They would have gone for this regardless of what Zelensky or Ukrainians did. Russians were planning a war of conquest from early 2000s.
First of all, Russia doesn’t get to have “a sphere of influence” just because they feel so. They lack the soft power to voluntarily attract anyone to their political alliance and always have. And it seems they lack the conventional military means as well. The option of staying under Russia’s domination is extreme poverty (you have to be poorer that your imperial masters) and slow disappearance. That’s it. Again, why did Poland fight in 1939?
And now that they have fought, what will happen? Their cities are bombed, their economy is ruined, they will lose more territory in the east of the country. They gambled that the west would help, and we sent them thoughts and prayers and changed our FB profile pictures instead. Staying under Russias yoke would sure have been the better option for my wife’s 96 year old grandmother who lives in Ukraine.
That was a good perspective on Zelenski. And no doubt he fell for biden’s false bravado. I am sure he was banking on some personal assurances from biden Inc. After all, biden is very, very tied in with Ukraine. But he should have made a deal. Especially with regards to NATO. Some far flung fantasy of joining NATO in the future, should not have made him dig in his heals. Hell, he could have just lied about it, until he had real certainty. As his country is being torn apart piece by piece. And he definitely over-estimated his importance to the west, or did he?
Half or Washington is beside themselves itching for this fight. Of course they are, it won’t cost them anything. It’s us who get to suffer for their miscalculations like the Ukrainians are suffering right now. Hence, I have no doubt when enough bodies hit the floor, the west will jump in. I hope I am wrong, but I see nothing but escalation. No sane, prudent, temperate, pragmatic, people trying to come up with a nuanced, complicated solution to a very serious problem. We have a bunch of high-schoolers, emotionally driven nimrods blathering hysteria all over the place making things worse. It seems like they all watched reruns of “24” as a class in conflict resolution.
We are an asshair away from a war we really, really don’t want.
NATO doesn’t have to agonize whether to defend the Suwalki gap. Even if Ukraine had keeled over, Russia would simply set it’s sights to the Baltics - probably @hankthetank89’s country due to its large proportion of Russian speakers. With a declining economy and social stagnation there is only one way forward - foreign military adventures. The same was the case for Tsarist Russia/USSR in 1905, 1914, 1979…
Staying under Russia’s yoke is never a better option.
My main point is that Moscow has made it clear from the early 2000’s that they will not accept Ukraine joining the west through either soft or hard power. That this was a red line for them. Turns out they weren’t bluffing. And Russia can absolutely crush Ukraine military, though they put up more of a fight than expected. China will alleviate sanctions and Europe is still buying oil and gas…
Everybody who knew Russia knew they weren’t bluffing. It was the Westerners who were telling Eastern Europeans that they were “hysterical” and “russophobic”.
That is now believed only by the Russians themselves and parts of the American right. Even the Chinese have doubts about the military prowess of their allies. And now there are no American trucks to drive the Red Army as was the case in 1942-45
Since the Russian yoke has this planned for them, why not fight?
I don’t know her well enough to say, but she’s sure had enough of war. I don’t think she has any interest in politics, just want to live in peace as most of us do.
Ukraine winning a war against Russia? In what universe? Bungling the attempted blitzkrieg doesn’t mean they couldn’t escalate the violence if they need to. I don’t think they need to. Soon Zelensky will give them Crimea and Donbass and some kind of agreement not to join NATO. The plucky resistance narrative notwithstanding.
Forgive me, but that doesn’t seem like a question that takes much of reality into account. Once the tanks roll in, there’s no stopping it. That’s like asking for a solution for your post workout nutrition after your protein shake is already spilled on the floor. My solution would have been to make Ukraine a neutral country way sooner. Make it clear that it had no interest in participating in the power plays between East and West.
These things don’t happen in a vacuum. I understand it’s an emotional issue, but what I mean to say is that there was geopolitical strategy playing out for a couple of decades leading up to this. As far as I can tell, the west led Ukraine down this path by overstating Ukraine’s strategic importance to the west, and over promised and under delivered on support ultimately.
Yeah, that deterrent doesn’t appear to be working. You’re buy what the media is selling, huh. The delusion is strong with you. The Ukrainians have fought admirably against very bad odds, but they are losing badly. They are not keeping Russia at bay as they lose city after city and energy hub after energy hub. This 3 day old map isn’t the map of Zelinski kicking putin’s ass. They are making Russia pay a heavy price, but that is not stopping them one iota.
Ukraine cannot win without the west jumping in and the west jumping in means war. Big war. Not some far off war, a close and painful one. And it may yet be required. There may be no way out of it. We are not there yet and perhaps cooler heads will prevail, but if any such heads exist, they better come out of the wood work pronto.
Horse-shit, nobody bothered to try so there is no way we can know that. That’s the chip putin laid on the table and nobody even tested the theory. It was plain hubris. Maybe taking NATO off the table wouldn’t have stopped putin, but we will never know, because nobody even tried to negotiate. Yeah, it’s a russian talking point and their propaganda, but nobody even tested the water to see if that might move the needle with putin or not. Instead we dared him to do it, and do it, he did.
I am grateful you seemed to have put yours on. While we comfortably discuss the situation on-line, it’s getting worse. All I know is that was a starting point, putin had something to say and he wanted to be heard. Instead of granting him an audience to see if we can lower the temperature in the region, we used him as a punch-line and double-dog dared him to do it. Nobody took him seriously and now it’s too late.
Biden. Biden was intimately tied in with Ukraine as we all know. And I am sure biden filled him with all the bluster he needed, after all along with Ukraine, so biden’s secrets get buried in the rubble as well.
Appears to be that way. Since we already played every non-kinetic option we had, there’s only one option on the table left.
Can I steal this line?
Well, that might have been possible with the right deal on the table for Russia. No way they let Ukraine go for free. And we already did the coup to over throw the previous more pro-russian government. There is no way that didn’t influence this war. You have to make deals in this world, nothing is free. Or you send an army and take it. Those still are the only two ways to get desired outcomes in the real world; you know the one not on social media were everybody is playing the hero in an imaginary world. You make a deal or you fight and take it.
And you know this how? This is how we get stupid decisions made. Making putin to be a cartoon villain has no value. We have no idea if détente could work because it wasn’t tried. And the reality on the real world is that putin didn’t do this just because he felt like being the bad guy and thought it would be fun. Things happened in that region that led to this point.
And sure, maybe at the end of the day, putin is nutty as a fruitcake and just wanted some conquest just for the hell of it. Maybe he is that guy. But it would have been nice to know we tried everything to prevent it.
And then the plea for the working class to suck up the pain of war would have been more palatable when our “leaders” showed how hard they tried to prevent war. They could have actually laid a reasonable case that putin is a lunatic without restraint. However, without powerful people on putin’s side he couldn’t have done this. And we will never know what his actual motivation is, because we didn’t bother to find out.
I believe their foot dragging is cowardice and purely political hedging.
The bureuacrats of Europe would rather watch Ukraine get annihilated, then deal with Putin for their energy needs than chip a fingernail helping.
They better just hope he doesnt shut the gas off again like in 2006, or by this time next winter there will be a lot more to fight over than there is now.
