Русский корабль - иди нахуй

[956 Worldwide 33962]

30 minutes ago, bolverk said:

@956 Worldwide Not to get too ahead of ourselves, but I'd like to know if you think there are any lessons from how we handled the collapse of the USSR that could be applied to post-Putin Russia. Was it a failure by the West to sufficiently support/build democratic institutions in Russia? Or was Russia always going to just fall back into an imperium no matter the timeline? I'm simply asking whether there will ever be the widespread hope in Russia that the sociologist from the previous page mentioned as being necessary and what, specifically, NATO/EU can do to foster it once Putin eventually croaks.

And Serbia is Baylor?

It’s so hard because I really don’t have enough of a crystal ball to predict what comes next except to say that it’s just gonna be a fucking wreck, socially and psychologically and economically. I don’t believe that we failed to support democratic institutions in Russia, that’s a two way street and Russia got every chance it deserved. There has to be a will there.
 

So my first lesson would be for us to stay true to our values and move quickly to consolidate the security of those countries that want to jump at the chance to leave Russia’s orbit. If we went wrong, it was in allowing any sort of confusion over whether or not these new states got to chart their own path. We need to center the aspirations of everything that isn’t Russia. 
 

Second, I’d say to remember that the fracture of the nuclear armed Soviet Union was at least as unthinkable as the fracture of the Russian Federation. But we got through it. So let the process shake out in Russia and don’t act like Russia in its current borders is some indispensable nation. We can manage a controlled dissolution if it comes to that, and we don’t need to give whoever sits in the Kremlin the luxury of viewing himself as a necessity. Be ready to help prevent a humanitarian disaster but make it clear that whatever “Russia” comes next, it will have to survive based on the consent of the governed and not with any propping up from us.

Third, get our own houses in order and use the respite gained by the collapse of Russia as an alternative partner to really lean on the assholes who are backsliding while in Western institutions. The lack of a viable Eastern option but China will do wonders, and Russia skillfully exploits corrupt pathways and uncommitted democrats to give itself breathing space. Orban should be target number one once we have breathing space and his buddy is gone.

And the toughest part is making sure we are improving ourselves and making our own society a soft empire built on on mutual attraction and consent. Strong democracy at home is key to our national security. 

[Gravy Train 969]

1 hour ago, BamaATL said:

Why Moscow needs to feel pain in a map

Interesting that with a population of just 490,000, Kaliningrad has already lost ~74,000 able-bodied men.

[956 Worldwide 33962]

7 minutes ago, Gravy Train said:

Interesting that with a population of just 490,000, Kaliningrad has already lost ~74,000 able-bodied men.

It hasn’t quite gotten there. The header says it’s counting verified RU deaths (~15k) via a few western sources.  We estimate 100k casualties and wounded:killed on the RU side at about 3:1 so still not close to 74K KIA overall. If Kaliningrad had lost 74k; extrapolated that means Zelenskyy is watching his parade down Red Square. 

[Brisketexan 103206]

2 hours ago, Trey3216 said:

FIFY

Yep.  I made that comparison some pages back.  Simultaneously claims to be by far the greatest nation the world has ever seen, so superior to everyone else that comparison is pointless.....while also seething with resentment of their perceived second-class treatment, all the bad things done to them, etc.  The cognitive dissonance of at once claiming to be both the god and the victim is the Russian....and aggy....brand.

[InkaUtexas 24835]

1 hour ago, DDD Dad said:

And I quote. 

 

[InkaUtexas 24835]

15 minutes ago, 956 Worldwide said:

It hasn’t quite gotten there. The header says it’s counting verified RU deaths (~15k) via a few western sources.  We estimate 100k casualties and wounded:killed on the RU side at about 3:1 so still not close to 74K KIA overall. If Kaliningrad had lost 74k; extrapolated that means Zelenskyy is watching his parade down Red Square. 

And not all are WIA/KIA I would suppose. Some are mobilized, but have not eaten a drone delivered pine apple. 

[Pato del Muerto 51921]

14 minutes ago, Brisketexan said:

Yep.  I made that comparison some pages back.  Simultaneously claims to be by far the greatest nation the world has ever seen, so superior to everyone else that comparison is pointless.....while also seething with resentment of their perceived second-class treatment, all the bad things done to them, etc.  The cognitive dissonance of at once claiming to be both the god and the victim is the Russian....and aggy....brand.

Fancy themselves as the heroes and saviors of ww2 to the exclusion of others’ contributions. 

[atomheartbevo 88759]

3 hours ago, DefinitelyNotHollywoodColt said:

Nah man.

There is a large portion of our society that won’t even consider (and often times never even see) information that challenges their beliefs.

They aren’t consuming various pieces of information and trying and failing to process all of it due to too much info.

They're doing the opposite. Blindly accepting information (often times not even rooted in reality) while wholly rejecting anything that challenges their truth.

3 hours ago, Trey3216 said:

It's the ability to consume endless amounts of information that supports confirmation bias that allows people to do exactly what you are saying.  They are incapable or unwilling to see the other information and assess that it is superior to that which they have decided was correct.  

It's crazy.  There are people who, when told that Putin has spoken for a long time about annexing (or "solving") Ukraine going back to 2014/Crimea and beyond, and that he won't stop there, and that he openly said Russia was going to take back Ukraine over the years, and they are just like "no, that's just how it's being spun".

And you can point them to Putin's writings, speeches, interviews, etc., where he has talked about Ukraine for years, and also mention his invasion in 2014.  You can provide them with a nice collection of texts and videos.   His own words. The man has literally laid out his plans for taking over and annexing Ukraine, and he's talking about other parts of Eastern Europe, and these people are covering their ears and saying "no, that's just how it's being framed, what he says is not what he actually means and you don't understand Ukrainian history!"

That's where they are at - what he says is not what he actually means with a lot of people opposed to.  I've spoken to some of them, people who are fine with Ukraine falling or giving up a chunk to Russia.  It's stunning - they are presented with evidence that he's going to do or is doing what he has said he would do for years, and "oh, that's not what's really happening".

I know that a lot of that kind of stuff is some kind of mental illness, and some of it is contrarian, but some of it is that they don't want to be seen as wrong for some reason.

[SydneyCarton 47126]

3 minutes ago, atomheartbevo said:

It's crazy.  There are people who, when told that Putin has spoken for a long time about annexing (or "solving") Ukraine going back to 2014/Crimea and beyond, and that he won't stop there, and that he openly said Russia was going to take back Ukraine over the years, and they are just like "no, that's just how it's being spun".

And you can point them to Putin's writings, speeches, interviews, etc., where he has talked about Ukraine for years, and also mention his invasion in 2014.  You can provide them with a nice collection of texts and videos.   His own words. The man has literally laid out his plans for taking over and annexing Ukraine, and he's talking about other parts of Eastern Europe, and these people are covering their ears and saying "no, that's just how it's being framed, what he says is not what he actually means and you don't understand Ukrainian history!"

That's where they are at - what he says is not what he actually means with a lot of people opposed to.  I've spoken to some of them, people who are fine with Ukraine falling or giving up a chunk to Russia.  It's stunning - they are presented with evidence that he's going to do or is doing what he has said he would do for years, and "oh, that's not what's really happening".

I know that a lot of that kind of stuff is some kind of mental illness, and some of it is contrarian, but some of it is that they don't want to be seen as wrong for some reason.

I mean, you just literally outlined a core foundation of how most of humanity is programmed, and has been for thousands of years. 

[atomheartbevo 88759]

3 hours ago, 956 Worldwide said:

This is a great article and reminds me of something I heard regularly back in the early 2000s— that Russia would eventually get off her knees and remember how she’d been treated. And also, that Russia was never either as strong or as weak as she may seem. 

I think both of those sentiments turned out to be true. And our mistakes, such as they were, was a desire to be either new great friends (impossible) or treating Russia with too much deference (just encourages baf behavior) for the past 20 years or so. Russia always does better when treated with a firm hand and clear eyes. 

The talk about the resentment over how Russia got treated in international structures is telling of the national pathology— the deal was that we allow this wreck of a country that drove into a ditch into the “Big 8” (Yeltsin’s term for the G7) where it had no right to be based on either it’s economy or soft power of attraction. And in exchange for that courtesy, Russia would take some advice on how to clean up and be a productive partner.  

Russia's nuclear stockpile has allowed her nearly 70 years of not having to worry about being invaded, and it means that she has to be treated with kid gloves by everybody, and Russians like Putin begin to believe that Russia, a nation of only 140 million people, is treated like it is because of Russia's glorious past, and not because it's a nation with the world's largest nuclear stockpile.

3 hours ago, 956 Worldwide said:

It should be noted that a lot of Central European nations navigated this humbling process just fine. But Russia couldn’t because it believes it has a right to this status and doesn’t have to earn it.  And so “wallah”, resentment. 

They didn't have the nuclear stockpile that Russia has, so they had to be a helluva lot more humble, and had to learn to get along with their neighbors, and all of the wars that came out of Europe also led to the rise of a true superpower (the US) and the realization that they either get along or they destroy themselves in ways that their 19th Century ancestors couldn't imagine.  And the amount of economic reliance they have on each other for materials, food, fuel, etc., also meant that they had to get along, unlike in earlier centuries where their countries were not as dependent on others.  Russia doesn't have that problem with food or fuel.

Russia doesn't have to earn any status it believes it has, simply because it has nukes, so therefore it has to be respected.  The fact that it so casually mentioned using them over the last year proves that. They still have that 19th Century mentality that you mentioned, that they have to be respected, not realizing that it's the nukes (before it was just the Russian Winter keeping them safe).

When we were fighting in Vietnam or Korea, it would have been insane for official American government spokespeople to go on live TV and casually mention on an almost weekly basis how maybe we should nuke North Korea back in the 50s or Hanoi in the 60s, and maybe even nuke China for supporting North Korea (and Chinese troops fought American troops) or the Soviet Union for having supplied Vietnam.   But that's exactly what Russia does.

They are just straight-up gangster types that have an inflated sense of self-worth and importance not because they've earned it, but because people are scared of their nukes.  Putin does not understand that simple and fundamental truth.  Without the nukes, NATO would have steamrolled the Russian Army by now.

[atomheartbevo 88759]

12 minutes ago, SydneyCarton said:

I mean, you just literally outlined a core foundation of how most of humanity is programmed, and has been for thousands of years. 

It's insane.  30 years ago, these people would be forming their opinions based on a few newspaper articles/op-eds, and maybe some weekend TV shows or a quick soundbite on the evening news.

Now they are presented with everything they could ever want to know about this or that person or country, and yeah, it's not that they can't handle it, it's that they built up this image in their minds, and they aren't going to change it regardless of how much evidence contradicts it.

"Oh, just because Russia says they are taking Ukrainian children to Russian, that's not what they actually mean, things get lost in translation and the Russian language is complex."

"Well you fucking moron, you barely passed high school Spanish, you've been outside of Texas maybe 20 times in your life and none of them were outside of the US/Canada, and so I don't think you're qualified to tell Putin's spokespeople/propagandists that when they say they are taking Ukrainian children, they aren't actually taking Ukrainian children."

[SydneyCarton 47126]

3 minutes ago, atomheartbevo said:

It's insane.  30 years ago, these people would be forming their opinions based on a few newspaper articles/op-eds, and maybe some weekend TV shows or a quick soundbite on the evening news.

Now they are presented with everything they could ever want to know about this or that person or country, and yeah, it's not that they can't handle it, it's that they built up this image in their minds, and they aren't going to change it regardless of how much evidence contradicts it.

"Oh, just because Russia says they are taking Ukrainian children to Russian, that's not what they actually mean, things get lost in translation and the Russian language is complex."

"Well you fucking moron, you barely passed high school Spanish, you've been outside of Texas maybe 20 times in your life and none of them were outside of the US/Canada, and so I don't think you're qualified to tell Putin's spokespeople/propagandists that when they say they are taking Ukrainian children, they aren't actually taking Ukrainian children."

You think this is a mentally ill sister in law type issue, but in reality this is a fuck ton of more people than that, most of which would be deemed "sane." Humans aren't wired to think they're fucking idiots and accept it. If they were, half of the world would be committing suicide. 

[bolverk 28897]

10 minutes ago, atomheartbevo said:

When we were fighting in Vietnam or Korea, it would have been insane for official American government spokespeople to go on live TV and casually mention on an almost weekly basis how maybe we should nuke North Korea back in the 50s or Hanoi in the 60s, and maybe even nuke China for supporting North Korea (and Chinese troops fought American troops) or the Soviet Union for having supplied Vietnam.   But that's exactly what Russia does.

They are just straight-up gangster types that have an inflated sense of self-worth and importance not because they've earned it, but because people are scared of their nukes.  Putin does not understand that simple and fundamental truth.  Without the nukes, NATO would have steamrolled the Russian Army by now.

To be fair, we also have our own home-grown base of mouth-breathers who've fantasized about nuking other countries/peoples that are a thorn in our side or displaying shitty behavior. The "turn the desert into glass" people come to mind. Fortunately, they're not in positions of power, except for that time MacArthur really wanted to use them in/on North Korea.  

[ABSR 5270]

29 minutes ago, Pato del Muerto said:

Fancy themselves as the heroes and saviors of ww2 to the exclusion of others’ contributions. 

And ignore the fact that they secretly helped Germany train and build their army in direct violation of the Versaille treaty (Rapallo Pact), then signed another secret treaty (Molotov Ribbentrop Pact) where they were Germany's ally and they invaded Poland, Finland etc...only to get later turned on by their Axis brother.

[bolverk 28897]

Orban still out there faking injuries to delay the game

 

[KYHorn 16696]

Cool idea.

 

[Chad Fuck 17279]

22 minutes ago, ABSR said:

And ignore the fact that they secretly helped Germany train and build their army in direct violation of the Versaille treaty (Rapallo Pact), then signed another secret treaty (Molotov Ribbentrop Pact) where they were Germany's ally and they invaded Poland, Finland etc...only to get later turned on by their Axis brother.

Isn't that something else someone said in this thread?  The Russians use of Nazi isn't about genocide, or raping and pillaging, it's about betrayal.  The Nazis were unfaithful to the Russians.  Talk about the biggest no honor among thieves moment in the 20th Century, that has to be in the running.

[RDCanecutter 25781]

I suspect that the bright red casualty rate in Pskov has something to do with a big military base-- I believe the VDV who got their lunch eaten were based there?

If so, they might count all those dead as Pskov residents no matter where they originally came from, same as if we were to call all 82nd Airborne losses North Carolinians.

[KYHorn 16696]

 

 

[SquishMitten 10368]

2 hours ago, MillerEP said:

Starting from tomorrow, 28 February, Kazakh authorities will begin to issue 10-year residence permits to Russian citizens in simplified manner. This applies to specialists, whose skill sets are in high demand in Kazakhstan.

 

[InkaUtexas 24835]

17 minutes ago, RDCanecutter said:

same as if we were to call all 82nd Airborne losses North Carolinians.

So that is why NC has such a high herpes rate. Can't be Wilmington. 

[atomheartbevo 88759]

11 minutes ago, InkaUtexas said:

So that is why NC has such a high herpes rate. Can't be Wilmington. 

Don't count out Myrtle Beach's impact.

[Gatorubet 29430]

“I stand in dirty 38 degree water to my knees long time.   My legs no works so good, and could not follow with guys when hohols came.  Lost now.   There is store behind fence maybe?   I am Volga German.….. I like strudel. Lots of strudel. In Ukraine, there is no strudel.”

[The Dog 42769]

 

[Superhero 8574]

15 hours ago, SL Xpress said:

Victor Ike had great speed. Hodges Mitchell did not. 

Wasn’t Victor Ike on the DL for most of his time on the 40 acres?

[AUS-97HORN 11546]

Man,   Those front Like Ukr's must know that they are basically being the sacrificial anvil plate that UKr cant do much about helping until they get all their shit ready for their spring attack.

 

kinda like the 1st Marines on Guadalcanal after the Navy got routed

So they have to eat the shit sandwich, take mega casualties and just take the hits until the rest of the UKr military's advances elsewhere take the heat off them.

[SydneyCarton 47126]

12 minutes ago, Superhero said:

Wasn’t Victor Ike on the DL for most of his time on the 40 acres?

Victor Ike had great speed in High School. He had an injury and was never quite the same after that. I can't remember if his injury was on campus here or in HS, though. 

[DefinitelyNotHollywoodColt 12301]

40 minutes ago, The Dog said:

 

Anybody?

[JesusSweatDuck 17779]

Just now, DefinitelyNotHollywoodColt said:

Anybody?

Clicking through it appears that the "success" of the offensive is overstated

[Schulz2.0 28616]

 

[Schulz2.0 28616]

21 minutes ago, JesusSweatDuck said:

Clicking through it appears that the "success" of the offensive is overstated

There was one source claiming the offensive. Others said they didn't see any offensive. Looks like the Russians are clamping down on Bakhmut and the Ukrainians will have to retreat. It's an optics win for Russia, but not really a tactical one.

Edited February 27, 2023 by Schulz2.0

[BamaATL 15771]

5 hours ago, Gatorubet said:

I forget who posted this a while ago, but some Surly poster said either he or a friend bought out a Russian immigrant’s car repair shop. He noted that the Russian owner had terrible customer service as he was always trying to overcharge and cheat people. That poster made the observation that the Russian came from a society where if you weren’t fucking somebody, they were fucking you.

He simply had no understanding of how there could be a cooperative relationship between an owner not screwing you and customers not screwing the owner. The concept of mutually beneficial without theft or threats was alien to him.  

That sounds like the micro and macro cultural result. 

Sounds like a hedge fund manager

[BamaATL 15771]

3 hours ago, atomheartbevo said:

Russia's nuclear stockpile has allowed her nearly 70 years of not having to worry about being invaded, and it means that she has to be treated with kid gloves by everybody, and Russians like Putin begin to believe that Russia, a nation of only 140 million people, is treated like it is because of Russia's glorious past, and not because it's a nation with the world's largest nuclear stockpile.

They didn't have the nuclear stockpile that Russia has, so they had to be a helluva lot more humble, and had to learn to get along with their neighbors, and all of the wars that came out of Europe also led to the rise of a true superpower (the US) and the realization that they either get along or they destroy themselves in ways that their 19th Century ancestors couldn't imagine.  And the amount of economic reliance they have on each other for materials, food, fuel, etc., also meant that they had to get along, unlike in earlier centuries where their countries were not as dependent on others.  Russia doesn't have that problem with food or fuel.

Russia doesn't have to earn any status it believes it has, simply because it has nukes, so therefore it has to be respected.  The fact that it so casually mentioned using them over the last year proves that. They still have that 19th Century mentality that you mentioned, that they have to be respected, not realizing that it's the nukes (before it was just the Russian Winter keeping them safe).

When we were fighting in Vietnam or Korea, it would have been insane for official American government spokespeople to go on live TV and casually mention on an almost weekly basis how maybe we should nuke North Korea back in the 50s or Hanoi in the 60s, and maybe even nuke China for supporting North Korea (and Chinese troops fought American troops) or the Soviet Union for having supplied Vietnam.   But that's exactly what Russia does.

They are just straight-up gangster types that have an inflated sense of self-worth and importance not because they've earned it, but because people are scared of their nukes.  Putin does not understand that simple and fundamental truth.  Without the nukes, NATO would have steamrolled the Russian Army by now.

Well, actually Barry Goldwater did exactly that, advocated using tactical nuclear weapons in Vietnam, while he was running for President.  So there's that. 

[jdhorn92 1525]

1 hour ago, SydneyCarton said:

Victor Ike had great speed in High School. He had an injury and was never quite the same after that. I can't remember if his injury was on campus here or in HS, though. 

Victor returned a KO for TD and at the time, it was the first KO for a TD for Texas in like 20 years.

[Rimbo 25213]

please take the football discussion to the football board and the China discussion to the China thread

thank you

 

Edited February 28, 2023 by Rimbo

[atomheartbevo 88759]

https://www.cnn.com/2023/02/27/europe/vladimir-putin-steven-seagal-award-intl-scli/index.html

Quote

Russian President Vladimir Putin has signed a decree to honor the American actor Steven Seagal with the state Order of Friendship.

The decree cited what it called Seagal’s “great contribution to the development of international cultural and humanitarian cooperation.”

Quote

Seagal has been a regular visitor to Russia and became a citizen of the country in 2016, when he received a Russian passport from Vladimir Putin personally. He has also worked as the Russian Foreign Ministry’s “special representative” to the United States and Japan.

The former action hero backed Russia’s illegal annexation of Crimea and has supported its invasion of Ukraine. He visited the occupied Donbas area last summer. In an interview on Russian television last year he spoke of an existential threat to Russia from Ukraine.

[Brisketexan 103206]

5 minutes ago, Rimbo said:

please take the football discussion to the football board and the China discussion to the China thread

thank you

 

Victor Ike woulda kicked China's ass, I tell you that!

[BamaATL 15771]

Other reports that the Ukrainians are withdrawing.  Had to figure this was coming once they blew the dam, which was a delaying tactic.  I was hopeful when reports of the counter attack came out, but it would appear those were overly optimistic.  

[atomheartbevo 88759]

5 minutes ago, BamaATL said:

Other reports that the Ukrainians are withdrawing.  Had to figure this was coming once they blew the dam, which was a delaying tactic.  I was hopeful when reports of the counter attack came out, but it would appear those were overly optimistic.  

Yeah, still don't see how it was worth all of the bloodshed/vehicle losses for the Russians.  

[The Dog 42769]

 

[MissingInAction 24271]

3 hours ago, Superhero said:

Wasn’t Victor Ike on the DL for most of his time on the 40 acres?

You're thinking of Henry shelton.

[HOOKEM4 4881]

16 minutes ago, MissingInAction said:

You're thinking of Henry shelton.

Nope you are thinking of Brian Melton.

[Judge Roybeanbag 11728]

1 hour ago, Rimbo said:

please take the football discussion to the football board and the China discussion to the China thread

thank you

 

[Slacks 6666]

21 hours ago, Grade of D as in David said:

Replace run up the middle for bubble screen and you have...

 

The greatest OC in the modern era of Texas football.

Fight me.

[JesusSweatDuck 17779]

[atomheartbevo 88759]

 

8 minutes ago, Slacks said:

The greatest OC in the modern era of Texas football.

Fight me.

Edited February 28, 2023 by atomheartbevo

[atomheartbevo 88759]

 

[Rimbo 25213]

ok, fuck you, fuck you, fuck you too, you're cool, fuck you.

While y'all wonder whether or not Greg Davis could conduct an offense that could get 3 yards against the PRC with a 3rd and 5 to go, Janet fuckin Yellen is in Kyiv to follow-up on Biden's ball-dragging across Putin's face:

 

[Armybrat 40479]

2 hours ago, BamaATL said:

Well, actually Barry Goldwater did exactly that, advocated using tactical nuclear weapons in Vietnam, while he was running for President.  So there's that. 

I remember when General MacArthur got fired by Truman for doing the same in Korea.

[BamaATL 15771]

Hat Trick in the minefield, stupid fuckers

3rd time in the same minefield in Vuldehar in last three days I think.