I don’t claim Biden handled the situation well. I’m not sure could US have prevented this war, or should it even your bussiness.
American Bund and Oswald Mosley comes to my mind at first. Latter was not a minor figure. Oh, and Henry Ford.
Also, many claimed Hitler had good reasons for expanding in 30s and did not engourage war against him. They did not see Hitler as a good dude, but believed that he is not a warmongering lunatic. Same thing is happening now with Putin. Remember Chamberlain.
I’ll try to give longer text about the war and it’s reasons later. It takes a while since we need to start from 1990.
He did, if you put yourself in his situation and understand the ideological imperatives of that version of Socialism.
His actions in the 1930’s were consistent with the ideology. Anschluss brought all of Austria’s ethnic Germans into the Reich, as did the annexation of the Sudetenland for Czechoslovakias German speakers.
The vampire economy Socialism conveniently sets up for the benefit of The Party also required sophisticated financial instruments called MEFO bills, which were just a form of funny money.
The deception of these instruments set up the urgent need for an economy of conquest to seize actual wealth, and they kept it propped up until they were conquered themselves.
What Russia is doing is playing the same kind of game for geopolitical influence and national security that every nation is forced to play. I’m not seeing Hitler over there any more than I see Hitler in Trump.
What should Russias response be to encirclement by hostile foreign powers?
I agree. Putin also has similar goals for the Eastern Europe and they’re completely justified from his perspective.
I said earlier that there are different perspectives, for me invading an independent country (and killing & raping civilians there) because of some imperialistic dream is not acceptable.
But I’ll get back to this when I have more time.
This is what Hitler was also saying when expanding. This is also Russia’s official stand. Problem is, that I personally think Putin is lying. He does not seek world domination, but domination over Europe? For sure.
What Hitler said and what he actually needed to do were two different things, as is the case most of the time in geopolitics. Russia’s natural resources today can prop up all kinds of bad economic policies that Germany could not in the 1930’s. They don’t have the same economic imperative.
It has always seemed like this war makes sense for Russia strictly on account of the more defensive border a Ukrainian conquest would yield. Plus the usual taking of stuff, of course. I’m sure much more is involved, but again I’m not seeing anything like Hitler.
Hitler HAD to conquer and seize wealth to prop his economy up. There was no other option that kept him in power. The whole MEFO bills scam would’ve collapsed his economy, crippled the rearmament efforts and left Germany as sitting ducks.
People like to fixate on what Hitler did in the 30’s and 40’s, for good reason, but very little about his activities in the 1920’s on his way to power gets the same kind of amplification today. It isn’t because it makes Hitler look good or anything, it is because it makes Socialists look bad.
My comment has absolutely nothing to do with the subject of this thread.
For English not being your first language, you have an exceptional skill communication the written word in English. I just would like to help you get better at it.
“Thought” means an idea or opinion produced by thinking with your mind.
The correct spelling of the word that you use as an adverb, that indicates that a factor qualifies or imposes restrictions on what was previously said, is spelled “though.”
Maybe I am splitting hairs, but your written English is very good. Why not make it better?
Are you asking this regarding Hitler and the National Socialists’ motives? He stated his reasoning for colonizing Eastern European countries in the first volume of Mein Kampf.
Why? It seems that Ukraine is doing a great job of defending the current border. Wouldn’t Russia be able to defend that border at least as well? When since WW2 have the geographic defensibility of land borders mattered?
In terms of pure buffer, Kiev is not much closer to Moscow than the Baltic states anyways. There are already NATO airbases in close range of Moscow. Ukraine is not the route to Moscow. The line about improving the defensibility of the border gets floated a lot, but it doesn’t seem to me to be well founded.
Which was a culmination of his political efforts that began in 1919, when he was elected by his military unit to serve as a socialist commissar. He didn’t just emerge on the scene in 1933. He was there when it was just the German Workers Party, quickly assuming a leadership role.
He didn’t rise to power in the idea of conquering Europe, let alone mass murder or declaring war on the USA. He sang the right kind of song for the place and time he was in.
The same song sung today in Maine, played to the rhythm of Marx’s dialectical materialism. You come to know the tune when you live through it being sung.
It is just a totally different situation than Putin, especially considering how poorly National Socialism is understood. It gets reduced into swear words for political expediency today. That’s how central economic planning and no concept of property rights becomes transformed into a “far right” political movement.
That’s why the same term is used today for MAGA, even though the similarities couldn’t be fewer.
Again, a totally different situation on nearly every level imaginable.
A good way of understanding Nazi motivations for conquest are the big ticking time bombs that could only be disarmed by conquest.
Time bomb one was the impending economic collapse being staved off by MEFO bills.
Time bomb two was oil.
Time bomb three was Soviet mobilization and broader allied rearmament.
Putin has had no such short fuse time bombs that I can see. He’s got the biggest one of all on a really long fuse to worry about.
Russian encirclement and hostile foreign takeovers of his government. A map of NATO aligned bases and our Pacific allies puts the degree of encirclement in perspective.
I’m not saying it is good or even justified according to my moral compass, just that it is very understandable.
I’m not critical of NATO per se, just observing what it has accomplished.
Given the lack of global conflict and especially no nukes being used, it has proven successful so far.
We also don’t get to play the good guy card with it forever, as the situation today is vastly different than when NATO formed.
It formed in the face of a Red Army still fully mobilized from WWII. It was a true machine of continental conquest, hardened by just fighting the fiercest war in history.
So you’re aware why countries around Russia are so eager to join the NATO?
Finland played the neutrality card for a long time. Russian aggression forced us to make a choice. In Europe there are currently only three situations if you’re bordering Russia.
You’re a vassal of Russia (Belarus)
You in a war with Russia (Ukraine)
You’re a NATO member.
It was a clear call for us. Russia claims it’s aggression. I would say it was self defense.
It is. Russia is not a superpower, and not a communist state. It’s still very aggressive though. Look how many wars Putin has started or has been involved with in 20 years.