The Unsaid Context of the Ukraine Conflict

[ER]

My pleasure, mate. I just thought it might help us understand Russia's war of aggression if we grasped the cool things about Ukraine that drew them in the first place. Kind of like how Irish women were so beautiful the English couldn't stay home? Well Russia desperately wants a cool place like Ukraine. I am not saying the invasion was about candy, but it was a slight factor.

[Alex]

Hmm, good point. Judging from the contents of my spam email folder, there are a lot of Ukrainian women out there wanting men. Perhaps Russia should just check its email folder more often?

[Allhallowsday]

...The reason why it's "long-winded" is because the issue is complex.

No, it's you. 

[ER]

Hmm, good point. Judging from the contents of my spam email folder, there are a lot of Ukrainian women out there wanting men. Perhaps Russia should just check its email folder more often?

Yes! That's exactly true. Putin telling his soldiers they'll be greeted by Ukrainian women desiring them and children giving them candy for liberating them has motivated basically every Russian soldier, but if Russians had the internet ---I checked and they don't---they'd have found out Ukrainian women were available for marriage and Ukrainian candy is available on Amazon. It's a tragedy of miscommunication.

[Alex]

Hmm, good point. Judging from the contents of my spam email folder, there are a lot of Ukrainian women out there wanting men. Perhaps Russia should just check its email folder more often?

Yes! That's exactly true. Putin telling his soldiers they'll be greeted by Ukrainian women desiring them and children giving them candy for liberating them has motivated basically every Russian soldier, but if Russians had the internet ---I checked and they don't---they'd have found out Ukrainian women were available for marriage and Ukrainian candy is available on Amazon. It's a tragedy of miscommunication.

Miscommunication or interference from the (evil obviously) American Neo(n) Genesis Evangelion?

[Trevor]

Hmm, good point. Judging from the contents of my spam email folder, there are a lot of Ukrainian women out there wanting men. Perhaps Russia should just check its email folder more often?

I checked both my Hotmail and Gmail addresses: no emails from those ladies 

[Alex]

Lol, I'll forward some to you if you really want, but personally, I would not trust the links enough to click on them.

[ER]

Hmm, good point. Judging from the contents of my spam email folder, there are a lot of Ukrainian women out there wanting men. Perhaps Russia should just check its email folder more often?

Yes! That's exactly true. Putin telling his soldiers they'll be greeted by Ukrainian women desiring them and children giving them candy for liberating them has motivated basically every Russian soldier, but if Russians had the internet ---I checked and they don't---they'd have found out Ukrainian women were available for marriage and Ukrainian candy is available on Amazon. It's a tragedy of miscommunication.

Miscommunication or interference from the (evil obviously) American Neo(n) Genesis Evangelion?

It's the CIA. Everybody knows how evil those conniving sunsabritches are. They should every one of them be stood against a wall and shot twice.

[Alex]

Hmm, good point. Judging from the contents of my spam email folder, there are a lot of Ukrainian women out there wanting men. Perhaps Russia should just check its email folder more often?

Yes! That's exactly true. Putin telling his soldiers they'll be greeted by Ukrainian women desiring them and children giving them candy for liberating them has motivated basically every Russian soldier, but if Russians had the internet ---I checked and they don't---they'd have found out Ukrainian women were available for marriage and Ukrainian candy is available on Amazon. It's a tragedy of miscommunication.

Miscommunication or interference from the (evil obviously) American Neo(n) Genesis Evangelion?

It's the CIA. Everybody knows how evil those conniving sunsabritches are. They should every one of them be stood against a wall and shot twice.

Remember, we are only doing this because we can't counter his arguments tho. 

[lester1/2jr]

I haven't read any of Ralfys posts in this thread but I agree with all of them

https://thehill.com/policy/defense/3781964-final-funding-bill-includes-45b-for-ukraine/

that makes 100 Billion in the last ten months

[ER]

You haven't read them but you agree with them? Yogi Berra is alive and well in Boston!

[Allhallowsday]

 

[ralfy]

Afraid I haven't read your previous posts. If it pleases your ego to think so then please go ahead. Goes back to the whole self-belief is the key to happiness thing. If anything I've said addresses older what you've said in previous posts I'd put that down to coincidence and that you keep repeating the same points endlessly, even when they don't make the points that you think they do.

I didn't say I've shown several times that you don't fact-check or or do due diligence. I said you've shown that you don't do them. Quite funny that you'd claim I was being delusional when you've misread what was written and frequently make claims about conversations that did not happen. I mean thanks for proving my point. Didn't need the help, but thanks anyway. You should try actually reading what is written not what you think is written. If you want to think I am ignorant of the matter, feel free to keep thinking that. It really doesn't bother me. The world is a lot less one-note than you think though and much more complicated and intertwined.

Maybe the reason I am posting on this thread and not replying to your points is simply because I am treating you with the same contempt you treated the Crazy SOB thread when you were repeatedly asked to take it elsewhere and chose not to. But hey, feel free to keep massaging your ego and telling yourself otherwise, it is no skin off my nose. If it helps, I'd imagine once I am back home tomorrow, or at the latest when I head back to work in the new year, I'll be back to not having enough time to waste on your posts. Until then enjoy the boost you feel it gives you and keep adding 2 and 2 and making 22.

You're free to prove your arguments anytime. I'm saying that because you've never done it.

And so that we don't go off-topic, let's start with Kennan's arguments, because those are the earliest. What do you want to fact-check concerning that?

[ralfy]

Ukrainian candy is good. I'll post a bunch of links to it when I get home!

Fun fact: instead of corn syrup, beet syrup is often used to sweeten Ukrainian candy.

Til then, a Ukrainian nursery rhyme (though it doesn't rhyme in English):

The chicken bit little Ana's toe,
Then she sneezed and lost her nose,
So Granny bought in a duck
To chase the chicken home.
To chase the chicken home.
To chase the chicken home.

You praised me in another thread for being levelheaded and mature about this. You need to follow your own advice.

This is obviously another trolling and immature attempt at derailing this thread.

So, I ask you the same as I did to Alex: why are the arguments that I raised wrong? Let's start with Kennan: he referred to the idea of containment, but later it became encirclement. Does that need to be fact-checked?

[ralfy]

My pleasure, mate. I just thought it might help us understand Russia's war of aggression if we grasped the cool things about Ukraine that drew them in the first place. Kind of like how Irish women were so beautiful the English couldn't stay home? Well Russia desperately wants a cool place like Ukraine. I am not saying the invasion was about candy, but it was a slight factor.

If you follow one of the reports I shared earlier, you will see that the actual Ukraine is much smaller than what it is, and it grew thanks to Muscovy. But we don't need to go that far because both Russia and Ukraine became co-founders of the Soviet Union, and the problems stemmed from that and not much earlier. Hence, Kennan and the Truman doctrine.

When both fell apart with the dissolution of the Union, Kennan warned that NATO would become irrelevant, and that if it were used as a sword instead of a shield (which is no longer needed because even Russia wanted to join NATO), then that would only antagonize Russia. Guess what happened?

And now, after months of protests in Europe, France is calling for a (another?) break from the U.S.

https://twitter.com/spectatorindex/status/1605680239014580224

Neocons will likely argue that because of that Europe will fall once more, just as it did during WW2. But they do because need to maintain the "evil empire" narrative. Is there really one? More important, are we looking at the wrong countries when we use that narrative?

Finally, neoliberals will argue that this is a bad sign because it shows that neoliberalism, or globalization dominated by the dollar, will fall apart.

It's like being caught between a rock and a hard place.