to borrow the historian Walter LaFeber's phrasing, NATO was mainly used "as a means to deal with more immediate problems [than a Soviet invasion]the integration of the Federal Republic of Germany into the West, the easing of Franco-German hatreds, the anchoring of a Great Britain tossed between continental and Atlantic-Commonwealth interests," and other intra-North Atlantic concerns. It was primarily a tool of integration.

But once the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, NATO rapidly became an arm of the US Empire. Or as NATO's website benignly puts it, with "changing conditions came new responsibilities. From being an exclusively defensive alliance for nearly half a century, NATO began to assume an increasingly proactive role within the international community." It participated in the Gulf War; the conflicts that rent the former Yugoslavia; the War on Terror; the Afghanistan War; and the Iraq War, to name only a few of its contributions. Indeed, by early 2021, NATO was partaking in operations in Afghanistan, Kosovo, the Mediterranean, Africa, and elsewhere.

The alliance has also grown to thirty members, and now includes many nations that were once in the Soviet sphere of influence, like Albania, Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and Romania. Unsurprisingly, the organization's wanton expansion into Eastern Europe has provoked Russia imagine how US decision-makers would have felt had Canada or Mexico joined the Warsaw Pact and NATO has been a useful foil for Russian President Vladimir Putin, helping him justify his revanchist foreign policy.

As this all suggests, there are significant drawbacks to NATO's continuing existence.]

---

Doesn't the Russian invasion of Ukraine demonstrate that oldest Russian desires for empire are alive and well?

---

No, not really. Russia's position isn't what it was during the time of the czars or the empire. It's not even what it was during the Cold War, when their forces were massed across from NATO with clear paths of attack. To say Russia will always do such-and-such because that's what they did centuries ago is meaningless. It's just another way of saying you don't like or trust Russia.

The explanation for the Ukraine war is in recent history, and it's all too obvious. They're doing what any great power would do in their situation.

---

They literally ****ing did it 16 months ago and you're in here saying they're not in the same position. My good man, you're a special kind of special

---

Not every military operation is empire-building, at least not according to the minds assembled here. See for example every invasion ever perpetrated by the oh-so-not-imperial USA.

---

so the stated goal per Russian state tv of wiping a nationality, language, and nation off the map along with the rape and plunder of its assets doesn't count as empire building to your regarded ass?

---

Russia is in Ukraine for reasons that are very specific to Ukraine. Nothing in their words or actions suggests that it's part of any imperial project or ancestral urge to conquer.

Sam Lowry said:

---

RMF5630 said:

---

Redbrickbear said:

---

RMF5630 said:

---

Redbrickbear said:

---

RMF5630 said:

---

Redbrickbear said:

---

RMF5630 said:

---

Redbrickbear said:

---

RMF5630 said:

---

Redbrickbear said:

---

RMF5630 said:

---

whiterock said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

whiterock said:

---

Redbrickbear said:

---

[The United States has committed itself to expanding NATO to Russia's borders. NATO, of course, stands for "North Atlantic Treaty Organization." A nave onlooker might ask why countries like Bulgaria, Finland, and Poland would be included in such a treaty. The answer is pretty simple: NATO has nothing to do with the North Atlantic. It is an anti-Russian military alliance.

Russia knew (or, rather, knows) that Ukraine has been courting both the European Union and NATO. Kiev wants to unite itself politically, economically, and militarily to the West. That would mean the United States has a right to place more troops and artillery on Russia's border. Russia didn't like that, and so it lashed out.
But the question is why does the United States want to put troops and artillery on Russia's border? Why has it maintained and, indeed, expanded this anti-Russian alliance, even though its original objective (i.e., the destruction of the Soviet Union) has been accomplished?

Our leaders have been clear on that point. To quote Richard Moore, the current chief of MI6: "With the tragedy and destruction unfolding so distressingly in Ukraine, we should remember the values and hard-won freedoms that distinguish us from Putin, none more than LGBT+ rights."
This isn't Kremlin disinformation. These are the words coming from the horse's mouth. We hate Russia because they are mean to the gays.
Deacon Nicholas Kotar, the great novelist and translator, gave a wider view:

Quote:

---

What the Russian government is doing is setting a red line to the spread of NGO-style liberal democracy. And Ukraine, unfortunately, has been a buffer zone, and a kind of test-case, for the spread, not of a political system, but of a system of values, that is espoused by the elites only....The problem is that with all these colored revolutions, no matter how you look at it, the thing that comes in together with the money is an insistence, unfortunately, on the adoption of the Western liberal cultural milieu. It happened in Georgia, it happened in Ukraine, it happened everywhere.

---

Ultimately, this isn't about Russia. It's not even about Ukraine. It's about us. Western elites want us to believe that the triumph of "NGO-style liberal democracy" is inevitable everywhere. But it's not. Russia is living proof of that.]

---

By contrast, when NATO expanded into the former Warsaw Pact nations and the Baltics, no permanent bases with standing maneuver units were stationed there.

---

Again, this is not true. Poland hosts both the forward command of the Army V Corps, first announced in 2020, and the "semi-permanent" headquarters of the 3rd Armored Brigade Combat Team of the 4th Infantry Division, which has been there since 2017 (and also has a rotational presence in Estonia and Latvia).

---

and what you say is true, but misleading. A forward command post is not a combat unit. There are no permanent bases with combat units permanently stationed in the former Warsaw Pact countries, out of deference to Russian sensitivities. the F-16s on Combat Air Patrol over Romania are permanently stationed in Germany and Italy. Those aircraft were maintained and fueled from their home bases. Yes, they landed on a "Nato airbase" in Romania. But the fuel, the refueling tankers, cargo flights of spare parts, etc....took off every few hours from home base back in Italy and Germany. ....because we do not permanently station combat aircraft in Romania, out of deference to Russia. We do, however, maintain the infrastructure in fmr WP countries to quickly receive those aircraft if/when needed. But they "live" in Germany and Italy. (and those bases in Germany and Italy had to bring in aircraft (mostly F-35s and F-15s) from elsewhere in the DOD to fulfill the mission of those F-16's sent to Romania.)

So my statement is both correct and true. We have no permanent stationing of combat units in fmr WP.

Out of deference to Russia.

Who invaded Ukraine anyway.

So what did that deference buy us?

Nothing.

It demonstrated weakness.

Russia exploited it.

Need to station armored divisions and combat aircraft in fmr WP nations soon.

To avoid showing further weakness to Russia.

---

They say that like it is a bad thing. I think it is great that we are getting permanent bases in Poland. If Germany doesn't want us, Poland sure does... Same with the Baltics.

---

There is no evidence of that.

The Germans love the injection of cash that U.S. imperial bases provide....and love the free protection.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/aug/02/removal-of-us-troops-from-germany-will-gravely-affect-local-communities

[Simply not OK': removal of US troops worries German communities.
Politicians say withdrawal of up to 12,000 soldiers will hurt local economy and makes little strategic sense]

---

Poll: Germans Want US Troops and Nuclear Weapons to Leave Country (businessinsider.com)


There are more. But, amazing how the attitude changed when the Tanks rolled into Ukraine. US aint' so bad...

---

They also want to live without using coal power but also without building any more nuclear reactors.

I doubt the German leadership would ever actual try and remove US troops. And as you said if they were foolish enough to do that then Poland would be more than happy to have the huge injection of cash.

---

Not only cash, presence.

---

eh....the cash would be 90% of the attraction

---

2 years ago, maybe since Ukraine... Deterrence plays a big part, especially the newer NATO members on the frontier with Russia.I know don't tell me, that is not the real reason. Right? Is anything EVER as it seems or what the data shows? According to this site, no. There is always an "inside" reason that only the truly educated or well connected know!


Permanent deterrence: Enhancements to the US military presence in North Central Europe - Atlantic Council

---

Are we back to the idea that Russia is gonna attempt to roll their tanks into Warsaw again?

You and whiterock have to make up your minds. Is Russia this massively powerful military force that is about to expand deep into Central Europe....or is it a corrupt demographically declining nation that can not even force its will on a deeply corrupt and poor Ukraine?

It can't be bot

---

You know there is a reason Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania, Poland and now Finland are all joining NATO, basically anyone that borders Russia wants to join NATO! Russia.

There are so many Nations looking to join NATO that there is a multi-year process to get in. Yet, NATO and the US are bad? You don't see an inconsistency there, huh?

---

It does not bode well for your argument that you make to literally make up statements and attribute them to me.

I never said NATO and the USA are bad.

What people have questioned if is pushing NATO up to the very borders of Russia is in the best interest of average Americans and Europe in general.

---

Well, if NATO is a defensive organization to protect Europe it makes sense to include everything up to the borders of those that are prone to invade.

---

On the contrary, it makes sense to have a buffer.

---

Giving a hostile opponent room to maneuver and build a several hundred miles of defensive positions is a recipe for huge losses on both sides. Not to mention the "buffer" that wants to develop and grow, not be a meat grinder for Putin! They have no say in this? That is a ludicrous position. If Ukraine was allowed in when Poland came in to NATO none of this would have happened. Ok let Putin play with the tyrant s on Syria, N Korea and Iran that want a Russian style govt. Poland, Ukraine, and the Baltics see their futures to the west.

RMF5630 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

RMF5630 said:

---

Redbrickbear said:

---

RMF5630 said:

---

Redbrickbear said:

---

RMF5630 said:

---

Redbrickbear said:

---

RMF5630 said:

---

Redbrickbear said:

---

RMF5630 said:

---

Redbrickbear said:

---

RMF5630 said:

---

whiterock said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

whiterock said:

---

Redbrickbear said:

---

[The United States has committed itself to expanding NATO to Russia's borders. NATO, of course, stands for "North Atlantic Treaty Organization." A nave onlooker might ask why countries like Bulgaria, Finland, and Poland would be included in such a treaty. The answer is pretty simple: NATO has nothing to do with the North Atlantic. It is an anti-Russian military alliance.

Russia knew (or, rather, knows) that Ukraine has been courting both the European Union and NATO. Kiev wants to unite itself politically, economically, and militarily to the West. That would mean the United States has a right to place more troops and artillery on Russia's border. Russia didn't like that, and so it lashed out.
But the question is why does the United States want to put troops and artillery on Russia's border? Why has it maintained and, indeed, expanded this anti-Russian alliance, even though its original objective (i.e., the destruction of the Soviet Union) has been accomplished?

Our leaders have been clear on that point. To quote Richard Moore, the current chief of MI6: "With the tragedy and destruction unfolding so distressingly in Ukraine, we should remember the values and hard-won freedoms that distinguish us from Putin, none more than LGBT+ rights."
This isn't Kremlin disinformation. These are the words coming from the horse's mouth. We hate Russia because they are mean to the gays.
Deacon Nicholas Kotar, the great novelist and translator, gave a wider view:

Quote:

---

What the Russian government is doing is setting a red line to the spread of NGO-style liberal democracy. And Ukraine, unfortunately, has been a buffer zone, and a kind of test-case, for the spread, not of a political system, but of a system of values, that is espoused by the elites only....The problem is that with all these colored revolutions, no matter how you look at it, the thing that comes in together with the money is an insistence, unfortunately, on the adoption of the Western liberal cultural milieu. It happened in Georgia, it happened in Ukraine, it happened everywhere.

---

Ultimately, this isn't about Russia. It's not even about Ukraine. It's about us. Western elites want us to believe that the triumph of "NGO-style liberal democracy" is inevitable everywhere. But it's not. Russia is living proof of that.]

---

By contrast, when NATO expanded into the former Warsaw Pact nations and the Baltics, no permanent bases with standing maneuver units were stationed there.

---

Again, this is not true. Poland hosts both the forward command of the Army V Corps, first announced in 2020, and the "semi-permanent" headquarters of the 3rd Armored Brigade Combat Team of the 4th Infantry Division, which has been there since 2017 (and also has a rotational presence in Estonia and Latvia).

---

and what you say is true, but misleading. A forward command post is not a combat unit. There are no permanent bases with combat units permanently stationed in the former Warsaw Pact countries, out of deference to Russian sensitivities. the F-16s on Combat Air Patrol over Romania are permanently stationed in Germany and Italy. Those aircraft were maintained and fueled from their home bases. Yes, they landed on a "Nato airbase" in Romania. But the fuel, the refueling tankers, cargo flights of spare parts, etc....took off every few hours from home base back in Italy and Germany. ....because we do not permanently station combat aircraft in Romania, out of deference to Russia. We do, however, maintain the infrastructure in fmr WP countries to quickly receive those aircraft if/when needed. But they "live" in Germany and Italy. (and those bases in Germany and Italy had to bring in aircraft (mostly F-35s and F-15s) from elsewhere in the DOD to fulfill the mission of those F-16's sent to Romania.)

So my statement is both correct and true. We have no permanent stationing of combat units in fmr WP.

Out of deference to Russia.

Who invaded Ukraine anyway.

So what did that deference buy us?

Nothing.

It demonstrated weakness.

Russia exploited it.

Need to station armored divisions and combat aircraft in fmr WP nations soon.

To avoid showing further weakness to Russia.

---

They say that like it is a bad thing. I think it is great that we are getting permanent bases in Poland. If Germany doesn't want us, Poland sure does... Same with the Baltics.

---

There is no evidence of that.

The Germans love the injection of cash that U.S. imperial bases provide....and love the free protection.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/aug/02/removal-of-us-troops-from-germany-will-gravely-affect-local-communities

[Simply not OK': removal of US troops worries German communities.
Politicians say withdrawal of up to 12,000 soldiers will hurt local economy and makes little strategic sense]

---

Poll: Germans Want US Troops and Nuclear Weapons to Leave Country (businessinsider.com)


There are more. But, amazing how the attitude changed when the Tanks rolled into Ukraine. US aint' so bad...

---

They also want to live without using coal power but also without building any more nuclear reactors.

I doubt the German leadership would ever actual try and remove US troops. And as you said if they were foolish enough to do that then Poland would be more than happy to have the huge injection of cash.

---

Not only cash, presence.

---

eh....the cash would be 90% of the attraction

---

2 years ago, maybe since Ukraine... Deterrence plays a big part, especially the newer NATO members on the frontier with Russia.I know don't tell me, that is not the real reason. Right? Is anything EVER as it seems or what the data shows? According to this site, no. There is always an "inside" reason that only the truly educated or well connected know!


Permanent deterrence: Enhancements to the US military presence in North Central Europe - Atlantic Council

---

Are we back to the idea that Russia is gonna attempt to roll their tanks into Warsaw again?

You and whiterock have to make up your minds. Is Russia this massively powerful military force that is about to expand deep into Central Europe....or is it a corrupt demographically declining nation that can not even force its will on a deeply corrupt and poor Ukraine?

It can't be bot

---

You know there is a reason Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania, Poland and now Finland are all joining NATO, basically anyone that borders Russia wants to join NATO! Russia.

There are so many Nations looking to join NATO that there is a multi-year process to get in. Yet, NATO and the US are bad? You don't see an inconsistency there, huh?

---

It does not bode well for your argument that you make to literally make up statements and attribute them to me.

I never said NATO and the USA are bad.

What people have questioned if is pushing NATO up to the very borders of Russia is in the best interest of average Americans and Europe in general.

---

Well, if NATO is a defensive organization to protect Europe it makes sense to include everything up to the borders of those that are prone to invade.

---

On the contrary, it makes sense to have a buffer.

---

Giving a hostile opponent room to maneuver and build a several hundred miles of defensive positions is a recipe for huge losses on both sides. Not to mention the "buffer" that wants to develop and grow, not be a meat grinder for Putin! They have no say in this? That is a ludicrous position. If Ukraine was allowed in when Poland came in to NATO none of this would have happened. Ok let Putin play with the tyrant s on Syria, N Korea and Iran that want a Russian style govt. Poland, Ukraine, and the Baltics see their futures to the west.

---

Ukraine was not asking to join NATO back in 1999 when Poland joined.

No one was keeping them out.

Are you under the impression that they wanted to join?

In fact there would be no discussion on the issue today it it was not for a U.S. back coup in Kyiv back in 2014

Redbrickbear said:

---

RMF5630 said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

RMF5630 said:

---

Redbrickbear said:

---

RMF5630 said:

---

Redbrickbear said:

---

RMF5630 said:

---

Redbrickbear said:

---

RMF5630 said:

---

Redbrickbear said:

---

RMF5630 said:

---

Redbrickbear said:

---

RMF5630 said:

---

whiterock said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

whiterock said:

---

Redbrickbear said:

---

[The United States has committed itself to expanding NATO to Russia's borders. NATO, of course, stands for "North Atlantic Treaty Organization." A nave onlooker might ask why countries like Bulgaria, Finland, and Poland would be included in such a treaty. The answer is pretty simple: NATO has nothing to do with the North Atlantic. It is an anti-Russian military alliance.

Russia knew (or, rather, knows) that Ukraine has been courting both the European Union and NATO. Kiev wants to unite itself politically, economically, and militarily to the West. That would mean the United States has a right to place more troops and artillery on Russia's border. Russia didn't like that, and so it lashed out.
But the question is why does the United States want to put troops and artillery on Russia's border? Why has it maintained and, indeed, expanded this anti-Russian alliance, even though its original objective (i.e., the destruction of the Soviet Union) has been accomplished?

Our leaders have been clear on that point. To quote Richard Moore, the current chief of MI6: "With the tragedy and destruction unfolding so distressingly in Ukraine, we should remember the values and hard-won freedoms that distinguish us from Putin, none more than LGBT+ rights."
This isn't Kremlin disinformation. These are the words coming from the horse's mouth. We hate Russia because they are mean to the gays.
Deacon Nicholas Kotar, the great novelist and translator, gave a wider view:

Quote:

---

What the Russian government is doing is setting a red line to the spread of NGO-style liberal democracy. And Ukraine, unfortunately, has been a buffer zone, and a kind of test-case, for the spread, not of a political system, but of a system of values, that is espoused by the elites only....The problem is that with all these colored revolutions, no matter how you look at it, the thing that comes in together with the money is an insistence, unfortunately, on the adoption of the Western liberal cultural milieu. It happened in Georgia, it happened in Ukraine, it happened everywhere.

---

Ultimately, this isn't about Russia. It's not even about Ukraine. It's about us. Western elites want us to believe that the triumph of "NGO-style liberal democracy" is inevitable everywhere. But it's not. Russia is living proof of that.]

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By contrast, when NATO expanded into the former Warsaw Pact nations and the Baltics, no permanent bases with standing maneuver units were stationed there.

---

Again, this is not true. Poland hosts both the forward command of the Army V Corps, first announced in 2020, and the "semi-permanent" headquarters of the 3rd Armored Brigade Combat Team of the 4th Infantry Division, which has been there since 2017 (and also has a rotational presence in Estonia and Latvia).

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and what you say is true, but misleading. A forward command post is not a combat unit. There are no permanent bases with combat units permanently stationed in the former Warsaw Pact countries, out of deference to Russian sensitivities. the F-16s on Combat Air Patrol over Romania are permanently stationed in Germany and Italy. Those aircraft were maintained and fueled from their home bases. Yes, they landed on a "Nato airbase" in Romania. But the fuel, the refueling tankers, cargo flights of spare parts, etc....took off every few hours from home base back in Italy and Germany. ....because we do not permanently station combat aircraft in Romania, out of deference to Russia. We do, however, maintain the infrastructure in fmr WP countries to quickly receive those aircraft if/when needed. But they "live" in Germany and Italy. (and those bases in Germany and Italy had to bring in aircraft (mostly F-35s and F-15s) from elsewhere in the DOD to fulfill the mission of those F-16's sent to Romania.)

So my statement is both correct and true. We have no permanent stationing of combat units in fmr WP.

Out of deference to Russia.

Who invaded Ukraine anyway.

So what did that deference buy us?

Nothing.

It demonstrated weakness.

Russia exploited it.

Need to station armored divisions and combat aircraft in fmr WP nations soon.

To avoid showing further weakness to Russia.

---

They say that like it is a bad thing. I think it is great that we are getting permanent bases in Poland. If Germany doesn't want us, Poland sure does... Same with the Baltics.

---

There is no evidence of that.

The Germans love the injection of cash that U.S. imperial bases provide....and love the free protection.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/aug/02/removal-of-us-troops-from-germany-will-gravely-affect-local-communities

[Simply not OK': removal of US troops worries German communities.
Politicians say withdrawal of up to 12,000 soldiers will hurt local economy and makes little strategic sense]

---

Poll: Germans Want US Troops and Nuclear Weapons to Leave Country (businessinsider.com)


There are more. But, amazing how the attitude changed when the Tanks rolled into Ukraine. US aint' so bad...

---

They also want to live without using coal power but also without building any more nuclear reactors.

I doubt the German leadership would ever actual try and remove US troops. And as you said if they were foolish enough to do that then Poland would be more than happy to have the huge injection of cash.

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Not only cash, presence.

---

eh....the cash would be 90% of the attraction

---

2 years ago, maybe since Ukraine... Deterrence plays a big part, especially the newer NATO members on the frontier with Russia.I know don't tell me, that is not the real reason. Right? Is anything EVER as it seems or what the data shows? According to this site, no. There is always an "inside" reason that only the truly educated or well connected know!


Permanent deterrence: Enhancements to the US military presence in North Central Europe - Atlantic Council

---

Are we back to the idea that Russia is gonna attempt to roll their tanks into Warsaw again?

You and whiterock have to make up your minds. Is Russia this massively powerful military force that is about to expand deep into Central Europe....or is it a corrupt demographically declining nation that can not even force its will on a deeply corrupt and poor Ukraine?

It can't be bot

---

You know there is a reason Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania, Poland and now Finland are all joining NATO, basically anyone that borders Russia wants to join NATO! Russia.

There are so many Nations looking to join NATO that there is a multi-year process to get in. Yet, NATO and the US are bad? You don't see an inconsistency there, huh?

---

It does not bode well for your argument that you make to literally make up statements and attribute them to me.

I never said NATO and the USA are bad.

What people have questioned if is pushing NATO up to the very borders of Russia is in the best interest of average Americans and Europe in general.

---

Well, if NATO is a defensive organization to protect Europe it makes sense to include everything up to the borders of those that are prone to invade.

---

On the contrary, it makes sense to have a buffer.

---

Giving a hostile opponent room to maneuver and build a several hundred miles of defensive positions is a recipe for huge losses on both sides. Not to mention the "buffer" that wants to develop and grow, not be a meat grinder for Putin! They have no say in this? That is a ludicrous position. If Ukraine was allowed in when Poland came in to NATO none of this would have happened. Ok let Putin play with the tyrant s on Syria, N Korea and Iran that want a Russian style govt. Poland, Ukraine, and the Baltics see their futures to the west.

---

Ukraine was not asking to join NATO back in 1999 when Poland joined.

No one was keeping them out.

Are you under the impression that they wanted to join?

In fact there would be no discussion on the issue today it it was not for a U.S. back coup in Kyiv back in 2014

---

Come on, the Presidency in Ukraine has been a back and forth between Russia plants and accusations of US coups. Russia has been pouring "ethnic Russians" into Donbas and Crimea forever. All I know is that Ukraine seems to be supporting Zelensky and support his trying to defend Ukraine. Or is that not real? Don't tell me there are 57 ethnic Russian in Kyiv that are against it...

As far back as 2008 Ukraine has tried to join NATO. I was making a comment, but if we are going to play minutia exact semantics games, ok if they joined in 2008 this wouldn't have happened. Better?

RMF5630 said:

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Sam Lowry said:

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RMF5630 said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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RMF5630 said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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RMF5630 said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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RMF5630 said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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RMF5630 said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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RMF5630 said:

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whiterock said:

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Sam Lowry said:

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whiterock said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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[The United States has committed itself to expanding NATO to Russia's borders. NATO, of course, stands for "North Atlantic Treaty Organization." A nave onlooker might ask why countries like Bulgaria, Finland, and Poland would be included in such a treaty. The answer is pretty simple: NATO has nothing to do with the North Atlantic. It is an anti-Russian military alliance.

Russia knew (or, rather, knows) that Ukraine has been courting both the European Union and NATO. Kiev wants to unite itself politically, economically, and militarily to the West. That would mean the United States has a right to place more troops and artillery on Russia's border. Russia didn't like that, and so it lashed out.
But the question is why does the United States want to put troops and artillery on Russia's border? Why has it maintained and, indeed, expanded this anti-Russian alliance, even though its original objective (i.e., the destruction of the Soviet Union) has been accomplished?

Our leaders have been clear on that point. To quote Richard Moore, the current chief of MI6: "With the tragedy and destruction unfolding so distressingly in Ukraine, we should remember the values and hard-won freedoms that distinguish us from Putin, none more than LGBT+ rights."
This isn't Kremlin disinformation. These are the words coming from the horse's mouth. We hate Russia because they are mean to the gays.
Deacon Nicholas Kotar, the great novelist and translator, gave a wider view:

Quote:

---

What the Russian government is doing is setting a red line to the spread of NGO-style liberal democracy. And Ukraine, unfortunately, has been a buffer zone, and a kind of test-case, for the spread, not of a political system, but of a system of values, that is espoused by the elites only....The problem is that with all these colored revolutions, no matter how you look at it, the thing that comes in together with the money is an insistence, unfortunately, on the adoption of the Western liberal cultural milieu. It happened in Georgia, it happened in Ukraine, it happened everywhere.

---

Ultimately, this isn't about Russia. It's not even about Ukraine. It's about us. Western elites want us to believe that the triumph of "NGO-style liberal democracy" is inevitable everywhere. But it's not. Russia is living proof of that.]

---

By contrast, when NATO expanded into the former Warsaw Pact nations and the Baltics, no permanent bases with standing maneuver units were stationed there.

---

Again, this is not true. Poland hosts both the forward command of the Army V Corps, first announced in 2020, and the "semi-permanent" headquarters of the 3rd Armored Brigade Combat Team of the 4th Infantry Division, which has been there since 2017 (and also has a rotational presence in Estonia and Latvia).

---

and what you say is true, but misleading. A forward command post is not a combat unit. There are no permanent bases with combat units permanently stationed in the former Warsaw Pact countries, out of deference to Russian sensitivities. the F-16s on Combat Air Patrol over Romania are permanently stationed in Germany and Italy. Those aircraft were maintained and fueled from their home bases. Yes, they landed on a "Nato airbase" in Romania. But the fuel, the refueling tankers, cargo flights of spare parts, etc....took off every few hours from home base back in Italy and Germany. ....because we do not permanently station combat aircraft in Romania, out of deference to Russia. We do, however, maintain the infrastructure in fmr WP countries to quickly receive those aircraft if/when needed. But they "live" in Germany and Italy. (and those bases in Germany and Italy had to bring in aircraft (mostly F-35s and F-15s) from elsewhere in the DOD to fulfill the mission of those F-16's sent to Romania.)

So my statement is both correct and true. We have no permanent stationing of combat units in fmr WP.

Out of deference to Russia.

Who invaded Ukraine anyway.

So what did that deference buy us?

Nothing.

It demonstrated weakness.

Russia exploited it.

Need to station armored divisions and combat aircraft in fmr WP nations soon.

To avoid showing further weakness to Russia.

---

They say that like it is a bad thing. I think it is great that we are getting permanent bases in Poland. If Germany doesn't want us, Poland sure does... Same with the Baltics.

---

There is no evidence of that.

The Germans love the injection of cash that U.S. imperial bases provide....and love the free protection.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/aug/02/removal-of-us-troops-from-germany-will-gravely-affect-local-communities

[Simply not OK': removal of US troops worries German communities.
Politicians say withdrawal of up to 12,000 soldiers will hurt local economy and makes little strategic sense]

---

Poll: Germans Want US Troops and Nuclear Weapons to Leave Country (businessinsider.com)


There are more. But, amazing how the attitude changed when the Tanks rolled into Ukraine. US aint' so bad...

---

They also want to live without using coal power but also without building any more nuclear reactors.

I doubt the German leadership would ever actual try and remove US troops. And as you said if they were foolish enough to do that then Poland would be more than happy to have the huge injection of cash.

---

Not only cash, presence.

---

eh....the cash would be 90% of the attraction

---

2 years ago, maybe since Ukraine... Deterrence plays a big part, especially the newer NATO members on the frontier with Russia.I know don't tell me, that is not the real reason. Right? Is anything EVER as it seems or what the data shows? According to this site, no. There is always an "inside" reason that only the truly educated or well connected know!


Permanent deterrence: Enhancements to the US military presence in North Central Europe - Atlantic Council

---

Are we back to the idea that Russia is gonna attempt to roll their tanks into Warsaw again?

You and whiterock have to make up your minds. Is Russia this massively powerful military force that is about to expand deep into Central Europe....or is it a corrupt demographically declining nation that can not even force its will on a deeply corrupt and poor Ukraine?

It can't be bot

---

You know there is a reason Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania, Poland and now Finland are all joining NATO, basically anyone that borders Russia wants to join NATO! Russia.

There are so many Nations looking to join NATO that there is a multi-year process to get in. Yet, NATO and the US are bad? You don't see an inconsistency there, huh?

---

It does not bode well for your argument that you make to literally make up statements and attribute them to me.

I never said NATO and the USA are bad.

What people have questioned if is pushing NATO up to the very borders of Russia is in the best interest of average Americans and Europe in general.

---

Well, if NATO is a defensive organization to protect Europe it makes sense to include everything up to the borders of those that are prone to invade.

---

On the contrary, it makes sense to have a buffer.

---

Giving a hostile opponent room to maneuver and build a several hundred miles of defensive positions is a recipe for huge losses on both sides. Not to mention the "buffer" that wants to develop and grow, not be a meat grinder for Putin! They have no say in this? That is a ludicrous position. If Ukraine was allowed in when Poland came in to NATO none of this would have happened. Ok let Putin play with the tyrant s on Syria, N Korea and Iran that want a Russian style govt. Poland, Ukraine, and the Baltics see their futures to the west.

---

Don't even get me started on Syria. The US has made a complete wreck of that place. They are lucky to have Russia's help, if nothing else.

Sam Lowry said:

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RMF5630 said:

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Sam Lowry said:

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RMF5630 said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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RMF5630 said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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RMF5630 said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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RMF5630 said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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RMF5630 said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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RMF5630 said:

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whiterock said:

---

Sam Lowry said:

---

whiterock said:

---

Redbrickbear said:

---

[The United States has committed itself to expanding NATO to Russia's borders. NATO, of course, stands for "North Atlantic Treaty Organization." A nave onlooker might ask why countries like Bulgaria, Finland, and Poland would be included in such a treaty. The answer is pretty simple: NATO has nothing to do with the North Atlantic. It is an anti-Russian military alliance.

Russia knew (or, rather, knows) that Ukraine has been courting both the European Union and NATO. Kiev wants to unite itself politically, economically, and militarily to the West. That would mean the United States has a right to place more troops and artillery on Russia's border. Russia didn't like that, and so it lashed out.
But the question is why does the United States want to put troops and artillery on Russia's border? Why has it maintained and, indeed, expanded this anti-Russian alliance, even though its original objective (i.e., the destruction of the Soviet Union) has been accomplished?

Our leaders have been clear on that point. To quote Richard Moore, the current chief of MI6: "With the tragedy and destruction unfolding so distressingly in Ukraine, we should remember the values and hard-won freedoms that distinguish us from Putin, none more than LGBT+ rights."
This isn't Kremlin disinformation. These are the words coming from the horse's mouth. We hate Russia because they are mean to the gays.
Deacon Nicholas Kotar, the great novelist and translator, gave a wider view:

Quote:

---

What the Russian government is doing is setting a red line to the spread of NGO-style liberal democracy. And Ukraine, unfortunately, has been a buffer zone, and a kind of test-case, for the spread, not of a political system, but of a system of values, that is espoused by the elites only....The problem is that with all these colored revolutions, no matter how you look at it, the thing that comes in together with the money is an insistence, unfortunately, on the adoption of the Western liberal cultural milieu. It happened in Georgia, it happened in Ukraine, it happened everywhere.

---

Ultimately, this isn't about Russia. It's not even about Ukraine. It's about us. Western elites want us to believe that the triumph of "NGO-style liberal democracy" is inevitable everywhere. But it's not. Russia is living proof of that.]

---

By contrast, when NATO expanded into the former Warsaw Pact nations and the Baltics, no permanent bases with standing maneuver units were stationed there.

---

Again, this is not true. Poland hosts both the forward command of the Army V Corps, first announced in 2020, and the "semi-permanent" headquarters of the 3rd Armored Brigade Combat Team of the 4th Infantry Division, which has been there since 2017 (and also has a rotational presence in Estonia and Latvia).

---

and what you say is true, but misleading. A forward command post is not a combat unit. There are no permanent bases with combat units permanently stationed in the former Warsaw Pact countries, out of deference to Russian sensitivities. the F-16s on Combat Air Patrol over Romania are permanently stationed in Germany and Italy. Those aircraft were maintained and fueled from their home bases. Yes, they landed on a "Nato airbase" in Romania. But the fuel, the refueling tankers, cargo flights of spare parts, etc....took off every few hours from home base back in Italy and Germany. ....because we do not permanently station combat aircraft in Romania, out of deference to Russia. We do, however, maintain the infrastructure in fmr WP countries to quickly receive those aircraft if/when needed. But they "live" in Germany and Italy. (and those bases in Germany and Italy had to bring in aircraft (mostly F-35s and F-15s) from elsewhere in the DOD to fulfill the mission of those F-16's sent to Romania.)

So my statement is both correct and true. We have no permanent stationing of combat units in fmr WP.

Out of deference to Russia.

Who invaded Ukraine anyway.

So what did that deference buy us?

Nothing.

It demonstrated weakness.

Russia exploited it.

Need to station armored divisions and combat aircraft in fmr WP nations soon.

To avoid showing further weakness to Russia.

---

They say that like it is a bad thing. I think it is great that we are getting permanent bases in Poland. If Germany doesn't want us, Poland sure does... Same with the Baltics.

---

There is no evidence of that.

The Germans love the injection of cash that U.S. imperial bases provide....and love the free protection.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/aug/02/removal-of-us-troops-from-germany-will-gravely-affect-local-communities

[Simply not OK': removal of US troops worries German communities.
Politicians say withdrawal of up to 12,000 soldiers will hurt local economy and makes little strategic sense]

---

Poll: Germans Want US Troops and Nuclear Weapons to Leave Country (businessinsider.com)


There are more. But, amazing how the attitude changed when the Tanks rolled into Ukraine. US aint' so bad...

---

They also want to live without using coal power but also without building any more nuclear reactors.

I doubt the German leadership would ever actual try and remove US troops. And as you said if they were foolish enough to do that then Poland would be more than happy to have the huge injection of cash.

---

Not only cash, presence.

---

eh....the cash would be 90% of the attraction

---

2 years ago, maybe since Ukraine... Deterrence plays a big part, especially the newer NATO members on the frontier with Russia.I know don't tell me, that is not the real reason. Right? Is anything EVER as it seems or what the data shows? According to this site, no. There is always an "inside" reason that only the truly educated or well connected know!


Permanent deterrence: Enhancements to the US military presence in North Central Europe - Atlantic Council

---

Are we back to the idea that Russia is gonna attempt to roll their tanks into Warsaw again?

You and whiterock have to make up your minds. Is Russia this massively powerful military force that is about to expand deep into Central Europe....or is it a corrupt demographically declining nation that can not even force its will on a deeply corrupt and poor Ukraine?

It can't be bot

---

You know there is a reason Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania, Poland and now Finland are all joining NATO, basically anyone that borders Russia wants to join NATO! Russia.

There are so many Nations looking to join NATO that there is a multi-year process to get in. Yet, NATO and the US are bad? You don't see an inconsistency there, huh?

---

It does not bode well for your argument that you make to literally make up statements and attribute them to me.

I never said NATO and the USA are bad.

What people have questioned if is pushing NATO up to the very borders of Russia is in the best interest of average Americans and Europe in general.

---

Well, if NATO is a defensive organization to protect Europe it makes sense to include everything up to the borders of those that are prone to invade.

---

On the contrary, it makes sense to have a buffer.

---

Giving a hostile opponent room to maneuver and build a several hundred miles of defensive positions is a recipe for huge losses on both sides. Not to mention the "buffer" that wants to develop and grow, not be a meat grinder for Putin! They have no say in this? That is a ludicrous position. If Ukraine was allowed in when Poland came in to NATO none of this would have happened. Ok let Putin play with the tyrant s on Syria, N Korea and Iran that want a Russian style govt. Poland, Ukraine, and the Baltics see their futures to the west.

---

Don't even get me started on Syria. The US has made a complete wreck of that place. They are lucky to have Russia's help, if nothing else.

---

Speaking of Syria:

[Syria has been at war for more than a decade. Its agony continues, with the U.S. punishing the Syrian people for the sins of their rulers. As Syria's neighbors reconcile with President Bashar al-Assad's government, Washington officials are having a meltdown. They want friendly Arab states to continue following America's ostentatiously cruel yet ineffective sanctions policy.

Syria is an enormous tragedy, the greatest disappointment of the ultimately disastrous 2011 Arab Spring.

Syria suffered traumatic civil war, jihadist depredations, and Turkish aggression. The Assad regime brutally suppressed peaceful protests. An armed insurgency emerged, dominated by radical jihadists. The Islamic State sought to establish an Islamist caliphate. The U.S., Europe, Gulf states, Iran, and Russia intervened on varying sides.]

https://www.theamericanconservative.com/the-cruelty-of-syria-sanctions/

Redbrickbear said:

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Quote:

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Quote:

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Quote:

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If you are the true humanist you clam and want peace, the quickest way to peace is make Ukraine a NATO member. If Ukraine was in NATO when the Baltics and Poland came in, no invasion. Crimea is still part of Ukraine. Capitulation leads to war and massive death.

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Russia is so backward and so incompetent in its military that it could not invade and take Poland or Romanian even if they were not in NATO.

Not to mention they don't even want to do that.

You are under the fantasy and delusion that the Russia of 2023 is the USSR of 1953

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Strong alliances keep the peace. Weak or incomplete alliances promote law. It doesn't matter what their capabilities are, only what their insane leader thinks it is.

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How does poor, broke, and demographically declining Bulgaria make the alliance strong?

You assumption is that reckless expansion is a sure sign of strength

---

Would be reckless not to include Bulgaria if available. Here's the benefit:
1) Completes a land-bridge/logistics route from Nato core to Turkey.
2) Denies Russia a land-bridge/logistics route to the Slavic balkan countries.

That is more important than it sounds. Here's why:
Russia co-opts/invades Bulgaria, it accomplishes two objectives. First, it severs completely Greece and Turkey from land connection (ground logistics) to the rest of Nato. It also severs air-bridge connections as well, since Russian air craft and defense systems would effectively deny Nato overflights. That leaves only seaborne logistical connections between the Nato core and its right flank, and those could be interdicted by Russian submarine forces stationed at Tartus, Syria (does the Syrian Civil War make more sense now?) as well as Russian air assets flying from bases in Bulgaria. Net effect is, Nato commo with Turkey/Greece would be forced to depart from western Med ports (Spain/France), the most distant ports from area of need, and run into progressively stiffer threats as they approached Greece/Turkey. Remedy would require an air campaign to regain air superiority over Bulgaria, followed by land invasion to remove the interdictions of air and land logistics, which renders the Russian naval threat to shipping the sole threat to deal with.

That's before we get to the issue of Romania, which is (under your policy) threatened by Bulgaria on the south and Ukraine on the north. If that happens and Romania falls, then Russia owns the Balkans and Turkey/greece is totally isolated. Isolate allies can capitulate, sign a separate peace, etc....allowing your adversary to focus it's total energy on YOU.

So, yeah, your take is myopic. Bulgaria is not a small deal. Everything gets a whole lot easier if you deny Bulgaria to the Russians. With Bulgaria in NATO, all of that Balkan campaign gets quite difficult for Russia (who will have to conduct an amphibious operation to secure it). And it allows Nato to use its offensive capabilities to reduce the sole Russian threat to the Nato Eastern Flank - Tartus - rather than having to use that offensive capability to remove a threat to the most of the southern flank of Nato to include the entirety of Italy, which would be under threat of air/missile attacks from bases in Russian controlled Balkans.

Whatever assets Bulgaria does have will help Nato secure all those threats, rather than help Russia beef up those threats. Where do we want the fight to be....in our yard, or in theirs?

trey3216 said:

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Sam Lowry said:

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whiterock said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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RMF5630 said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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RMF5630 said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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RMF5630 said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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You think there is more reason to expand NATO into the east today than in 1990? What?

You think modern Russia is more of a threat than the super power that was the USSR?

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Why does Russia have to be a threat for NATO to add nations that are like minded, want to join the EU and want freedom that security brings? Is Russia being a threat the only reason NATO can add? Or a nation that wants t o join NATO can join?

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What common values and "like mindedness" do you think Britain, France, Albania, Canada, Romania, Portugal, Croatia, Turkey, Estonia, Greece, and the USA have?

The "liked mindedness" idea becomes even more hilarious when you look at the government of Turkey and its neo-Ottoman/semi-Islamist autocratic leader Erdogan and the post-national liberal governments of places like Canada.

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And what was Turkey's Government like when they joined? Turkey is also a top 20ish economy and very Capitalist. Even if not, what is wrong with joining for security? You know the real world is not just meet all three or NO.

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In 1952 Turkey had a Kemalist government (same type of guys who mass murdered the Christian Armenians and Assyrian Christians during world war I)

Also committed the anti-Greek Christian pogroms that destroyed the native Greeks of Istanbul who had been there since the time of Constantine the great.


[In 67 September 1955 an anti-Greek pogrom was orchestrated in Istanbul by the Turkish military's Tactical Mobilization Group. The events were triggered by the news that the Turkish consulate in Thessaloniki, north Greece the house where Mustafa Kemal Atatrk was born in 1881 had been bombed the day before. A bomb planted by a Turkish usher of the consulate, who was later arrested and confessed, incited the events. The Turkish press conveying the news in Turkey was silent about the arrest and instead insinuated that Greeks had set off the bomb. Over a dozen people died during or after the pogrom as a result of beatings and arson. Jews, Armenians and others were also harmed. In addition to commercial targets, the mob clearly targeted property owned or administered by the Greek Orthodox Church. 73 churches and 23 schools were vandalized, burned or destroyed, as were 8 asperses and 3 monasteries.

The pogrom greatly accelerated emigration of ethnic Greeks from Turkey, and the Istanbul region in particular. The Greek population of Turkey declined from 119,822 persons in 1927, to about 7,000 by 1978. In Istanbul alone, the Greek population decreased from 65,108 to 49,081 between 1955 and 1960.]

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So Turkey should be out. The Baltics? Out. Finland, Sweden, Poland, Czech, Eastern Part of Germany, Australia, Romania... Basically, all of NATO should be disbanded and the US maybe pay reparations to most of the world while we are at it? How about adding Texas, NM, AZ and CA to give back to Mexico? Would giving AK to the Russians make up for all the harm we have done? HI needs to be reverted to a Kingdom, throw in the 7th Fleet to make up. That cover it? I am sure if you think about it there is someone else the US has harmed that we can pay. Maybe just dissolve the US. Would that suffice?


There is absolutely NOT ONE THING that NATO and US has done well according to you guys.

---

Well of course that is a lie and no one on this thread ever said that.

NATO was a necessary military alliance to stop the spread of Communism and the massive socialist empire called the USSR. The communists being backed up by the Red Army that had 400 division stationed in Europe, 25,000 tanks, and 45,000 nukes. Along with 8 other Warsaw pact countries under communist rule with their armies.

The USSR and the Warsaw pact are now long long gone.

https://www.foreignexchanges.news/p/nato-has-outlived-its-usefulness
[In many ways, NATO was wildly successful in its time. But that time is over, and now it should be dismantled...

The decision to keep NATO operating after the Cold War ensured that it functioned as support for the US hegemon. During the Cold War, as NATO's website proudly affirms, the organization's "forces were not involved in a single military engagement." Instead, to borrow the historian Walter LaFeber's phrasing, NATO was mainly used "as a means to deal with more immediate problems [than a Soviet invasion]the integration of the Federal Republic of Germany into the West, the easing of Franco-German hatreds, the anchoring of a Great Britain tossed between continental and Atlantic-Commonwealth interests," and other intra-North Atlantic concerns. It was primarily a tool of integration.

But once the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, NATO rapidly became an arm of the US Empire. Or as NATO's website benignly puts it, with "changing conditions came new responsibilities. From being an exclusively defensive alliance for nearly half a century, NATO began to assume an increasingly proactive role within the international community." It participated in the Gulf War; the conflicts that rent the former Yugoslavia; the War on Terror; the Afghanistan War; and the Iraq War, to name only a few of its contributions. Indeed, by early 2021, NATO was partaking in operations in Afghanistan, Kosovo, the Mediterranean, Africa, and elsewhere.

The alliance has also grown to thirty members, and now includes many nations that were once in the Soviet sphere of influence, like Albania, Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and Romania. Unsurprisingly, the organization's wanton expansion into Eastern Europe has provoked Russia imagine how US decision-makers would have felt had Canada or Mexico joined the Warsaw Pact and NATO has been a useful foil for Russian President Vladimir Putin, helping him justify his revanchist foreign policy.

As this all suggests, there are significant drawbacks to NATO's continuing existence.]

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Doesn't the Russian invasion of Ukraine demonstrate that oldest Russian desires for empire are alive and well?

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No, not really. Russia's position isn't what it was during the time of the czars or the empire. It's not even what it was during the Cold War, when their forces were massed across from NATO with clear paths of attack. To say Russia will always do such-and-such because that's what they did centuries ago is meaningless. It's just another way of saying you don't like or trust Russia.

The explanation for the Ukraine war is in recent history, and it's all too obvious. They're doing what any great power would do in their situation.

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They literally ****ing did it 16 months ago and you're in here saying they're not in the same position. My good man, you're a special kind of special

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We should get Sam to point to a time in history of the last 500 years when Russia was NOT playing the expansion game to secure strategic depth as a way to compensate for indefensible borders, insofar as their budgets allowed.

Sam Lowry said:

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so the stated goal per Russian state tv of wiping a nationality, language, and nation off the map along with the rape and plunder of its assets doesn't count as empire building to your regarded ass?
Russia is in Ukraine for reasons that are very specific to Ukraine. Nothing in their words or actions suggests that it's part of any imperial project or ancestral urge to conquer.

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except for the statements of their leadership, and most of the Russian people, that Ukraine is not a "thing," not a real country, but just part of Mother Russia that needs to return home. Frankly, given that the Russian state was BORN in Kyiv, that view is understandable in context, even if it is wildly discordant with Ukrainian perceptions and preferences on the question.

Sam Lowry said:

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2 years ago, maybe since Ukraine... Deterrence plays a big part, especially the newer NATO members on the frontier with Russia.I know don't tell me, that is not the real reason. Right? Is anything EVER as it seems or what the data shows? According to this site, no. There is always an "inside" reason that only the truly educated or well connected know!

Permanent deterrence: Enhancements to the US military presence in North Central Europe - Atlantic Council

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Are we back to the idea that Russia is gonna attempt to roll their tanks into Warsaw again?

You and whiterock have to make up your minds. Is Russia this massively powerful military force that is about to expand deep into Central Europe....or is it a corrupt demographically declining nation that can not even force its will on a deeply corrupt and poor Ukraine?

It can't be bot

---

You know there is a reason Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania, Poland and now Finland are all joining NATO, basically anyone that borders Russia wants to join NATO! Russia.

There are so many Nations looking to join NATO that there is a multi-year process to get in. Yet, NATO and the US are bad? You don't see an inconsistency there, huh?

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It does not bode well for your argument that you make to literally make up statements and attribute them to me.

I never said NATO and the USA are bad.

What people have questioned if is pushing NATO up to the very borders of Russia is in the best interest of average Americans and Europe in general.

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Well, if NATO is a defensive organization to protect Europe it makes sense to include everything up to the borders of those that are prone to invade.

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On the contrary, it makes sense to have a buffer.

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Giving a hostile opponent room to maneuver and build a several hundred miles of defensive positions is a recipe for huge losses on both sides. Not to mention the "buffer" that wants to develop and grow, not be a meat grinder for Putin! They have no say in this? That is a ludicrous position. If Ukraine was allowed in when Poland came in to NATO none of this would have happened. Ok let Putin play with the tyrant s on Syria, N Korea and Iran that want a Russian style govt. Poland, Ukraine, and the Baltics see their futures to the west.

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Don't even get me started on Syria. The US has made a complete wreck of that place. They are lucky to have Russia's help, if nothing else.

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It's not like Syria was the garden of Eden before the current war there started.....

Redbrickbear said:

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Quote:

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Quote:

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Giving a hostile opponent room to maneuver and build a several hundred miles of defensive positions is a recipe for huge losses on both sides. Not to mention the "buffer" that wants to develop and grow, not be a meat grinder for Putin! They have no say in this? That is a ludicrous position. If Ukraine was allowed in when Poland came in to NATO none of this would have happened. Ok let Putin play with the tyrant s on Syria, N Korea and Iran that want a Russian style govt. Poland, Ukraine, and the Baltics see their futures to the west.

---

Don't even get me started on Syria. The US has made a complete wreck of that place. They are lucky to have Russia's help, if nothing else.

---

Speaking of Syria:

[Syria has been at war for more than a decade. Its agony continues, with the U.S. punishing the Syrian people for the sins of their rulers. As Syria's neighbors reconcile with President Bashar al-Assad's government, Washington officials are having a meltdown. They want friendly Arab states to continue following America's ostentatiously cruel yet ineffective sanctions policy.

Syria is an enormous tragedy, the greatest disappointment of the ultimately disastrous 2011 Arab Spring.

Syria suffered traumatic civil war, jihadist depredations, and Turkish aggression. The Assad regime brutally suppressed peaceful protests. An armed insurgency emerged, dominated by radical jihadists. The Islamic State sought to establish an Islamist caliphate. The U.S., Europe, Gulf states, Iran, and Russia intervened on varying sides.]

https://www.theamericanconservative.com/the-cruelty-of-syria-sanctions/

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Just a word of perspective on Syria:

Syria has been a rogue regime my entire life. It's been on the state sponsor of terrorism list for decades. It's a client state of both Russia and Iran. It facilitated and participated with Iranian establishment and growth of Hizballah, which before 9/11 was the terror group responsible for the most number of American casualties (a four-digit number). Sponsored terrorism all over the world. Unprovoked invasions of Israel. Hosting a Russian naval base at Tartus. Sponsoring attacks on American troops in Iraq. Iran's right-hand man in the middle east.....

Syria can bend over and get effed by a herd of camels, as far as I'm concerned.
Those arseholes are not worth of your sympathy.
They've got it coming, due to a dogged determination to make consistently bad policy decisions.

Sam Lowry said:

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RMF5630 said:

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Sam Lowry said:

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RMF5630 said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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RMF5630 said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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RMF5630 said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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RMF5630 said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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RMF5630 said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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RMF5630 said:

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whiterock said:

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Sam Lowry said:

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whiterock said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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[The United States has committed itself to expanding NATO to Russia's borders. NATO, of course, stands for "North Atlantic Treaty Organization." A nave onlooker might ask why countries like Bulgaria, Finland, and Poland would be included in such a treaty. The answer is pretty simple: NATO has nothing to do with the North Atlantic. It is an anti-Russian military alliance.

Russia knew (or, rather, knows) that Ukraine has been courting both the European Union and NATO. Kiev wants to unite itself politically, economically, and militarily to the West. That would mean the United States has a right to place more troops and artillery on Russia's border. Russia didn't like that, and so it lashed out.
But the question is why does the United States want to put troops and artillery on Russia's border? Why has it maintained and, indeed, expanded this anti-Russian alliance, even though its original objective (i.e., the destruction of the Soviet Union) has been accomplished?

Our leaders have been clear on that point. To quote Richard Moore, the current chief of MI6: "With the tragedy and destruction unfolding so distressingly in Ukraine, we should remember the values and hard-won freedoms that distinguish us from Putin, none more than LGBT+ rights."
This isn't Kremlin disinformation. These are the words coming from the horse's mouth. We hate Russia because they are mean to the gays.
Deacon Nicholas Kotar, the great novelist and translator, gave a wider view:

Quote:

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What the Russian government is doing is setting a red line to the spread of NGO-style liberal democracy. And Ukraine, unfortunately, has been a buffer zone, and a kind of test-case, for the spread, not of a political system, but of a system of values, that is espoused by the elites only....The problem is that with all these colored revolutions, no matter how you look at it, the thing that comes in together with the money is an insistence, unfortunately, on the adoption of the Western liberal cultural milieu. It happened in Georgia, it happened in Ukraine, it happened everywhere.

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Ultimately, this isn't about Russia. It's not even about Ukraine. It's about us. Western elites want us to believe that the triumph of "NGO-style liberal democracy" is inevitable everywhere. But it's not. Russia is living proof of that.]

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By contrast, when NATO expanded into the former Warsaw Pact nations and the Baltics, no permanent bases with standing maneuver units were stationed there.

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Again, this is not true. Poland hosts both the forward command of the Army V Corps, first announced in 2020, and the "semi-permanent" headquarters of the 3rd Armored Brigade Combat Team of the 4th Infantry Division, which has been there since 2017 (and also has a rotational presence in Estonia and Latvia).

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and what you say is true, but misleading. A forward command post is not a combat unit. There are no permanent bases with combat units permanently stationed in the former Warsaw Pact countries, out of deference to Russian sensitivities. the F-16s on Combat Air Patrol over Romania are permanently stationed in Germany and Italy. Those aircraft were maintained and fueled from their home bases. Yes, they landed on a "Nato airbase" in Romania. But the fuel, the refueling tankers, cargo flights of spare parts, etc....took off every few hours from home base back in Italy and Germany. ....because we do not permanently station combat aircraft in Romania, out of deference to Russia. We do, however, maintain the infrastructure in fmr WP countries to quickly receive those aircraft if/when needed. But they "live" in Germany and Italy. (and those bases in Germany and Italy had to bring in aircraft (mostly F-35s and F-15s) from elsewhere in the DOD to fulfill the mission of those F-16's sent to Romania.)

So my statement is both correct and true. We have no permanent stationing of combat units in fmr WP.

Out of deference to Russia.

Who invaded Ukraine anyway.

So what did that deference buy us?

Nothing.

It demonstrated weakness.

Russia exploited it.

Need to station armored divisions and combat aircraft in fmr WP nations soon.

To avoid showing further weakness to Russia.

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They say that like it is a bad thing. I think it is great that we are getting permanent bases in Poland. If Germany doesn't want us, Poland sure does... Same with the Baltics.

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There is no evidence of that.

The Germans love the injection of cash that U.S. imperial bases provide....and love the free protection.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/aug/02/removal-of-us-troops-from-germany-will-gravely-affect-local-communities

[Simply not OK': removal of US troops worries German communities.
Politicians say withdrawal of up to 12,000 soldiers will hurt local economy and makes little strategic sense]

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Poll: Germans Want US Troops and Nuclear Weapons to Leave Country (businessinsider.com)


There are more. But, amazing how the attitude changed when the Tanks rolled into Ukraine. US aint' so bad...

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They also want to live without using coal power but also without building any more nuclear reactors.

I doubt the German leadership would ever actual try and remove US troops. And as you said if they were foolish enough to do that then Poland would be more than happy to have the huge injection of cash.

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Not only cash, presence.

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eh....the cash would be 90% of the attraction

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2 years ago, maybe since Ukraine... Deterrence plays a big part, especially the newer NATO members on the frontier with Russia.I know don't tell me, that is not the real reason. Right? Is anything EVER as it seems or what the data shows? According to this site, no. There is always an "inside" reason that only the truly educated or well connected know!


Permanent deterrence: Enhancements to the US military presence in North Central Europe - Atlantic Council

---

Are we back to the idea that Russia is gonna attempt to roll their tanks into Warsaw again?

You and whiterock have to make up your minds. Is Russia this massively powerful military force that is about to expand deep into Central Europe....or is it a corrupt demographically declining nation that can not even force its will on a deeply corrupt and poor Ukraine?

It can't be bot

---

You know there is a reason Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania, Poland and now Finland are all joining NATO, basically anyone that borders Russia wants to join NATO! Russia.

There are so many Nations looking to join NATO that there is a multi-year process to get in. Yet, NATO and the US are bad? You don't see an inconsistency there, huh?

---

It does not bode well for your argument that you make to literally make up statements and attribute them to me.

I never said NATO and the USA are bad.

What people have questioned if is pushing NATO up to the very borders of Russia is in the best interest of average Americans and Europe in general.

---

Well, if NATO is a defensive organization to protect Europe it makes sense to include everything up to the borders of those that are prone to invade.

---

On the contrary, it makes sense to have a buffer.

---

Giving a hostile opponent room to maneuver and build a several hundred miles of defensive positions is a recipe for huge losses on both sides. Not to mention the "buffer" that wants to develop and grow, not be a meat grinder for Putin! They have no say in this? That is a ludicrous position. If Ukraine was allowed in when Poland came in to NATO none of this would have happened. Ok let Putin play with the tyrant s on Syria, N Korea and Iran that want a Russian style govt. Poland, Ukraine, and the Baltics see their futures to the west.

---

Don't even get me started on Syria. The US has made a complete wreck of that place. They are lucky to have Russia's help, if nothing else.

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Assad, Putin, and ? Maybe Kim or Khakeni?? Go for the trifecta of the worst dictators on the planet to defend? Really? You guys can defend these with a straight face and tell us how bad the US is in foreign policy? Did you guys go to Ivy League schools???

whiterock said:

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Sam Lowry said:

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Quote:

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Quote:

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Quote:

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2 years ago, maybe since Ukraine... Deterrence plays a big part, especially the newer NATO members on the frontier with Russia.I know don't tell me, that is not the real reason. Right? Is anything EVER as it seems or what the data shows? According to this site, no. There is always an "inside" reason that only the truly educated or well connected know!

Permanent deterrence: Enhancements to the US military presence in North Central Europe - Atlantic Council

---

Are we back to the idea that Russia is gonna attempt to roll their tanks into Warsaw again?

You and whiterock have to make up your minds. Is Russia this massively powerful military force that is about to expand deep into Central Europe....or is it a corrupt demographically declining nation that can not even force its will on a deeply corrupt and poor Ukraine?

It can't be bot

---

You know there is a reason Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania, Poland and now Finland are all joining NATO, basically anyone that borders Russia wants to join NATO! Russia.

There are so many Nations looking to join NATO that there is a multi-year process to get in. Yet, NATO and the US are bad? You don't see an inconsistency there, huh?

---

It does not bode well for your argument that you make to literally make up statements and attribute them to me.

I never said NATO and the USA are bad.

What people have questioned if is pushing NATO up to the very borders of Russia is in the best interest of average Americans and Europe in general.

---

Well, if NATO is a defensive organization to protect Europe it makes sense to include everything up to the borders of those that are prone to invade.

---

On the contrary, it makes sense to have a buffer.

---

Giving a hostile opponent room to maneuver and build a several hundred miles of defensive positions is a recipe for huge losses on both sides. Not to mention the "buffer" that wants to develop and grow, not be a meat grinder for Putin! They have no say in this? That is a ludicrous position. If Ukraine was allowed in when Poland came in to NATO none of this would have happened. Ok let Putin play with the tyrant s on Syria, N Korea and Iran that want a Russian style govt. Poland, Ukraine, and the Baltics see their futures to the west.

---

Don't even get me started on Syria. The US has made a complete wreck of that place. They are lucky to have Russia's help, if nothing else.

---

It's not like Syria was the garden of Eden before the current war there started.....

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Who said it was?

The point is that regime change war (financed by the U.S.) has failed.

Maybe it's time to try a different approach? Certainly the rest of the Arab states are now interested in pursuing peace.

whiterock said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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Quote:

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Quote:

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Giving a hostile opponent room to maneuver and build a several hundred miles of defensive positions is a recipe for huge losses on both sides. Not to mention the "buffer" that wants to develop and grow, not be a meat grinder for Putin! They have no say in this? That is a ludicrous position. If Ukraine was allowed in when Poland came in to NATO none of this would have happened. Ok let Putin play with the tyrant s on Syria, N Korea and Iran that want a Russian style govt. Poland, Ukraine, and the Baltics see their futures to the west.

---

Don't even get me started on Syria. The US has made a complete wreck of that place. They are lucky to have Russia's help, if nothing else.

---

Speaking of Syria:

[Syria has been at war for more than a decade. Its agony continues, with the U.S. punishing the Syrian people for the sins of their rulers. As Syria's neighbors reconcile with President Bashar al-Assad's government, Washington officials are having a meltdown. They want friendly Arab states to continue following America's ostentatiously cruel yet ineffective sanctions policy.

Syria is an enormous tragedy, the greatest disappointment of the ultimately disastrous 2011 Arab Spring.

Syria suffered traumatic civil war, jihadist depredations, and Turkish aggression. The Assad regime brutally suppressed peaceful protests. An armed insurgency emerged, dominated by radical jihadists. The Islamic State sought to establish an Islamist caliphate. The U.S., Europe, Gulf states, Iran, and Russia intervened on varying sides.]

https://www.theamericanconservative.com/the-cruelty-of-syria-sanctions/

---

Just a word of perspective on Syria:


Syria can bend over and get effed by a herd of camels, as far as I'm concerned.
Those arseholes are not worth of your sympathy.
They've got it coming, due to a dogged determination to make consistently bad policy decisions.

---

Yes yes

You have consistently shown on this forum that you don't care about the lives of foreigners.

But syria is home to millions of people (including millions of Christians) who's only crime is being born in a place with an unjust ruling class.

Maybe we don't help starve them to death just for that?

Redbrickbear said:

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whiterock said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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Quote:

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Quote:

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Giving a hostile opponent room to maneuver and build a several hundred miles of defensive positions is a recipe for huge losses on both sides. Not to mention the "buffer" that wants to develop and grow, not be a meat grinder for Putin! They have no say in this? That is a ludicrous position. If Ukraine was allowed in when Poland came in to NATO none of this would have happened. Ok let Putin play with the tyrant s on Syria, N Korea and Iran that want a Russian style govt. Poland, Ukraine, and the Baltics see their futures to the west.

---

Don't even get me started on Syria. The US has made a complete wreck of that place. They are lucky to have Russia's help, if nothing else.

---

Speaking of Syria:

[Syria has been at war for more than a decade. Its agony continues, with the U.S. punishing the Syrian people for the sins of their rulers. As Syria's neighbors reconcile with President Bashar al-Assad's government, Washington officials are having a meltdown. They want friendly Arab states to continue following America's ostentatiously cruel yet ineffective sanctions policy.

Syria is an enormous tragedy, the greatest disappointment of the ultimately disastrous 2011 Arab Spring.

Syria suffered traumatic civil war, jihadist depredations, and Turkish aggression. The Assad regime brutally suppressed peaceful protests. An armed insurgency emerged, dominated by radical jihadists. The Islamic State sought to establish an Islamist caliphate. The U.S., Europe, Gulf states, Iran, and Russia intervened on varying sides.]

https://www.theamericanconservative.com/the-cruelty-of-syria-sanctions/

---

Just a word of perspective on Syria:


Syria can bend over and get effed by a herd of camels, as far as I'm concerned.
Those arseholes are not worth of your sympathy.
They've got it coming, due to a dogged determination to make consistently bad policy decisions.

---

Yes yes

You have consistently shown on this forum that you don't care about the lives of foreigners.

But syria is home to millions of people (including millions of Christians) who's only crime is being born in a place with an unjust ruling class.

Maybe we don't help starve them to death just for that?

---

Replace the dictator in charge. It seems your solution is to give the dictator that is creating the situation, and worse, what they want in the name of humanitarianism. How do you think that will change anything? Giving Putin what he wants in Ukraine allows him to consolidate resources and so he can than attack somewhere else! Assad, is just a tyrant. There is a reason when he took power in 2000 the "Damascus Spring" ended.

RMF5630 said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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whiterock said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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Quote:

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Quote:

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Giving a hostile opponent room to maneuver and build a several hundred miles of defensive positions is a recipe for huge losses on both sides. Not to mention the "buffer" that wants to develop and grow, not be a meat grinder for Putin! They have no say in this? That is a ludicrous position. If Ukraine was allowed in when Poland came in to NATO none of this would have happened. Ok let Putin play with the tyrant s on Syria, N Korea and Iran that want a Russian style govt. Poland, Ukraine, and the Baltics see their futures to the west.

---

Don't even get me started on Syria. The US has made a complete wreck of that place. They are lucky to have Russia's help, if nothing else.

---

Speaking of Syria:

[Syria has been at war for more than a decade. Its agony continues, with the U.S. punishing the Syrian people for the sins of their rulers. As Syria's neighbors reconcile with President Bashar al-Assad's government, Washington officials are having a meltdown. They want friendly Arab states to continue following America's ostentatiously cruel yet ineffective sanctions policy.

Syria is an enormous tragedy, the greatest disappointment of the ultimately disastrous 2011 Arab Spring.

Syria suffered traumatic civil war, jihadist depredations, and Turkish aggression. The Assad regime brutally suppressed peaceful protests. An armed insurgency emerged, dominated by radical jihadists. The Islamic State sought to establish an Islamist caliphate. The U.S., Europe, Gulf states, Iran, and Russia intervened on varying sides.]

https://www.theamericanconservative.com/the-cruelty-of-syria-sanctions/

---

Just a word of perspective on Syria:


Syria can bend over and get effed by a herd of camels, as far as I'm concerned.
Those arseholes are not worth of your sympathy.
They've got it coming, due to a dogged determination to make consistently bad policy decisions.

---

Yes yes

You have consistently shown on this forum that you don't care about the lives of foreigners.

But syria is home to millions of people (including millions of Christians) who's only crime is being born in a place with an unjust ruling class.

Maybe we don't help starve them to death just for that?

---

Replace the dictator in charge. It seems your solution is to give the dictator that is creating the situation, and worse, what they want in the name of humanitarianism. How do you think that will change anything? Giving Putin what he wants in Ukraine allows him to consolidate resources and so he can then attack somewhere else! Assad, is just a tyrant. There is a reason when he took power in 2000 the "Damascus Spring" ended.

---

If only Assad could be more like those Saudi friends of ours. Such nice people!

Sam Lowry said:

---

RMF5630 said:

---

Redbrickbear said:

---

whiterock said:

---

Redbrickbear said:

---

Quote:

---

Quote:

---

Giving a hostile opponent room to maneuver and build a several hundred miles of defensive positions is a recipe for huge losses on both sides. Not to mention the "buffer" that wants to develop and grow, not be a meat grinder for Putin! They have no say in this? That is a ludicrous position. If Ukraine was allowed in when Poland came in to NATO none of this would have happened. Ok let Putin play with the tyrant s on Syria, N Korea and Iran that want a Russian style govt. Poland, Ukraine, and the Baltics see their futures to the west.

---

Don't even get me started on Syria. The US has made a complete wreck of that place. They are lucky to have Russia's help, if nothing else.

---

Speaking of Syria:

[Syria has been at war for more than a decade. Its agony continues, with the U.S. punishing the Syrian people for the sins of their rulers. As Syria's neighbors reconcile with President Bashar al-Assad's government, Washington officials are having a meltdown. They want friendly Arab states to continue following America's ostentatiously cruel yet ineffective sanctions policy.

Syria is an enormous tragedy, the greatest disappointment of the ultimately disastrous 2011 Arab Spring.

Syria suffered traumatic civil war, jihadist depredations, and Turkish aggression. The Assad regime brutally suppressed peaceful protests. An armed insurgency emerged, dominated by radical jihadists. The Islamic State sought to establish an Islamist caliphate. The U.S., Europe, Gulf states, Iran, and Russia intervened on varying sides.]

https://www.theamericanconservative.com/the-cruelty-of-syria-sanctions/

---

Just a word of perspective on Syria:


Syria can bend over and get effed by a herd of camels, as far as I'm concerned.
Those arseholes are not worth of your sympathy.
They've got it coming, due to a dogged determination to make consistently bad policy decisions.

---

Yes yes

You have consistently shown on this forum that you don't care about the lives of foreigners.

But syria is home to millions of people (including millions of Christians) who's only crime is being born in a place with an unjust ruling class.

Maybe we don't help starve them to death just for that?

---

Replace the dictator in charge. It seems your solution is to give the dictator that is creating the situation, and worse, what they want in the name of humanitarianism. How do you think that will change anything? Giving Putin what he wants in Ukraine allows him to consolidate resources and so he can then attack somewhere else! Assad, is just a tyrant. There is a reason when he took power in 2000 the "Damascus Spring" ended.

---

If only Assad could be more like those Saudi friends of ours. Such nice people!

---

Yeah, if only he could. Too bad he hasn't in the past 23 years.

RMF5630 said:

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Sam Lowry said:

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RMF5630 said:

---

Redbrickbear said:

---

whiterock said:

---

Redbrickbear said:

---

Quote:

---

Quote:

---

Giving a hostile opponent room to maneuver and build a several hundred miles of defensive positions is a recipe for huge losses on both sides. Not to mention the "buffer" that wants to develop and grow, not be a meat grinder for Putin! They have no say in this? That is a ludicrous position. If Ukraine was allowed in when Poland came in to NATO none of this would have happened. Ok let Putin play with the tyrant s on Syria, N Korea and Iran that want a Russian style govt. Poland, Ukraine, and the Baltics see their futures to the west.

---

Don't even get me started on Syria. The US has made a complete wreck of that place. They are lucky to have Russia's help, if nothing else.

---

Speaking of Syria:

[Syria has been at war for more than a decade. Its agony continues, with the U.S. punishing the Syrian people for the sins of their rulers. As Syria's neighbors reconcile with President Bashar al-Assad's government, Washington officials are having a meltdown. They want friendly Arab states to continue following America's ostentatiously cruel yet ineffective sanctions policy.

Syria is an enormous tragedy, the greatest disappointment of the ultimately disastrous 2011 Arab Spring.

Syria suffered traumatic civil war, jihadist depredations, and Turkish aggression. The Assad regime brutally suppressed peaceful protests. An armed insurgency emerged, dominated by radical jihadists. The Islamic State sought to establish an Islamist caliphate. The U.S., Europe, Gulf states, Iran, and Russia intervened on varying sides.]

https://www.theamericanconservative.com/the-cruelty-of-syria-sanctions/

---

Just a word of perspective on Syria:


Syria can bend over and get effed by a herd of camels, as far as I'm concerned.
Those arseholes are not worth of your sympathy.
They've got it coming, due to a dogged determination to make consistently bad policy decisions.

---

Yes yes

You have consistently shown on this forum that you don't care about the lives of foreigners.

But syria is home to millions of people (including millions of Christians) who's only crime is being born in a place with an unjust ruling class.

Maybe we don't help starve them to death just for that?

---

Replace the dictator in charge. It seems your solution is to give the dictator that is creating the situation, and worse, what they want in the name of humanitarianism. How do you think that will change anything? Giving Putin what he wants in Ukraine allows him to consolidate resources and so he can then attack somewhere else! Assad, is just a tyrant. There is a reason when he took power in 2000 the "Damascus Spring" ended.

---

If only Assad could be more like those Saudi friends of ours. Such nice people!

---

Yeah, if only he could. Too bad he hasn't in the past 23 years.

---

The House of Saud is actively committing war crimes and genocide in Yemen right now.

They are as bad or worse than Assad.

We can only imagine how they would react to a civil war in country against their rule. And we do know they have been the largest contributor and funder of radical Wahhabi Islam around the world since the 1970s

Redbrickbear said:

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RMF5630 said:

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Sam Lowry said:

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RMF5630 said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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whiterock said:

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Redbrickbear said:

---

Quote:

---

Quote:

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Giving a hostile opponent room to maneuver and build a several hundred miles of defensive positions is a recipe for huge losses on both sides. Not to mention the "buffer" that wants to develop and grow, not be a meat grinder for Putin! They have no say in this? That is a ludicrous position. If Ukraine was allowed in when Poland came in to NATO none of this would have happened. Ok let Putin play with the tyrant s on Syria, N Korea and Iran that want a Russian style govt. Poland, Ukraine, and the Baltics see their futures to the west.

---

Don't even get me started on Syria. The US has made a complete wreck of that place. They are lucky to have Russia's help, if nothing else.

---

Speaking of Syria:

[Syria has been at war for more than a decade. Its agony continues, with the U.S. punishing the Syrian people for the sins of their rulers. As Syria's neighbors reconcile with President Bashar al-Assad's government, Washington officials are having a meltdown. They want friendly Arab states to continue following America's ostentatiously cruel yet ineffective sanctions policy.

Syria is an enormous tragedy, the greatest disappointment of the ultimately disastrous 2011 Arab Spring.

Syria suffered traumatic civil war, jihadist depredations, and Turkish aggression. The Assad regime brutally suppressed peaceful protests. An armed insurgency emerged, dominated by radical jihadists. The Islamic State sought to establish an Islamist caliphate. The U.S., Europe, Gulf states, Iran, and Russia intervened on varying sides.]

https://www.theamericanconservative.com/the-cruelty-of-syria-sanctions/

---

Just a word of perspective on Syria:


Syria can bend over and get effed by a herd of camels, as far as I'm concerned.
Those arseholes are not worth of your sympathy.
They've got it coming, due to a dogged determination to make consistently bad policy decisions.

---

Yes yes

You have consistently shown on this forum that you don't care about the lives of foreigners.

But syria is home to millions of people (including millions of Christians) who's only crime is being born in a place with an unjust ruling class.

Maybe we don't help starve them to death just for that?

---

Replace the dictator in charge. It seems your solution is to give the dictator that is creating the situation, and worse, what they want in the name of humanitarianism. How do you think that will change anything? Giving Putin what he wants in Ukraine allows him to consolidate resources and so he can then attack somewhere else! Assad, is just a tyrant. There is a reason when he took power in 2000 the "Damascus Spring" ended.

---

If only Assad could be more like those Saudi friends of ours. Such nice people!

---

Yeah, if only he could. Too bad he hasn't in the past 23 years.

---

The House of Saud is actively committing war crimes and genocide in Yemen right now.

They are as bad or worse than Assad.

We can only imagine how they would react to a civil war in country against their rule. And we do know they have been the largest contributor and funder of radical Wahhabi Islam around the world since the 1970s

---

Both you and Sam's response to almost any point is that the US has some allie or had some allie in the past, so that is somehow relevant to the discussion at hand. You say the US is hypocritical, what Nation isn't?

Foreign Policy for every Nation is filled with hypocritical decisions. It has to be, the world is too complex to be so simplistic as say the Saudi's do things we don't like so we will walk away from Saudi Oil and trillions in defense spending. A little childish... Saudi arms purchases are an economy to itself and worth more jobs than can easily counted. So, do we make consessions, hell yes. This falls under the "grow up" category. We all have to do it. Except Ivy League schools...

RMF5630 said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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RMF5630 said:

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Sam Lowry said:

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RMF5630 said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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whiterock said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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Quote:

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Quote:

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Giving a hostile opponent room to maneuver and build a several hundred miles of defensive positions is a recipe for huge losses on both sides. Not to mention the "buffer" that wants to develop and grow, not be a meat grinder for Putin! They have no say in this? That is a ludicrous position. If Ukraine was allowed in when Poland came in to NATO none of this would have happened. Ok let Putin play with the tyrant s on Syria, N Korea and Iran that want a Russian style govt. Poland, Ukraine, and the Baltics see their futures to the west.

---

Don't even get me started on Syria. The US has made a complete wreck of that place. They are lucky to have Russia's help, if nothing else.

---

Speaking of Syria:

[Syria has been at war for more than a decade. Its agony continues, with the U.S. punishing the Syrian people for the sins of their rulers. As Syria's neighbors reconcile with President Bashar al-Assad's government, Washington officials are having a meltdown. They want friendly Arab states to continue following America's ostentatiously cruel yet ineffective sanctions policy.

Syria is an enormous tragedy, the greatest disappointment of the ultimately disastrous 2011 Arab Spring.

Syria suffered traumatic civil war, jihadist depredations, and Turkish aggression. The Assad regime brutally suppressed peaceful protests. An armed insurgency emerged, dominated by radical jihadists. The Islamic State sought to establish an Islamist caliphate. The U.S., Europe, Gulf states, Iran, and Russia intervened on varying sides.]

https://www.theamericanconservative.com/the-cruelty-of-syria-sanctions/

---

Just a word of perspective on Syria:


Syria can bend over and get effed by a herd of camels, as far as I'm concerned.
Those arseholes are not worth of your sympathy.
They've got it coming, due to a dogged determination to make consistently bad policy decisions.

---

Yes yes

You have consistently shown on this forum that you don't care about the lives of foreigners.

But syria is home to millions of people (including millions of Christians) who's only crime is being born in a place with an unjust ruling class.

Maybe we don't help starve them to death just for that?

---

Replace the dictator in charge. It seems your solution is to give the dictator that is creating the situation, and worse, what they want in the name of humanitarianism. How do you think that will change anything? Giving Putin what he wants in Ukraine allows him to consolidate resources and so he can then attack somewhere else! Assad, is just a tyrant. There is a reason when he took power in 2000 the "Damascus Spring" ended.

---

If only Assad could be more like those Saudi friends of ours. Such nice people!

---

Yeah, if only he could. Too bad he hasn't in the past 23 years.

---

The House of Saud is actively committing war crimes and genocide in Yemen right now.

They are as bad or worse than Assad.

We can only imagine how they would react to a civil war in country against their rule. And we do know they have been the largest contributor and funder of radical Wahhabi Islam around the world since the 1970s

---

Both you and Sam's response to almost any point is that the US has some allie or had some allie in the past, so that is somehow relevant to the discussion at hand. You say the US is hypocritical, what Nation isn't?

Foreign Policy for every Nation is filled with hypocritical decisions. It has to be, the world is too complex to be so simplistic as say the Saudi's do things we don't like so we will walk away from Saudi Oil and trillions in defense spending. A little childish... Saudi arms purchases are an economy to itself and worth more jobs than can easily counted. So, do we make consessions, hell yes. This falls under the "grow up" category. We all have to do it. Except Ivy League schools...

---

That's a lot of words to say you like arming and selling weapons to the corrupt Saudi royals while they use that money to fund radical Islam around the world.

All while we help starve the people of Syria to death because of who their current dictator is

Redbrickbear said:

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RMF5630 said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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RMF5630 said:

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Sam Lowry said:

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RMF5630 said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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whiterock said:

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Redbrickbear said:

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Quote:

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Quote:

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Giving a hostile opponent room to maneuver and build a several hundred miles of defensive positions is a recipe for huge losses on both sides. Not to mention the "buffer" that wants to develop and grow, not be a meat grinder for Putin! They have no say in this? That is a ludicrous position. If Ukraine was allowed in when Poland came in to NATO none of this would have happened. Ok let Putin play with the tyrant s on Syria, N Korea and Iran that want a Russian style govt. Poland, Ukraine, and the Baltics see their futures to the west.

---

Don't even get me started on Syria. The US has made a complete wreck of that place. They are lucky to have Russia's help, if nothing else.

---

Speaking of Syria:

[Syria has been at war for more than a decade. Its agony continues, with the U.S. punishing the Syrian people for the sins of their rulers. As Syria's neighbors reconcile with President Bashar al-Assad's government, Washington officials are having a meltdown. They want friendly Arab states to continue following America's ostentatiously cruel yet ineffective sanctions policy.

Syria is an enormous tragedy, the greatest disappointment of the ultimately disastrous 2011 Arab Spring.

Syria suffered traumatic civil war, jihadist depredations, and Turkish aggression. The Assad regime brutally suppressed peaceful protests. An armed insurgency emerged, dominated by radical jihadists. The Islamic State sought to establish an Islamist caliphate. The U.S., Europe, Gulf states, Iran, and Russia intervened on varying sides.]

https://www.theamericanconservative.com/the-cruelty-of-syria-sanctions/

---

Just a word of perspective on Syria:


Syria can bend over and get effed by a herd of camels, as far as I'm concerned.
Those arseholes are not worth of your sympathy.
They've got it coming, due to a dogged determination to make consistently bad policy decisions.

---

Yes yes

You have consistently shown on this forum that you don't care about the lives of foreigners.

But syria is home to millions of people (including millions of Christians) who's only crime is being born in a place with an unjust ruling class.

Maybe we don't help starve them to death just for that?

---

Replace the dictator in charge. It seems your solution is to give the dictator that is creating the situation, and worse, what they want in the name of humanitarianism. How do you think that will change anything? Giving Putin what he wants in Ukraine allows him to consolidate resources and so he can then attack somewhere else! Assad, is just a tyrant. There is a reason when he took power in 2000 the "Damascus Spring" ended.

---

If only Assad could be more like those Saudi friends of ours. Such nice people!

---

Yeah, if only he could. Too bad he hasn't in the past 23 years.

---

The House of Saud is actively committing war crimes and genocide in Yemen right now.

They are as bad or worse than Assad.

We can only imagine how they would react to a civil war in country against their rule. And we do know they have been the largest contributor and funder of radical Wahhabi Islam around the world since the 1970s

---

Both you and Sam's response to almost any point is that the US has some allie or had some allie in the past, so that is somehow relevant to the discussion at hand. You say the US is hypocritical, what Nation isn't?

Foreign Policy for every Nation is filled with hypocritical decisions. It has to be, the world is too complex to be so simplistic as say the Saudi's do things we don't like so we will walk away from Saudi Oil and trillions in defense spending. A little childish... Saudi arms purchases are an economy to itself and worth more jobs than can easily counted. So, do we make consessions, hell yes. This falls under the "grow up" category. We all have to do it. Except Ivy League schools...

---

That's a lot of words to say you like arming and selling weapons to the corrupt Saudi royals while they use that money to fund radical Islam around the world.

All while we help starve the people of Syria to death because of who their current dictator is

---

Then you say you don't want us in other people's wars! What is it? Are we the Dudley DooRight of the world or are we the isolationist? Ukraine, we shouldn't help. Syria we are letting the poor Syrians starve. We should accommodate Putin to avoid war, but spurn Saudi because they have bad human rights. Do you realize how all over the board you guys are, all the whole saying you are consistently honorable?

To be clear, I am not saying we should spurn Saudi. I'm questioning why we should attack Syria.

There are tens of millions of ppl who still believe Iraq had WMDs, was building nuclear weapons and that 20 years of war was justified. Filthy rich psychopaths pulled that off for profit. It wasn't bad decision making, it was pure corruption. Think about that.

This is going to sound like a conspiracy but it's the truth and it's not one many can swallow as to why we're in Ukraine:

Russia and US are gonna divvy the spoils of Ukraine and neither wants a bunch of militias and tough guys resisting when they bring in their industries. That's the point of this war.

Redbrickbear said:

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whiterock said:

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Sam Lowry said:

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Quote:

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Quote:

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Quote:

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Quote:

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Quote:

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Quote:

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Quote:

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2 years ago, maybe since Ukraine... Deterrence plays a big part, especially the newer NATO members on the frontier with Russia.I know don't tell me, that is not the real reason. Right? Is anything EVER as it seems or what the data shows? According to this site, no. There is always an "inside" reason that only the truly educated or well connected know!

Permanent deterrence: Enhancements to the US military presence in North Central Europe - Atlantic Council

---

Are we back to the idea that Russia is gonna attempt to roll their tanks into Warsaw again?

You and whiterock have to make up your minds. Is Russia this massively powerful military force that is about to expand deep into Central Europe....or is it a corrupt demographically declining nation that can not even force its will on a deeply corrupt and poor Ukraine?

It can't be bot

---

You know there is a reason Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania, Poland and now Finland are all joining NATO, basically anyone that borders Russia wants to join NATO! Russia.

There are so many Nations looking to join NATO that there is a multi-year process to get in. Yet, NATO and the US are bad? You don't see an inconsistency there, huh?

---

It does not bode well for your argument that you make to literally make up statements and attribute them to me.

I never said NATO and the USA are bad.

What people have questioned if is pushing NATO up to the very borders of Russia is in the best interest of average Americans and Europe in general.

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Well, if NATO is a defensive organization to protect Europe it makes sense to include everything up to the borders of those that are prone to invade.

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On the contrary, it makes sense to have a buffer.

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Giving a hostile opponent room to maneuver and build a several hundred miles of defensive positions is a recipe for huge losses on both sides. Not to mention the "buffer" that wants to develop and grow, not be a meat grinder for Putin! They have no say in this? That is a ludicrous position. If Ukraine was allowed in when Poland came in to NATO none of this would have happened. Ok let Putin play with the tyrant s on Syria, N Korea and Iran that want a Russian style govt. Poland, Ukraine, and the Baltics see their futures to the west.

---

Don't even get me started on Syria. The US has made a complete wreck of that place. They are lucky to have Russia's help, if nothing else.

---

It's not like Syria was the garden of Eden before the current war there started.....

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Who said it was?

The point is that regime change war (financed by the U.S.) has failed.

Maybe it's time to try a different approach? Certainly the rest of the Arab states are now interested in pursuing peace.

---

You set up the retort. See above, in bold. It's not like Syria is a garden spot. Yes, several of their cities are wrecked, but they were not exactly destination wedding locations before the arty started flying, either. Syria is a tin-pot fascist dictatorship in a rocky, dry part of the world run by kleptocrats dependent upon all the wrong people.

So you say the Syrian war failed? Did it, really, completely? I mean, sure, the Assad regime is still in power. But the place is a "complete wreck," right? So that degrades Syrian ability to do all the ****ty things Syria is wont to do, doesn't it? And who's on the hook for all the cleanup? Russia and Iran, right? Is there no lesson of deterrence there for the ne'er-do-wells? Fact is, we have imposed far more costs on those three of our adversaries than we invested in the effort. And all they have to do to quit having to spend money cleaning up messes is to quit messing with us and our friends.

And we did have allies in that. Saudis and others spent a shiite-ton of money, too.

Redbrickbear said:

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whiterock said:

---

Redbrickbear said:

---

Quote:

---

Quote:

---

Giving a hostile opponent room to maneuver and build a several hundred miles of defensive positions is a recipe for huge losses on both sides. Not to mention the "buffer" that wants to develop and grow, not be a meat grinder for Putin! They have no say in this? That is a ludicrous position. If Ukraine was allowed in when Poland came in to NATO none of this would have happened. Ok let Putin play with the tyrant s on Syria, N Korea and Iran that want a Russian style govt. Poland, Ukraine, and the Baltics see their futures to the west.

---

Don't even get me started on Syria. The US has made a complete wreck of that place. They are lucky to have Russia's help, if nothing else.

---

Speaking of Syria:

[Syria has been at war for more than a decade. Its agony continues, with the U.S. punishing the Syrian people for the sins of their rulers. As Syria's neighbors reconcile with President Bashar al-Assad's government, Washington officials are having a meltdown. They want friendly Arab states to continue following America's ostentatiously cruel yet ineffective sanctions policy.

Syria is an enormous tragedy, the greatest disappointment of the ultimately disastrous 2011 Arab Spring.

Syria suffered traumatic civil war, jihadist depredations, and Turkish aggression. The Assad regime brutally suppressed peaceful protests. An armed insurgency emerged, dominated by radical jihadists. The Islamic State sought to establish an Islamist caliphate. The U.S., Europe, Gulf states, Iran, and Russia intervened on varying sides.]

https://www.theamericanconservative.com/the-cruelty-of-syria-sanctions/

---

Just a word of perspective on Syria:


Syria can bend over and get effed by a herd of camels, as far as I'm concerned.
Those arseholes are not worth of your sympathy.
They've got it coming, due to a dogged determination to make consistently bad policy decisions.

---

Yes yes

You have consistently shown on this forum that you don't care about the lives of foreigners.

But syria is home to millions of people (including millions of Christians) who's only crime is being born in a place with an unjust ruling class.

Maybe we don't help starve them to death just for that?

---

Christians have been prominent players in the Assad Regime, which is an alliance between the Alawites and Christians, effectively creating a coalition of two very small minorities ruling over a much larger muslim population. Do we spare holding Syria accountable just because Christians have a disproportionate role in Syrian government (and in Syrian foreign policy)?

The world is a cruel place, Red. Some places in the world, peoples form a social contract that greatly help people. Others, not so much. We are in that former category. Syria is in the latter. Now, we can let Syria be Syria unless they start poking us in the eye. We can talk to them about our grievances, but if that doesn't generate some redress, we do have other options, to include bombing the hell out of Syrian government facilities and personnel. Yes, that will have a dreadful impact on the Syrian people. Perhaps the Syrian people should do something about their government. Indeed, that is exactly what our policy was.....to support opposition to the Syrian regime. Sure, we got some target practice on some terror cells from time to time, even a raid or three. But that's not what Syria was about. It was about imposing costs on a proxy of our adversary.....you try to destabilize us or ours, we will destabilize you right back, buddy. If you don't want to end up like Syria, don't act like Syria, OK?

I think that message has been sent.

Sam Lowry said:

---

RMF5630 said:

---

Redbrickbear said:

---

whiterock said:

---

Redbrickbear said:

---

Quote:

---

Quote:

---

Giving a hostile opponent room to maneuver and build a several hundred miles of defensive positions is a recipe for huge losses on both sides. Not to mention the "buffer" that wants to develop and grow, not be a meat grinder for Putin! They have no say in this? That is a ludicrous position. If Ukraine was allowed in when Poland came in to NATO none of this would have happened. Ok let Putin play with the tyrant s on Syria, N Korea and Iran that want a Russian style govt. Poland, Ukraine, and the Baltics see their futures to the west.

---

Don't even get me started on Syria. The US has made a complete wreck of that place. They are lucky to have Russia's help, if nothing else.

---

Speaking of Syria:

[Syria has been at war for more than a decade. Its agony continues, with the U.S. punishing the Syrian people for the sins of their rulers. As Syria's neighbors reconcile with President Bashar al-Assad's government, Washington officials are having a meltdown. They want friendly Arab states to continue following America's ostentatiously cruel yet ineffective sanctions policy.

Syria is an enormous tragedy, the greatest disappointment of the ultimately disastrous 2011 Arab Spring.

Syria suffered traumatic civil war, jihadist depredations, and Turkish aggression. The Assad regime brutally suppressed peaceful protests. An armed insurgency emerged, dominated by radical jihadists. The Islamic State sought to establish an Islamist caliphate. The U.S., Europe, Gulf states, Iran, and Russia intervened on varying sides.]

https://www.theamericanconservative.com/the-cruelty-of-syria-sanctions/

---

Just a word of perspective on Syria:


Syria can bend over and get effed by a herd of camels, as far as I'm concerned.
Those arseholes are not worth of your sympathy.
They've got it coming, due to a dogged determination to make consistently bad policy decisions.

---

Yes yes

You have consistently shown on this forum that you don't care about the lives of foreigners.

But syria is home to millions of people (including millions of Christians) who's only crime is being born in a place with an unjust ruling class.

Maybe we don't help starve them to death just for that?

---

Replace the dictator in charge. It seems your solution is to give the dictator that is creating the situation, and worse, what they want in the name of humanitarianism. How do you think that will change anything? Giving Putin what he wants in Ukraine allows him to consolidate resources and so he can then attack somewhere else! Assad, is just a tyrant. There is a reason when he took power in 2000 the "Damascus Spring" ended.

---

If only Assad could be more like those Saudi friends of ours. Such nice people!

---

but they are friendly toward us, so we can afford to be pragmatic.