Prediction Thread: When Will Ukraine Conquer Russia

[Geronimo]

The actual seditious conspiracy convictions are probably just a coincidence.

I think that was sort of his point. That the FBI didn't claim an organized conspiracy for the whole event but instead prosecuted smaller conspiracies within the riot/protest. My point was that that in no way renders viewing it overall as an attempted coup unreasonable.

[Dinner]

Never mind. Big G covered it. I will disagree that there was ever any "coup" attempt.

[Serb]

Really? . "I have seen with my own eyes[/U] in 90's."??

How is that even possible? You saw them load up the assets into cargo planes running from the cops?

What did you actually see with your own eyes Serb?

I've seen poverty and a suicide on a mass-scale in 90's in my country, as well as a civil war between Russia and its part Chechnya instigated by YOU, USA).
I've seen how our government was infested by your American and Western "advisors", who had the real power over the economy and everything else (absolutely the same kind of power you have over Ukraine since 2014).
I've seen how your Corporations were withdrawing trillions, not billions, but TRILLIONS of USD from the Russian economy to the American, British , Cyprus banks.​
I've seen it all! With my own eyes!

So, don't fuking tell me, American, you know better then me about Russia!​

[Serb]

...

[Serb]

Only if it's also a coup for a leader to be elected after killing an unpopular protestor with his bare hands on national TV and getting elected partly due to jury nullification and public backlash against the protests.

It's not enough to have violent toadies, do something violent personally, or even gain power in part due to violent actions. The violent actions must constitute some sort of coercive force applied to the political process.

I would agree that a leader forced to flee for his life could be a coup if those who gained power forced him to flee. I don't agree that Viktor was forced to flee. I don't agree that those who gained power were threatening his life or using force.

What a sh!t!!!

[Serb]

Keep farting to the glass full of water on half, Westerners!

[Serb]

Serb is still full of surprises, Geronimo.

[BeBMan]

The actual seditious conspiracy convictions are probably just a coincidence.

I was wondering if that oathkeeper guy really lost an eye, or if is he's just using an eyepatch to look sharper?

[Geronimo]

I was wondering if that oathkeeper guy really lost an eye, or if is he's just using an eyepatch to look sharper?

According to the Mythbu$ters pirates would wear an eyepatch so that when their raids would move indoors from the sunny outdoors they could move the eyepatch over for instant adaptation to the lower light levels to more efficiently pursue their victims and ransack the place.

[Geronimo]

I've seen poverty and a suicide on a mass-scale in 90's in my country, as well as a civil war between Russia and its part Chechnya instigated by YOU, USA).
I've seen how our government was infested by your American and Western "advisors", who had the real power over the economy and everything else (absolutely the same kind of power you have over Ukraine since 2014).
I've seen how your Corporations were withdrawing trillions, not billions, but TRILLIONS of USD from the Russian economy to the American, British , Cyprus banks.​
I've seen it all! With my own eyes!

So, don't fuking tell me, American, you know better then me about Russia!​

​

My father had a possition of an eqivalent of a major of 1 million city (my city) during the Soviet times and later was a minister of indusrty of Omsk region (1.5 million population and a large industrial and scientific center of Russia, where such things as Russian tanks, hypersonic missiles and spaceships are made).
And he knows personally Putin and Medvedev - two out of three Russian presidents, just because of the job (the first president - Yeltsin was a fker, nobody want to be happy to know him). As well, as he personally knew the first man in the open space Alexey Leonov or the coach of the "Red machine" of the legendary Canada-Russia series of 80's, Anatoly Tarasov, which is an absolute LEGEND in the world of hockey. I have a hockey stick signed by the whole team USSR of that series and he personally knows Slava Tretyak as well, just like he knows Alexander "Storm" Shlemenko MMA champion. I have books in my library, signed by such persons as Soviet fieldmarshals, Soviet cinema stars or world-known travelers and all that kind of sh!t!

He is retired now from the state service, but you may consider him as one of my sources.​​

Seeing the devastation of the macro-economic meltdown of the 90's first hand certainly explains your passion about the crime but it does not increase the credibility of your implication of the criminal(s).

You seem to be saying that your "own eyes", with respect to implicating those criminals, actually were those of your close family. Of course this gives me pause, not because I think that grants more credibility, but because now pursuing a healthy debate may be construed by you as some sort of personal attack on your family.

I suppose you should instead say that your father saw trillions of USD from the Russian economy transferred to foreign banks. First of all, that's not something even the president of a country sees with their own eyes. Nobody sees that with their own eyes. Secondly withdrawing TRILLION of USD (or any amount really) and depositing it in foreign banks isn't theft. If it is then PRC is the biggest such "thief" in the world, but you seem eager to tie the Russian economy more closely to theirs. Third, if Russian oligarchs were moving those Trillions overseas how would things have looked different to you or to your father and his illustrious friends?

How exactly do you maintain the US achieved its theft? Did your father claim they hacked Russian bank accounts? Held guns to their heads or ransomed their kidnapped family members? Defrauded them over and over in con jobs where they took payment for goods and services never rendered? What kind of theft exactly was seen by your sources with their own eyes?

I think it makes the most sense that when Russian oligarchs (who definitely had the opportunity for such theft) stole trillions it was in their interests to blame foreigners and Russians were eager to believe that and bitterly pass along those delusions to their sons and other immediate family.

[Geronimo]

What except? Does that conflict with something I posted here?

[pchang]

I was not disagreeing with you. I was disagreeing with Serb's interpretation.

[Dinner]

There have been some great explanation videos of how stuff works in authoritarian dictatorships with low rule of law. Basically, 3veryone wants to export, steal, or embezzle as much as possible as quickly as possible then transfer the money abroad to some where safe where corrupt officials can't reach it.

[BlackCat]

Nice little Perun video

[Berzerker]

They wouldn't have needed to shoot him but they certainly would have needed to arrest him, hold a gun to his head or otherwise use force against him or functional members of his government. The massacre certainly could have been force if delivered with any sort of ultimatum or coercion. It's not use of force to frame the leadership for a crime. Violence without coercion isnt force. It's just violence.

To say otherwise implies other bizarre scenarios such as that if a leader was reelected in large measure for ordering a successful special military operation against a Nazi neighbor then I guess that election would become a coup and the runner up would be the legitimate leadership. It's nuts Berz.

But as fun as this is to debate how would Viktor losing power in a "coup", however you like to define "coup" have any relevance in 2014 let alone 2022? A coup doesn't confer any sort of license to secede or nullify any state treaties.

I'm using the definition I posted and you keep ignoring it. There's no requirement for a coup to arrest anyone. They murdered his cops and framed him for a massacre. That was a violent alteration of the existing govt, the very definition of 'coup'. You keep making up criteria that aren't in the definition. So now you're claiming they massacred a bunch of people for no reason other than they're violent people? Ofc that had a coercive effect, many... The new govt buried what happened and the right wing ran amok with our help. The post coup government agreed to Minsk and ignored it. Please stop with the analogies.

[Berzerker]

I agree with your wider point but I don't get your example.

A simpler example in my mind was if a leader were assassinated, is that a coup? I don't ever (credibly) hear the assassination of Lincoln or Kennedy referred to as such, or the attempts on Thatcher or the Queen by the IRA to be a coup.

Many coups merely drive the leader(s) out of office or the country

I think JFK was a coup

[Geronimo]

I'm using the definition I posted and you keep ignoring it. There's no requirement for a coup to arrest anyone. They murdered his cops and framed him for a massacre. That was a violent alteration of the existing govt, the very definition of 'coup'. You keep making up criteria that aren't in the definition. So now you're claiming they massacred a bunch of people for no reason other than they're violent people? Ofc that had a coercive effect, many... The new govt buried what happened and the right wing ran amok with our help. The post coup government agreed to Minsk and ignored it. Please stop with the analogies.

If we agree with your definition every transfer of power is a coup. Violence never ceases anywhere and it can always be said to influence the legal process. Somehow according to you and Serb it then also follows that therefore no treaties are valid and all governments are illegitimate.

I make no claims about why they massacred anyone. I simply claim as performed it was in no meaningful way an act of force. Terrorism surely, but not an act of force.

I have also even called it a "coup" in the past not because I agreed in the slightest that it should be called a coup but because you and Serb call it that and I recognize that whether or not it is a "coup" by any definition has absolutely no relevance to treaty obligations to Ukraine or to its territorial integrity.

Analogies are absolutely essential to avoid the extremely common problem of reinterpreting and even redefining every principle to serve their desired angle on the each every situation. If someone makes one assertion in defence of something in one context that assertion had better sure as hell hold up in other contexts real and hypothetical. People who run from analogies generally are trying to hide absurdities in their reasoning.

Furthermore, your entire campaign to drag Websters out and attempt to characterize euromaidan as a "coup" is effectively a giant appeal to analogy isn't it? If you can call Euromaidan "coup" and we all agree that coups are bad then Ukraine is the bad guys and the Separatists and Russian armed forces are just working to oppose a "coup" and oppose the bad guys.

that's what is total bullcrap Berz. That is also why I'm throwing these analogies at you. If we accept your definition of a "coup" then it can be shown that "coup" doesn't necessarily describe any similarity to other commonly recognized "coups" and whether or not you can redefine Euromaidan as a "coup" in this way is totally irrelevant.

[Berzerker]

Oh good, because Azov didn't need to be setup either so I guess now you'll stop invoking them to justify everything Russia does.

The victims don't need to be politicians but the crimes against the victims do need to be politically coercive if they are not. Violence as deception would not count. You need to understand that if force=violence, your Webster definition starts to include scenarios that do not even remotely resemble a coup. The definition is clearly using a narrower sense of the word "force" than just "violence". Dictionaries don't work if you don't use some critical thinking.

​​​​

Didn't you keep invoking little green men to justify Azov shelling the Donbas for 8 years? If Russia was removed entirely from this scenario I'd still be left pondering the question, 'who started it?' Obama did, we either requested a massacre or at the very least embraced the coup and then armed Azov to shell the Donbas for 8 years.

The violence made him flee and informed everyone else in the country they better not complain because the CIA knows who's been naughty or nice. You dont think that violence had coercive effects?