It’s been interesting to see the shifting of alliances in recent years. The Turkish “deep state” which has historically been extremely anti-Russian has been showing signs of wanting to sever ties to the West and ally with Russian nationalists - see Turkish Council of State shooting. The “National Bolshevik” Aleksandr Dugin describes the Grey Wolves as “pro-Russian.” Turkey is best understood as Gulf state aligned Islamists versus Russian aligned secular nationalists.
[quote]Bismark wrote:
Regardless, I hardly need constructive criticism from someone who expresses his geopolitical pontifications as vulgarly as yourself.
[/quote]
Made me think of this:
[quote]Gkhan wrote:
[quote]Bismark wrote:
Regardless, I hardly need constructive criticism from someone who expresses his geopolitical pontifications as vulgarly as yourself.
[/quote]
Made me think of this:
Best movie ever.
Ukraine = Kosovo part 2. Only this time “Serbia” wins.
2 telling articles:
Put yourself in the position of Russian strategic planners.
[quote]SexMachine wrote:
[quote]Bismark wrote:
[quote]Gkhan wrote:
[quote]Bismark wrote:
[quote]Gkhan wrote:
http://www.aol.com/article/2014/08/28/official-2-tank-columns-from-russia-enter-ukraine/20953841/?icid=maing-grid7|main5|dl1|sec1_lnk2%26pLid%3D521813
1000 Russian troops supported by missiles and tanks cross the border into Ukraine. The West & Nato looks weaker than ever. [/quote]
Not quite. Weakness is not qualified by being reluctant to go to war with the largest nuclear weapon state in the world over Ukraine. [/quote]
When I suggested this in April, you said Russia would not risk nuclear annihilation over the Crimean…did you suddenly change your mind?
[/quote]
No, what gives you that impression? The Russian Federation maintains the greatest quantitative nuclear arsenal in the world. Is it possible you believed I was referring to the U.S.? NATO should use force against a great power and nuclear weapons state only as a last resort when all other options have been exhausted and the interests at stake are absolutely vital. The Ukraine crisis does not qualify as such.[/quote]
So how should the west deal with Russian irredentism?
[/quote]
Curtail the motivating variables. That is, NATO enlargement, EU expansion, and democratic social engineering.
[quote]Gkhan wrote:
What good are buffer zones in a world of ICBMs, Tomahawks, B-2’s, B-1B 's, B-52’s , and attack drones?
[/quote]
It’s known as the primacy of land power. Strategic bombing campaigns and naval blockades are of limited utility absent of ground forces that can clear and hold territory. A huge expanse of flat land that Napoleonic France, imperial Germany, and Nazi Germany all crossed to strike at Russia itself, Ukraine serves as a buffer state of enormous strategic importance to Russia.
The architect of Cold War containment, George Kennan, predicted in 1998 that NATO expansion would provoke a crisis with Russian.
[quote]Bismark wrote:
[quote]SexMachine wrote:
[quote]Bismark wrote:
[quote]Gkhan wrote:
[quote]Bismark wrote:
[quote]Gkhan wrote:
http://www.aol.com/article/2014/08/28/official-2-tank-columns-from-russia-enter-ukraine/20953841/?icid=maing-grid7|main5|dl1|sec1_lnk2%26pLid%3D521813
1000 Russian troops supported by missiles and tanks cross the border into Ukraine. The West & Nato looks weaker than ever. [/quote]
Not quite. Weakness is not qualified by being reluctant to go to war with the largest nuclear weapon state in the world over Ukraine. [/quote]
When I suggested this in April, you said Russia would not risk nuclear annihilation over the Crimean…did you suddenly change your mind?
[/quote]
No, what gives you that impression? The Russian Federation maintains the greatest quantitative nuclear arsenal in the world. Is it possible you believed I was referring to the U.S.? NATO should use force against a great power and nuclear weapons state only as a last resort when all other options have been exhausted and the interests at stake are absolutely vital. The Ukraine crisis does not qualify as such.[/quote]
So how should the west deal with Russian irredentism?
[/quote]
Curtail the motivating variables. That is, NATO enlargement, EU expansion, and democratic social engineering. [/quote]
NATO/EU expansion is not a conscious strategic decision of the West. It has resulted from former Soviet block states moving away from Russia by the own choice motivated by desire for political and economic autonomy and their own security needs. The West has massively scaled back its nuclear and conventional forces in Eastern Europe since the fall of the Soviet Union - entirely unilaterally I might add.
Today Russia is again presenting an increasing threat to NATO. Since the fall of the Soviet Union Russian irredentist thought has been dominant in the political and intellectual elite. Vice President Alexander Rutskoy made claims to parts of Estonia, Ukraine and Kazakhstan in the early 90’s. Claims to Belarus, Moldova and Romania are asserted by prominent irredentists such as Aleksandr Dugin. South Ossetia was invaded, Crimea occupied and annexed and now Eastern Ukraine. Russia is the belligerent; not NATO/EU. You are advocating a policy of appeasement and withdrawal. That’s fine, but let’s not mince words and pretend otherwise.
[quote]Bismark wrote:
Put yourself in the position of Russian strategic planners.[/quote]
Oh, I have. Yes indeedy.
[quote]Bismark wrote:
The architect of Cold War containment, George Kennan, predicted in 1998 that NATO expansion would provoke a crisis with Russian.
http://www.nytimes.com/1998/05/02/opinion/foreign-affairs-now-a-word-from-x.html[/quote]
[quote]SexMachine wrote:
[quote]Bismark wrote:
Put yourself in the position of Russian strategic planners.[/quote]
Oh, I have. Yes indeedy.[/quote]
Russia is a declining great power. It doesn’t have the military capability or the economic wherewithal to forge a new empire.
[quote]pushharder wrote:
[quote]Bismark wrote:
[quote]SexMachine wrote:
[quote]Bismark wrote:
Put yourself in the position of Russian strategic planners.[/quote]
Oh, I have. Yes indeedy.[/quote]
Russia is a declining great power. It doesn’t have the military capability or the economic wherewithal to forge a new empire. [/quote]
But they’d like to change all that. And that’s precisely what they’re attempting.
[/quote]
You also might want to tell the big stack of nukes sitting in Russia that they are a declining power.
[quote]jjackkrash wrote:
[quote]pushharder wrote:
[quote]Bismark wrote:
[quote]SexMachine wrote:
[quote]Bismark wrote:
Put yourself in the position of Russian strategic planners.[/quote]
Oh, I have. Yes indeedy.[/quote]
Russia is a declining great power. It doesn’t have the military capability or the economic wherewithal to forge a new empire. [/quote]
But they’d like to change all that. And that’s precisely what they’re attempting.
[/quote]
You also might want to tell the big stack of nukes sitting in Russia that they are a declining power. [/quote]
Absolutely. Putin is the greatest 18th century statesman of the 21st century. He lives and breaths Realpoltik. Russia, however, cannot hope to recover its former superpower status. Demography is destiny, after all. addressed Russia’s nuclear arsenal ad nauseum in this thread. Is Russia a great power? Yes. Does Russia possess the largest quantitative nuclear arsenal in the world? Yes. Is Russia’s power relative to its peers in the international system increasing? No, it is the opposite. Its actualized and latent power are declining while those of its peers are rising.
[quote]Bismark wrote:
[quote]jjackkrash wrote:
[quote]pushharder wrote:
[quote]Bismark wrote:
[quote]SexMachine wrote:
[quote]Bismark wrote:
Put yourself in the position of Russian strategic planners.[/quote]
Oh, I have. Yes indeedy.[/quote]
Russia is a declining great power. It doesn’t have the military capability or the economic wherewithal to forge a new empire. [/quote]
But they’d like to change all that. And that’s precisely what they’re attempting.
[/quote]
You also might want to tell the big stack of nukes sitting in Russia that they are a declining power. [/quote]
Absolutely. Putin is the greatest 18th century statesman of the 21st century. He lives and breaths Realpoltik. Russia, however, cannot hope to recover its former superpower status. Demography is destiny, after all. addressed Russia’s nuclear arsenal ad nauseum in this thread. Is Russia a great power? Yes. Does Russia possess the largest quantitative nuclear arsenal in the world? Yes. Is Russia’s power relative to its peers in the international system increasing? No, it is the opposite. Its actualized and latent power are declining while those of its peers are rising. [/quote]
It would seem Ze Big New Realist disagrees:
[quote]SexMachine wrote:
[quote]Bismark wrote:
[quote]SexMachine wrote:
[quote]Bismark wrote:
[quote]Gkhan wrote:
[quote]Bismark wrote:
[quote]Gkhan wrote:
http://www.aol.com/article/2014/08/28/official-2-tank-columns-from-russia-enter-ukraine/20953841/?icid=maing-grid7|main5|dl1|sec1_lnk2%26pLid%3D521813
1000 Russian troops supported by missiles and tanks cross the border into Ukraine. The West & Nato looks weaker than ever. [/quote]
Not quite. Weakness is not qualified by being reluctant to go to war with the largest nuclear weapon state in the world over Ukraine. [/quote]
When I suggested this in April, you said Russia would not risk nuclear annihilation over the Crimean…did you suddenly change your mind?
[/quote]
No, what gives you that impression? The Russian Federation maintains the greatest quantitative nuclear arsenal in the world. Is it possible you believed I was referring to the U.S.? NATO should use force against a great power and nuclear weapons state only as a last resort when all other options have been exhausted and the interests at stake are absolutely vital. The Ukraine crisis does not qualify as such.[/quote]
So how should the west deal with Russian irredentism?
[/quote]
Curtail the motivating variables. That is, NATO enlargement, EU expansion, and democratic social engineering. [/quote]
NATO/EU expansion is not a conscious strategic decision of the West. It has resulted from former Soviet block states moving away from Russia by the own choice motivated by desire for political and economic autonomy and their own security needs. The West has massively scaled back its nuclear and conventional forces in Eastern Europe since the fall of the Soviet Union - entirely unilaterally I might add.
[/quote]
Well if Russia disarmed its nuclear missiles in Eastern Europe where would that put them?
[quote]Bismark wrote:
[quote]SexMachine wrote:
[quote]Bismark wrote:
Put yourself in the position of Russian strategic planners.[/quote]
Oh, I have. Yes indeedy.[/quote]
Russia is a declining great power. It doesn’t have the military capability or the economic wherewithal to forge a new empire. [/quote]
Exactly nor do they want to, Ukraine is a special situation, it has a soft spot in practically all Russian’s hearts. Kyivsky Rus, the first state of Eastern Slavs, the predecessor to the modern nations of Belarus, Russia and Ukraine, was centered in Ukraine for the most part. There has always been a Moscovy ( before it was called Russia) policy to reclaim the “Ruska” land. So much history on why Putin sees Ukraine as fair ground, nothing to do with evil plans. And yes for sure if Ukraine sided with NATO a lot of Russians would feel betrayed. Like broken hearted betrayed.
But Russia definitely has no where near the military power to handle any long standing war. Last time Russia beefed in Ukraine they lost more troops in western Ukraine then they ever lost in Afghanistan.