The Unsaid Context of the Ukraine Conflict

[ralfy]

From December last year:

"How the West hung Ukraine out to dry"

https://theweek.com/world/1008430/how-the-west-let-ukraine-hang-out-to-dry

In short, Western powers have repeatedly used Ukraine to give Putin a bloody nose, but they have neither given it the resources that would be necessary to make an alliance with the West a good deal nor made enough of a military commitment to deter Russia.

NATO extends this combination of arrogance and incompetence toward Russia and Ukraine. The declared purpose of the treaty organization was to counter the Soviet Union and contain the spread of international communism. Neither of those have existed for 30 years, yet NATO continued mindlessly expanding throughout the 1990s and 2000s. Nobody seemed to consider whether Russia might get the idea that NATO was still an anti-Russian alliance, nor that Moscow might have understandable reasons to worry about a Western military presence in Ukraine.

The West treated Ukraine before the invasion in the same it did Russia several years earlier: dangling the EU-NATO carrot while using the two groups to start working on Ukraine.

[Allhallowsday]

No,  it is you.  Don't.  Do not. 

"No, you..." is how 4chaners would say it, which basically expresses your knowledge of this issue.

I am ignorant of "4chaners". 

[Rev. Powell]

I propose a Christmas truce in this thread.



"Silent night, holy night...."

[lester1/2jr]

we've given Ukraine $100 billion in 10 months so far. If this thing goes say 3 to 5 years that means...500 billion?? all going to Raytheon etc from taxpayers to DC.

for a war that could have been prevented with 2 phone calls by a rational president

[ER]

we've given Ukraine $100 billion in 10 months so far. If this thing goes say 3 to 5 years that means...500 billion?? all going to Raytheon etc from taxpayers to DC.

for a war that could have been prevented with 2 phone calls by a rational president

leeeeester, its still Christmas.....

[ralfy]

I am ignorant of "4chaners". 

You're a natural, then.

[ralfy]

From the defense industry, "Merry Christmas!"

"The defense industry will profit from war in Ukraine—with your money"

https://www.americamagazine.org/politics-society/2022/03/09/defense-industry-ukraine-242533

[ralfy]

"Have sanctions against Russia backfired? | DW Business Special"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0osNhIouMI0

[ralfy]

"Retrospective: Before The Special Military Operation"

https://meaninginhistory.substack.com/p/retrospective-before-the-special

Will Schryver has been republishing some of his older tweet threads, and they still make good reading. Here's a twelve part one from January 16, 2022—so a couple of months before Putin launched the SMO in Ukraine. It's very prescient, but more than simply looking back at Ukraine and Russia, it also looks forward to China.

The conclusion to be drawn is that our ruling class dragged the US into this mad war on Russia through the usual Neocon flummery—combinations of geopolitical hubris and belief in their own infallible ability to finesse things. Militarily and economically. We were never going to be involved militarily because we'd finesse the war through sanctions shock and awe. Woops!

[ralfy]

"Is Russian Restraint Averting the Risk of Nuclear War – or Inviting It?"

http://www.ronpaulinstitute.org/archives/featured-articles/2022/december/14/is-russian-restraint-averting-the-risk-of-nuclear-war-or-inviting-it/

Among realists who don't accept the Kiew siegt an allen Fronten! narrative it is widely assumed that Russia will soon begin, perhaps in dramatic and decisive fashion, a winter offensive. This would come just as Kiev is hitting "empty" on all key manpower and materiel indicators, exacerbated by the Zelensky regime's continued insistence on squandering them on strategically meaningless attacks on hardened Russian positions.

The assumption of a bold Russian shift to the offensive may not be valid, though, as it's clear that among Moscow's primary intentions is to avoid triggering a direct clash with NATO forces, which, they reasonably believe, could escalate uncontrollably to the strategic nuclear level. (That's why it appears Moscow has abandoned its longstanding no-first-use nuclear doctrine for launch-on-warning See: Paul Craig Roberts: A Hair Trigger on Endgame - LewRockwell)

[ralfy]

"Lindsey Graham, the Ugly American"

http://www.ronpaulinstitute.org/archives/featured-articles/2022/december/24/lindsey-graham-the-ugly-american/

It does get tiresome to list all the nations the USG has messed with, undermined, occupied, and terrorized. This is not something one can write about if he or she is a corporate war propaganda journalist. It's verboten, an assured career killer.

If bribery of autocrats and sadistic dictators does not work, if rigged elections are not possible and if a population resists the dictates of an imposed neoliberal financial order, that's when the military steps in, cheered on by the likes of the pathocrat Sen. Lindsey Graham and other neocons.

[ralfy]

"After the Zelensky Spectacle – Let the Partition Begin!"

http://www.ronpaulinstitute.org/archives/featured-articles/2022/december/23/after-the-zelensky-spectacle-let-the-partition-begin/

[ralfy]

""Anyone who underestimates Russia is headed for defeat""

https://www.economist.com/syrsky-interview

An interview with Colonel-General Oleksandr Syrsky, Ukraine's second most senior soldier

[ralfy]

"Ukraine war - "2.5 Million US-$ an hour" USA: Rise in homelessness, poverty and inflation"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eSDC5bI8FUI

"Billions for Ukraine as U.S. poverty festers"

https://spokesman-recorder.com/2022/06/30/billions-for-ukraine-as-u-s-poverty-festers/

[Allhallowsday]

MERRY CHRISTMAS  TO ALL !!  

I am ignorant of "4chaners".  

You're a natural, then.

We agree.  I have been informed and understand that you and I live in different worlds.  I find 21st century cynical uninteresting.  Unless one is on the ground ducking or bearing down, talk is cheap.