Russia and American elections, now featuring radical republicans as co-stars

[SmokeyTheBear 5562]

3 hours ago, BrickHorn said:

I like this @956 Worldwide cat. He’s the Antistatis. 

 

Yeah, I'm subscribing to his newsletter

[SmokeyTheBear 5562]

2 hours ago, kevwun said:

It is contrarianism.  They can’t agree with dirty libs and no position is untenable as long as they can fight over it.

Thats the GOPs part of the strategy using Fox and reenforcing sides in lots of levels: Political sides, question framing in which the are only 2 sides and they always align politically, etc. Russia used the GOPs decades long strategy to grab and maintain power with a shrinking voter base, and did it masterfully. No doubt with help of China as a potential kill shot to our standing in the world. If the election fraud shit took hold and the insurrection worked, Putin and Xi would be dealing with a Trump and they could make their moves without a unified response from the rest of the world. 

[Anastasis 23306]

55 minutes ago, BrickHorn said:

Define “y’all.” 

Meet me half way in terms of effort. 
 

you post all the quotes of posters pushing back on that nonsense and I will in kind post the hits of the posters deep throating it. 
 

One of us has a much easier tasking than the other. 

Edited December 27, 2021 by Anastasis

[JimmyJames 12271]

5 hours ago, atomheartbevo said:

The Republican love of Russia is weird as fuck

Money has a way to make things crystal clear.

It’s always about the money. 

[Anastasis 23306]

1 minute ago, JimmyJames said:

Money has a way to make things crystal clear.

It’s always about the money. 

Follow the Gazprom brokerage fees. 

[JimmyJames 12271]

1 hour ago, Anastasis said:

It should offend all Americans. And particularly those that are professionally charged with effecting justice and the rule of law. 

While I could get into another pointless argument with you about FISA warrants, I will say this instead. 
 

The standards for obtaining a search warrant, including FISA warrants, should be higher than they currently are. The way the courts have interpreted the fourth amendment have essentially rendered it meaningless. This was in no doubt in response to the increase in crime which culminated in the early 90s. The causes of which are in dispute.

Nevertheless the only solution I see to this conundrum is to allow civil cases against the police and local government for violations of the fourth amendment to actually proceed, which current law makes virtually impossible including the doctrine qualified immunity among many other legal doctrines. You aren’t going to change directly it in criminal law. It will not work. 
 

Are you prepared to support that? Because the downside would be people like me who you dislike actually making some money off it. You take the good with the bad. 
 

Well?

 

[Anastasis 23306]

7 minutes ago, JimmyJames said:

Nevertheless the only solution I see to this conundrum is to allow civil cases against the police and local government for violations of the fourth amendment to actually proceed, which current law makes virtually impossible including the doctrine qualified immunity among many other legal doctrines. You aren’t going to change directly it in criminal law. It will not work. 

Other than your lack of imagination, I feel nothing particularly offensive here. 

[JimmyJames 12271]

1 minute ago, Anastasis said:

Other than your lack of imagination, I feel nothing particularly offensive here. 

Well if you have a better solution I’m all ears.

[JimmyJames 12271]

I suppose we could eliminate all republican judges appointed in the last 40 years and replace them with newly appointed democratic criminal defense lawyers. 
 

That should do the trick. 

[DDD Dad 14137]

11 hours ago, Anastasis said:

Meet me half way in terms of effort. 
 

you post all the quotes of posters pushing back on that nonsense and I will in kind post the hits of the posters deep throating it. 
 

One of us has a much easier tasking than the other. 

[Ghost of LL 15321]

On 12/24/2021 at 5:15 AM, Shady Ray said:

I have been thinking about this, as well, and I am not sure that he takes or occupies anything, as Russians have zero appetite for absorbing Donbas, as opposed to their overwhelming support of the annexation of Crimea. Hell, taking Crimea was so popular internally that even Navalny said he wouldn't return it. But bodybags coming home from a worthless area of fuckin' Ukraine would quickly erode his position. But I do think that he is fully prepared to fuck Ukraine's shit up something fierce and leave it a condition where it essentially breaks the country sending it into full-blown intra-Ukrainian meltdown, which I believe it would. People look at the strength and structural reslillience in Ukraine through rose-colored lenses in the West. It is not in good shape by any metric and it would not take much to send it from its current awful state to complete collapse and chaos internally. The country is not particularly cohesive and does suffer from decades and decades of corruption and ethnic strife. Putin knows this and I would not be surprised if his secondary objective if he doesn't gain concessions from the US as to European security structure is just to say, "fuck it...destroy it then and let Europe deal with the fallout". To me, that makes much more sense than the risk/expenditure of political capital required to invade and annex. At the end, he knows that a failed Ukrainian state has no chance of entering the EU or NATO anytime soon and he would have at least bought himself years before dealing with the issue again. Not married to this idea, but its as good as my spitballing can get at the moment.

 

As to whether the EU will defend Ukraine...not a snowball's chance. IMO, most EU nationals - at least in Western Europe would support shit going hot with Russia if Russia touched a NATO member, because they value the idea of NATO...but they would not for Ukraine. Basically, Berlin and Paris would risk an attack by Moscow on behalf of defending Warsaw...they won't for Kiev, and every politician knows that stepping in militarily against Russia may very easily result in a situation where they have to address their electorate from a smoldering pile of rubble and defend their entry into what is seen by many - rightly or wrongly - as an intra-slavic historical conflict having nothing to do with us. 

 

And while it may be unpopular to state in public or in diplomatic statements, but this position against military interventiion in France and Germany is not just about Russia…it is also about a general indifference (and for many here, a distaste - even within the urban, professional pro-EU/Atlanticist class) for the current Ukrainian state itself. Ukraine is portrayed in the US media as a promising democracy full of democratic politicians with some semblance of the structural elements required to efficiently integrate into the “European fold” with just a little TLC from Brussels…as though it is analogous to Czechia or Poland or Slovenia at the time of their respective entries into the EU/NATO. Unfortunately, that is a very naive and oversimplified portrayal. In my opinion, Ukraine makes the pre-accession conditions of Romania and Bulgaria, which were (and remain) very difficult for the EU for years, look like integrating Luxembourg by comparison to what we would face with Ukraine.

 

"Ukraine-Fatigue" is a very real-thing here in Germany (and in France), where the country is seen essentially as a borderline-failed state with all of the same problems that Russia has, only with volatile internal politics which produce puppets/corrupted/incompetent heads of state instead of a fixed autocrat like Putin. It is completely dysfunctional even outside of its issues with Russia, burdened with xenophobic attitudes by some powerful people on all respective sides(which are endlessly exploited and exagerrated by Putin, but neverthless seen and reported on as a real concern here). It is thoroughly corrupted by shady oligarchs, chronically insolvent despite billions of EU direct-cash infusions, and completely mismanaged with infrastructure decrepitness that rivals even their eternal-basketcase neighbor, Moldova. It is filled with less-than desirable elements in positions of influence - and that goes for both sides of the Dnieper. And as I mentioned on a previous post in this thread, the desire of German Industry/Politicians to move ahead with NS2 is not only about securing a steady and affordable fuel supply (which it is, of course), it is also about reducing the endless headaches that come along with dealing with Ukraine as a transit state. Decrepit pipeline infrastructure and unreliable supply through Ukraine have been a long-held irritation by German Industry and no amount of contributed funds (even when specifically earmarked for such purposes year after year) or pressure has helped to resolve this. Ukraine is a black-hole with respect to EU direct aid and even the EU technocrats are tired of the games over there. In short, Ukraine is the child that only Uncle Sam loves. It's support elsewhere in Europe is directly proportionate to the self-interests of a given nation at a given time.

 

So, while pure economic interests should not necessarily determine Europe's willingness to defend Ukraine militarily, the truth of the matter is that they do, and I just can't see the average Western European government backing sending troops to defend it given the baggage that it has. Any military defense would immediately open the door to nationalist politicians making political hay over what would be an ugly, ugly situation. Macron couldn't afford it given his upcoming election next year, which is already proving to be an election fought on the right, and the declining AfD would immediately start to tick back up again here in Germany. So I just don't see it happening. Way too much downside defending a place that isn't particularly sympathetic behind closed boardroom and residential doors.

I agree with all of this.  I would just add that I think you understate the level of anti-Slav racism that underpins much of the Western European thinking about this.

It's kind of akin to the popular American view of Latin America.  Anything that is south of the Rio Grande is "Mexico," and who knows what the fuck goes on in Mexico?  Whatever it is, it's probably some combination of corruption, drugs and drug cartels, and outright stupidity.  So if Honduras and El Salvador go to war over a soccer match, is the United States going to do anything to stop it?  Are the American people even going to notice?

It's the same thing with Western Europe and the Slavs.  In the mind of the average Munchner or Bordelais, everything east of Oder is "Slavia," and who knows what the fuck goes on in Slavia?  The only way anybody in Western Europe is going to give a damn about what happens in an intra-slavic dispute is (1) if it interrupts their supply of Russian oil & gas or (2) if it causes a refugee crisis.

Note that both are entirely possible here.  But the Europeans are so lacking in foresight that they won't know about it until it happens.

Two questions for you: 

First, where do you see Turkey in all this?  I see them as the big wild card.  Erdogan seems to be in a politically tough place, and could really use the boost in popularity that a foreign conflict often brings.  And beyond that, Turkey is still pissed at the Russians over their intervention in Syria, and I suspect the Turkish diplomatic and military establishment would really like to bloody the Russian nose.  So I really wouldn't be surprised to see a significant covert intervention by the Turks on behalf of Ukraine, perhaps akin to what they did last year with Azerbaijan.

Second, there's a whole radiological site right there in northern Ukraine that probably wouldn't react too well to bullets.  And it's probably something that the Ukrainians could sabotage if there were a strong southwesterly wind and really fuck with the Russians.  Has anybody given the least little thought to that?

[Shady Ray 1633]

7 hours ago, 956 Worldwide said:

Western Europeans, especially, are driven to distraction by both Russian threats and the belief that if Russia receives what it wants, it will be somehow more amenable. But as the author points out, Russia will never be “at peace” with its neighbors and especially its European neighbors in the broadest sense. Having a “normal” relationship with Russia means dealing with and fending off lots of hostile behavior. Caving to bravado and hostility encourages more of same from Russian leadership.
 

 

I agree with a lot of what was said in the thread that you cited, particularly the elements pointing to this extending far beyond Putin and into a full-on component of the Russian psyche. This goes back far, far beyond current leadership and is embedded in their worldview. Of course, Vlad exploits this unreservedly. Thanks for sharing this. 

 

But I don't agree at all that Western Europeans are distracted by/"appeasement-prone" wrt Putin/Russian threats, which seems to be the position of so much of the western media...as though this is some "Chamberlain in Munich" moment. Every sovereign entity evaluates its own risks and rewards of esclation. The French and Germans and Italians etc. would support military involvement against Russia in response to any aggression towards EXISTING NATO members in two seconds flat. But the powers that be and the electorate here do not believe that Russia has revanchist designs on anything outside of securing a continued disfunctional/neutral Ukraine. They could be right or they could be wrong, but it is their position nevertheless, and that is what guides policy here re Russia. 

 

This over-simplified, "made-for-American-audience" take completely discards Western Europe's own legitimate interests, history, and future objectives with respect to Russia. It basically boils down this entire complex and VERY nuanced situation (one that has huge risks to Europe as a whole) to some "Freedom NATO vs. Evil Russia" narrative to which very few in Western Europe subscribe, yet is so pervasive in US media circles, regardless of whether one resides on the American political left or right.

 

Western Europe's position is not the same as that of the US, and at some point, the US will hopefully understand that European leaders cannot approach this from the same perspective as some talking head sitting there drawing a nice paycheck in Northern Virginia can. I will expand on this, but spoiler out of respect for those not inclined to sift through my bullshit, er, I mean verbosity:

 

Spoiler

Western Europe wants the status quo wrt Ukraine. They want a return to Minsk II, or some derivative of it, and they want both sides to respect it. And that is what will eventually come out of this once the Sturm and Drang theater blows over.

 

 

No one here supports Russian expansion/invasion/occupation of Ukraine, and at the same time, most do not support any further steps whatsoever to integrate Ukraine into our existing NATO or EU structures, which will inevitably be expected by the US and its loyal adherents in the former Warsaw Pact if shit goes hot. We are already seeing pushes for such a stupid move coming out of NATO, Warsaw and Vilnius. It will not happen. Ever. 

 

Western European voters are much, much more in tune to the dynamics of the relationship of Great Power/Russian relations stretching back centuries than are Adam Schiff, Fat Wolverine, or this idiot GOP Senator from Mississippi who actually spoke about first-strike nukes on Moscow a couple of weeks back on Fox News. Fucking regarded. This is not some narrow-minded strictly-post-Cold-War view. This is a viewpoint formed from living with/trading with/fighting with Russia for centuries. Thankfully, Biden seems to understand this.

 

The only reason that this debate is even occuring in Western Europe is out of deference to the US as a major ally...no one here outside of possibly the German Greens wants to have anything to do with Ukraine. The SPD doesn't. The CDU/CSU doesn't. The FDP doesn't. The Linke doesn't. The AfD doesn't. Macron doesn't. le Pen (of course) doesn't. Zemmour doesn't. Pecresse doesn't. Draghi doesn't. Salvini (of course) doesn't. Conte doesn't. I can go on and on through almost every government/opposition party in the big players in Western Europe and you will be hard-pressed to find anyone who gives one single solitary fuck about getting involved in the dumpster fire that is Ukraine. And it isn't because they are "scared" or "appeasers" or any other buzzword the US uses to justify geopolitical positions counter to its own...it is frankly because they don't see Ukraine as desirable in the EU/NATO fold, and they don't care enough to lay down life and limb to defend it. While this sounds cynical to our American values towards freedom and democracy, it is a valid position based in a very real Realpolitik calculation.

 

Only the US, the UK, and the Eastern Europeans care. And unfortunately for the Eastern Europeans, in particular, the Western Europeans pay the cost to be the boss here. That's what they agreed to when the East decided to avail themselves to that sweet, sweet, Western European-provided largesse that they all depend upon. That doesn't mean that Western Europe supports Russia...but it does mean that brutal sanctions are as far as it's going to go.

 

Let's look at this from a German's eyes. 

 

What does Germany get if Ukraine - a Ukraine that EVERYONE knows is never going to accede to NATO or the EU - goes hot?

- Exploding energy costs;
 

- Large-scale economic strife with respect to our own corporate environment - at a time when COVID has already put a beating on our export-driven economy - coupled with very real risk that the German auto industry goes tits up due to increase energy costs which will completely cripple Germany, and, by extension, the rest of Europe;
 

- Ukraine (we think) has around 50 million citizens with a GDP per capita of 3,500 USD. It makes Russia at approx 11k USD GDP per capita look like fuckin' Norway. If it had the ability to complete the most basic of government functions - a census - which it inexplictly hasn't been able to carry out for over 20 years, we would know exactly how many people live there, but, of course, it can't carrry that out, so we don't know for sure. But regardless, we would see an immediate massive influx of unskilled, non-German/non-English speaking refugees headed straight into Germany the second the missiles start flying, many with VERY questionable worldviews and most all with limited (read "absolutely fucking zero") prospects here. Oh, and not just pro-Western Ukrainians, but significant portions of the pro-Russian Ukrainians from the east, who will gladly head to Berlin long before they head to some bumfuck vilage in rural Western Russia or remain in some bumfuck village in Ukraine. Russia doesn't pay enough out of their measly welfare state to live in Moscow or St. P...but God knows the Germans will certainly make room for them and generously float their nut for them to stay in Berlin or Munich or Hamburg. Point being, hardly any will be stopping off in Slovakia or Poland or Czech...they are heading straight to Germany with our generous social welfare system, cost-free refugee housing, wonderful health care, and generally high standard of living even for the destitute and aimless. This will bring similar inter-ethnic strife on the streets, similar to what we already experience here between the immigrant Kurds and Turks and Russians, only now we are welcoming thousands of angry, unskilled Ukrainians into the mix in our urban centers. This will be a powder keg and govt coalition will fall on this development alone. And let's not even get into how much the average German would prefer to keep all Slavs in the East. Anti-Slavism is very much alive and well here, albeit very discrete, of course. 
 

- Assymetrical Russian actions in Bosnia and Serbia for absolute fucking certain in an area already about to blow sky high at the moment due to the Ethnic Serbs' recalcitrance in Bosnia (which is unbelievably supported by existing EU/NATO members); as well as in Serbia proper given Kosovo and Albania now openly flirting with unification, which will also result in chaos on the most volatile of all borders of Europe. This will also likely result in a replay of the 1990s when half of fucking Yugoslavia found its way to - and to a large degree, remained in - Munich, Berlin, Cologne and Stuttgart.
 

- Guaranteed assymetrical action against NATO-member-backed interests in Syria, specifically Turkish interests should they support action in Ukraine, which will destabliize and likely expand, a relatively isolated pocket of fighting in NW Syria across the north to the Northeast, potentially resulting in yet another wave of Syrian refugees to Germany a la 2015.

 

- The very real risk that the US just fucks off and pulls out, leaving a mess for us to finance/clean up, if Trump or his heir apparent is (re)elected, leaving a smouldering mess like we did in Iraq, Afghanistan, and (along with the French's idiocy) in Libya.
 

- A completely destabilized internal political situation once all this chaos kicks off where the far-right Alternative fur Deutschland (AfD) explodes in popularity (relative to their previous highs), probably touching on 20-22% of the total vote, with much higher numbers in the former East Germany (probably 35%+), thus massively disrupting our entire political process and making fresh elections pure chaos after the inevitable coalition collapse occurs (FDP will leave to save its ass). They will never come anywhere close to power here, but they can make coalition building a massive, massive problem and their numbers are directly correlated to immigrant/foreign policy chaos.

 

 

- The very real possibility of a public situation where the NATO alliance is providing weapons directly to Azov Battalion or Centuria in a rump Western Ukraine as part of NATO-backed guerilla movements, which they would have to do if Western Ukraine was to hold up. Do you have any idea how quickly that would be disavowed here? Immediately. It is a non-starter. See chart below*. Germans are well-informed on the internal dynamics in Ukraine, unlike most in the US, and they are not so naive as to believe that Azov, Right Sector, Centuria etc. are some fringe movement within the Ukrainian defense forces. They know that Ukraine is not the neo-Nazi state that Putin's propaganda arm portrays it to be, both at the individual citizen and Parliamentary level, but they do know that the far, far, far Right form critical units in the Ukranian military and that the Ukrainian defense against Russia absolutely depends on them...the ZDF (German state-funded TV) has reported on their widespread adherence to neo-Nazism and on NATO's unfortunate (and knowing) training of them as recently as this year. Hell, Germany's Ambassador to Ukraine had to release a public statement in April of this year condemning Ukranians for marching in honor the SS Galicia. This shit is so fucking embarassing to Germany and it is political kryptonite here. If - as has been repeatedly insisted upon by Western Europeans - Ukraine can't rid itself of this vocal, albeit effective, element of its military, its done wrt German support.

 

*The Greens were the only party that advocated going so far as simply arming Ukraine in the 2021 election here. Green Party Co-Leader Robert Habeck said that while visiting Kiev on May 24th. Here is the polling for the 2021 cycle. Notice a coincidence? While not the sole reason for the decline, it was a major one and it was the one that kicked off the trend line. Just the idea of Ukrainian military support is political suicide here.

 

 

And what do those of us in Germany get in exchange for supporting military action in a country that we prefer remain neutral...?

- A warm fuzzy feeling?

- Attaboys from NATO, a NATO which is not even particularly revered here?

- Dependence on expensive LNG from the US derived from extraction methods that are completely illegal here?

- The self-pride that comes with risking your own entire system to placate an abstract idea of "Ukrainian freedom"?

 

There are maybe three US politicians over the past two decades that would engage in such a suicide mission based on their own moral convictions, yet the US expects Western European pols to do what not a single fucking one of them would ever do. There is a reason all support comes from unelected NATO and Brussels here and not from those facing re-election.
 

This is realpolitik and everyone is going along with the US optically until the shit hits the fan, but no one here is going to support anything over there. So, everyone can go through the song and dance discussing appeasement, freedom, sovereign-determination, etc., but at the end of the day, this is a fait accompli. We can and should manage the situation, but we won't prevail in doing anything but inviting absolute chaos into the EU by escalating.

 

And over what? Ukraine? That's never going to fly.

 

Anyway, appreciate your thoughtfulness on this topic. As usual, it is great stuff and I really appreciate your informed takes.

 

[HenryJames 65814]

9 minutes ago, Ghost of LL said:

I would just add that I think you understate the level of anti-Slav racism that underpins much of the Western European thinking about this.

 

[956 Worldwide 34222]

Today Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov made a fairly astonishing statement that can only be called “saying the quiet part out loud.” He described the prior expansion of NATO as “mastering unowned lands” following the collapse of the Warsaw Pact and the Soviet Union. His comments are useless as a descriptor of what actually happened, but wonderfully insightful of the Russian conception of international order.  There are big countries— the United States, China, maybe Germany or France or England but most assuredly Russia. And there are territories to be owned by said big states. 

And it reveals the futility of Western Europeans’ alleged sophisticated approach to Russia. Peaceful cooperation for the common good and the balance of power in Great Power rivalry are foreign concepts and they play the Great Power game by different rules. Russia is engaged in a perpetual struggle to extend its power to the absolute limit of its ability. And Western Europeans have been getting this wrong for centuries. For Russia, the only secure border is one with Russian soldiers on both sides. 

[Ghost of LL 15321]

5 minutes ago, 956 Worldwide said:

Today Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov made a fairly astonishing statement that can only be called “saying the quiet part out loud.” He described the prior expansion of NATO as “mastering unowned lands” following the collapse of the Warsaw Pact and the Soviet Union. His comments are useless as a descriptor of what actually happened, but wonderfully insightful of the Russian conception of international order.  There are big countries— the United States, China, maybe Germany or France or England but most assuredly Russia. And there are territories to be owned by said big states. 

And it reveals the futility of Western Europeans’ alleged sophisticated approach to Russia. Peaceful cooperation for the common good and the balance of power in Great Power rivalry are foreign concepts and they play the Great Power game by different rules. Russia is engaged in a perpetual struggle to extend its power to the absolute limit of its ability. And Western Europeans have been getting this wrong for centuries. For Russia, the only secure border is one with Russian soldiers on both sides. 

I think this is broadly right, but I don't think that last bit is right.

Russia doesn't have any natural obstacles that would slow an invader. That's something that has been apparent since the time of the Vikings, and of which the Russians are keenly aware.  But that also means that the Russians know what a natural border would be.  They've been eyeing it for centuries.

In the east, it's the Pacific--they've reached that.  In the south, it's the Gobi and the Himalaya and the Caucasus--they have friendly regimes all the way along that string of obstacles.  On the west, it's the Rhine to the Alps to the Julian Alps to the Adriatic--and they're not anywhere close to that.  Until the Russians at least get friendly regimes to that line, they'll never feel secure.

That being said, there's a big difference between the mildly insecurity Russia feels with NATO on the other side of the Elbe and the high level of insecurity Russia would feel if it were to look over and see NATO troops in Eastern Ukraine.  Even the other side of the Dnieper would be a big improvement for the Russians. 

[Onboard 2.0 9083]

Russia’s vast size has always been their best defense 

[956 Worldwide 34222]

1 hour ago, Ghost of LL said:

I think this is broadly right, but I don't think that last bit is right.

Russia doesn't have any natural obstacles that would slow an invader. That's something that has been apparent since the time of the Vikings, and of which the Russians are keenly aware.  But that also means that the Russians know what a natural border would be.  They've been eyeing it for centuries.

In the east, it's the Pacific--they've reached that.  In the south, it's the Gobi and the Himalaya and the Caucasus--they have friendly regimes all the way along that string of obstacles.  On the west, it's the Rhine to the Alps to the Julian Alps to the Adriatic--and they're not anywhere close to that.  Until the Russians at least get friendly regimes to that line, they'll never feel secure.

That being said, there's a big difference between the mildly insecurity Russia feels with NATO on the other side of the Elbe and the high level of insecurity Russia would feel if it were to look over and see NATO troops in Eastern Ukraine.  Even the other side of the Dnieper would be a big improvement for the Russians. 

The last bit is a slight exaggeration, but Russia’s own 20th century century history belies their comfort with even their seemingly “secure” borders. At the height of the Soviet empire, Russia felt compelled to invade Afghanistan, insecure behind the vastness of the Central Asian republics and Siberian steppe.  Russian and Chinese fellow travelers came closer to nuclear war than Russia ever did with the West and in fact regular troops shot at each other. Russia and China are, at best, at an uneasy truce. To this day, Russia has unresolved territorial disputes with Japan over useless islands entirely peripheral in any strategic sense.

The West has always been Russia’s bugbear par excellence, though. And the fundamental issue with this ideal border is that the territory is full of people who aren’t Russian, have no wish to be Russian, are mostly richer and more developed than Russians, and have only ever sporadically and begrudgingly fallen under Russia’s sphere of influence. And Russia creates its own security dilemma- the harder it pushes, the more desperately the people run for a Western security guarantee. Russian foreign policy to Ukraine has been a failure inasmuch as it turned a nation that wavered between friendliness and neutrality into a sworn enemy. 
 

And, this interpretation also does not leave room for an equally valid rationale for Russian expansionism. We have long been accustomed to think of Central and Eastern Europe as poor and backward. But in comparison to Russia, the Bohemian, Polish, Hungarian, Baltic, Romanian, and Ukrainian lands have mostly been incomparably richer and more developed for all of recorded history. It’s vital to remember that COMECON was a one way transfer of wealth and technology to Great Russia. Russia did not just lose part of its empire— it lost the (stolen) crown jewels, which goes a long way towards explaining its singleminded fixation on influence and access to the Western reaches and not the more desolate Central Asian sphere (which was a net drag for the Soviets). 

 

[InkaUtexas 25259]

Russian windows must really suck. Also, who would open one during the winter there? 

 

[wildcat09 29143]

We really need to get into Russian window security. The defenestrations are growing so frequent it really seems like there's some money that could be made in protecting against them. 

[Cacti 191]

6 hours ago, Shady Ray said:

The French and Germans and Italians etc. would support military involvement against Russia in response to any aggression towards EXISTING NATO members in two seconds flat.

You are in a better position than I am to judge whether or not the referenced countries would defend a NATO ally, but a 2020 Pew poll suggests otherwise.

Quote

...there is widespread reluctance to fulfill the collective defense commitment outlined in Article 5 of NATO’s founding treaty. When asked if their country should defend a fellow NATO ally against a potential attack from Russia, a median of 50% across 16 NATO member states say their country should not defend an ally, compared with 38% who say their country should defend an ally against a Russian attack.

 

[Ghost of LL 15321]

45 minutes ago, Cacti said:

You are in a better position than I am to judge whether or not the referenced countries would defend a NATO ally, but a 2020 Pew poll suggests otherwise.

 

I think you have to be very cautious about polling on questions that have no particular significance at the time.  It's like polling "do you think the United States should actively resist if Queen Elizabeth II asserted the Declaration of Independence to be null and void?".  I mean, yeah.  Probably.

The thing is that opinions on such questions have a way of shifting pretty radically when the hypothetical question becomes real.

[atomheartbevo 89295]

2 hours ago, Ghost of LL said:

 It's like polling "do you think the United States should actively resist if Queen Elizabeth II asserted the Declaration of Independence to be null and void?".  I mean, yeah.  Probably.

Wait, let's talk about this one.

[Shady Ray 1633]

17 hours ago, Ghost of LL said:

I agree with all of this.  I would just add that I think you understate the level of anti-Slav racism that underpins much of the Western European thinking about this.

It's kind of akin to the popular American view of Latin America.  Anything that is south of the Rio Grande is "Mexico," and who knows what the fuck goes on in Mexico?  Whatever it is, it's probably some combination of corruption, drugs and drug cartels, and outright stupidity.  So if Honduras and El Salvador go to war over a soccer match, is the United States going to do anything to stop it?  Are the American people even going to notice?

It's the same thing with Western Europe and the Slavs.  In the mind of the average Munchner or Bordelais, everything east of Oder is "Slavia," and who knows what the fuck goes on in Slavia?  The only way anybody in Western Europe is going to give a damn about what happens in an intra-slavic dispute is (1) if it interrupts their supply of Russian oil & gas or (2) if it causes a refugee crisis.

Note that both are entirely possible here.  But the Europeans are so lacking in foresight that they won't know about it until it happens.

Two questions for you: 

First, where do you see Turkey in all this?  I see them as the big wild card.  Erdogan seems to be in a politically tough place, and could really use the boost in popularity that a foreign conflict often brings.  And beyond that, Turkey is still pissed at the Russians over their intervention in Syria, and I suspect the Turkish diplomatic and military establishment would really like to bloody the Russian nose.  So I really wouldn't be surprised to see a significant covert intervention by the Turks on behalf of Ukraine, perhaps akin to what they did last year with Azerbaijan.

Second, there's a whole radiological site right there in northern Ukraine that probably wouldn't react too well to bullets.  And it's probably something that the Ukrainians could sabotage if there were a strong southwesterly wind and really fuck with the Russians.  Has anybody given the least little thought to that?

Oh, you are absolutely right about the Anti-slavism. Xenophobia towards Slavs is the only thing you can still get away with without too much in the way of consequences socially here. I mean, no one is out there hollering about the untermenschen or wanting to retake the Sudetenland, but behind closed doors, oh yeah, they are looked down upon. Germans are gonna German. 

 

It isn't a one-size fits all racism, in my experience, (and I am of course speaking broadly)but basically Germans see three types of Slavs (which even include some non-slavs). One, the "known Slavs", who actually have a specific and unique identity to the Germans in and of themselves due to cultural familiarity: These are the Poles, who are referred to as "Poles", and the Czechs, who are referred to as "Czechs". They are geographic neighbors, but they have their own identity, and there is obviously a lot of bad blood there left over from the War, both on their side due to that whole invasion, occupation, mass genocide kerfuffle, and on the German side due to the resulting expulsions in '45 and '46. And if your family was expelled from the Sudetenland or Upper Silesia...well, there are probably some pretty severe xenophobic tendencies there. Generally, though, the Poles are seen as completely foreign creatures that are not understood whatsoever by the Germans, but "they'll do" as craftsmen for jobs that don't have to be tooooo precise if in a pinch if the Bavarians or Schwaben can't find a time; while the Czechs are seen as sturdy, independent, rational neighbors who really don't cause any heartburn and generally stick to themselves - and people who share that most important of traditions...good beer.

 

Then you have the former Yugoslavian countries, all of whom are just generally referred to as "Yugoslavians" between Germans. Except for the Kosovars. Those are called "Albanians". The "Yugoslavians" are the favorite for sure (outside of the Albanians/Kosovars)...they are integrated and just kinda part of the culture here. Germans see them much more as "our slavs", particularly the Croats, which, of course goes back to less than savory history.

 

And then you have "the Russians", which are basically everyone else. Bulgarian? Ehhhh, Russian. Ukrainian? Russian. Belarusian? Russian. Russian? Russian. Georgian? Not slavs...but nevertheless, Russians. Moldova? Yeah, why not...Russians. Romanians are "Romanians", as they are only referred to when it comes to discussing massive corruption within the EU, which apparently the Germans feel is so bad that it deserves its own special "non-Slavic" treatment. But the "Russians"...yeah, as you said, that's just an obscure soccer match on an unkempt pitch somewhere "over there".

 

And you are dead on in your analysis: The flow chart is: IS RUSSIAN GAS FLOWING THROUGH YAMAL AND NS1? Yes --> ARE HORDES OF PEOPLE USING CYRILLIC ALPHABET AND WEARING ADIDAS TRACK SUITS HEADING OUR WAY? No = Then whatever is clever.

 

Re Turkey...man, I can't figure out what Erdogan is up to. That dude has so much wild shit going on all over the place, making heads or tails of what he's going to pull is a fool's errand. I think the only thing that we can count on is that he will, in fact, pull something. Obviously, the Lira is all kinds of fucked up and he is charting this "brave new world" with respect to the pressure he is putting on his central bank. He also has this new goofy EEZ maritime beef with the Greeks, he has one foot in bed with the Iranians, and he has Europe by the balls wrt migration from the region, but in turn, Putin has Erdogan by the balls wrt migration due to his leverage in turning on the spigot in Idlib. He sold the Ukrainians Bayraktar drones, which had a lot of success against Russian ground systems in the whole Azerbaijan deal, which the Ukrainians used in Donbass recently, infuriating the Russians. Of course, he has to deal with the Russians to some degree in Syria, so he is certainly susceptible to pressure by Putin and would also greatly benefit by cutting a deal with them. That is a big deal at the moment. Turkey is a long way from anything resembling stability and Putin could very easily create refugee flows out of NW Syria, which would be a disaster for Erdogan domestically. People are already restless there due to the inflation and his entire domestic pitch re Syria is that his involvement is to fuck up the Kurds/potential Kurdistan AND create a "safe place" for the Syrian migrants to return. His base expects Syrians to be heading back eventually, not to be getting fresh arrivals. Russia also has Turkey by the balls re energy and Turkstream gives Putin a ton of leverage there as well.

 

If I was a betting man, I would bet that he cuts a deal with Putin re Idlib in exchange for staying out of Ukraine. Putin has tolerated deviations in their geopolitical interests to date, but this whole drone sale to Ukraine really pissed Putin off. Erdogan, if nothing else is a wiley Turkish negotiator and he knows that Ukraine is the "third rail" with the Russians. Nothing the Russians could gain in Syria...Tartus, Latakia, etc. comes even close to Ukraine for Putin. So I think Erdogan will leverage that fact to get a much better position in Idlib. Putin has essentially free rein wrt Assad, and Assad knows that without Putin, all of those gains over the past five years will go up in smoke. So I think Putin and Erdogan will have an intense negotiation that will result in concessions beyond just Ukraine/Syria (perhaps Russian political support on the Greek maritime issue and/or wrt the Kurdish issue in the form of de facto annexation of Erdogan's dream strip in the north?), but will eventually come to an agreement where Russia - to the extent possible in light of the conflict - respects the spots within Ukraine that Turkey has invested large sums (which are significant) and gives him room to maneuver in Idlib, in exchange for Turkey staying out of the conflict AND refraining from playing any games arising out of Turkey's rights under Montreaux.

 

Re the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone...your point is honestly the first that I have ever even thought about that. I know for sure it hasn't come up in any major outlets here, but gotdamn that is a good point. Shit could get real weird with that.

 

But that brings me to another larger observation that I don't feel is being addressed enough in the talking class: The complete lack of domestic, internal stability of basically everyone involved in this entire ordeal, outside of Russia, ranging from the EU to the Turks to Germany to Ukraine itself. I'll spoiler out of respect to the board:

 

Spoiler

With the exception of Russia, the domestic front in all involved parties is completely fucked at the moment. Turkey is completely spiraling out of control and this inflation issue could very well bring Erdogan down. The EU itself is divided along east-west lines re Ukraine, while also fighting internally on other issues. The Germans are about to put a major, major hurt on Poland at the EU level by allowing the EU to thump Poland around for violations of EU law re LGBT rights/some court rulings that their high court has handed down re supremacy of EU vs. Polish law. Merkel had previously restrained the EU from doing that, but there is a ton of bad blood between the two right now. The Poles are doing their typical rant about "the Fourth Reich" and "MOARRRR REPARATIONS", which isn't sitting well here. Merkel was always very sensitive to the Poles demanding reparations and throwing the Third Reich card around, but those days are over. No one gives a fuck about that line of attack anymore. The Germans are furious with the Balts...specifically the Lithuanians regarding this whole Taiwan deal, which has resulted in China threatening to cease doing with business with German auto part giant Continental until they stop using Lithuanian-produced components. Germany could not have fallen into a worse moment for Merkel to bounce. I am not a huge Merkel fan on a lot of issues, but I'll be damned it if she wasn't A) a calming force within Europe, and B) a huge, huge asset from the Russian perspective. Putin and Angie didn't see eye-to-eye, but they respected each other and the equity derived from their 16+ years of working together avoided a lot of unknown issues, truth be told. Unlike Kohl, Angie left office relatively popular and in any circumstance, the departure of a four-term head of state leaves a vacuum, but this is a big one and I don't know of any coalition going back to perhaps Willie Brandt's 1972 coalition with the FDP that is at such a risk for collapse. And this one is less than a month old. I am not saying it is inevitable or immediate, but I do think it will result in fresh elections in about 2 years. The FDP and Greens won't be able to tolerate each other longer than that. The CDU, although out of power, only lost because they ran a moron in Laschet instead of Söder, in which case they would have won. Current approval of the coalition is at 52%, which is a terrible place to be a month in.

 

Anyway, the French are entering into their pre-election period and all kinds of noise on the right to -far right is being made that would complicate Macron's path to victory...so much so that he even made an official visit to previous-outcast Victor Orban in Hungary a couple weeks back, which was widely seen as a bone tossed to the Catholic, nationalist center-right in France. Macron does not have room to work like he would like here, and I think part of Russia's strategy is timing this whole ordeal before the French elections so that Europe truly is caught without strong leadership in either France or Germany.

 

I don't need to get into the state of the US re this, as this board knows full well that whatever move the US makes here is going to be criticized by one team or another, but the point is that we are also hopelessly divided and Biden will be completely bogged down with internal politics/Republican haymaking.

 

But most importantly, Ukraine itself - even by its own unparalleled standards for mediocrity in governance, which is legit third-worldesque - is about to descend into a raging inferno of domestic chaos. Zelensky is cratering in the polls, losing 2/3rds of his support already and he has filed criminal charges against Poroshenko, who was about as anti-Russian/Pro-Western as one could get. (I honestly think that the Poroshenko deal might be what has done him in once the dust settles...the US finds Poroshenko much more capable than Zelensky, and the only other option is Yulia Tymoshenko, who, while absolutely still bangable at age 60, is not digestible by the Ukrainian populace...In short, I think that Zelensky's move on Poroshenko was to put the US in a position where there is no other choice than to stick by his incapable ass). He has pissed off the oligarchs (even those who supported him) and he is now threatening to shut down opposition TV stations (and not the pro-Russian stations that they already shut down, but stations that are "oligarch controlled", which means "opposed to him"). And my personal opinion, although I have nothing concrete and can only try to read the tea leaves, is that over the past couple of weeks Zelensky has officially lost support from those in Washington who were previously in his corner. And, in fact, I would not be surprised if the US has decided to cut its losses all together in Ukraine. And this development is my biggest concern with respect to keeping shit orderly. This conflict is not as simple as people are making it out to be, where the ONLY linear path to war is Russian aggression against a hunkered-down Ukraine. There are vested interests in Ukraine that may actually see benefits to ratcheting up the conflict solely out of desperation.

 

There is a valid argument to be made that if Zelensky sees that US backing is fading, and that Germany is about to cut a deal with Putin which will bind the EU effectively, that a hail mary in the form of triggering conflict before all the pieces are set is worth a try. No one is talking to Zelensky, nor have they been in the past. He is seen as a tiny (both literally and figuratively), weak man in an otherwise very masculine world and he has done silly things like pulling a Dukakis on the tank stuff to counter this insecurity. He came to power promising peace with Russia, and that hasn't happened. The Russians won't even talk with him or even say his name. Biden calls him two and three days after Biden's important calls/meetings with Putin. He trashed Angie in a phone call to Trump, which was leaked and pissed the Germans off a ton. Hell, my very reserved retired-secretary mother-in-law referred to him as "that sad little man Zelensky" over Christmas dinner when the topic came up...seriously, he is even ridiculed by the masses over here. Macron has no use for him. He genuinely is a geopolitical pip squeak and now the only thing he had in his pocket - electoral support - is vanishing like a borscht-fueled fart on the windy Ukrainian steppe. Of course, the likelihood of pure old-fashioned Russian aggression is more likely to be the catalyst for armed conflict, IMO, but I don't think it is fair to completely discount the tenuous spot that Ukrainian leadership is currently in and how such desperation can lead to desperate moves. Because once this thing is resolved, it is going to be resolved for good. The Russians are not doing this to kick the can down the road. This is "The Big One" to resolve the Ukraine issue once and for all and the Ukrainians know this.

 

And let's not forget, Russian intelligence is ALLLLLLLL over various segments of Ukrainian's power elite. And its power elite are no more loyal or altruistic than any other corrupt politiican in the Belarus/Ukraine/Russian sphere. There is no one - whether pro-Western on paper or not - who can be conclusively deemed to be completely loyal to "the cause" there.

 

There is also a point to be made that the rabid far-right Ukrainian nationalists, who do in fact possess major influence in the military, (despite the disingenuous whitewashing of this fact by the US media), and just as importantly, in the form of street enforcers in certain areas, would view their entire opportunity of ridding themselves of Russian influence as gone without NATO backing might seek to throw a wrench is thrown into a potential "arrangement". Anyone who has studied European history in any serious way understands that this would not be the first time that such a move was made.

 

I guess my point is that are waltzing into a situation where a group of countries, none of which are on firm footing with respect to security of their leadership (with the exception of Russia) are faced with what I view as the biggest geopolitical challenge since the end of the Cold War, are expected to manage volatile domestic terrain while simultaneously managing The Bear. That is not a good place to be.

 

Edited December 28, 2021 by Shady Ray

[Shady Ray 1633]

The big US-Russia meeting is now set for January 10th...first working day after Orthodox Christmas. Followed by Russia-NATO direct talks on January 12th, and Russia-OSCE meetings on the 13th. 

 

Definitely some urgency in that timeline.

 

https://www.france24.com/en/europe/20211228-us-russia-to-hold-talks-on-arms-control-ukraine-on-january-10

 

[Shady Ray 1633]

16 hours ago, 956 Worldwide said:

The West has always been Russia’s bugbear par excellence, though. And the fundamental issue with this ideal border is that the territory is full of people who aren’t Russian, have no wish to be Russian, are mostly richer and more developed than Russians, and have only ever sporadically and begrudgingly fallen under Russia’s sphere of influence. And Russia creates its own security dilemma- the harder it pushes, the more desperately the people run for a Western security guarantee. Russian foreign policy to Ukraine has been a failure inasmuch as it turned a nation that wavered between friendliness and neutrality into a sworn enemy. 
 

With respect to Ukraine and Georgia, absolutely, Russia has shown aggression towards them since the 2008 announcement was made by GWB that their NATO accession was on the table.

 

But I really don't see how you can say that the big, "problematic enlargements" (at least in the eyes of the Russians) in 1999 and 2004 were fueled by Russian aggression pushing Central Europe into the arms of NATO for a security guarantee. Now, there may have been some geopolitical benefits to the US in undertaking such an expansion, but it wasn't as a result of an expansionist Russia threatening its neighbors...Russia was completely inwardly focused on keepings itself together at the time.

 

I point to the incomparable diplomatic titan/legend/chief architect of US Cold War policy, George F. Kennan, when interviewed by the NY Times about the initial tranche of englargment back in 1998:

 

Quote

Opinion:
Foreign Affairs; Now a Word From X
By Thomas L. Friedman
May 2, 1998

His voice is a bit frail now, but the mind, even at age 94, is as sharp as ever. So when I reached George Kennan by phone to get his reaction to the Senate's ratification of NATO expansion it was no surprise to find that the man who was the architect of America's successful containment of the Soviet Union and one of the great American statesmen of the 20th century was ready with an answer.

 

''I think it is the beginning of a new cold war,'' said Mr. Kennan from his Princeton home. ''I think the Russians will gradually react quite adversely and it will affect their policies. I think it is a tragic mistake. There was no reason for this whatsoever. No one was threatening anybody else. This expansion would make the Founding Fathers of this country turn over in their graves. We have signed up to protect a whole series of countries, even though we have neither the resources nor the intention to do so in any serious way. [NATO expansion] was simply a light-hearted action by a Senate that has no real interest in foreign affairs.''

 

 

''What bothers me is how superficial and ill informed the whole Senate debate was,'' added Mr. Kennan, who was present at the creation of NATO and whose anonymous 1947 article in the journal Foreign Affairs, signed ''X,'' defined America's cold-war containment policy for 40 years. ''I was particularly bothered by the references to Russia as a country dying to attack Western Europe. Don't people understand? Our differences in the cold war were with the Soviet Communist regime. And now we are turning our backs on the very people who mounted the greatest bloodless revolution in history to remove that Soviet regime.

 

''And Russia's democracy is as far advanced, if not farther, as any of these countries we've just signed up to defend from Russia,'' said Mr. Kennan, who joined the State Department in 1926 and was U.S. Ambassador to Moscow in 1952. ''It shows so little understanding of Russian history and Soviet history. Of course there is going to be a bad reaction from Russia, and then [the NATO expanders] will say that we always told you that is how the Russians are -- but this is just wrong.''

 

One only wonders what future historians will say. If we are lucky they will say that NATO expansion to Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic simply didn't matter, because the vacuum it was supposed to fill had already been filled, only the Clinton team couldn't see it. They will say that the forces of globalization integrating Europe, coupled with the new arms control agreements, proved to be so powerful that Russia, despite NATO expansion, moved ahead with democratization and Westernization, and was gradually drawn into a loosely unified Europe. If we are unlucky they will say, as Mr. Kennan predicts, that NATO expansion set up a situation in which NATO now has to either expand all the way to Russia's border, triggering a new cold war, or stop expanding after these three new countries and create a new dividing line through Europe.

 

But there is one thing future historians will surely remark upon, and that is the utter poverty of imagination that characterized U.S. foreign policy in the late 1990's. They will note that one of the seminal events of this century took place between 1989 and 1992 -- the collapse of the Soviet Empire, which had the capability, imperial intentions and ideology to truly threaten the entire free world. Thanks to Western resolve and the courage of Russian democrats, that Soviet Empire collapsed without a shot, spawning a democratic Russia, setting free the former Soviet republics and leading to unprecedented arms control agreements with the U.S.

 

And what was America's response? It was to expand the NATO cold-war alliance against Russia and bring it closer to Russia's borders.

 

Yes, tell your children, and your children's children, that you lived in the age of Bill Clinton and William Cohen, the age of Madeleine Albright and Sandy Berger, the age of Trent Lott and Joe Lieberman, and you too were present at the creation of the post-cold-war order, when these foreign policy Titans put their heads together and produced . . . a mouse.

 

We are in the age of midgets. The only good news is that we got here in one piece because there was another age -- one of great statesmen who had both imagination and courage.
 

https://www.nytimes.com/1998/05/02/opinion/foreign-affairs-now-a-word-from-x.html

 

Now this doesn't mean things haven't changed, but the bulk of NATO expansion had nothing to do with Russian aggression.

 

And Kennan, even in his last decade of life, proved himself to be as prescient as ever.

Edited December 28, 2021 by Shady Ray

[956 Worldwide 34222]

2 hours ago, Shady Ray said:

With respect to Ukraine and Georgia, absolutely, Russia has shown aggression towards them since the 2008 announcement was made by GWB that their NATO accession was on the table.

 

But I really don't see how you can say that the big, "problematic enlargements" (at least in the eyes of the Russians) in 1999 and 2004 were fueled by Russian aggression pushing Central Europe into the arms of NATO for a security guarantee. Now, there may have been some geopolitical benefits to the US in undertaking such an expansion, but it wasn't as a result of an expansionist Russia threatening its neighbors...Russia was completely inwardly focused on keepings itself together at the time.

 

I point to the incomparable diplomatic titan/legend/chief architect of US Cold War policy, George F. Kennan, when interviewed by the NY Times about the initial tranche of englargment back in 1998:

 

Now this doesn't mean things haven't changed, but the bulk of NATO expansion had nothing to do with Russian aggression.

 

And Kennan, even in his last decade of life, proved himself to be as prescient as ever.

This is an incredibly short-sighted and Americacentric analyses of why NATO enlarged I’ve ever read. NATO expansion into Central and Eastern Europe was driven by Russian aggression and enabled by Russian weakness. It’s worth remembering that NATO has never forced a member to join and that each new member had to ask and apply. 
 

A short history of the first, 1999 expansion and the new member states’ history with Russia or the Soviet Union in the 20th century. In 1991 Czechoslovakia, Poland, and Hungary formed the Visegrad Group with the stated aim of joining NATO and the EU.  In June of that same year, the last regular Soviet troops left Czechoslovakia after a 30 year occupation that began with an invasion in 1968. Also in 1991, the last Soviet troops left Hungary after invading and occupying THAT country in 1956. 

Poland gained its independence from Tsarist Russia, Germany, and Austria-Hungary in 1918. A few months later war broke out with the Soviets, and the Red Army reached Warsaw and was militarily defeated.  In 1939, the Soviet Union partnered with Nazi Germany to invade Poland and liquidate it as a state. In 1945, the Soviet Union destroyed the Polish Home Army that rebelled against Nazi rule and installed a puppet government. In 1981, the Soviets threatened to invade again and pointed to Hungary and Czechoslovakia, resulting in martial law and the most repressive period in Polish history since Stalinism.

It takes a breathtaking bit of willful blindness to claim that those three states (Czechoslovakia split in 1993 and the Czechs joined first) were not prompted to join NATO due to their entirely rational experience of Russian aggression, and the expectation that the window to find a security guarantee was small. And we haven’t even touched on the Vilnius group’s history. And it’s worth noting that Russia has intervened militarily in Ukraine, Moldova, Georgia, and Tajikistan following the collapse of the Soviet Union, but has not touched the smaller and more vulnerable Baltics, which host significant populations of ethnic Russians— which is almost certainly due to their own NATO membership. 

The fact that Kennan could, apparently in all seriousness, write that Russian democracy in the 1990s was more developed than the Czechs under Vaclav Havel should be enough to tip your hat to his past insights and then prevent him from embarrassing himself further. 

A relevant map— for all Russia’s talk of U.S. encroachment on its borders, Russian troops permanently stationed outside of Russia on NATO’s borders outnumber U.S. troops stationed on Russian borders 3-1.  This map does not include EFP rotations into the  Baltics, which are in the hundreds of U.S. troops and which also didn’t exist before Russia invaded and occupied Ukraine and scared the shit out of its neighbors. 

 

 

 

Edited December 28, 2021 by 956 Worldwide

[atomheartbevo 89295]

7 hours ago, Shady Ray said:

Re Turkey...man, I can't figure out what Erdogan is up to. That dude has so much wild shit going on all over the place, making heads or tails of what he's going to pull is a fool's errand. I think the only thing that we can count on is that he will, in fact, pull something.

I think Turkey wants Russia out of Syria first and foremost.  Whether that's the semi-cordial agreement/arrangement you mentioned, or whether Turkey helps make life hard for Russia elsewhere (Ukraine, etc.) to suck Russia troops from foreign deployments (such as Syria) is hard to say.  Or maybe Turkey does both.

But Turkey wants to be the power player in that region and can't be as long as Russia is there.

And Turkey knows that if things go south for Russia in Ukraine, that Russia will throw everything they have in there, which will leave a vacuum for Turkey elsewhere.  Because Putin's political career will hinge on Ukraine going successfully.

That's the scary part about an invasion of Ukraine.  Putin can't afford to lose.

[Ghost of LL 15321]

6 hours ago, atomheartbevo said:

I think Turkey wants Russia out of Syria first and foremost.  Whether that's the semi-cordial agreement/arrangement you mentioned, or whether Turkey helps make life hard for Russia elsewhere (Ukraine, etc.) to suck Russia troops from foreign deployments (such as Syria) is hard to say.  Or maybe Turkey does both.

But Turkey wants to be the power player in that region and can't be as long as Russia is there.

And Turkey knows that if things go south for Russia in Ukraine, that Russia will throw everything they have in there, which will leave a vacuum for Turkey elsewhere.  Because Putin's political career will hinge on Ukraine going successfully.

That's the scary part about an invasion of Ukraine.  Putin can't afford to lose.

And that's why I don't get the play.  Or, at least I agree with @Shady Ray's take that the play is to advance to the Dnieper, leave a rump Ukraine as a failed state to bother Europe, and call it a day.  If they do that, I can't imagine Russia won't be able to achieve its objectives within three weeks.

But if Russia intends to follow a more ambitious path and annex the entirety of Ukraine, that could be . . . challenging.  I mean, they'll still achieve their goals in a month, much like we ostensibly did in Iraq.  But it is easy to envision a significant insurrection, just as in Iraq, that will ensure that Ukraine is not pacified for years (if ever).  Iraq was bad enough, but the Iraqi insurgency never had a major power supporting them with money and intelligence.  It is easy to see a Ukrainian insurgency getting a lot of help from a number of sources (the US, the UK, Turkey, Israel).

I mean, even if you think there's a low percentage of this being a total shitshow for the Russian army, that means there's a possibility of a total shitshow for the Russian army.  And I really don't understand why you would roll the dice when you can accomplish your goals through other means (e.g., diplomatic, economic, covert, cyber).

[atomheartbevo 89295]

1 hour ago, Ghost of LL said:

But it is easy to envision a significant insurrection, just as in Iraq, that will ensure that Ukraine is not pacified for years (if ever).  Iraq was bad enough, but the Iraqi insurgency never had a major power supporting them with money and intelligence.  It is easy to see a Ukrainian insurgency getting a lot of help from a number of sources (the US, the UK, Turkey, Israel).

Iraq had Iran and the Saudis fucking around and creating a civil war between Sunni and Shiite Iraqis as well.  If you didn't have that Sunni/Shiite thing going on, and the Iraqis were truly unified, Iran or the Saudis could have made the Iraqi insurgency a far more powerful force than it was. People forget that we only had around 250,000 troops/allies invading in 2003, and far less than that as the occupying force of a country with 25 million.

Ukraine is a country with 41 million people (excluding the area Russia occupies) and will have multiple NATO members next door to it, making for an easy path for money/weapons to flow (and NATO has a shit-ton of experience in how insurgencies work now), and Ukrainian insurgents will mostly have one enemy - Russia.  

I'm aware of the various factions/etc. within Ukraine and that some will favor the Russians, but Ukraine won't have the Sunni vs Shiite thing that the Iranians and Saudis were exploiting (suicide bombings, etc.).  But even if things turn into a similar situation with Iraq and you get a large semi-civil war going on between pro-Russian and anti-Russian forces, the distances and geography favor the West and Russia will find itself having to guard its rear areas and its supply chain and that sucks up combat forces.

 

Edited December 29, 2021 by atomheartbevo

[atomheartbevo 89295]

1 hour ago, Ghost of LL said:

I mean, even if you think there's a low percentage of this being a total shitshow for the Russian army, that means there's a possibility of a total shitshow for the Russian army.  And I really don't understand why you would roll the dice when you can accomplish your goals through other means (e.g., diplomatic, economic, covert, cyber).

Yeah, I don't get it either.  Russia simply doesn't have the actual boots on the ground to go very deep into Ukraine, while still maintaining their supply lines.  This isn't Sherman in the Civil War cutting loose his supply wagons and living off the land when the Confederate forces are a shadow of themselves or tied up north of him.

If this becomes a clusterfuck, I don't see how Putin survives politically.  And if it starts to become a clusterfuck, that'll motivate the Ukrainian resistance even more, and they'll get more bold (especially against their supply lines), which will suck up more Russian troops.

[Shady Ray 1633]

Agree with both of you here. Even if the risk is low that they get bogged down into a shitshow, the fallout of that domestically within Russia would be catastrophic for Putin. And maybe it isn't as much about taking Ukraine east of the Dnieper in full, but rather slicing off the valuable parts along the Black Sea coast.

 

Looking at the maps, it really reinforces the idea that there are three possible invasion and subsequent occupation options if they decide to actually go in.

 

1) Work out of the Donbass to the Southwest, keeping Ukrainian forces occupied with activity out of the north/east with an ultimate objective of stopping at Crimea, thus effectively taking the entire Sea of Azov (rational, and also solves the headache of the fresh water shortage due to the Ukrainian's damming of the North Crimean Canal a few years back);

 

2) Move all the way down the Black Sea coast, hoping to minimize losses until effectively taking the area all the way to Odessa and depriving Ukraine of Black Sea access. Which will immediately collapse the Ukrainian government, if it hasn't already (risky and ambitious, but possibly worth it if their intel looks good...from an internal geopolitical perspective, this would obviously devastating for a post-ceasefire Ukraine moving forward). Supply would be much more manageable there given proximity to existing infrastructure in Crimea;

 

3) Go full Leeroy Jenkins and cross the Dnieper and try to go deep into Western Ukraine (can't imagine they would do this...suicidal).

 

 From what I understand, the most likely place where the Russians would cross the Dnieper is at Kherson for a variety of logistical/practical reasons. I guess theoretically, they could set out an initial objective to accomplish #1, and then see where things stand before deciding on whether to pursue #2. But the second they start moving towards that red mass, the risk skyrockets. But I am an idiot when it comes to military tech and shit, so what the fuck do I know.

 

 

 

[atomheartbevo 89295]

1 hour ago, Shady Ray said:

Agree with both of you here. Even if the risk is low that they get bogged down into a shitshow, the fallout of that domestically within Russia would be catastrophic for Putin. And maybe it isn't as much about taking Ukraine east of the Dnieper in full, but rather slicing off the valuable parts along the Black Sea coast.

Looking at the maps, it really reinforces the idea that there are three possible invasion and subsequent occupation options if they decide to actually go in.

I still don't know how it doesn't become some kind of shitshow with lots of Russians going home in bodybags every month, and with a constant insurgency acting against Russian supply lines, even if they stick close to the Black Sea in option #2, or even go very conservative with option #1 and the Sea of Azov.

Even sticking to the Sea of Azov is dicey, because that leaves a large chunk of the Ukraine untouched.  If they just keep bombing the shit out of the Ukraine to try and keep Ukrainian forces/insurgents back away from that area, they run the risk of serious economic/trade problems as they kill more and more civilians, and they run the risk of Russian aircraft being shot down over time, as well as building up more and more Ukrainian hatred/resistance against Russia.

And if they did something like try to slice off the Black Sea access, I really don't see how Putin survives that one.  Doing something that could bring down the Ukrainian government opens up the door to a Yugoslavia situation, and while on the surface that may look favorable to Putin, the reality is that it means a massive and unstable nation right next door to Russia, which means that Russian troops will be tied up having to try and stabilize a large area around their possessions. And it invites NATO into Ukraine.

No matter what option Russia goes with, there will be a shitload of very pissed off Ukrainians of all kinds of persuasions who are going to blame Russia for all of their ills, and they will welcome any and all NATO assistance.

This whole thing is just so incredibly fucking stupid, because it's not a "We are going to take this objective or kill this person and leave", it's a "we are going to go and have to commit Russian forces for decades to come, and Russians are going to be coming home in bodybags every month."

[atomheartbevo 89295]

Ukraine and Afghanistan are not too far off from one another in size.

Soviets had a peak of 115,000 troops in Afghanistan, and couldn't tame it (with far looser rules of engagement than they would have in Ukraine), and here in 2021, the Russians do not have nearly the military strength they did in the 1980s - they are running at about a third the size of active duty personnel that they had in the 1980s. And it's been argued that insurgents would have an easier time in Ukraine than Afghanistan for a variety of reasons (geography, weapons technology, technology in general, etc.).

Toss in a bunch of civilians being slaughtered and what happens if the rest of Europe bites the bullet and cuts off trade with Russia - how does Putin sell that to the average Russian?

[Shady Ray 1633]

18 hours ago, 956 Worldwide said:

This is an incredibly short-sighted and Americacentric analyses of why NATO enlarged I’ve ever read. NATO expansion into Central and Eastern Europe was driven by Russian aggression and enabled by Russian weakness. It’s worth remembering that NATO has never forced a member to join and that each new member had to ask and apply. 
 

A short history of the first, 1999 expansion and the new member states’ history with Russia or the Soviet Union in the 20th century. In 1991 Czechoslovakia, Poland, and Hungary formed the Visegrad Group with the stated aim of joining NATO and the EU.  In June of that same year, the last regular Soviet troops left Czechoslovakia after a 30 year occupation that began with an invasion in 1968. Also in 1991, the last Soviet troops left Hungary after invading and occupying THAT country in 1956. 

Poland gained its independence from Tsarist Russia, Germany, and Austria-Hungary in 1918. A few months later war broke out with the Soviets, and the Red Army reached Warsaw and was militarily defeated.  In 1939, the Soviet Union partnered with Nazi Germany to invade Poland and liquidate it as a state. In 1945, the Soviet Union destroyed the Polish Home Army that rebelled against Nazi rule and installed a puppet government. In 1981, the Soviets threatened to invade again and pointed to Hungary and Czechoslovakia, resulting in martial law and the most repressive period in Polish history since Stalinism.

It takes a breathtaking bit of willful blindness to claim that those three states (Czechoslovakia split in 1993 and the Czechs joined first) were not prompted to join NATO due to their entirely rational experience of Russian aggression, and the expectation that the window to find a security guarantee was small. And we haven’t even touched on the Vilnius group’s history. And it’s worth noting that Russia has intervened militarily in Ukraine, Moldova, Georgia, and Tajikistan following the collapse of the Soviet Union, but has not touched the smaller and more vulnerable Baltics, which host significant populations of ethnic Russians— which is almost certainly due to their own NATO membership. 

The fact that Kennan could, apparently in all seriousness, write that Russian democracy in the 1990s was more developed than the Czechs under Vaclav Havel should be enough to tip your hat to his past insights and then prevent him from embarrassing himself further. 

A relevant map— for all Russia’s talk of U.S. encroachment on its borders, Russian troops permanently stationed outside of Russia on NATO’s borders outnumber U.S. troops stationed on Russian borders 3-1.  This map does not include EFP rotations into the  Baltics, which are in the hundreds of U.S. troops and which also didn’t exist before Russia invaded and occupied Ukraine and scared the shit out of its neighbors. 

 

Yeah, I have a pretty good grasp of the relevant history here. 

 

I wasn’t in any way discounting the legitimate impact of the Soviet invasions on Central European countries, because you are exactly right…those experiences are completely, absolutely, 100% valid from the Czech/Polish etc. perspective. I am approaching this from a post-Cold War view (since the concept of some transatlantic “security guarantee” that you referenced wasn’t even a “thing” prior to the 1990s). 

 

My central point is this: Re the 1990s, I think that the immediate post-Cold War era was precisely the time to reset the table across Europe and not to perpetuate the endless cycle of historical grievances, reaction/counter-reaction cycles by dividing Europe into yet another "us vs. them". This has never served Europe well. The US had full spectrum power then, and we could have completely re-set Europe. We didn't do that. We squandered that chance. And now, we don't have it anymore.

 

So, if we are talking about invasions prior to the collapse of the Soviet Union as justifications for current geopolitical worldviews of Central Europeans, then you can't simultaneously claim that the repeated (and relatively recent) historical experiences of invasion/aggression experienced by Russia arising precisely through the geographic area currently at issue in Ukraine are somehow invalid, dismissing their concerns as illegitimate wrt the expansion of NATO into Ukraine. Particularly given NATOs complete shitshow and erratic behavior over the past 20 years. We have not inspired confidence as rational actors whatsoever.

 

As I know you know, Russia-proper lost 15,000,000 people…the Soviets a total of approx 28m over a four year period which occurred right between the events that you cited as justifications for NATO expansion. This was due entirely to their loss of territorial control of that exact stretch of real estate that we are discussing now in Ukraine. So, if the Czechs and Poles are (justifiably) traumatized from their experience to a degree that it impacts their geopolitical calculus, it is least understandable that the Russians draw on their own traumatic history to do the same. And as the sole superpower at the time this realignment went down -dealing with an insecure, but heavily nuclear-armed regional power - we should have considered that a lot more than we did. Moral justifications don't matter when dealing with contries with 5,000 nukes. Practicality matters. 

 

As the lone superpower at the time - and a non-European one at that - we could have at a minimum paused the idea of NATO expansion in light of Russia’s peaceful abandonment of the Warsaw Pact- particularly given that NATO was designed to contain the Communist USSR and not to contain a fledgling democratic Russia that at the time was being led literally by a compliant leader in Yeltsin. This would have given the Russians an opportunity to demonstrate their willingness to move into the international community, which they were trying to do under Yeltsin (and even in the early years of Putin post 9/11, when Russia gave us use of their military bases in Central Asia to carry out the Afghanistan invasion). We would have had no problem snuffing out any revanchist Russia during that time should they have gotten squirelly. It was a time to start fresh in Central/Eastern Europe and only someone deliberately blinding themselves would not see that it would have been spun by Russian nationalists as their prideful nation being punched while it was down and trying its best to recover. 

 

But hey, those rocket-surgeons Paul Wolfowitz and Scooter Libby literally created this doctrine in 1992 in our official post-Cold War policy doctrine, which was followed from 1992 through the GWB years as official policy, so it must have been well thought out, because as history shows, those guys always got it right. True fucking statesman. Giants in the craft.

 

Like you, I lived in Russia when Putin came to power. I remained there through 2005, watching the 2004 nato expansion unfold, and I saw a ton of my young, professional, pro-western-inclined colleagues in Moscow immediately sour on the US when the expansion came into place. That was a huge, huge deal there. It was a terrible look for us and we could have handled it much, much better. 

 

One takes its nuclear-armed-power adversary as one finds them, and when the US pulls the whole “Russia is irrational for feeling insecure here”, it is discounting their loss in fighting the Nazis as our allies, as well as truly viewing NATO’s post-Cold War irrational interventions/destablizations (which are objectionably atrocious) in the most self-benevolent light imaginable. As if NATO has been some paragon of well-reasoned, well-planned, well-executed foreign interventions over the past 20 years. It most certainly has not.

 

Regardless of whether you and I agree on NATO expansion in the 1990s, which I imagine we never will, ultimately, what we do agree on is that "what’s done is done" and Russia should not be allowed to redraw existing Iines in NATO under any circumstance. And they are absolutely not the Russia of the 1990s any longer, so they do not deserve the benefit of the doubt…but we must recognize the fire that we are playing with here and we need to find a way to manage the Ukraine situation, because they aren’t joining the EU or NATO, so we need to find a way from keep it from becoming more of a shitshow than it already is. 

[Onboard 2.0 9083]

21 minutes ago, Shady Ray said:

Yeah, I have a pretty good grasp of the relevant history here. 

 

I wasn’t in any way discounting the legitimate impact of the Soviet invasions on Central European countries, because you are exactly right…those experiences are completely, absolutely, 100% valid from the Czech/Polish etc. perspective. I am approaching this from a post-Cold War view (since the concept of some transatlantic “security guarantee” that you referenced wasn’t even a “thing” prior to the 1990s). 

 

My central point is this: Re the 1990s, I think that the immediate post-Cold War era was precisely the time to reset the table across Europe and not to perpetuate the endless cycle of historical grievances, reaction/counter-reaction cycles by dividing Europe into yet another "us vs. them". This has never served Europe well. The US had full spectrum power then, and we could have completely re-set Europe. We didn't do that. We squandered that chance. And now, we don't have it anymore.

 

So, if we are talking about invasions prior to the collapse of the Soviet Union as justifications for current geopolitical worldviews of Central Europeans, then you can't simultaneously claim that the repeated (and relatively recent) historical experiences of invasion/aggression experienced by Russia arising precisely through the geographic area currently at issue in Ukraine are somehow invalid, dismissing their concerns as illegitimate wrt the expansion of NATO into Ukraine. Particularly given NATOs complete shitshow and erratic behavior over the past 20 years. We have not inspired confidence as rational actors whatsoever.

 

 

But hey, those rocket-surgeons Paul Wolfowitz and Scooter Libby literally created this doctrine in 1992 in our official post-Cold War policy doctrine, which was followed from 1992 through the GWB years as official policy, so it must have been well thought out, because as history shows, those guys always got it right. True fucking statesman. Giants in the craft.

 

Like you, I lived in Russia when Putin came to power. I remained there through 2005, watching the 2004 nato expansion unfold, and I saw a ton of my young, professional, pro-western-inclined colleagues in Moscow immediately sour on the US when the expansion came into place. That was a huge, huge deal there. It was a terrible look for us and we could have handled it much, much better. 

 

 

 

 

THIS ^^^^ The central crux, and lynchpin of a Russians psyche.  This thread has been a great read.  My knowledge of Russia has come from college history courses, a few books, TV productions, and a general day to day news feed.  

Their history is one of conquest, and invasion from east, west, and internally.  They're neither western nor eastern hemisphere. They've always been something in between. It's always fueled their distrust of everyone. Coupled with the fact there's never really been a true middle class. The serf - master relationship has never really been overcome.  Tsars have ruled with an iron fist with only glimpses of progressive movement (and you really have to go back to Catherine for any of that progressive thought).

I'd say your comments on the souring of emotions towards the west during the post Cold War NATO expansion would be spot on for the average Russian, but is just another chapter in the us against everybody mindset they've always seemed to have.  I'd say we maybe missed a chance to help foster a more democratic path for the Russians.

I'd also say the rocket surgeons (love that description BTW) probably knew a lot more than we or the average Russian did about who was moving to take power in the post Soviet world, and who that cast of players would be.  How would anyone not think ex KGB would be the ones who moved to that end ?  They had the training, apparatus, and all the other tricks needed to drive Russia right back to it's current mafioso state.  Of course I could be way off, but I don't think it's a great leap of faith to think that was going to happen.  

Russians have had zero experience with democracy, voting or self governance ever in the entire history of their country.  That they were going to succeed in that 180 degree transformation would have been a bit of a miracle.

[956 Worldwide 34222]

@Shady Ray, nearly all of the rebuttals to this argument are embedded within the arguments themselves. First, you are entirely mistaken in claiming that the concept of a Transatlantic security guarantee did not exist until the 1990s. The concept is embedded in the founding document of the charter, which states that an attack on any member of the Alliance will be treated as attack on all. Literally the entire point of the Alliance was to offer Europe a guarantee of American intervention in the event of a Soviet attack, thereby ending European regional rivalries and arms races. It’s worth noting that the ideas has been wildly successful in that war between European nations is as close to “unthinkable, as exists in geopolitics the idea of any external attack on Europe within NATO. 
 

Onwards. As you accurately note, Russia feels insecure because it “lost control” of the strip of land now inside NATO. The key here is that security for the inhabitants means independence and an Alliance freely chosen. For Russia, security involves control and repression and a veto over other countries’ choices. One of these behaviors is legitimate and the other completely illegitimate. 
 

And it’s important to remember that Soviet (Russian) aggression was a prime mover in starting World War II and the subsequent loss of 15,000,000 citizens. Although Russia teaches that the war started in 1941 (you’ll be put in jail for teaching otherwise), the war started in 1939 with the Soviet Union as an aggressor when they teamed up with Hitler to destroy and occupy Poland. The Soviets were also at war with another vulnerable neighbor over territory that didn’t belong to them (Finland) and had recently illegally and aggressively annexed the Baltic nations.

Before that they had signed a non-aggression pact with Hitler, allowing him to focus all of his attention on attacking Western Allies, secure in the knowledge that the USSR would quite literally have his back. It’s no exaggeration to say that if the Soviet Union had acted like responsible nation rather than looking to aggressively expand as Hitler stirred up shit in Europe, then Hitler would never have been in a position to invade the Soviet Union. TL;DR, Russia was not a victim in 1941 and most of their problems were enabled by their own aggressive behavior. 

Which brings me to the real point, which is that we DID achieve a reset in Europe after the Cold War. A huge bunch of former enemies are now friends. Lots of people who were poor are now rich. Lots of territory that used to be contested and the source of wars is now secure and peaceful and almost invulnerable to outside attack. Europeans that used to solve problems by fighting now entertain themselves with Brussels bureaucracy and rulemaking. It’s a smashing success for everyone.

Except Russia. Because, as you have so accurately noted, Russia can’t feel secure if they don’t control those countries, and now they don’t. And if they can’t control them, the second best option is for them to be weak and vulnerable to attack by Russia.  This is a structural feature of Russian thinking about security and its telling that your Russian friends feel personally insulted when their small neighbors are allowed to do what they want. 
 

The only thing more pie in the sky than belief in a reset with Russia is belief in a potential democratic Russia. Even a cursory familiarity with Russian history and society reveals these truths. The correct response to a Russia which believes it needs to control, bully, and impoverish its neighbors to feel secure (and that is Russian official strategy and doctrine and has been regardless of who sat in the Kremlin or on the throne for centuries) is to reduce the zone where this is a feasible course of action, not to expand it so they feel better at everyone else’s expense. 
 

By any measure except “making Russia happy”, expansion of NATO has been an incredible success for everyone involved. Europe has never been more stable, prosperous, independent, and secure and the United States has never had a better and more effective transatlantic partner. 

[956 Worldwide 34222]

21 minutes ago, Onboard 2.0 said:

 

I'd also say the rocket surgeons (love that description BTW) probably knew a lot more than we or the average Russian did about who was moving to take power in the post Soviet world, and who that cast of players would be.  How would anyone not think ex KGB would be the ones who moved to that end ?  They had the training, apparatus, and all the other tricks needed to drive Russia right back to it's current mafioso state.  Of course I could be way off, but I don't think it's a great leap of faith to think that was going to happen.  

Russians have had zero experience with democracy, voting or self governance ever in the entire history of their country.  That they were going to succeed in that 180 degree transformation would have been a bit of a miracle.

The rocket surgeons were right on this one. It’s important to keep this in perspective. Thanks to NATO expansion, we are concerned about Russian intervention in Ukraine or Georgia. Based on past lessons, we’d be worrying about Russian intervention in Poland, Hungary, or East Germany.  That’s a win for us. 
 

The alternative is to posit an alternative history where Russia not only abandons an external strategy of regional aggression and destabilization that has been remarkably consistent for centuries, but also completely transforms itself internally into a reliable partner.  That’s the real bit of magical thinking. 

[Shady Ray 1633]

48 minutes ago, 956 Worldwide said:

@Shady Ray, nearly all of the rebuttals to this argument are embedded within the arguments themselves. First, you are entirely mistaken in claiming that the concept of a Transatlantic security guarantee did not exist until the 1990s. The concept is embedded in the founding document of the charter, which states that an attack on any member of the Alliance will be treated as attack on all. Literally the entire point of the Alliance was to offer Europe a guarantee of American intervention in the event of a Soviet attack, thereby ending European regional rivalries and arms races. It’s worth noting that the ideas has been wildly successful in that war between European nations is as close to “unthinkable, as exists in geopolitics the idea of any external attack on Europe within NATO. 
 

Onwards. As you accurately note, Russia feels insecure because it “lost control” of the strip of land now inside NATO. The key here is that security for the inhabitants means independence and an Alliance freely chosen. For Russia, security involves control and repression and a veto over other countries’ choices. One of these behaviors is legitimate and the other completely illegitimate. 
 

And it’s important to remember that Soviet (Russian) aggression was a prime mover in starting World War II and the subsequent loss of 15,000,000 citizens. Although Russia teaches that the war started in 1941 (you’ll be put in jail for teaching otherwise), the war started in 1939 with the Soviet Union as an aggressor when they teamed up with Hitler to destroy and occupy Poland. The Soviets were also at war with another vulnerable neighbor over territory that didn’t belong to them (Finland) and had recently illegally and aggressively annexed the Baltic nations.

Before that they had signed a non-aggression pact with Hitler, allowing him to focus all of his attention on attacking Western Allies, secure in the knowledge that the USSR would quite literally have his back. It’s no exaggeration to say that if the Soviet Union had acted like responsible nation rather than looking to aggressively expand as Hitler stirred up shit in Europe, then Hitler would never have been in a position to invade the Soviet Union. TL;DR, Russia was not a victim in 1941 and most of their problems were enabled by their own aggressive behavior. 

Which brings me to the real point, which is that we DID achieve a reset in Europe after the Cold War. A huge bunch of former enemies are now friends. Lots of people who were poor are now rich. Lots of territory that used to be contested and the source of wars is now secure and peaceful and almost invulnerable to outside attack. Europeans that used to solve problems by fighting now entertain themselves with Brussels bureaucracy and rulemaking. It’s a smashing success for everyone.

Except Russia. Because, as you have so accurately noted, Russia can’t feel secure if they don’t control those countries, and now they don’t. And if they can’t control them, the second best option is for them to be weak and vulnerable to attack by Russia.  This is a structural feature of Russian thinking about security and its telling that your Russian friends feel personally insulted when their small neighbors are allowed to do what they want. 
 

The only thing more pie in the sky than belief in a reset with Russia is belief in a potential democratic Russia. Even a cursory familiarity with Russian history and society reveals these truths. The correct response to a Russia which believes it needs to control, bully, and impoverish its neighbors to feel secure (and that is Russian official strategy and doctrine and has been regardless of who sat in the Kremlin or on the throne for centuries) is to reduce the zone where this is a feasible course of action, not to expand it so they feel better at everyone else’s expense. 
 

By any measure except “making Russia happy”, expansion of NATO has been an incredible success for everyone involved. Europe has never been more stable, prosperous, independent, and secure and the United States has never had a better and more effective transatlantic partner. 

You raise a lot of great points here. And I am not being facetious when I say that I genuinely appreciate them. Your posts are some of the most edifying on this site IMO.

 

But as I said, this is not about morality, or history or right and wrong…anymore. We all know that Central Europe was a victim. We all know that Germany was an aggressor. We all know that the Soviets were aggressors. We all know that they started shit off together under Molotov-Ribbentrop. That is indisputable. No one paid more of a price than the Central European states wrt to the European theatre.

 

But morals in 1939 don’t matter.

 

But what is indisputable is the fact that regardless of their morality in prior times under the USSR, Russia remains a powerful, nuclear-armed power that we must deal with on the terms of their current status. And that current status must be viewed beyond the lens of secure, fat-and-happy Central Europe.

 

It is quite simply a geopolitical calculation. We have far, far more important issues in the world than the third-world dumpster fire that is Ukraine. Because of certain (very, very personally invested) people’s insistence that Ukraine be brought into the NATO fold, we have squandered massive levels of equity in areas that are critical for us in the future. Despite what the idiot talking heads say, Russia was never a natural ally of China. Never.

 

But now they are. Balls deep. We have completely undone the Sino-Soviet (er, Russian) split so that we can fuck around with neo-Nazi regiments and babushkas in Ukraine. Russia is completely dependent on Chinese largesse…completely dependent on their industry, completely dependent on their financial system particularly once SWIFT goes offline for them, which is why they have spent millions over the past couple of years developing SPFS, essentially binding themselves to China.

 

They were never geopolitically inclined to be our adversary in the Middle East. They had no desire to go to war alongside China in Asia. They had no intention of binding their entire future with the Chinese - who are our most serious adversaries. As you know, there are border disputes in Asian Russia with the Chinese and the Russians historically have been every bit as skeptical of Beijing as it has been of Brussels. As Kissinger (barf) said...and as was the case as recently as GWB...we had a wedge there. They wanted to be with us, if the conditions were right.

 

But our stupid, stupid, stupid policies in Ukraine and Georgia, of all worthless places on the planet - coupled with our sanctions and threats - have pushed Russia so far into China’s camp that historians will laugh about our stupidity. And for what? Ukraine. Or in Georgia...some piddly territory in the Caucasus wedged between Russia, Azerbaijan and Armenia that we will never be able to control?

 

Come on, man. /NoBiden

 

I cannot stand Kissinger, but gottdam he was effective. And even his old ass has commented about how disastrous this is.

 

Piddly ass ex-Soviet Europe is not a vacuum. Russia has massive influence in the Mid-East. They have massive power in Syria. They have massive influence in Iran. Massive influence in Central Asia. And a natural aversion to China.

 

But what are we doing? Pushing them into China’s arms for what? Fuckin’ Ukraine…the Congo of Europe. Literally the most worthless area of Europe for us, and the most valuable area of Europe for them?

 

We are being completely short-sighted here.

Edited December 29, 2021 by Shady Ray

[Woland 729]

Looking at historical trends, there has always been an ebb and flow of Russian/Soviet military might and projection of power. The Russians are currently in an upward trend that should continue for at least another 15-20 years. We need to plan policy accordingly. Putin is providing the necessary political stability so I expect the current trends to continue until he is dead. At that point, it will be about time for a Russian decline and some of this pressure from Russia will disappear. Future events will be influenced by how stable Russian will be internally once Putin is gone.

[Brisketexan 104215]

I'll hand out some more rep in a bit, but appreciate the insight from Shady, 956, and even Onboard and GOLL.  The geopolitical chess board with Russia on it is a fascinating match (and we all know how good the rooskies are at chess).  What has repeatedly struck me about anyone's dealings with Russia is how it is almost impossible to "get it right," because if you think bringing out your rook is to your advantage, they have a strategy to pivot and use that to their advantage.  And if you argue 'no, you fool!  Bring out the knight!".....well, they have a strategy to pivot to turn that to their advantage as well.

There are only two rules:

1 - Russia wants "security."

2 - Russia will do functionally anything to get it.

Everything else is just details.  For example, they can get security by either having 1) stable allies covering their flank (Warsaw Pact) or 2) unstable nations (Ukraine, Georgia) serving as a buffer on their flank, and on the other side of that flank, weakened/bickering western nations that are therefore less of a threat.  They don't care HOW they get security.  They'll do it around your rook, your knight, or your queen.  They DGAF.

So, maybe the takeaway is this: whatever move you make against Russia, it's almost certainly the wrong one.

 

Oh, and because I talked about chess so much, here's a reward for your patient reading:

Edited December 29, 2021 by Brisketexan

[Biff Tannen 45420]

1 minute ago, Brisketexan said:

So, maybe the takeaway is this: whatever move you make against Russia, it's almost certainly the wrong one.

Never get involved in a land war in Asia.

[Shady Ray 1633]

50 minutes ago, Woland said:

Looking at historical trends, there has always been an ebb and flow of Russian/Soviet military might and projection of power. The Russians are currently in an upward trend that should continue for at least another 15-20 years. We need to plan policy accordingly. Putin is providing the necessary political stability so I expect the current trends to continue until he is dead. At that point, it will be about time for a Russian decline and some of this pressure from Russia will disappear. Future events will be influenced by how stable Russian will be internally once Putin is gone.

You raise a very good point here. I have mentioned this before, I think, but I have a team of attorneys reporting to me across Europe practicing in the area of Government Relations. Three of those reports are in Russia and they are very, very plugged into the scuttlebutt in Moscow.

 

There is definitely talk in Moscow circles that Putin is - at a minimum - not well and that part of this entire Ukraine deal is tied into his desire to sew up the Ukraine issue before he is seen as too terribly weak. He will go as long as he can, but he is not afraid to go early IF he can ensure the compliance of his successor...basically, the same deal as the Yeltsin-Putin handoff. The Ukraine deal is a huge, huge open issue that they desperately need tied up. The entire senior leadership there…Putin (69), Lavrov (71), Shoigu (66), and the hugely important Valery Gerasimov (66) are not only past standard retirement age, (and Gerasimov is significant, as he should be mandatorily pushed out by now, but has nevertheless been kept on, likely due to this pending military issue...he has capable replacements, but no one close to his chops) but getting close to that nasty ol’ grim reaper.

 

 

As there is not an heir apparent there, (outside of Shoigu, who would be bad news for us, but is IMO the most likely replacement candidate) and there is an anticipated power vacuum coming - one that will not be filled by Medvedev (who is seen as suspiciously pro-western) so the intention in senior leadership is to at least create an environment where that is duked out legitimately amongst the potential heirs and not subject to the possible influence of outside influence.

 

As my top direct report over there says, “Putin is a corrupt, kleptocratic, authoritarian gangster…but nevertheless, he genuinely is a true Russian Nationalist who seems to feel that his reign has been ordained from some higher power…and his influence in the provinces is that he genuinely appears to love Russia.”

 

This entire leadership is going to look very different in 5 years, max, and our intelligence agencies surely aren’t discounting that when it comes to predicting their behavior.

Edited December 29, 2021 by Shady Ray

[956 Worldwide 34222]

We’re not short sighted at all but rather realistic. This argument calls for belief in three propositions that are dubious at best. First, that Russia’s perception of the West as its first and most important enemy is based on Western actions and is malleable, rather than a permanent and defining feature of Russian strategic thought. The second dubious proposition is that Russia will be reassured rather than emboldened if the West compromises its fundamental values. And third, that hypothetical (and improbable) cooperation with Russia on the Middle East or against China is more valuable than the very real and tangible benefit we’ve received by expanding the Euroatlantic sphere of prosperity. 
 

Its worthwhile to note what prompted the NATO assurance to pursue integration with Ukraine and Georgia— the 2008 Russian invasion of Georgia.  The invasion came first. It’s worthwhile to note what sparked Russian fury and threats (followed through upon) in Ukraine in 2014– the prospect of a Ukraine-EU free trade agreement and not NATO membership.  This is normal and expected Russian behavior and acceptance of it does not satisfy Russia or prompt better behavior elsewhere, it simply encourages Russia to press further.

The first principle to understand when dealing with Russia is the Russian view of compromise.  Russia demands the contents of a bank vault at gunpoint then compromises by accepting half. The perfect example of this is the unstated but barely veiled compromise of accepting Crimea’s loss in exchange for the East. 
 

The second principle is that long term cooperation based on anything beyond immediate, pressing equal threats is impossible and in fact Russia views such offers as deeply suspicious. Policy makers will do well to remember this when hearing about Russia-China cooperation. A corollary to this principle is that Russia expects rewards and compensation for doing the right thing even when it’s in Russia’s own interests, like nuclear non-proliferation. 
 

Russia is a blackmailer which will always view the West as target one, and it’s not a wise idea to be seduced by short term cooperation (which Russia will view as a temporary agreement between thieves) that in the long term will just make them a more capable, emboldened, and powerful extortionist. 

[Shady Ray 1633]

35 minutes ago, Brisketexan said:

 

Oh, and because I talked about chess so much, here's a reward for your patient reading:

 

__

[Brisketexan 104215]

20 minutes ago, 956 Worldwide said:

Russia is a blackmailer which will always view the West as target one, and it’s not a wise idea to be seduced by short term cooperation (which Russia will view as a temporary agreement between thieves) that in the long term will just make them a more capable, emboldened, and powerful extortionist. 

I think this is a strong -- and true -- point.

In some negotiations, you are dealing with an opposing player who acts in good faith, sees the relationship as mutually beneficial, and that it can offer mutual benefit in the future.  You can make good-faith concessions to that person because they will make some concessions in return, and you each will be rewarded by a functional and profitable relationship.  The classic "win-win."

In other negotiations, it is a zero-sum, one-off game -- even if you might have future dealings with each other, that doesn't figure into things.  The other side is thinking one thing: how can I extract the most personal benefit from this transaction.  There is no "win-win" -- quite the opposite.  For me to win, you must lose something.  (And, without going down that rabbit hole too far, does that remind you of the approach of a certain recent president?  It may tell you why he though so highly of Putin and Russia).

In dealing with Russia, you are dealing with the second type of counterparty.  Always.  

[956 Worldwide 34222]

41 minutes ago, Brisketexan said:

I think this is a strong -- and true -- point.

In some negotiations, you are dealing with an opposing player who acts in good faith, sees the relationship as mutually beneficial, and that it can offer mutual benefit in the future.  You can make good-faith concessions to that person because they will make some concessions in return, and you each will be rewarded by a functional and profitable relationship.  The classic "win-win."

In other negotiations, it is a zero-sum, one-off game -- even if you might have future dealings with each other, that doesn't figure into things.  The other side is thinking one thing: how can I extract the most personal benefit from this transaction.  There is no "win-win" -- quite the opposite.  For me to win, you must lose something.  (And, without going down that rabbit hole too far, does that remind you of the approach of a certain recent president?  It may tell you why he though so highly of Putin and Russia).

In dealing with Russia, you are dealing with the second type of counterparty.  Always.  

More true than you realize. One of the defining features of dealing with the U.S. during the Trump era was a (uncharacteristic for the U.S.) zero-sum, cutthroat New York real estate approach to cutting deals even with our FRIENDS. And it reveals the limits of the persistent myth among some voters that we need a “businessman” to get things done.  Negotiating with Allies and enemies is nothing like a real estate deal. There will always be something else you’ll need to negotiate, the other party will never take his money and leave or be forced out of business. And the other party will remember how you behaved. 

[Brisketexan 104215]

2 minutes ago, 956 Worldwide said:

More true than you realize. One of the defining features of dealing with the U.S. during the Trump era was a (uncharacteristic for the U.S.) zero-sum, cutthroat New York real estate approach to cutting deals even with our FRIENDS. And it reveals the limits of the persistent myth among some voters that we need a “businessman” to get things done.  Negotiating with Allies and enemies is nothing like a real estate deal. There will always be something else you’ll need to negotiate, the other party will never take his money and leave or be forced out of business. And the other party will remember how you behaved. 

100% this, and of all the things to be critical of about his admin, that was the one that chafed me the most.  When you look at our long-time allies solely as counterparties to be taken advantage of instead of long-term partners....it turbofucks the relationship.

If I am going to have to do business with you again, it is almost never in my interest to fuck you over today.

[atomheartbevo 89295]

2 hours ago, Woland said:

Future events will be influenced by how stable Russian will be internally once Putin is gone.

Given that Putin has worked to make sure he has no competition (anybody that could rise to his level), I fully expect things to go to shit as a bunch of lower- and mid-level bureaucrats jockey for position and power.  

Edited December 29, 2021 by atomheartbevo

[956 Worldwide 34222]

22 minutes ago, atomheartbevo said:

Given that Putin has worked to make sure he has no competition (anybody that could rise to his level), I fully expect things to go to shit as a bunch of lower- and mid-level bureaucrats jockey for position and power.  

This is really just back to the future, as one of the favored pastimes of Russia hands used to be Kremlinology— speculation over the health of the General Secretary, poring over May Day photos and TASS quotations to decipher who is in favor and who might be a favored replacement….in a lot of ways, the Tsar was much better because even if he was autocratic and viewed Russia as a personal possession, he at least presumably wanted to hand over something marginally functional to a clearly designated family successor. 

[Shady Ray 1633]

22 hours ago, 956 Worldwide said:

Its worthwhile to note what prompted the NATO assurance to pursue integration with Ukraine and Georgia— the 2008 Russian invasion of Georgia.  The invasion came first. It’s worthwhile to note what sparked Russian fury and threats (followed through upon) in Ukraine in 2014– the prospect of a Ukraine-EU free trade agreement and not NATO membership.  This is normal and expected Russian behavior and acceptance of it does not satisfy Russia or prompt better behavior elsewhere, it simply encourages Russia to press further.

 

This is completely (and demonstrably) wrong. The Georgia/Ukraine NATO timeline is public, it is exhaustive and it is indisputable. The invitation to Georgia and Ukraine to join NATO as agreed upon and publicly stated began well before that 2008 War and Russia’s subsequent invasion.

 

But yeah, let’s talk about that war. Because what whole thing was fucking absurd and I am honestly not surprised that the US media (unlike ours here, which actually reports on it) just kinda says “ehhhhh, Russia invaded Georgia ... hey, look over there guys!” and sweeps it under the rug, because the truth of the ordeal is a fucking embarrassment..to us, to NATO, and to our credibility in Western Europe. I mean, there legitimately could be compelling HBO series made about this complete shit show...and particularly the time since the ceasefire. Jesus Christ its insane.

 

First, the timeline:

 

The timeline as per official US State Department cable dispatches*, Georgian Government/NATO press releases, and THE official investigative report by the Independent International Fact-Finding Mission on the Conflict in Georgia, which was the authoritative investigatory commission set up by the Council of the EU (adopted as official by the UN) and carried out by esteemed Swiss Diplomat Heidi Tagliavini**,:

 

• February 14, 2005: NATO begins the official membership track with Georgia with execution of NATO PfP process.
   
• March 16, 2005: NATO and Georgia sign agreement authorizing them to act as host and transit country for NATO forces
   
• March 26, 2006 : NATO Individual Partner Action Plan (IPAP) implementation team arrives in Tbilisi for implementation of IPAP
   
• April 13, 2006 the IPAP implementation assessment is presented to the larger NATO 26+1 format
   
• Mid-January, 2008: Russia is formally notified through the January 2008 Burns-Lavrov discussions of our intent move forward with a Membership Action Plan (MAP) for Ukraine and Georgia, as evidenced by the infamous January 30th  “Nyet Means Nyet” cable  sent to the Joint Chiefs, NATO, NSA, Sec Def, Sec State by then-Ambassador to Russia, and current CIA Director, William Burns, which was later leaked by Wikileaks. I have attached that cable below.
   
• April 4th, 2008: NATO’s Bucharest Summit. NATO officially announces that Ukraine and Georgia would join saying, “NATO welcomes Ukraine’s and Georgia’s Euro Atlantic aspirations for membership in NATO. We agreed today that these countries will become members of NATO” in the official Summit Declaration.
   
• Mid-July, 2008: The U.S. carries out joint military exercises called “Immediate Response” with the Georgians in Georgia in mid-July 2008 involving approx 2,000 troops from the US, Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan and Ukraine.
   
• Late July/Early August 2008: The Russians respond by carrying out their own drills in their own North Caucasus Military District and on the Black Sea;
   
• First week of August 2008: South Ossetians and Georgians ratcheted up hostilities with tit-for-tat car bombings and sniper fire. It is amost certains that Russians were also involved in this.
   
• Night of August 7th to 8th: As per the IIFFMCG Official Report, “hostilities commence with the Georgian military operation consisting of “massive shelling” of Tskhinvali during the night of August 7th and 8th" (although the report does note that there was a long period of tensions, provocations and incidents on both sides prior to the Georgian military action).
   
• August 8th, 2:30 PM: Russians commence invasion of Georgia. They get to within 10 miles of Tbilisi before stopping
   
• August 12th: Ceasefire agreement negotiations commence
   
• August 16th, Condoleeza Rice travels to Tbilisi, where Saakashvili, signs ceasefire in her presence. Dmitry Medvedev signs next day in Moscow.
   
• August 17th: Russians pull back to their South Ossetian positions and both sides swap POWs.
   
• Fin

(all dates are correct...for ease of sourcing, I will post to Wikipedia for the pre-war history, and the BBC hosted version of the IFFMCG report for post invasion dates)

 

So, no. NATO expansion into Ukraine and Georgia was in no way a response to the Russo-Georgian War in August 2008. That’s not even something that reasonable minds can disagree on. That process was far, far along before shit kicked off in 2008.

 

*This diplomatic cable is worth the read for a variety of reasons, most notably that the tone and rationality of each side towards the topic is a far, far cry from what it is today. Plus, at least for me, it was absolutely fascinating in general. They explicitly discussed the fact that Georgia and Ukraine were moving forward with an official MAP in that Memo and you can literally read in Burns’ own words that Russia had accepted the current state of NATO, and recognized NATO’s legitimate regional interests, but Lavrov explicitly communicates that the entire NATO-Russian relationship would change if those two - especially Ukraine - were admitted because of the deep, deep threat perception/difficulties/instabilities/internal Russian domestic impact that would be perceived by such an action. It is literally in black and white in that State Dept. cable.

 

The entire cable spoilered below:

Spoiler

----

 

 

 

 

 

----

 

**Tagliavini’s credibility is impeccable. She has been everything from Swiss Ambassador to Moscow to the Personal Representative of the OSCE in the Caucuses, to Swiss Ambassador to Bosnia and Herz during the 1990s/early 2000s and head of Diplomatic Affairs for the Swiss Dept of Foreign Affairs. She was the Chief of Mission for the UN Observer Mission in Georgia for years before the war - observing the implementation of the 1993 agreement - and has been the Special Representative of the General Secretary of OSCE wrt the Ukraine-Russia conflict and was essentially responsible for the original ceasefire and subsequent Minsk Protocols. She is literally at the highest echelon of European diplomats. And as is known, the Swiss are badasses when it comes to diplomacy.

 

The Carnegie Institute for Peace - Moscow, which Burns cites as subject matter experts on the topic of Russian-NATO expansion in the Nyet Means Nyet memo, says that there is no question who fired first, and that it was the Georgians. But more importantly, they go on to say that one of the single biggest factors in that war was that Georgian PM Saakashvili (dear loooord, this fuckin' guy)*** misread GWB’s willingness to defend Georgia should they attack. When he did, and we didn’t defend him, he was fucked. This is EXACTLY what we are running the risk of doing now in Ukraine. Biden seems to be very, very aware of this and it seems that his people (particularly Jake Sullivan) to continuously convey our position to an increasingly despearate Zelensky.

 

***Saakashvili. Dear. God. This guy. And what became of Saakashvili - that same Georgian President that was found by the IIFFMCG to have triggered the war by shelling Tskhinvali, thus getting his country buttraped by the Russians?

 

Ohhhh, let’s just talk about the Journey of Lil’ Misha Saakashvili. I am going to spoiler this for those who don't care, but if you want to read the wildest, batshit crazy part of this whole ordeal, AND the part that is critically important wrt the Western European insistence to stay out of this mess, read about this guy. Read about the oh-so-western, oh-so-democratic, oh-so-stable leader of Georgia in 2008 and what wild and crazy adventures this fuckstick has been on in the years following. And remember while you read this...every single voter in Germany or Fance or the Netherlands knows who this guy is by name and knows the entire story of this great, great man who the US championed as a freedom fighter.

 

 

Spoiler

 

Three years after the 2008 Russo-German war, Saakashvili was booted out of office and then moved to Ukraine and became a leader in the Maidan revolution. He immediately gets Ukrainian citizenship under bizarre circumstances, and, inexplicitly then enters Ukraine’s government as Governor of Odessa (only AFTER turning down the post of First Prime Minister of Ukraine (WTF?) because it would require him to give up his Georgian Citizenship,.

 

 

Which is weird, as I can’t imagine ever having the Governor of Alberta losing an election due to findings of mass, mass corruption, fleeing to Texas, suddenly getting citizenship and us saying…yeah, you know that Canuck sounds pretty damned good, he knows about oil and stuff…let’s vote him in to lead our major state”.

 

 

But ok…whatever. He was widely seen as “the US’ guy” (former US State Dept intern, went to Columbia Law) meeting with GWB and having McCain basically fellate him on Georgian TV over there, so take it for what its worth.

 

But that’s just the beginning:

 

 

Remember…and I repeat myself…this guy isn’t Ukrainian. He’s Georgian.

 

 

Ukrainian PM Petro Poroshenko (a committed, albeit corrupt, Pro-Western/Anti-Russian Ukrainian PM) catches Saakashvili trying to pull off a Coup d’etat against Ukraine’s own Pro-Western government IN THE FUCKING UKRAINE, so he is stripped of his citizenship and deported.

 

And to where? Tbilisi? Warsaw? Chișinău?

 

Nah, fucking Brooklyn. At which time he was stripped of all citizenships and became stateless, which is honestly quite an achievement.

 

But then, for some reason, he was allowed to return to Ukraine (many believe it was at the behest of us) in 2017. He was then arrested by the Ukrainian Security Services AGAIN, this time on the charge of “attempting to overthrow the Ukrainian constitution”, AS WELL AS for receiving funds from a criminal organization tied to the ex-Ukrainian PM.

 

Surely that’s the end of this guy, though, right? I mean, come on.

 

Oh noooo. Oh no it isn’t.

 

 

Poroshenko then loses to current president/US ally Vlodomyr Zelensky in 2019. And one of Zelensky’s first acts? He bizarelly pardons Saakashvili AND THEN APPOINTS HIM TO LEAD THE UKRAINIAN EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE FOR NATIONAL REFORM. Yeah, because that makes a lot of sense. Ex-Georgian President, kicked out of office in Georgia for large scale corruption, moves to Ukraine, gets kicked out and stripped of all nationalities, arrested twice for attempted coup…this guy definitely knows about good-governance reform. Perfect fit. Absolutely NOTHING shady there. I can say for sure, this looks GREAT to Western Europeans. Real winners over there, say all the "naive" German and French voters. 

 

But then what did our great NATO 2008/Good Governance leader, ol’ trusty Mikheil, do after inexplicably being tasked with reforming the pathetically corrupt Ukraine?

 

Did he continue his noble work on “National Reform” in Ukraine?

 

Did he keep his head down trying to do the Lord’s work for good-governance and salvage his fourth (or was it fifth) chance?

 

Oh no. Of course, not…he bolted from Ukraine and then FUCKING SHOWED UP LAST MONTH IN GEORGIA CALLING FOR HIS SUPPORTERS TO STORM THE CAPITAL IN TBILISI and overthrow the current pro-Western/Pro-NATO government in favor of himself before he was arrested AGAAAAIINNNN and thrown into a Georgian jail. To which he is apparently going to be detained forever, per the statements of the current Georgian President.

 

Yes, this is all true. Yes, this is factual. Don’t believe me? Just look him up online “Mikheil Saakashvili”…THIS is the man who we were supporting in Georgia and then once again in Ukraine. This is they type of people with whom we throw our lot over there, while knowing that we are completely obliterating our support with Western European allies because our “people” in Ukraine and Georgia are legit fucking nimrods. I mean, its like we just created politicians comprised of equal part Trump Pillow Guy/Matt Gaetz/Don Jr and said...hey, run shit in geopolitical hotspots.

 

This is what I mean when I say we are viewing this with shortsightedness. When the US and NATO come to Germany with the “big ask” relating to China or Iran or whatever, do you know what the Linke or AfD or even the SPD on occasion does…they point to people like Saakashvili. They point to people like Zelensky. They point to this raging shit show and they say, “Remember that guy...no, not the little comedian riding around in the tank or the billionaire Chocolate Oligarch who stole all our infrastructure funds paying off his friends...we mean the one who tried to go Leeroy Jenkins on Russia and then carry out coup d'etat's against two separate countries...yeah, that one that GWB and John McCain showed up to praise. yeah...remember him? You guys wanna go ahead and follow the Americans into this shit in the middle east?”

 

Jesus Christ, it is like I have lost my mind living in a world where any of this is seen as remotely normal or would remotely be acceptable if the other side wasn’t Russia. Like any of this would warrant one single American or European life or one single dollar of a US/EU taxpayer.

 

These countries are legit fucking insane. Russia. Ukraine. Georgia. All three of them.

 

They. Are. Fucking. Insane.

 

So, no, Western Europeans aren’t naive or heartless when they don’t want to expand our nice, secure, clean, peaceful social welfare states to include them. They are instead smart and informed.

 

Anyway, back to the 2008 war:

 

It is my opinion is that Russia was “being typical Russia” and thus lying in wait, fully prepared to exploit Georgia’s stupidity (and most certainly instigating it with low-level provocation), but Georgia played right into their hands by shelling South Ossetia and got in way over its head and ultimately paid the price. And this is EXACTLY what bothers me…the very real risk that their neighbors get stupid and silly when neighbor relations are viewed through the lens of having the world’s biggest and baddest military is in their corner. Russia’s neighbors have ancient disputes with Russia…they couldn’t act on them based on their own power, but they sure as fuck can feel empowered when they think that A10 Warthogs and the US Marines are in their corner. The worst thing one can do when dealing with smaller, underdeveloped countries is to give them the big bad stick and tell them that we've got their back. We can - and should when the time is right - defend non-NATO members based precisely on the circumstances at hand - and we can do that with Ukraine and Georgia if the situation is right -  but giving guarantees...giving Article 5 protection to this basket full of chowderheads is insane. 

 

Furthermore, according to the findings of the IIFFMCG (which were only findings of fact, as the mission was not a tribunal), which was investigated over 9 months by a whole slew of distinguished Western European political/military/legal experts, no one involved in this was innocent. Neither party was justified and both sides violated international law:

 

Details of the report spoilered:

Spoiler

 

Per the Report:

 

 

- the Georgians violated International law initially by shelling Tskhinvali indiscriminately during the night of August 7/8 with GRAD Multiple Rocket Launchers (which had been provided to them by the US), as indiscriminate shelling through the entire night did not satisfy the requirements of being necessary or proportionate;

 

- The Georgians violated international law in their use of force against Russian peacekeeping forces in South Ossetia, as the Mission found that there was no ongoing armed attack by Russia prior to the start of the Georgian operation and Georgia provided no evidence to the commission that Russian armed forces were on South Ossetia prior to the offensive, and they could provide no evidence that Russians were on the verge of a major attack.

 

-The Russians did not violate international law when they defended their Peacekeepers in South Ossetia, as their initial response was proportionate to the Georgian attack.

 

-The Russians DID violate international law in the subsequent military invasion which was deemed to exceed far beyond the reasonable limits of self-defense when they bombed the Kodori Valley and took control of Georgian towns and highways during the 5 day invasion.

 

-Both sides committed violations of International Humanitarian/Human Rights Law in their respective campaigns, both before and after the ceasefire. Errrrbody was all fucked up over there.

 

Now, none of this can be completely deemed correct...it is for certain that Russians were preparing for this, but they are going on what they could prove, and any attempt to spin it with PR machines on either side is beyond what I care about. The Russians say the report is wrong because it was too hard on them, the Georgians/pro-NATO side says it was wrong because it assumes results based on things that occurred, but weren't proved. I don't care. I care about the report from someone who is a credible, disinterested Diplomat. And if she legitimately "wronged" either side, then the Ukrainians and the Russians wouldn't have agreed on her as the mediator in Minsk II, so spare me with the hot takes from the Russian or American press saying "she's wrong"

There have been coordinated efforts in recent years by both the Russians and the Georgians to propogandize and twist this report in their media spheres into some form of justification and “see, it was totally the other guy…100% him” bullshit over the years, but the report is neutral, it is thorough, and it is damning of the behavior of both sides. 

 

Bottom line, “Russia Bad, Little Russian Democratic Neighbors Good” is a naive way to view geopolitics here. So no, the Germans don’t see their worldview towards Russia as “sophisticated” or “self-centered”…they are simply informed. As opposed to what passes for foreign affairs coverage in the English Language Media.

 

956 mentioned a great man in an earlier post...Vaclav Havel...or we can also use Lech Walesa. When we entred into these important relationships with these countries and guaranteed their safety, they were led by wise, experienced, and (pardon the cheese) Great Men. They had experienced hardship. They knew the horrors of war and they knew the value of their freedom. They weren't about lining their own pockets, or carrying out coups, or balls deep in shady dealings etc. They were about bringing real, meaningful security for their people. We literally have people over there now who would make Donald Trump blush when it comes to their corruption, incompetence and audacity.

 

God, we are gonna waltz into something bad here, aren't we? I see that Putin and Biden are having an urgent call today to discuss. I am not feeling nearly as optimistic as I was that we are going to avoid something over there...there is no reason to have this call with the January 10th call already set. Something isn't good.

 

Well, it's 3:00 PM for me...and while the Germans say "Kein Bier vor Vier"...I'm giving myself 90 minutes grace.

 

Edit: Sorry all, but I don't know why the fuck this random screen cap of the cable is stuck below, but I can't figure out how to get it removed without fucking up my spoiled cap of the cable, so I am just leaving it.

 

Edited December 30, 2021 by Shady Ray