Prediction Thread: When Will Ukraine Conquer Russia

[BeBMan]

Meduza revealed that Putin armed the Nazis. And just recently Reuters found out that he also gave them roles in his presidential apparatus.

[Berzerker]

snip snip

[PLATO]

Bullcrap Berz.

Great name!

[PLATO]

Thanks Dauphin. That was an insightful article. It certainly makes me question if I have some subconscious misogyny going on here. I'd like to think not, but the research you provided looks good. Something to work on I guess...

[Berzerker]

Bullcrap Berz. The US couldn't have invented the likes of the Taliban. Our bureaucrats just aren't that imaginative. They kept the insurrection by mujahedeen against the communist government hot by sending those mujahedeen weapons, but eventually that government was going to succumb to corruption and religious insurrection in the long run anyway. You act like all the US has to do is drop some weapons in an area and war breaks out. that's not how it works. USSR and PRC trained plenty of north Korean and north Vietnamese fighters and sent them mountains of war material. Do you ascribe those millions of casualties 3/3 to the communists? Why not? You say the Donbas rose up in arms because of Kiev's "coup"? Why don't you think Syrians rose up in arms because of Assad's "coup"? After all, you defined coup earlier as any change in power resulting from violence anywhere in the political process and Assad's entire assumption of his dads dynasty is soaked in blood.

I'm completely with you on opposing US armed intervention in nearly all cases. What I find despicable, however, is your huge double standard when Russia, or anyone else engages in these armed interventions. When that happens you seem to forget all about the standard you apply to US interventions.

The US and its allies recruited, funded and armed fanatical Muslims to wage a proxy war against Russia in Afghanistan. But no, not really... Americans would never dream up such a strategy. Carter's advisor said that was the plan. Why would the Taliban - religious zealots - inherit a country conquered by religious zealots flocking to the call and dime of Uncle Sam? I never mentioned Korea but the war in Vietnam stemmed from France trying to hang onto it after WWII. The natives were restless and war eventually drove the French into retreat with pleas for our help. Not exactly the moral high ground for us to wage a war killing millions.

If the Donbas and Crimea dont want to be ruled by Azov should we force them? That wont happen of course, we wont risk the US army to compel eastern Ukrainians to live under western Ukrainian rule. What intervention specifically were you comparing Ukraine to for this double standard you see? If Russia toppled the Mexican govt and sent an army to attack people south of our border I would oppose arming Russia - thats consistent. How about you? I defined coup as what now? I didn't support Assad or his dad, I'm opposed to arming terrorists to destroy Syria... or does the end justify the means?

[Berzerker]

Plato, signing off

[Geronimo]

The simmering civil war in Afghanistan was the result of Carter and Reagan (and the Saudis and Pakistanis) recruiting and arming Islamic radicals to topple the govt. Yeah, we paid terrorists to invade Afghanistan and destroy the place. Sound familiar? But we weren't calling them moderate rebels back then, they were freedom fighters. They morphed into AQ in time for Bush's Gulf war and started attacking us when we stayed in Saudi Arabia to enforce sanctions on Iraqis.

Which of those wars would have happened against our wishes? We currently occupy 1/3rd of Syria after a decade of bombing the hell out of the country while arming terrorists to drive Assad from power, but you dont think we bear any responsibility? We dont get involved to end enormous conflicts, our fingerprints are all over these countries and wars. That Arab Spring was propaganda to pressure Muslim govts we didn't like but it got a bit too close to our Saudi friends so Obama, Trump and Biden helped commit genocide in Yemen. If we didn't want this war in Ukraine there wouldn't be a war in Ukraine... And so on.

Bullcrap Berz. The US couldn't have invented the likes of the Taliban. Our bureaucrats just aren't that imaginative. They kept the insurrection by mujahedeen against the communist government hot by sending those mujahedeen weapons, but eventually that government was going to succumb to corruption and religious insurrection in the long run anyway. You act like all the US has to do is drop some weapons in an area and war breaks out. that's not how it works. USSR and PRC trained plenty of north Korean and north Vietnamese fighters and sent them mountains of war material. Do you ascribe those millions of casualties 3/3 to the communists? Why not? You say the Donbas rose up in arms because of Kiev's "coup"? Why don't you think Syrians rose up in arms because of Assad's "coup"? After all, you defined coup earlier as any change in power resulting from violence anywhere in the political process and Assad's entire assumption of his dads dynasty is soaked in blood.

I'm completely with you on opposing US armed intervention in nearly all cases. What I find despicable, however, is your huge double standard when Russia, or anyone else engages in these armed interventions. When that happens you seem to forget all about the standard you apply to US interventions.

[PLATO]

If Russia recruited and armed terrorists to take over Mexico or Canada we wouldn't be having this debate. We didn't act on behalf of mistreated Afghans, we wanted a proxy war on Russia's border and that led to 40+ years of war. After the 1st Iraq war we kept an army in Saudi Arabia and got attacked by disgruntled Muslims. So what role did we play? We enforced sanctions on Iraq killing even more people, kinda why those Muslims were getting mad. The crusaders were back in town.

What is the overall situation in Syria? We bombed the country, armed terrorists (no no, modera...), and sit on oil and food resources (I wouldn't be surprised if those quakes brought a smile to many a neocon face, Congress overwhelmingly voted for more sanctions). Yes, the 2 main Muslim factions dont like each other... and we armed and aided a genocide in Yemen. I dont know how you can separate us from that based on the relationship between Iran and Saudi Arabia. Do we get to help genocides around the world based on how much we like or dislike the war criminals and victims?

So I see you take your normal knee jerk reaction instead of trying to think things through. Once again a very simplistic and totally inaccurate categorization of events.

I must applaud Geronimo for his patience on continually countering your flawed and very siloed points of view. I must say that I don't have the patience to continue to confront your inaccuracies with facts like he does.

Your arguments show your thought process to be one of a simple minded person and your inability to learn from the repeated reality you have been shown only confirms it.

My recommendation is that you take a much deeper look into the issues you are constantly showing ignorance of and get to root causes, their effects, and the opportunity cost of not dealing with them. If you do that with an open mind and honestly, then people here will have some relief from rolling their eyes and Geronimo will be free to contribute his insightful and meaningful posts on more pressing events. I wish you luck in your search for truth should you honestly undertake it, but I must admit I believe the chances you will do so are slim.

[Berzerker]

This is an incredibly simplistic (and outright incorrect) view of each of those conflicts. It is easy to assign blame when people die, but much harder to get to root causes. Equally simplistic however, you should look at the role Russians played in Afghanistan, the role U.S. forces played in Saudi post 1st Gulf War, the overall situation in Syria, and the Iranian role in Yemen. You may just find that your facts are not nearly so black and white as you like to say. Once again, try and extrapolate long term consequences for the U.S. not being involved in each of those situations.

Your view of things brings to light the possibility of a much darker world with even darker possibilities on the future had the U.S. not become involved.

It is easy to criticize when you silo each event into a myopic view of reality.

If Russia recruited and armed terrorists to take over Mexico or Canada we wouldn't be having this debate. We didn't act on behalf of mistreated Afghans, we wanted a proxy war on Russia's border and that led to 40+ years of war. After the 1st Iraq war we kept an army in Saudi Arabia and got attacked by disgruntled Muslims. So what role did we play? We enforced sanctions on Iraq killing even more people, kinda why those Muslims were getting mad. The crusaders were back in town.

What is the overall situation in Syria? We bombed the country, armed terrorists (no no, modera...), and sit on oil and food resources (I wouldn't be surprised if those quakes brought a smile to many a neocon face, Congress overwhelmingly voted for more sanctions). Yes, the 2 main Muslim factions dont like each other... and we armed and aided a genocide in Yemen. I dont know how you can separate us from that based on the relationship between Iran and Saudi Arabia. Do we get to help genocides around the world based on how much we like or dislike the war criminals and victims?

[Berzerker]

The one thing that no one ever seems to consider is "What if the U.S. didn't play a peacekeeping role in the world?" What would the death toll be then? You always have to balance the "what is" versus the "what could have been" and that is no easy task. Maybe I am a homer when it comes to the USA but my sense is that there would be millions more dead around the world if we didn't do what we do.

Does that mean that every decision was the right one? Of course not, that would be impossible. Still, I believe the world is better off because we chose to get involved.

peacekeeping

[PLATO]

The simmering civil war in Afghanistan was the result of Carter and Reagan (and the Saudis and Pakistanis) recruiting and arming Islamic radicals to topple the govt. Yeah, we paid terrorists to invade Afghanistan and destroy the place. Sound familiar? But we weren't calling them moderate rebels back then, they were freedom fighters. They morphed into AQ in time for Bush's Gulf war and started attacking us when we stayed in Saudi Arabia to enforce sanctions on Iraqis.

Which of those wars would have happened against our wishes? We currently occupy 1/3rd of Syria after a decade of bombing the hell out of the country while arming terrorists to drive Assad from power, but you dont think we bear any responsibility? We dont get involved to end enormous conflicts, our fingerprints are all over these countries and wars. That Arab Spring was propaganda to pressure Muslim govts we didn't like but it got a bit too close to our Saudi friends so Obama, Trump and Biden helped commit genocide in Yemen. If we didn't want this war in Ukraine there wouldn't be a war in Ukraine... And so on.

This is an incredibly simplistic (and outright incorrect) view of each of those conflicts. It is easy to assign blame when people die, but much harder to get to root causes. Equally simplistic however, you should look at the role Russians played in Afghanistan, the role U.S. forces played in Saudi post 1st Gulf War, the overall situation in Syria, and the Iranian role in Yemen. You may just find that your facts are not nearly so black and white as you like to say. Once again, try and extrapolate long term consequences for the U.S. not being involved in each of those situations.

Your view of things brings to light the possibility of a much darker world with even darker possibilities on the future had the U.S. not become involved.

It is easy to criticize when you silo each event into a myopic view of reality.

[PLATO]

Berz the US started Afghanistan and Iraq 2003 the rest were enormous conflicts before the US got involved at all. Even Afghanistan was intervention in a simmering civil war. It's ridiculous to ascribe 2/3 let alone 3/3 of the total to the US. Generally the only way to start a war and make it stick is to either "start" one that was going to start anyway or to put boots on the ground and invade keeping the war going directly as in Iraq. There is nothing the US could have done to substantially reduce most of those casualties, apart from managing to get support from at least one side for a vast US+multinational peace keeping role and avoid having the locals turn the peacekeeping role into an endless simmering insurrection like in Afghanistan.

The one thing that no one ever seems to consider is "What if the U.S. didn't play a peacekeeping role in the world?" What would the death toll be then? You always have to balance the "what is" versus the "what could have been" and that is no easy task. Maybe I am a homer when it comes to the USA but my sense is that there would be millions more dead around the world if we didn't do what we do.

Does that mean that every decision was the right one? Of course not, that would be impossible. Still, I believe the world is better off because we chose to get involved.

[Berzerker]

Berz the US started Afghanistan and Iraq 2003 the rest were enormous conflicts before the US got involved at all. Even Afghanistan was intervention in a simmering civil war. It's ridiculous to ascribe 2/3 let alone 3/3 of the total to the US. Generally the only way to start a war and make it stick is to either "start" one that was going to start anyway or to put boots on the ground and invade keeping the war going directly as in Iraq. There is nothing the US could have done to substantially reduce most of those casualties, apart from managing to get support from at least one side for a vast US+multinational peace keeping role and avoid having the locals turn the peacekeeping role into an endless simmering insurrection like in Afghanistan.

The simmering civil war in Afghanistan was the result of Carter and Reagan (and the Saudis and Pakistanis) recruiting and arming Islamic radicals to topple the govt. Yeah, we paid terrorists to invade Afghanistan and destroy the place. Sound familiar? But we weren't calling them moderate rebels back then, they were freedom fighters. They morphed into AQ in time for Bush's Gulf war and started attacking us when we stayed in Saudi Arabia to enforce sanctions on Iraqis.

Which of those wars would have happened against our wishes? We currently occupy 1/3rd of Syria after a decade of bombing the hell out of the country while arming terrorists to drive Assad from power, but you dont think we bear any responsibility? We dont get involved to end enormous conflicts, our fingerprints are all over these countries and wars. That Arab Spring was propaganda to pressure Muslim govts we didn't like but it got a bit too close to our Saudi friends so Obama, Trump and Biden helped commit genocide in Yemen. If we didn't want this war in Ukraine there wouldn't be a war in Ukraine... And so on.

[Geronimo]

3/3rds... Those are our wars and the numbers dont include the 80s when we armed 'freedom fighters' and Islamic terrorists and used Iraq as a proxy vs Iran and spent the 90s killing Iraqis et al with sanctions and bombs. We could go back further, Vietnam and the Cambodian genocide, but that preceded Victoria's reign of terror.

Berz the US started Afghanistan and Iraq 2003 the rest were enormous conflicts before the US got involved at all. Even Afghanistan was intervention in a simmering civil war. It's ridiculous to ascribe 2/3 let alone 3/3 of the total to the US. Generally the only way to start a war and make it stick is to either "start" one that was going to start anyway or to put boots on the ground and invade keeping the war going directly as in Iraq. There is nothing the US could have done to substantially reduce most of those casualties, apart from managing to get support from at least one side for a vast US+multinational peace keeping role and avoid having the locals turn the peacekeeping role into an endless simmering insurrection like in Afghanistan.

[Dauphin]

I wanted to fact check myself.

https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0274317

"Overall, we find that, contrary to previous research, coverage and sentiment biases suggest equal public interest in female politicians. Rather than overt hostile or benevolent sexism, the results of the nominal and lexical analyses suggest this interest is not as professional or respectful as that expressed about male politicians. Female politicians are often named by their first names and are described in relation to their body, clothing, or family; this is a treatment that is not similarly extended to men"