I've been noticing this a lot. There's a lot more Russian support in all my apps. I really think there's a concerted effort that is now being fully enabled by our current administration.
If Russia withdrew their troops, there would be peace immediately
That's technically true. However, Russia uses military force in its sphere of influence for a reason, not solely because Putin bad (which he is, I'm a commie and Putin is fascist-adjacent at best).
Russia, like all big capitalist countries, wants to secure a sphere of influence in which it can do easy trade, influence the politics, and generally have support from these countries. The US does this for example with western Europe through NATO, and with less diplomatic methods by supporting coups and invading other countries. China does this through economic trade and through massive investment projects. Russia is in a weak position internationally, barely recovered economically from the dismantling of the USSR, and it's surrounded by former soviet republics very much in a similar plane (barely economically recovered from the 90s crisis as a consequence of the dismantling of the USSR).
These post-soviet republics, such as Ukraine or Georgia, adopted capitalism (as Russia did) in a very quick and disorderly fashion, and the resulting oligarchs and capitalist owners ended up fumbled in a mix of pro-russian and pro-european/US positions.
The EU and the USA both exert pressure on these countries to try and bring them to their side. Being economically and politically stronger, they can use trade, diplomacy, intelligence and economic means to alienate these countries front the Russian sphere of influence. Russia, in a more precarious and weaker economic and political position, simply doesn't have the means to maintain the diplomatic, economic and intelligence means to maintain these countries aligned to itself.
The war in Ukraine, much as the interference in Georgian and Romanian elections by the EU, mustn't be understood as a struggle between freedom and oppression. It's sadly just a struggle between two capitalist empires, namely Russia and US/EU, fighting for the control of smaller countries that they want aligned to themselves.
Once Russia doesn't have the means to economically, diplomatically and through intelligence, to influence its former sphere of influence into staying by its side, the only option left is the military route. The US and the EU know this, and they keep trying to mess with Russia's sphere of influence for gains to their empires. The reality is that there is no good side and no bad side: it's just struggle between opposing empires.
So yes, technically if Russia withdrew its troops, there would be peace. But this peace would mean that firstly the surrounding regions around Russia, and Russia itself, would become colonies and vassal states of the western world. It wouldn't mean "freedom" for Ukraine, as we can see by the exploitative contract for the minerals of Ukraine that the US offers. If you think the EU will offer something substantially less exploitative towards Ukrainians, you're wrong.
Ukraine, sad as it is, as long as it remains a state between empires, will suffer the effects of both. And only socialism in Europe and Russia can offer a meaningful response to this.
Russia was by no means forced into the conflict. They did it because Putin wants more power for himself.
Russia has great diplomatic power. They managed to get a Russia loving president in US.
If Ukraine falls, then thereās going to be some other nation that will be the āstate between empiresā. Next will be Moldova. Maybe Russia is brave enough to take on the Baltic countries as well now when the future of NATO is uncertain. If that succeeds, then Poland will be next, and maybe also eastern Germany.
Ukraine rejected the US offer because it didnāt offer any safety guarantees other than that Trump said that Putin said something. Why should Ukraine sign a deal that wonāt end the war?
They managed to get a Russia loving president in US
Holy moly "great men historiography" and "Russia is behind everything I hate" both in one single comment, that's quite the feat. Great job firstly ignoring the material analysis and geopolitics of the situation and trying to explain history as "big man makes decision", and then falling for the racist trope that the USA isn't capable of electing a fascist without external interference, as if the US wasn't founded in the fascist principles of the Lebensraum and slavery->segregation
If Ukraine falls
Ukraine will not fall. The objective of Russia in this war isn't pure expansionism further to the west, it's the imposition of its political principles and strategic desires in its sphere of influence. The Russian government knows it cannot control successfully for a long period of time the now (understandably) anti-Russian radicalised sections of central and western Ukraine, what it wants are concessions in geopolitical and strategic terms. Mark my words: the war in Ukraine will stop sooner than later, and after it, only some sections in eastern Ukraine will be annexed to Russia.
Furthermore your reasoning of "if this nation falls, there's gonna be the next", is exactly the way Russia feels about its geopolitical allies. In 1990, there was an agreement that NATO wouldn't push beyond Germany, and that has been violated first with Poland and then with more countries. Why push a US-backed military alliance to the borders of the US-declared main geopolitical enemy? What consequences do you expect from that? Imagine a Russian-led military coalition pushing for the annexion of Mexico.
Ukraine rejected the US offer because it didnāt offer any safety guarantees
Regardless of safety guarantees, the resources of western Ukraine will be plundered by the NATO block, whether it be EU or the USA I cannot know, but mark my words when you see the economic situation of Ukraine in 2030
OK, please tell me how the NATO block is any better in this regard, haven't you literally just been witness to the most open genocide in history and NOBODY in the west did anything to stop it?
And only socialism in Europe and Russia can offer a meaningful response to this.
I mean maybe, but that's utopian given that all socialism efforts so far where actually authoritan regimes using socialism as a label. We don't know whether it'd help, we have exactly zero data points.
Regarding the Ukraine problem in particular and the situation of Ukraine during socialism in Europe, I have already made a comment demystifying some of the most pervasive anticommunist, russophobic propaganda. Please give it a read and show me your thoughts :)
If you think my solution is "utopian", check out this data from OurWorldInData (hopefully a Bill Gates outlet won't be suspect of tankieism or pro-russian tendencies for you) for GDP per capita in Ukraine since the dismantling of the Soviet Union. Ukraine never recovered its soviet levels of production and of quality of life for people. The USSR was no utopia, it was a very real thing, and it was materially and significantly better for Ukraine than whatever options exist now.
There wasnāt peace before Russia invaded. The far-right US puppet regime was slaughtering ethnic Russians in the east, and allowing NATO to move in troop and missile deployments to the Russian border.
Why would Ukraine behave differently after a Russian withdrawal, when they were escalating for 8 years prior to the invasion?
What is it about NATO & Israeli bots that causes yāall to so reflexively gravitate towards sexual violence? Is it part of the official training, or are yāall just like that?
You're either a bot, a troll or just plain old stupid.
Even if you're just stupid, you're not worth my time because I cant fix stupid, and there's really no point in arguing with you.
Na just a MAGA trumpist. They are like that, their brains have permanently atrophied and they cannot understand information any more, they just keep parrotting their bullshit endlessly like a broken record.
I dunno, there are a tonne of incredibly stupid and uncreative people who conservatives believe every day for years. The part about loki seems to be a statisical outlier not just ābest case scenarioā, ya know?
Give Ukraine everything they need to kick the Russians off their soil. Tomahawks, F35s, a million artillery shells a week, etc... lift all usage restrictions with the exception of civilian targets and infrastructure. Once every square inch of Ukraine is back in Ukrainian hands full NATO membership and a Marshall like recovery plan.
Or assassinate Putin. As long as Putin lives Ukraine is under threat.
I meant civilian infrastructure. So like power stations or shipping centers that handle civilian goods or subways etc.... If it carries a single artillery round it's fair game.
Russia is importing North Koreans to fight. You think if Ukraine gets unlimited weapons the war will last 5 more years? What day of the 3 day invasion are we on now?
The only reason the war has lasted this long is because of the drip feeding of weapons. which was probably a ploy to extend the war and make defense contractors more rich. So yeah, end it quickly by giving Ukraine what it needs to win.
Weapons don't win wars, people do, and Ukraine has a severe troops shortage right now that will only get worse as the war goes on. You can give them all the weapons in the world, if there's no one there to fire them, they'll still lose
I never said weapons don't matter, I said people do matter, and if the war goes on long enough then ukraine won't have any to fight the war.
The weapon difference between colonial India and Britain is nowhere near that between Russia and Ukraine. This has become a war of artillery and drones, both sides have them and can produce them at scale. This isn't some colonial era imperial war where one side has machine guns and the other has a couple muskets and swords.
Why don't you look to more modern examples where overwhelming firepower and technological superiority was supposed to win a war, like Vietnam or Afghanistan. Hell look at Korea, China was able to force the Americans to a draw after it's economy was in ruins after a decade of Japanese occupation and civil war while the u.s. had half the worlds production capacity. The Russian economy is leagues better then China was in the early 50s, and the u.s. isnt nearly as dominant.
It only means Nuclear War if Putin decides he's ready to die.
its not a gaurantee he flips a switch and decides to unleash fire the second NATO starts shooting at him, good chance he scuffles off and cuts his losses, if the fighting is contained to Ukraine and the border, its not a given that he'd condemn himself and his empire to death over the wasteland that is the Donbas
Theory that more weapons wins is based on Russia being overextended and not outproducing west by itself. Your point on "endless war being perfect US policy" is the right one. Wining a war is always terrible. It means an end to war, and just look at how sad everyone around here is about that prospect. That Ukraine could suffer far more destruction, as retaliation for the special weapons it uses for terrorism inside Russia, is far more likely, as is striking western nations as punishment for "breaking the script of a slow war of attrition with eventual Russian victory".
ATCMS got Ukraine electricity sector destroyed, instead of winning. US can produce 60 per year.
And if youāre wrong and the war can indeed go on for 10 more years are you prepared to deal with the consequences of the destruction of Ukraine, potentially nuclear war and destabilization of Europe?
Russia does not have the capacity to fight 5 or 10 more years (unless the US backstops them). Ukraine does not need the resources to go 10 years. They need the resources to outlast the Russians. That is probably more like 18 to 24 months. It could be less.
In my view, that is not only affordable but quite inexpensive given the benefits.
Europe and the US have contributed about $250 billion collectively over the last 3 years (Europe has contributed more). That is a small amount of money for either of them. Most of the $120 billion the US counts as Ukraine aid has been spent on new weapons systems for the United States for the US military. The US builds themselves new weapons, sends Ukraine old ones, and counts the value of the old weapons as Ukraine aid. The thing is, most of these weapons would have been decommissioned in a few years without being used (assuming the US does not enter any major wars). So, the ārealā cost to the US is actually far less.
Both the US and Europe not only can sustain their current commitment. They could easily increase it without breaking a sweat. I lay no claim to it but Norway alone has a $1.7 trillion dollar pile of cash.
In my view, the real question is who is going to pay for the aftermath of Russiaās continued aggression if they are allowed to invade Ukraine?
Was it cheaper to have World War II or to stop Germany in Poland or Czechoslovakia? What would we have done in 1945 if given the chance to do it again?
Perhaps you are right that it is unrealistic. That is more an opinion than a demonstrable fact and my opinion is no better than yours.
I am not sure I can agree that it is brainless. While that is also an opinion, there are lots to facts to counter that argument.
Supporting Ukraine no matter what it takes seems like the clear and obvious choice. I guess that is why it is what every country that matters is doing (except the USānow).
Looks like weāll meet again here in a few years, after thousands more will die and more territory will be lost to argue again about how this war can hypothetically end, just because Zelenskyās ego was too big.
Your point hasnāt been proven. OPs point was that Putin promises canāt be trusted. And without US putting force behind that promise, Ukraine is wise to be worried about such a deal.
Just because one alternative realized doesnāt mean there werenāt other options, better or worse.
Edit: plus, a peace deal is far from done, regardless which side you root for.
History teaches us that Russia cease fire agreements mean that fewer die immediately but that lasts a far shorter time than you hope for. In the end, even more people die than before when Russia resumes their aggression.
This is not a prediction or an opinion. That are literally dozens of historical events to draw this information from.
Russia has always firmly opposed expansion of NATO, including the missiles and NATO troops that were lined up at their border with Ukraineās participation.
All those countries that joined NATO, Their sovereignty doesn't end where hurt russian fee-fees begin
if Russia doesnt like it, then maybe they should reflect on how they acted like savage barbarians to those people throughout history. Maybe they should reflect that they aren't entiteld to an "Empire" or a "Sphere of Influence" or whatever they want to call it. Reflect on the fact that Eastern and Central europe are not pawns and slaves to a larger power. but nations with agency, hopes, dreams and goals.
but they wont, Imperialism, Warmongering, and Genocide are married to the current excuse of "Russian Culture"
Yeah like, instead of taking a hard look into the mirror why countries kept wanting to join NATO, or why the russian-bloc equivalent failed so much, LULZ WE JUST GONNA WALTZ IN NO NATO PLOX.
Ah, nevermind, they did discover why so many countries wanted to join NATO. š
If it was about their sovereignty, itās weird that you donāt mind NATO attacking their sovereignty to install pro-western politicians through corruption or straight up coups. āSovereigntyā only seems to matter when itās anti-Russian.
Itās not about feelings. There were many agreements for NATO not to expand. They did it anyway. There are consequences for that.
Please educate me. Which countries had pro-western politicians "Installed"
And if you're already typing Ukraine, boy do I have a bridge to sell you.
With maybe the exception of Serbia, Russia has been antagonistic and Imperialistic towards Europe for CENTURIES. Theres a reason Russia finds itself fighting against most/all of Europe every century. You need only ask the butchered populations of Eastern Europe who found themselves as Russian subjects at any point in history. The only reason they were ever friendly with Serbia, was because the Serbs are like a microchasm of the same thing the Russians did. Mini-mes, if you will.
you want to scream America bad, NATO bad, fine. but remove both of them from the equation, it wouldnt change the fact that the continent distrusts Russia for a reason.
So if they installed pro-western politicians in Ukraine, Why was the president of Ukraine at the time of Euromaidan checks notes Viktor Yanukovitch? the Pro-Russian fraudster who was once removed from the presidency after having cheated in the elections. and even afterward, managed to ratfuck his way into a term later on in 2010. Only to get Impeached and removed from power By his own government after he ordered the Berkut and Internal Troops to use lethal force against protestors.
this tired argument of western coups against these ex soviet countries always forgets to address the fact that a couple of suspicious phonecalls in embassies doesn't hold the same power as millions of people taking to the streets over a government doing something that is widely unpopular.
if the CIA and all these other groups people accuse of toppling governments were as competent as fiction made them out to be, Joe Biden would still be President, Putin would be dead, Russia would be a balkanized state, and the Ukraine war would probably never have happened, and if it did, it would have been over by now with a Ukrainian victory.
No, youāre describing the Maidan Coup, which was backed by the US to install a far-right puppet regime because they opposed Yanukovitch maintaining neutrality with Russia, and not bowing to US demands to block a lease on a Crimean naval base.
There were many agreements for NATO not to expand.
Oh were there?
That's interesting, considering how controversial it still is whether oral agreements ever existed in the first place. What isn't controversial is of course that being oral-only, they can hardly be binding or transactionary. That is to say, the failure was to never transfer these agreements - if they even existed - into writing, bilaterally as that's how you'd have to do it.
Complete horseshit. They literally invaded and installed a puppet regime in Chechnia, and there were zero NATO "expansion efforts" there. And that is just one example out of many.
"The United States should invade a country that might in the future join an alliance to help prevent the US from invading other countries as we have in the past." Do you realize how fucking stupid your nAtO eXpAnSiOn propaganda sounds!?
Lies don't become true just because you keep saying "facts". The Russian propaganda (that you're parroting) is the untrue part, not the events themselves. Ukraine defending itself against Russia before and during their violent, illegal invasion is not an "expansion" and has nothing to do with NATO. Full stop.
I would go one further. Ukraine trying to join NATO is not a valid reason for an invasion. In fact, I can't think of any valid reason for an invasion. Invading a country is wrong.
Maybe Ukraine wants to join NATO because they share a border with a gigantic country that wants to conquer them.
Except Ukraine was on their border and not part of NATO and other countries on their border are. NATO Then Russia invaded and took the Crimean peninsula unprovoked. Not a surprise that Ukraine wants NATO membership, and now Finland joined NATO because of Russia's attack on Ukraine, doubling the NATO/Russia border.
Incorrect. The Crimea invasion followed a soft coup of Ukraine by the US, wherein they installed a far-right puppet regime. The following years, Ukraine allowed a torrent of NATO & US troops and missile deployments to be installed at their border with Russia.
NATO hasn't "expanded" in a long time, until recently when Sweden and Finland decided to join. A decision that was made based on the Russian invasion of Ukraine. So through Russia's actions, two countries have decided to join an organisation that was made to opposed Russia.
Before that, no new members were accepted into NATO, even if they wanted to join, because NATO members weren't really seeing the point of NATO anymore, and they didn't see a reason to provoke Russia. That changed in 2014 when Russia invaded Ukraine for the first time, and annexed Crimea.
Last but not least; NATO doesn't expand. It's not a nation with borders that grow through conquest or subjugation. It is a defensive pact that the peolpe of a nation must vote on to join. And then the members of NATO must unanimously vote on letting the new country join. It is voluntary and democratic.
So instead of shoutong "NATO IS EXPANDING, GRRR!!", why not ask yourself "why would Russia's neighbouring countries want to join NATO?"
The fundamental difference here is between a sovereign nation pursuing defensive alliances versus an aggressive invasion violating international law. Ukraine wasn't "amassing troops & missiles" at Russia's border as an hostile threat - it was seeking security guarantees after Russia had already annexed Crimea in 2014 and fomented separatist movements in eastern Ukraine. National sovereignty means countries get to determine their own security arrangements, and Russia's "security concerns" don't justify violating Ukraine's territorial integrity or dictating its foreign policy choices.
Ukraine, Russia, the DPR and LPR signed a ceasefire agreement, the Minsk Protocol, in September 2014.[40] Ceasefire breaches became rife, 29 in all,[41] and heavy fighting resumed in January 2015, during which the separatists captured Donetsk Airport. A new ceasefire, Minsk II, was agreed on 12 February 2015. Immediately after, separatists renewed their offensive on Debaltseve and forced Ukraine's military to withdraw.[42] Skirmishes continued but the front line did not change. Both sides fortified their position by building networks of trenches, bunkers and tunnels, resulting in static trench warfare.[43][44] Stalemate led to the war being called a "frozen conflict",[45] but Donbas remained a war zone, with dozens killed monthly.[46] In 2017, on average a Ukrainian soldier died every three days,[47] with an estimated 40,000 separatist and 6,000 Russian troops in the region.[48][49] By the end of 2017, OSCE observers had counted around 30,000 people in military gear crossing from Russia at the two border checkpoints it was allowed to monitor,[50] and documented military convoys crossing from Russia covertly.[51] All sides agreed to a roadmap for ending the war in October 2019,[52] but it remained unresolved.[53][54] During 2021, Ukrainian fatalities rose sharply and Russian forces massed around Ukraine's borders.[55] Russia recognised the DPR and LPR as independent states on 21 February 2022 and deployed troops to those territories. On 24 February, Russia began a full-scale invasion of Ukraine, subsuming the war in Donbas into it.
Make no Mistake: Russia is trying to destroy Ukraine since 2014. Russia is the agressor and needs to put in its place.
Russia is trying to destroy Ukraine ever since both of them were founded as independent counties. This is just a reiteration of what we've already seen in the russian empire and in the USSR. History is a merry-go-round and I'm getting motion sick of all the rotation.
Goes back to the Russian Revolution at the very least, though probably to the the Russian Empire. Historical data send to suggest that the Russian elite will not accept anyone but Russian hegemony over the region. The Bolsheviks betrayed the Ukrainian Anarcho-Communists who had helped to defeat the White army because they wanted independent self-governance rather than bowing to the Bolsheviks' authoritarian Central Council in Moscow.
This is just a reiteration of what we've already seen in the russian empire and in the USSR
Comparing the Russian Empire and the USSR is the most ahistorical thing you can possibly do. During the Russian Empire and for all of history before that, Ukraine was a people without a nation. Oppressed, without representation, without borders, without a right to education or even learning to read in their language.
The Bolsheviks, with their first constitution in 1917, granted the right to self-determination and secession to all peoples of the former Russian Empire, which Lenin referred to as "the prison of peoples". Quite literally after Poland seceded in this legal fashion, the Polish government decided it wanted to return to the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth borders, and proceeded to unilaterally invade Ukraine and part of modern Belarus. It was the Red Army of the Russian Socialist Federation of Soviet Republics, that fought off the Polish invasion and established a lasting Ukrainian People's Republic for the first time in history.
This wasn't without controversy: while Lenin argued for the right to representation and to a Ukrainian Republic within the USSR, others like Rosa Luxembourg argued for a united, more homogeneous sort of socialist soviet nationality that outgrew former nationalisms. It is partially thanks to Lenin that Ukraine ended up having its own borders, administration and representation.
I know what you'll say: "but Holodomor! Genocide against Ukrainians!". The famine of the USSR was a sad and unintended consequence of bad policy during the collectivisation/dekulakization process of the early 30s. Millions of people died both within Ukraine and without it, especially as well in Central Asia and southern Russia. As bad as it was, and as avoidable as one can argue it may have been, there's simply no evidence of any intent of attack towards Ukrainian people, it's not precedented by anything similar, and it's not followed by anything similar in the entire history of the USSR.
In those decades and the ones to come, Ukraine would obtain and solidify its own nationality, people would for the first time obtain generalised literacy in their own language, the right to study in their language up to university level, a majority of publications (both journalistic and literary) in Ukrainian, and the very next president of the USSR Nikita Khruschchyov would be Ukrainian.
Attempting to construe a history of oppression of Ukrainians in the USSR is nothing but fictitious, anti-communist and russophobic propaganda, meant to create a divide between Ukrainians and Russians. There are clear geopolitical reasons to do so, and there are clear reasons why Ukrainians are very much afraid or simply hate Russians, because of the modern proto-fascist state that the Russian Republic has become. But creating a line between this capitalist country, the socialist USSR, and the feudalist Russian Empire, is simply an attempt to divide Eastern Europe further and to push Ukraine towards the EU and away from Russia. This point can be argued for without resorting to russophobic and anticommunist myths. We're smarter than this.
Nah, USSR discarded socialism and communism the moment Lenin decided he didn't like losing the elections, and Stalin made it worse for decades. There's nothing anti-communist in calling out an authoritarian dictatorship for what it was.
During the Soviet times there were repeated attempts to homogenize (as you said) all non-russian ethnicities into one big Soviet mass, easy to manage and control. Russian language, culture and values were held as the supposedly communist ideal future at the cost of national identity, replaced by pretense of representation.
Not just Holodomor, but also forced relocations of Ukrainians, Belarusians, Crimean Tatars and other Eastern European ethnicities contributed to that.
So, maybe tune down on Soviet apologia in front of people whose parents and grandparents literally had to live there.
You can absolutely want peace and even agree to concessions to Russia to reach a sustainable peace, but this point is absolutely valid: there must be security guarantees, otherwise Putin will just use the armistice to rebuild its strength and attack again.
Oh, absolutely. We want peace more than anyone else, but giving putin a chance to regroup, pull more support together and attack again is not peace, it's surrender
Why surrender and let the invader murder with impunity, when you can still make him fight for every inch.
thats where we're at. Thats been the score since Bucha. Because Ukraine resisted, both sides hate each other like Israel and Palestine now. every time Russia gets into a city, they rape and pillage, murder civilians on the street, torture and castrate POWs before murdering them, and flatten cities to the ground.
you dont surrender to that. you fight to the death. you have no choice.
Oh. And after I went to trouble of typing all that big wall of text in response to your other comment, giving you the benefit of the doubt of arguing in good faith.
Security guarantees are nice but only if there believable. If the last 3 years have shown anything it's that the west will not go to all out war with Russia over Ukraine. It may make putin more hesitant but if he calls our bluff a piece of paper isn't going to change the fact that Americans and western Europeans aren't willing to die for Ukraine.
The deal should be...
All Russian troops get pulled out of Ukraine. Ukraine gets a lump sum of all seized Russian assets in foreign nations, Russia agrees not to move troops within 100 miles of Ukraine's border without Ukraine's consent. Ukraine agrees to allow and even assist civillain Russian services with locating and returning living and deceased Russians.
The alternative is we take the limits off of what targets can be attacked within Russia, and enable Ukraine to enforce the conditions as proposed.
I'd also like to add that Russia and the US give up their UN "super veto" power. I don't think anything good and effective can come from the UN when a single country can just "nope" any UN proposals.
Veto power in the UN is a short for "we will use nukes if you do this". The UN is not world government, it's the organisation which task(among many less important things) is to prevent nuclear war.
the amount of Fascist, Jingoistic shitposting that favors either Republican or Russian propaganda on social media is STAGGERING. The people arguing for it are more concerned about bathroom gender signs, DEI, wokism, and a bunch of other made up stuff, and not only are they oblivious that their country is being taken over by a foreign aggressor, THEY ARE PROUD OF IT. Because "at least the Russians kill the gays"
We are in this position we are today, because Russia has been waging an information war against NATO countries for 15-20 years. and the seeds they planted during the days of Georgia and Crimea, are blooming into fruit now.
The free world is AT WAR with Russia, and for the time being, America has been conquered. Victory from the jaws of Defeat, for the Russian mafia
Don't move the goal post. You asked, you got a reply. You don't like that reply because of how trivially it calls out your bullshit, and you're clearly not adult enough to handle that, but you still got called out on bullshit.
Memes aren't journalism, but this is a meme community, not a news community. However, one could argue that this is not exactly a meme, so your point is fair.
With the time you took to comment you could have looked it up yourself, and then with a bit more time you could have posted the sources here.
You're consciously choosing to not be informed, and to do nothing yourself and expect random people to do work for you.
We're talking about major recent history from 2014. Unless they're 12, they don't really have an excuse to be this ill informed for an entire decade. The time it took to comment is a drop in the bucket compared to the rest of their time spent in willful ignorance.
The source for the meme appears to be a tweet from the Ukraine foreign minister. Zelensky has quoted similar numbers. These numbers are coming out of Ukrainian officialsā mouths and not 3rd party journalists and itās not at all clear on how theyāre counting since I canāt find easily any other sources.
Side note: with how bad Google is nowadays, people should never chide anyone else for being unable to locate a source themselves again.
"Russia violated all of the ceasefires and talks since 2014, but it is really important that the exact number is verified by 3rd parties."
You dismissing the overall point by focusing on the absolute least important detail. If the number of talks and ceasefires is greater then zero and Russia has violated all of them, then why does it matter if there were two dozen or two hundred?
Because details fucking matter, thatās why? It matters even if the side Iām on is the one potentially exaggerating. Donāt you care to know that? Or do the facts not matter to you anymore?
Because when someone starts arguing that there were 33 violations and not 35 or something along those lines I know they are just trying to derail the discussion away from the point that matters: Russia has consistently violated ceasefires and that is why security guarantees are needed.
I agree with you about sources, but instead of asking and waiting you can search for them as well. I did a quick search for some of the information in the image and I got some results about 200 rounds of talks since 2014. Not ones I recognize so I canāt say if theyāre legit or not but it only took a few seconds to get that at least that far.
I'm not OP, though. Not everyone will do the googling themselves and if you're posting stuff like that, I think it's a responsibility of the OP to supply the sources.
Otherwise, that's the exact same strategy misinformation peddlers like LibsofTiktok use.
LibsOfTiktok, on the right, was effective. They are, apparently, much better at motivating people than you are.
Also, let's not pretend you don't just disagree with what is being said. Nobody asks for sources until it's an issue somebody might pick up a sign over.
Well the source is one of a number that document violations of the Minsk agreement. You don't just need to read that one and it's from 8 years ago I just grabbed it to show how long Russia has been ignoring their related ceasefire agreements. I think the source is relatively neutral but you are right it may have some bias, it's about as neutral as English language sources come though.
I think this post may be off in interpreting or wording because Russia has had major violations of a number of treaties, notably recently the Minsk agreement but I think Zelensky is talking about 25 major violations not 25 separate agreements.
Regardless of all of that, Russia has a very long history of not honoring their truces and ceasefires and using them as a reprieve to beef up their military forces before continuing to fight.
Your French has been pardoned but fuck you too pal.
The source still is the US government, i.e. NATO. It can hardly be interpreted as impartial.
You're touching on why "just google it" is a horrible advice: sources in english language will emphasize the western consensus who have a vested interest in weakening Russia and are in an active economical war with Russia. it's really hard to find english speaking, impartial sources.
From what I found online, while the claims of "genocide" are blown out of proportion, Ukraine has still also violated the Minsk treaty by attacking Donbas.
I think it's important to note that I don't want to condone neither Russia, nor Ukraine. Even if everything is true about Russian minorities in the Donbas: I don't think that being conscripted is too much better. But I also think that the Ukrainian state is using its' own population as cannon-fodder to fight a proxy war for the west (if it weren't a proxy war, the changing stance of the US wouldn't be as big of a problem).
What do you want me to say, that it's clear Russia continually violates ceasefire for the past 20 years of various nation states?
Like idk you can go find plenty of sources that say that I'm sure some won't be in English but you're not going to ever find something from Russia themselves that says "yeah we violated this shit"
Whats wrong here? It should always be ok to ask for sources!
In this case the research is significant and it is reasonable to assume that avid readers here know the sources and need less research to respond quickly.
Ukraine did shell Horlivka (March 10, 2015) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Horlivka , killed civilians; claimed retaliation.
The DPR tried to capture Debaltseve right before the ceasefire and failed to do so completely before it came into effect. As a result fighting within the city continued and the DPR even claimed the ceasefire did not include Debaltseve. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Debaltseve so this was also violated by Ukraine too, but now we see a shift towards more Russian violations.
Later violations
The last violations where Ukraine can be assigned any noticeable role in are around 2020. Now that the military is more organized the troops do follow ceasefire orders more strictly and violations for ceasefires after 2020 can be nearly unilaterally assigned to the Russian side.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minsk_agreements (follow the links from there to more recent ceasefires)
So the image/meme is mostly true but also propaganda (as to be expected). I also do not know where the number of 20 agreements comes from. I do know/find details of about 8. Maybe somebody else can provide a list?
So in summary: The message is true. Russia and mainly the DPR troops they support can not be trusted to follow ceasefires as long as the conditions at the front do not significantly change.
I like sticking to the facts and do not agree with the presentation in the image, but at least its still way way closer to the truth than Russian propaganda. In this case sticking to the facts would even have sent the same message and not give the Russians any point where they can base their counterpoint on. On the other side differentiated and detailed analysis is not that well suited to steer up emotions and support for the cause.
I absolutely agree on your point about misinformation. I was trying to hint that maybe none of this belongs here, despite me personally resonating with the "meme". I guess I am just rambling, don't mind me.
Do not trust Russia, and do not trust the US under current administration, or while the GOP still exists. We in the rest of the world are ON OUR OWN and must band together against this push of fascism across the world. This is not a drill, this is not a joke. Fascism is again on the rise, as it was in the 1930s. We all know where that led, so don't let it do so again!
Russians overwhelmingly understand this is a defensive war for them. The most extreme delusional propaganda we are fed is that provoking this war would help overthrow Putin with pro NATO liberalism. NATO is not a purely defensive alliance desperately trying to convince Russians of love and freedom from submission to them.
Yes, I'm sure Russians believe that invading another nation and sending their children to die is "defensive." After all, they're fed the propaganda of the fascist dictator, Putin. Just as the people of North Korea are made to believe the outside world is evil...
The far-right in Ukraine was slaughtering ethnic Russians for 8 years before the invasion, and letting NATO move in missile & troop deployments to the Russian border. Yes, that kind of thing makes people feel as though theyāre on the defensive.
It is time that the world recognized that the USA is just like Russia and China. Never, ever to be trusted. All the pretense has fallen away under Trump but the real America, supported by 70% of its population, is showing its true colours. They've bullied their "Allies" for 70 years to be their friends, but they've never been a friend back. It's all been a guise to get whatever they wanted and steal all the riches a country could produce or make other country's industry beholden to American corporations. While previous American Administrations may have believed in the soft power their approach yielded and understood how it made the USA rich, Trump does not.
Can someone explain how you are supposed to get Russia to leave? Sanctions didn't work, lethal aid didn't work, F-16s didn't work, and striking Russia itself isn't either.
You can argue for the war to continue I suppose, but Ukraine isn't winning and I'm not seeing anything here that would change that fact.
Can someone explain how you are supposed to get Russia to leave? Sanctions didnāt work, lethal aid didnāt work, F-16s didnāt work, and striking Russia itself isnāt either.
These things haven't won the war, but they most definitely are working. Russia's economy is crippled, their military is running out of old equipment to cannibalize, and they lack the capability to produce the kinds of advanced military equipment they need. They've been throwing bodies into the meat grinder trying to overwhelm Ukraine, but despite the high cost they are making very little progress. This is not a great long term strategy, but it's the one Russia has been stuck with.
You can argue for the war to continue I suppose, but Ukraine isnāt winning and Iām not seeing anything here that would change that fact.
But what's the alternative? Right now Ukraine can only fight or surrender. While they fight, they can try to negotiate a peace deal, but so far the only deals Putin and Trump seem willing to consider are nearly indistinguishable from surrender. Give Russia everything they want, give up on everything you want, stop the fighting for now but put nothing in place to ensure that Russia won't just rearm and invade again later.
There's no evidence that Russia is going to lose steam economically or on the battlefield any time soon. Continuing to fight a losing war will only make any final deal between the US, Russia and Ukraine worse for the latter. There's a reason the 2022 treaty that was proposed looks unrealistic today, and whatever deal they make now will be much better than when they finally run out of men in the Ukrainian army.
With the situation as it stands, negotiating is the best way out if you actually care about Ukraine. If you just want to weaken Russia then sure, fight to the last ukrainian.
Well, I ran this through several media bias checkers - it came back as unbiased. Site leans a little left, but that's about it.
So tell me again, what are you trying to say? Because if your answer is more or less 'it's propaganda' - I'm not sure I should entertain this topic any further.
I'm not sure I understand. The article you have linked concludes with:
Writing for The Bell, Russian economy experts Alexander Kolyandr and Alexandra Prokopenko also disputed what they described as āclaims of an imminent catastropheā for the Russian economy. āIn our view, all things being equal, itās unlikely that the economy will implode soon,ā they write. They have a point.
Which just agrees with what I've said about sanctions not working.
In our view, all things being equal, itās unlikely that the economy will implode soon, forcing Russia to scale back its military campaign in Ukraine; or that deposits will be frozen. That doesnāt mean, however, that nothing will ever happen to deposits, nor that the banking sector will always be trouble-free. However, there are far bigger threats to the Russian economy at the moment: for example, a lack of transparent decision-making, little independent expertise, and the classification of much economic data all undermines trust in the authorities. This is more likely to, eventually, lead to some sort of hard-to-predict, man made crisis.Ā
So, they dispute the idea that there will be a credit/ banking crisis. They do not dispute that the Russian economy is in bad shape.
Figures of the week
Inflation in Russia might be starting to slow. Between January 1 and January 13, prices went up 0.67%, which suggests annual inflation of 9.9% (it was 9.5% last year). However, Januaryās figures reflect one-off boosts from increased sales of alcohol and tobacco, a further rise in the recycling fee for cars, higher public transport fares and a weakening ruble. Together with a fall in consumer demand and an increase in consumer borrowing, this could mean inflation will peak in the first half of the year. In the absence of external shocks (such as tighter sanctions) this could pave the way for lower interest rates.
So, no, they do not agree that sanctions would not work. In fact, they imply here that an external shock like tighter sanctions would likely cause inflation to continue rising.
What would be most likely to cause a man made crisis if not the value of the rouble decreasing further + a continued bloody war?
There's no evidence period about anything that's not propaganda right now. Either side could be days away from total collapse without any of us knowing it.
True, but there are a few things we can glean through the war propaganda. The fact that Ukraine is outgunned to this day on the battlefield isn't some big state secret.
These things havenāt won the war, but they most definitely are working. Russiaās economy is crippled, their military is running out of old equipment to cannibalize, and they lack the capability to produce the kinds of advanced military equipment they need. Theyāve been throwing bodies into the meat grinder trying to overwhelm Ukraine, but despite the high cost they are making very little progress.
Ukrainian propaganda that they've been winning all along. Russian military production is over 70% higher than at start of war, 30%/year last 2, and they gain territory every week with a weapons advantage including when new western arms shipments come in. Believing your fantasy is pro suiciding of Ukrainians.
The only deals Putin and Trump seem willing to consider are nearly indistinguishable from surrender.
The same deal from Russia was always on table for avoiding the war. Absolutely zero reason to think it was ever insincere or not meant to put both countries back at peace. If Ukraine's goal for a ceasefire is to rearm and resume terrorism operations on liberated regions of Ukraine, then Ukraine needs a new leader to get a lasting peace. Again, zero reason that Russia won't abide by peace it demands. US led Ukraine on the wrong track, and Ukraine Russia relations can get back on right track with "traditional attitude rulership"
You're right, the Ukrainians should just give up on all these uppity notions of national sovereignty and self determination. They are in Russia's sphere of influence, their place is to do what Russia says. It's their fault if they don't listen and Putin has to give them a black eye, that's just him correcting them and showing he cares.
They should welcome their Russian liberators, so they can finally see how wonderful life under Russian rule is. Just ask the people of Bucha and Mariupol, they'll be happy to tell you (if you can find a Ouija board in Cyrillic).
It is a war of attrition with Russia against the amount of aid the West is willing to provide to Ukraine.
The only way Russia wins is if the US changes the balance of power by enriching Russia (dropping sanctions) or impoverishing Ukraine (dropping support).
Yes, but they very much were not the game changers as touted by western leaders. Russia still very much has air superiority, which has been key for their battlefield results.
Ah, but have you considered that the good guy always wins?
This seems to genuinely be how libs think about this. There's no need for any practical considerations about what is achievable or how long it would take or how much it would cost, because the people with the best ideas will always come out on top, no matter what. The only way to lose is to corrupt the purity of the cause and of the ideal, practical/material considerations are unimportant and somehow unclean and distasteful to even consider.
So you believe there is some magical weapon "X", when given to Ukraine, will make Russia leave? There is one, it's nuclear bomb lol. Other than that, it's not a specific weapon type that has to be provided, but a steady flow of a range of weapons.
The point I'm making is that they are receiving the weapons the US and Europe can make/spare, and they are still losing on the battlefield. If negotiating is not the way to go (as the meme implies) then what's the way to victory? As it's going, every man in Ukraine will die and they'll still lose.
Oh, okay. So no need to fight wars anymore. We can tell who will win by eye. And the country who we eye-spot will lose the war should just throw away their sovereignty to the aggressors from the start since they can't win.
America spends the most on defense, so they'll probably win in any war. Then, I guess America should just de-facto rule the world. United Earth of America, everyone. Resistance is futile.
"Every man" will not die, because they intentionally not mobilising the young men. They also did hold for several months completely by themselves while West was scared and only talked about sending diapers & bandage. They also survived when US stopped their aid completely for 6 month. It's been 3 years since the hold against a supposedly "2nd army in the world", so they are definitely not losing. They did an incredibly well job given their resources, if they ask for more, who we are to decide for them?
The only reason they haven't lowered the age of conscription further is because it's very unpopular and the current government can't afford the political hit.
They have resisted to the best of their ability, yes. No one can deny that, but even then they are being pushed back more and more as time goes on. And that is, in fact, losing. Specially in a war of attrition like we are seeing.
They did an incredibly well job but are still losing the war and territory because Russia has more meat to throw on the battlefield and a bigger economy.
Dragging the war with foreign aid is not providing any resolution, itās making the EU look as weak headless chicken who canāt come up with a concrete plan to stop a war on its doorstep.
They did an incredibly well job but are still losing the war and territory because Russia has more meat to throw on the battlefield and a bigger economy
Yup, unfortunately still loosing some territory while inflicting heavy losses to the other side
itās making the EU look as weak headless chicken who canāt come up with a concrete plan to stop a war on its doorstep.
Yup, agreed
Dragging the war with foreign aid is not providing any resolution
"Dragging the war with current amount of foreign aid is not providing any resolution" FTFY
People expect Ukrainians to fight to the last man, for honor or some shit, and its gross. People are dying, and they've been at a stalemate for years. The outcome of this was never going to be good, considering the West has never given a single shit about Ukraine. Even before the war, the US toyed with them and blocked them from joining NATO for YEARS. With all the wars the West loses, you'd think they'd know when to call it off.
A reminder, atleast Putin sees Ukrainians as his people just under the wrong leadership (even if it's imperialism and annexation). It's not like Israel where they want to wipe 5+ million people off the fucking region, ideally in concentration camps which is happening and documented.
(Not endorsing Russia, I just fucking hate all of you)
The meme talks about 2014 to 2022, your sub stack post about 2021 to 2025, so one is talking about the conflict leading up to the full invasion by Russia, the other is talking about what happened after the Russian invasion. They are closely related but not the same.
I think somebody has misunderstood a comment made by Zelenskyy at the International Summit on the Support of Ukraine, held this February just passed. Zelenskyy said:
We remember that Russia has violated the ceasefire more than 25 times since 2014.
Zelenskyy is talking about the ceasefire which formed part of the Minsk agreements. Representatives from both Ukraine and Russia signed these agreements, with the final protocol's first point being:
To ensure an immediate bilateral ceasefire.
This is the ceasefire agreement which Russia has violated. That is to say, there haven't been 20 separate ceasefire agreements, there was one which Zelenskyy told the Summit Russia had violated more than 25 times.
I also canāt imagine this ends with the current far-right regime maintaining their grip on power, nor being allowed to continue the genocide of ethnic Russians in the east.
As i just said in another comment: imagine the backlash if someone were to post something similar with putin face. People are being accused of being russian trolls for the slightest unaligned critic of ukraine government. I'm not questioning it but this post is what propaganda actually looks like
Ah yes, good old "Let me post any literal shit because if readers want, they must prove it themself". That's impolite, but understandable. But for God's sake, to post logically malformed statements and wait for readers to indicate it is a whole new level of egoism.
Not tell me, proud democrat, if Russia invaded with its army Ukraine in 2022, then with whom was Ukraine reaching those mystical 20 cease-fire agreements 8 years before? About what were there agreements when there litreally was no Russian army and Ukraine was fighting its own regions for years?
We are not just believing propaganda anymore. Ukraine can either work to stop this war or keep it going with out US support. Good luck to them! Russia can say the same about the NATO and Ukraine but that wouldnāt fit the agenda.
Yeah I spread facts not propaganda. Did NATO break its promise to Russia after Russia allowed democracy at its door step when Ukraine became a independent country?
Haha of course. An "oral agreement" that nobody has any record of. They called no takesies backsies, too!
Here's an actual promise that really was agreed to. Signed by Russia. In writing. You know, like what happens when countries actually agree to things in the real world and not in Russian propaganda la la land.
Oh, so weāre ānot just believing propaganda anymoreāāexcept for the part where you parrot Russiaās favorite talking points? Ukraine didnāt start this war; Russia did. Telling Ukraine to āwork to stop itā is like blaming a robbery victim for not handing over their wallet fast enough. If youāre done with propaganda, maybe start by questioning the one that excuses the actual aggressor.
When Ukraine gained independence, Russia's understanding was that it would accept the emergence of democracy on its doorstep in exchange for assurances regarding security. Specifically, the agreement entailed that NATO would not expand beyond Germany. In the early 1990s and again in 2000, Russia sought to join NATO, only to be rebuffed. NATO, in turn, has often relied on portraying Russia as a threat to justify its military expenditures and equipment buildup. The conflict in Ukraine was sparked in large part by NATOās eastward expansion, especially its support for Ukraineās NATO aspirations and the subsequent military aid provided to Kyiv. To understand this complex geopolitical issue more fully, it is important to engage with historical sources rather than be swayed by biased narratives.
Ukraine's account of who broke ceasefires is as reliable as Israel's. During period in question, ethnic Russians were being massacred by nationalists such as Azov battalion paramilitaries. You'd need to examine each of the 20 ceasefires without playing favorites to get an honest account, which I can't do. Overall, Ukraine was the definite aggressor during this period.
sorry I meant to reply but then forgot this account even exists lol. Here is a good list of links with an overview of the Ukrainian civil war from 2014 onwards:
On 13 July 2014, mortar shells fired from Ukrainian territory landed in the courtyard of a private home in the border town of Donetsk. The shelling killed one civilian and injured two others
The Ukraine-Russia conflict has begun to sound a lot like the Israel-Gaza conflict, in so far as you've got these little media bubbles where "My side has NEVER done ANYTHING wrong and they just want to kill all of us, so everyone on their side is a valid target for shelling."
You were unable to understand a very short sentence? Alright, I'll bite.
Yeah, absolutely, these are very similar conflicts, essentially these are - one imperialist country is trying to completely erase another smaller one, by whatever means necessary. Again, even if this was done by UAF, this wouldn't have happened without r*ssian invasion.
Russian assistance to Donbas came after Banderite/Azov terrorism. Also, the ceasefire breaking accusations are against Donbas leaders who just wanted autonomy inside Ukraine until the SMO became the necessary action to protect them, and protect Russia against NATO.
Russian assistance to Donbas came after Banderite/Azov terrorism.
Certain liberals simply cannot believe Ukraine might hold it's own violent reactionary elements, posed to do violence against ethnic Russian civilians.
That's why you had the Canadian parliament applauding a member of the Wauffin SS a few years back.
That's why liberals will refer to Russian conscripts as "Orks" and make up fanciful stories about 40 beheaded babies to justify hospital bombing in Gaza City.
That's why Americans elected a Mussolini loving convicted criminal to their highest office, for fear of a brown woman candidate being too nice to other brown people.
The propaganda machine is eating itself. Westerners are completely incapable of seeing through their local brand of fascist agitprop.
Biden was the most neocon/zionist/republican/warmonger the DNC loved, but manufacturing a war on Russia was not an election platform. I won't condemn liberalism, except for the complete stupidity of trusting DNC to be a liberal organization instead of warmongering neocons first. The gullibility that Biden/DNC must be good just because they are the lesser evil, just led to protests over the weekend for more war on Russia.
We've reached body snatcher level of political dysfunction. I'm still resistant to impune liberal rationality. Trump or Putin Derangement syndrome is simply disturbing people to be against peace. Let me assure everyone that war on Russia was and still is a bad idea. Surely a new war will happen soon enough for you to be happy again.
Weāve reached body snatcher level of political dysfunction.
It drives me up the wall when you've got a Tech Bro / Finance Freak Cartel running the White House and the only response I see on these big liberal forums is "Putin is in control!"
Like Peter Thiel and Robert Mercer and Miriam Adelson and Linda McMahon don't exist.
I mean, technically sort of, yeah. Continued russian aggression and interference most definitely contributed to the rise of political extremism. Which just so happened to give the Kreml plenty of reason for further interference, such as the direct deployment of "volunteers" into the civil war.
Russia would have had the opportunity to support Russian communities in Ukraine peacefully, for example with beneficial trade agreements and cultural exchange programs. Unfortunately for these Russian communities, all the Kreml knows are diplomatic pressure and coercion and force of arms. As such, Russian culture was regarded as a mark of oppresion and the communities became targets of both Russian and Ukrainian nationalists - either as enemies, or potential agents.
Note: This is simply my, obviously non-comprehensive, personal understanding of the situation. Feel free to elaborate.
Before the full scale invasion, more than half of Kyiv residents preferred speaking russian over Ukrainian in day to day communication, myself included. If the invasion never happened, I'd still be speaking russian. They literally did it to themselves.
Right now I've switched to Ukrainian in almost all cases, so, right now, I don't. But, to answer your question about my past preference, it was mostly peer pressure. Most of my friends and large part of my relatives were speaking either russian or surzhyk (a sort of Ukrainian-russian creole, that varies depending on the region).
If Russia withdrew their troops, there would be peace immediately.
If Ukraine withdrew their troops, Ukraine would be no more - and thereās no indication Russia would stop there.
Lots of LLM bots today. We may need to start verifying accounts :/
I've been noticing this a lot. There's a lot more Russian support in all my apps. I really think there's a concerted effort that is now being fully enabled by our current administration.
The US officially de-prioritized countering Russian cyber threats a few days ago. It makes sense they would become more emboldened
I don't doubt this, but I haven't personally noticed it before. Can you share more insight about what you noticed, so I can be on the lookout?
https://youtu.be/GZ5XN_mJE8Y
That's technically true. However, Russia uses military force in its sphere of influence for a reason, not solely because Putin bad (which he is, I'm a commie and Putin is fascist-adjacent at best).
Russia, like all big capitalist countries, wants to secure a sphere of influence in which it can do easy trade, influence the politics, and generally have support from these countries. The US does this for example with western Europe through NATO, and with less diplomatic methods by supporting coups and invading other countries. China does this through economic trade and through massive investment projects. Russia is in a weak position internationally, barely recovered economically from the dismantling of the USSR, and it's surrounded by former soviet republics very much in a similar plane (barely economically recovered from the 90s crisis as a consequence of the dismantling of the USSR).
These post-soviet republics, such as Ukraine or Georgia, adopted capitalism (as Russia did) in a very quick and disorderly fashion, and the resulting oligarchs and capitalist owners ended up fumbled in a mix of pro-russian and pro-european/US positions.
The EU and the USA both exert pressure on these countries to try and bring them to their side. Being economically and politically stronger, they can use trade, diplomacy, intelligence and economic means to alienate these countries front the Russian sphere of influence. Russia, in a more precarious and weaker economic and political position, simply doesn't have the means to maintain the diplomatic, economic and intelligence means to maintain these countries aligned to itself.
The war in Ukraine, much as the interference in Georgian and Romanian elections by the EU, mustn't be understood as a struggle between freedom and oppression. It's sadly just a struggle between two capitalist empires, namely Russia and US/EU, fighting for the control of smaller countries that they want aligned to themselves.
Once Russia doesn't have the means to economically, diplomatically and through intelligence, to influence its former sphere of influence into staying by its side, the only option left is the military route. The US and the EU know this, and they keep trying to mess with Russia's sphere of influence for gains to their empires. The reality is that there is no good side and no bad side: it's just struggle between opposing empires.
So yes, technically if Russia withdrew its troops, there would be peace. But this peace would mean that firstly the surrounding regions around Russia, and Russia itself, would become colonies and vassal states of the western world. It wouldn't mean "freedom" for Ukraine, as we can see by the exploitative contract for the minerals of Ukraine that the US offers. If you think the EU will offer something substantially less exploitative towards Ukrainians, you're wrong.
Ukraine, sad as it is, as long as it remains a state between empires, will suffer the effects of both. And only socialism in Europe and Russia can offer a meaningful response to this.
Holy moly "great men historiography" and "Russia is behind everything I hate" both in one single comment, that's quite the feat. Great job firstly ignoring the material analysis and geopolitics of the situation and trying to explain history as "big man makes decision", and then falling for the racist trope that the USA isn't capable of electing a fascist without external interference, as if the US wasn't founded in the fascist principles of the Lebensraum and slavery->segregation
Ukraine will not fall. The objective of Russia in this war isn't pure expansionism further to the west, it's the imposition of its political principles and strategic desires in its sphere of influence. The Russian government knows it cannot control successfully for a long period of time the now (understandably) anti-Russian radicalised sections of central and western Ukraine, what it wants are concessions in geopolitical and strategic terms. Mark my words: the war in Ukraine will stop sooner than later, and after it, only some sections in eastern Ukraine will be annexed to Russia.
Furthermore your reasoning of "if this nation falls, there's gonna be the next", is exactly the way Russia feels about its geopolitical allies. In 1990, there was an agreement that NATO wouldn't push beyond Germany, and that has been violated first with Poland and then with more countries. Why push a US-backed military alliance to the borders of the US-declared main geopolitical enemy? What consequences do you expect from that? Imagine a Russian-led military coalition pushing for the annexion of Mexico.
Regardless of safety guarantees, the resources of western Ukraine will be plundered by the NATO block, whether it be EU or the USA I cannot know, but mark my words when you see the economic situation of Ukraine in 2030
Really well explained in both your comments...
Mental gymnastics. Killing innocent people mercilessly is a problem, stop being an insane apologist for slaughter. Peace is peace.
OK, please tell me how the NATO block is any better in this regard, haven't you literally just been witness to the most open genocide in history and NOBODY in the west did anything to stop it?
I mean maybe, but that's utopian given that all socialism efforts so far where actually authoritan regimes using socialism as a label. We don't know whether it'd help, we have exactly zero data points.
Regarding the Ukraine problem in particular and the situation of Ukraine during socialism in Europe, I have already made a comment demystifying some of the most pervasive anticommunist, russophobic propaganda. Please give it a read and show me your thoughts :)
If you think my solution is "utopian", check out this data from OurWorldInData (hopefully a Bill Gates outlet won't be suspect of tankieism or pro-russian tendencies for you) for GDP per capita in Ukraine since the dismantling of the Soviet Union. Ukraine never recovered its soviet levels of production and of quality of life for people. The USSR was no utopia, it was a very real thing, and it was materially and significantly better for Ukraine than whatever options exist now.
There wasnāt peace before Russia invaded. The far-right US puppet regime was slaughtering ethnic Russians in the east, and allowing NATO to move in troop and missile deployments to the Russian border.
Why would Ukraine behave differently after a Russian withdrawal, when they were escalating for 8 years prior to the invasion?
Arent your eyes watering? How can you even type? With putins cock jammed so far your throat? No gag reflex?
What is it about NATO & Israeli bots that causes yāall to so reflexively gravitate towards sexual violence? Is it part of the official training, or are yāall just like that?
You're either a bot, a troll or just plain old stupid. Even if you're just stupid, you're not worth my time because I cant fix stupid, and there's really no point in arguing with you.
Na just a MAGA trumpist. They are like that, their brains have permanently atrophied and they cannot understand information any more, they just keep parrotting their bullshit endlessly like a broken record.
If somebody fools you twenty times they are (best case scenario) literally Loki.
I dunno, there are a tonne of incredibly stupid and uncreative people who conservatives believe every day for years. The part about loki seems to be a statisical outlier not just ābest case scenarioā, ya know?
So whatās the alternative?
Edit: looks like there wasnāt an alternative despiteso many people beating their chests that there is š¤·āāļø
https://www.rferl.org/a/trump-congress-ukraine-russia-war-tariffs-speech/33336730.html
Give Ukraine everything they need to kick the Russians off their soil. Tomahawks, F35s, a million artillery shells a week, etc... lift all usage restrictions with the exception of civilian targets and infrastructure. Once every square inch of Ukraine is back in Ukrainian hands full NATO membership and a Marshall like recovery plan.
Or assassinate Putin. As long as Putin lives Ukraine is under threat.
No. That has to go. The war will end a lot sooner, if there aren't any bridges and rails left, the Russkies can use to ship ammo and cannon fodder.
I meant civilian infrastructure. So like power stations or shipping centers that handle civilian goods or subways etc.... If it carries a single artillery round it's fair game.
How did we reach a point where the most hawkish warmongering psychos think they're left-leaning?
Fighting fascists is a long standing tradition of the left. Pick up a history book idiot.
Why did the US install a fascist government in Russia?
Thatās unsustainable, brainless and unrealistic, who is going to pay and fight if the war continues for 5 more years, what about 10 more years?
Russia is importing North Koreans to fight. You think if Ukraine gets unlimited weapons the war will last 5 more years? What day of the 3 day invasion are we on now?
The only reason the war has lasted this long is because of the drip feeding of weapons. which was probably a ploy to extend the war and make defense contractors more rich. So yeah, end it quickly by giving Ukraine what it needs to win.
So, what's your "totally realistic"TM solution?
Weapons don't win wars, people do, and Ukraine has a severe troops shortage right now that will only get worse as the war goes on. You can give them all the weapons in the world, if there's no one there to fire them, they'll still lose
That is fundementally wrong. Firepower absolutely makes up for numbers disadvantage.
if a hundred Russians, Norks and other Mercenaries and their vehicles get smoked in a battle by a single cluster bomb. Rinse and repeat
Guess India just lacked the manpower to kick out the Brits. Same with the Japanese and *checks notes, 4 American ships.
Weapons absolutely matter.
I never said weapons don't matter, I said people do matter, and if the war goes on long enough then ukraine won't have any to fight the war.
The weapon difference between colonial India and Britain is nowhere near that between Russia and Ukraine. This has become a war of artillery and drones, both sides have them and can produce them at scale. This isn't some colonial era imperial war where one side has machine guns and the other has a couple muskets and swords.
Why don't you look to more modern examples where overwhelming firepower and technological superiority was supposed to win a war, like Vietnam or Afghanistan. Hell look at Korea, China was able to force the Americans to a draw after it's economy was in ruins after a decade of Japanese occupation and civil war while the u.s. had half the worlds production capacity. The Russian economy is leagues better then China was in the early 50s, and the u.s. isnt nearly as dominant.
These people are delusional, the liberation of Ukraine can only happen if NATO troops land on the battlefield. And we all know that means nuclear war.
It only means Nuclear War if Putin decides he's ready to die.
its not a gaurantee he flips a switch and decides to unleash fire the second NATO starts shooting at him, good chance he scuffles off and cuts his losses, if the fighting is contained to Ukraine and the border, its not a given that he'd condemn himself and his empire to death over the wasteland that is the Donbas
Looks like I was right and thereās no other real alternative, which is why Zelenskyy did a 180 on the minerals deal š¤·āāļø:
https://www.rferl.org/a/trump-congress-ukraine-russia-war-tariffs-speech/33336730.html
Theory that more weapons wins is based on Russia being overextended and not outproducing west by itself. Your point on "endless war being perfect US policy" is the right one. Wining a war is always terrible. It means an end to war, and just look at how sad everyone around here is about that prospect. That Ukraine could suffer far more destruction, as retaliation for the special weapons it uses for terrorism inside Russia, is far more likely, as is striking western nations as punishment for "breaking the script of a slow war of attrition with eventual Russian victory".
ATCMS got Ukraine electricity sector destroyed, instead of winning. US can produce 60 per year.
Out producing the west by itself? Bwahaahhahahahaa.
3 times the artillery shells as US+Europe combined
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arms_industry_of_Russia#%3A%7E%3Atext=As+of+2024%2C+Russia+produces%2Cfrom+the+US+and+Europe.
Your propaganda bubble is not there to help you.
And if youāre wrong and the war can indeed go on for 10 more years are you prepared to deal with the consequences of the destruction of Ukraine, potentially nuclear war and destabilization of Europe?
So you don't actually want to talk solutions. I asked what is your solution? I will answer no more questions until you answer mine.
Russia does not have the capacity to fight 5 or 10 more years (unless the US backstops them). Ukraine does not need the resources to go 10 years. They need the resources to outlast the Russians. That is probably more like 18 to 24 months. It could be less.
In my view, that is not only affordable but quite inexpensive given the benefits.
Europe and the US have contributed about $250 billion collectively over the last 3 years (Europe has contributed more). That is a small amount of money for either of them. Most of the $120 billion the US counts as Ukraine aid has been spent on new weapons systems for the United States for the US military. The US builds themselves new weapons, sends Ukraine old ones, and counts the value of the old weapons as Ukraine aid. The thing is, most of these weapons would have been decommissioned in a few years without being used (assuming the US does not enter any major wars). So, the ārealā cost to the US is actually far less.
Both the US and Europe not only can sustain their current commitment. They could easily increase it without breaking a sweat. I lay no claim to it but Norway alone has a $1.7 trillion dollar pile of cash.
In my view, the real question is who is going to pay for the aftermath of Russiaās continued aggression if they are allowed to invade Ukraine?
Was it cheaper to have World War II or to stop Germany in Poland or Czechoslovakia? What would we have done in 1945 if given the chance to do it again?
Perhaps you are right that it is unrealistic. That is more an opinion than a demonstrable fact and my opinion is no better than yours.
I am not sure I can agree that it is brainless. While that is also an opinion, there are lots to facts to counter that argument.
Supporting Ukraine no matter what it takes seems like the clear and obvious choice. I guess that is why it is what every country that matters is doing (except the USānow).
Do you have a better argument?
Looks like weāll meet again here in a few years, after thousands more will die and more territory will be lost to argue again about how this war can hypothetically end, just because Zelenskyās ego was too big.
Don't pretend like you give a shit about Ukrainian lives.
Donāt pretend like you give a shit about Ukrainian lives
Can you really not imagine an alternative?
I canāt believe that my point was proven in just a couple of days: https://www.rferl.org/a/trump-congress-ukraine-russia-war-tariffs-speech/33336730.html
Your point hasnāt been proven. OPs point was that Putin promises canāt be trusted. And without US putting force behind that promise, Ukraine is wise to be worried about such a deal.
Just because one alternative realized doesnāt mean there werenāt other options, better or worse.
Edit: plus, a peace deal is far from done, regardless which side you root for.
I see plenty of alternatives, just not one in which people stop dying immediately.
History teaches us that Russia cease fire agreements mean that fewer die immediately but that lasts a far shorter time than you hope for. In the end, even more people die than before when Russia resumes their aggression.
This is not a prediction or an opinion. That are literally dozens of historical events to draw this information from.
According to what youāre saying, the only solution is NATO troops fighting in Ukraine because we cannot trust Russia in any way, shape or form.
When are you willing to enroll to go to the front?
You have textbook RT talking points. It's so fucking obvious you're a russian asset at the very keast
Yeah bro, everyone who doesnāt have your specific world view is a russian asset. What, are you 12?
What is there to negotiate? If all the russians leave ukraine, ukranians will probably stop shooting them...
Russia has always firmly opposed expansion of NATO, including the missiles and NATO troops that were lined up at their border with Ukraineās participation.
All those countries that joined NATO, Their sovereignty doesn't end where hurt russian fee-fees begin
if Russia doesnt like it, then maybe they should reflect on how they acted like savage barbarians to those people throughout history. Maybe they should reflect that they aren't entiteld to an "Empire" or a "Sphere of Influence" or whatever they want to call it. Reflect on the fact that Eastern and Central europe are not pawns and slaves to a larger power. but nations with agency, hopes, dreams and goals.
but they wont, Imperialism, Warmongering, and Genocide are married to the current excuse of "Russian Culture"
Yeah like, instead of taking a hard look into the mirror why countries kept wanting to join NATO, or why the russian-bloc equivalent failed so much, LULZ WE JUST GONNA WALTZ IN NO NATO PLOX.
Ah, nevermind, they did discover why so many countries wanted to join NATO. š
If it was about their sovereignty, itās weird that you donāt mind NATO attacking their sovereignty to install pro-western politicians through corruption or straight up coups. āSovereigntyā only seems to matter when itās anti-Russian.
Itās not about feelings. There were many agreements for NATO not to expand. They did it anyway. There are consequences for that.
Please educate me. Which countries had pro-western politicians "Installed"
And if you're already typing Ukraine, boy do I have a bridge to sell you.
With maybe the exception of Serbia, Russia has been antagonistic and Imperialistic towards Europe for CENTURIES. Theres a reason Russia finds itself fighting against most/all of Europe every century. You need only ask the butchered populations of Eastern Europe who found themselves as Russian subjects at any point in history. The only reason they were ever friendly with Serbia, was because the Serbs are like a microchasm of the same thing the Russians did. Mini-mes, if you will.
you want to scream America bad, NATO bad, fine. but remove both of them from the equation, it wouldnt change the fact that the continent distrusts Russia for a reason.
Ukraine, Georgia, Bulgaria, Romania, etc.
https://www.jeffsachs.org/newspaper-articles/bfsmbpe4plx7cc6lgxhf37lx249r22?ref=pressrex.com&format=amp
Oh boy
So if they installed pro-western politicians in Ukraine, Why was the president of Ukraine at the time of Euromaidan checks notes Viktor Yanukovitch? the Pro-Russian fraudster who was once removed from the presidency after having cheated in the elections. and even afterward, managed to ratfuck his way into a term later on in 2010. Only to get Impeached and removed from power By his own government after he ordered the Berkut and Internal Troops to use lethal force against protestors.
this tired argument of western coups against these ex soviet countries always forgets to address the fact that a couple of suspicious phonecalls in embassies doesn't hold the same power as millions of people taking to the streets over a government doing something that is widely unpopular.
if the CIA and all these other groups people accuse of toppling governments were as competent as fiction made them out to be, Joe Biden would still be President, Putin would be dead, Russia would be a balkanized state, and the Ukraine war would probably never have happened, and if it did, it would have been over by now with a Ukrainian victory.
No, youāre describing the Maidan Coup, which was backed by the US to install a far-right puppet regime because they opposed Yanukovitch maintaining neutrality with Russia, and not bowing to US demands to block a lease on a Crimean naval base.
š Geezus some people are so far down the disinformation hole there's fuck all ways to dig them back out, ever...
Oh were there?
That's interesting, considering how controversial it still is whether oral agreements ever existed in the first place. What isn't controversial is of course that being oral-only, they can hardly be binding or transactionary. That is to say, the failure was to never transfer these agreements - if they even existed - into writing, bilaterally as that's how you'd have to do it.
āWe didnāt agree in writingā didnāt seem to prevent a war from breaking the agreement.
NATO wouldn't need to expand if Russia wasn't constantly threatening their neighbors.
Theyāve only ever threatened their neighbors during NATO expansion efforts.
I see you haven't spoken to many people from Finland... Or Latvia... Or Syria... Or Chechnya... Or Ukrainians, for that matter.
You wanna name anymore western imperialist projects?
"Everyone who's afraid of Russia (for good reason) is a western imperialist project"
Russia was threatening their neighbors before NATO even existed.
NATO existed before Russia, genius. Itās an anti-Soviet org.
The Soviet Union was still Russia. They've not changed their attitude since then.
Then explain this different government, economy, and borders.
Your immense historical knowledge seems to have missed the fact that Russia existed long before the Soviet Union, Einstein.
Youāre proposing that this Russia is the same one? When did they re-establish the czar?
Complete horseshit. They literally invaded and installed a puppet regime in Chechnia, and there were zero NATO "expansion efforts" there. And that is just one example out of many.
This is abuser logic. "If you would quit misbehaving, then I wouldn't have to hit you!"
Itās an adult understanding of international politics. Aggression rarely goes unanswered.
"The United States should invade a country that might in the future join an alliance to help prevent the US from invading other countries as we have in the past." Do you realize how fucking stupid your nAtO eXpAnSiOn propaganda sounds!?
Iām literally just plainly stating historical events.
...that just so happen to line up with the propaganda of the Russian invaders.
Facts donāt stop being facts when a Russian says them. If theyāre factually stating the sequence of events, it doesnāt change anything.
Lies don't become true just because you keep saying "facts". The Russian propaganda (that you're parroting) is the untrue part, not the events themselves. Ukraine defending itself against Russia before and during their violent, illegal invasion is not an "expansion" and has nothing to do with NATO. Full stop.
I would go one further. Ukraine trying to join NATO is not a valid reason for an invasion. In fact, I can't think of any valid reason for an invasion. Invading a country is wrong.
Maybe Ukraine wants to join NATO because they share a border with a gigantic country that wants to conquer them.
Lies aren't facts, Einstein.
You are doing nothing of the sort, you are literally just regurgitating Putin propaganda.
Except Ukraine was on their border and not part of NATO and other countries on their border are. NATO Then Russia invaded and took the Crimean peninsula unprovoked. Not a surprise that Ukraine wants NATO membership, and now Finland joined NATO because of Russia's attack on Ukraine, doubling the NATO/Russia border.
Incorrect. The Crimea invasion followed a soft coup of Ukraine by the US, wherein they installed a far-right puppet regime. The following years, Ukraine allowed a torrent of NATO & US troops and missile deployments to be installed at their border with Russia.
Nope... you're spreading bullshit. People got rid of a Putin puppet. Hope we do the same.
Where did you come up with this? At no time has the US or NATO had troops or missiles in Ukraine. Get your facts correct or say nothing.
āAt no time,ā when theyāre there as we speak. So stupid.
My man, if we had US troops and missiles participating in the war, Kursk would have already been a proud Ukrainian city.
You really ought to take to news sources other than Twitter or Telegram. š
NATO hasn't "expanded" in a long time, until recently when Sweden and Finland decided to join. A decision that was made based on the Russian invasion of Ukraine. So through Russia's actions, two countries have decided to join an organisation that was made to opposed Russia.
Before that, no new members were accepted into NATO, even if they wanted to join, because NATO members weren't really seeing the point of NATO anymore, and they didn't see a reason to provoke Russia. That changed in 2014 when Russia invaded Ukraine for the first time, and annexed Crimea.
Last but not least; NATO doesn't expand. It's not a nation with borders that grow through conquest or subjugation. It is a defensive pact that the peolpe of a nation must vote on to join. And then the members of NATO must unanimously vote on letting the new country join. It is voluntary and democratic.
So instead of shoutong "NATO IS EXPANDING, GRRR!!", why not ask yourself "why would Russia's neighbouring countries want to join NATO?"
Completely untrue. NATO has been expanding since the 90ās.
Of course it has. Of course it has. I mean, if your dillusions help you find your happy place, who am I to judge, right?
Fact check me.
Do you think that NATO was planning to invade Russia? And if not, then WTF is Putin's problem?
The primary mission of NATO is aggression with the Soviet Union/Russia. Thatās the only reason it exists.
Why does Russia get to dictate what other countries do within their borders?
Iām pretty sure every country on earth would respond to a hostile force amassing troops & missiles at their border.
100% found a russian shill.
No, I was just alive at the time. Even in the states, they were covering the Maidan Coup at the time. They just rewrote the whole thing later.
Iām not gonna be peer pressured into forgetting history I witnessed. š
Yeah, no.
You're definitely a shill reading straight from his playbook.
The fundamental difference here is between a sovereign nation pursuing defensive alliances versus an aggressive invasion violating international law. Ukraine wasn't "amassing troops & missiles" at Russia's border as an hostile threat - it was seeking security guarantees after Russia had already annexed Crimea in 2014 and fomented separatist movements in eastern Ukraine. National sovereignty means countries get to determine their own security arrangements, and Russia's "security concerns" don't justify violating Ukraine's territorial integrity or dictating its foreign policy choices.
Itās not a sovereign nation. The US installed a far-right puppet regime in the 2014 Maidan Coup, which triggered the Crimea invasion.
Funny that folks who claim to support Ukrainian sovereignty donāt give a shit about them being under a western thumb.
And where is the "non-puppet" that was removed during the Maidan Revolution hiding these days?
War in Donbas
Make no Mistake: Russia is trying to destroy Ukraine since 2014. Russia is the agressor and needs to put in its place.
Russia is trying to destroy Ukraine ever since both of them were founded as independent counties. This is just a reiteration of what we've already seen in the russian empire and in the USSR. History is a merry-go-round and I'm getting motion sick of all the rotation.
Edit: typo
Goes back to the Russian Revolution at the very least, though probably to the the Russian Empire. Historical data send to suggest that the Russian elite will not accept anyone but Russian hegemony over the region. The Bolsheviks betrayed the Ukrainian Anarcho-Communists who had helped to defeat the White army because they wanted independent self-governance rather than bowing to the Bolsheviks' authoritarian Central Council in Moscow.
Comparing the Russian Empire and the USSR is the most ahistorical thing you can possibly do. During the Russian Empire and for all of history before that, Ukraine was a people without a nation. Oppressed, without representation, without borders, without a right to education or even learning to read in their language.
The Bolsheviks, with their first constitution in 1917, granted the right to self-determination and secession to all peoples of the former Russian Empire, which Lenin referred to as "the prison of peoples". Quite literally after Poland seceded in this legal fashion, the Polish government decided it wanted to return to the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth borders, and proceeded to unilaterally invade Ukraine and part of modern Belarus. It was the Red Army of the Russian Socialist Federation of Soviet Republics, that fought off the Polish invasion and established a lasting Ukrainian People's Republic for the first time in history.
This wasn't without controversy: while Lenin argued for the right to representation and to a Ukrainian Republic within the USSR, others like Rosa Luxembourg argued for a united, more homogeneous sort of socialist soviet nationality that outgrew former nationalisms. It is partially thanks to Lenin that Ukraine ended up having its own borders, administration and representation.
I know what you'll say: "but Holodomor! Genocide against Ukrainians!". The famine of the USSR was a sad and unintended consequence of bad policy during the collectivisation/dekulakization process of the early 30s. Millions of people died both within Ukraine and without it, especially as well in Central Asia and southern Russia. As bad as it was, and as avoidable as one can argue it may have been, there's simply no evidence of any intent of attack towards Ukrainian people, it's not precedented by anything similar, and it's not followed by anything similar in the entire history of the USSR.
In those decades and the ones to come, Ukraine would obtain and solidify its own nationality, people would for the first time obtain generalised literacy in their own language, the right to study in their language up to university level, a majority of publications (both journalistic and literary) in Ukrainian, and the very next president of the USSR Nikita Khruschchyov would be Ukrainian.
Attempting to construe a history of oppression of Ukrainians in the USSR is nothing but fictitious, anti-communist and russophobic propaganda, meant to create a divide between Ukrainians and Russians. There are clear geopolitical reasons to do so, and there are clear reasons why Ukrainians are very much afraid or simply hate Russians, because of the modern proto-fascist state that the Russian Republic has become. But creating a line between this capitalist country, the socialist USSR, and the feudalist Russian Empire, is simply an attempt to divide Eastern Europe further and to push Ukraine towards the EU and away from Russia. This point can be argued for without resorting to russophobic and anticommunist myths. We're smarter than this.
Nah, USSR discarded socialism and communism the moment Lenin decided he didn't like losing the elections, and Stalin made it worse for decades. There's nothing anti-communist in calling out an authoritarian dictatorship for what it was.
During the Soviet times there were repeated attempts to homogenize (as you said) all non-russian ethnicities into one big Soviet mass, easy to manage and control. Russian language, culture and values were held as the supposedly communist ideal future at the cost of national identity, replaced by pretense of representation.
Not just Holodomor, but also forced relocations of Ukrainians, Belarusians, Crimean Tatars and other Eastern European ethnicities contributed to that.
So, maybe tune down on Soviet apologia in front of people whose parents and grandparents literally had to live there.
Lots of propaganda today, seems like someone doesn't like Zelenskyy or a strong Ukraine.
Slava Ukraine!
Zelensky confirmed it was 25 in his meeting with Trump.
The image describes 2014-2022. So it seems he's had 5 additional sit-downs with Russia between 2023-2025.
At least someone is trying to make peace happen (Ukraine).
You can absolutely want peace and even agree to concessions to Russia to reach a sustainable peace, but this point is absolutely valid: there must be security guarantees, otherwise Putin will just use the armistice to rebuild its strength and attack again.
Oh, absolutely. We want peace more than anyone else, but giving putin a chance to regroup, pull more support together and attack again is not peace, it's surrender
That's generally what happens when, you know, you're losing a war.
Why surrender and let the invader murder with impunity, when you can still make him fight for every inch.
thats where we're at. Thats been the score since Bucha. Because Ukraine resisted, both sides hate each other like Israel and Palestine now. every time Russia gets into a city, they rape and pillage, murder civilians on the street, torture and castrate POWs before murdering them, and flatten cities to the ground.
you dont surrender to that. you fight to the death. you have no choice.
Oh. And after I went to trouble of typing all that big wall of text in response to your other comment, giving you the benefit of the doubt of arguing in good faith.
Security guarantees are nice but only if there believable. If the last 3 years have shown anything it's that the west will not go to all out war with Russia over Ukraine. It may make putin more hesitant but if he calls our bluff a piece of paper isn't going to change the fact that Americans and western Europeans aren't willing to die for Ukraine.
There are already were security guarantees, and then the US and their puppet in Ukraine violated their agreements.
The deal should be... All Russian troops get pulled out of Ukraine. Ukraine gets a lump sum of all seized Russian assets in foreign nations, Russia agrees not to move troops within 100 miles of Ukraine's border without Ukraine's consent. Ukraine agrees to allow and even assist civillain Russian services with locating and returning living and deceased Russians.
The alternative is we take the limits off of what targets can be attacked within Russia, and enable Ukraine to enforce the conditions as proposed.
I'd also like to add that Russia and the US give up their UN "super veto" power. I don't think anything good and effective can come from the UN when a single country can just "nope" any UN proposals.
Veto power in the UN is a short for "we will use nukes if you do this". The UN is not world government, it's the organisation which task(among many less important things) is to prevent nuclear war.
Ah, that explains why India and North Korea have veto power.
As good as this comment is, neither has the range or targeting capability that the US does or that the USSR did.
The security council veto was designed to keep the US and the USSR at the negotiating table and off the battlefield.
Then why are all those other nations on the security council? Just seems like we only need the members with veto power at this point.
We would have a much more effective UN if only Pakistan stopped vetoing everything!
the amount of Fascist, Jingoistic shitposting that favors either Republican or Russian propaganda on social media is STAGGERING. The people arguing for it are more concerned about bathroom gender signs, DEI, wokism, and a bunch of other made up stuff, and not only are they oblivious that their country is being taken over by a foreign aggressor, THEY ARE PROUD OF IT. Because "at least the Russians kill the gays"
We are in this position we are today, because Russia has been waging an information war against NATO countries for 15-20 years. and the seeds they planted during the days of Georgia and Crimea, are blooming into fruit now.
The free world is AT WAR with Russia, and for the time being, America has been conquered. Victory from the jaws of Defeat, for the Russian mafia
The US won the physical war but lost the soft war to Russia.
The US is being couped, and we need to dethrone them before it's too late.
i don't know who needs to hear this, who in their right minds would see Ukraine as the aggressor in this war
Negotiations without security assurances*
This is the prime stickler with the USA-Ukraine deal that has been discussed on the news
Putin needs to lose something or he'll just invade someone else.
He only ever invades in response to NATO expansion. Maybe the west should stop trying to move in.
Historically illiterate.
Which Putin invasion was not preceded by another NATO expansion?
The invasion of Crimea and Ukraine. New NATO members joined after that happened in response.
Crimea happened after the US overthrew the government of Ukraine, and installed a far-right regime.
You want to repeat that, but in the same room with a Ukrainian? You have a good dental plan, I hope?
Don't move the goal post. You asked, you got a reply. You don't like that reply because of how trivially it calls out your bullshit, and you're clearly not adult enough to handle that, but you still got called out on bullshit.
I wasn't aware he invaded Finland and Sweden already
Because memes aren't journalism: you got any sources?
Memes aren't journalism, but this is a meme community, not a news community. However, one could argue that this is not exactly a meme, so your point is fair.
I'd still like to get the sources. Otherwise, content like this is like disinformation spreads. Meme community or not.
With the time you took to comment you could have looked it up yourself, and then with a bit more time you could have posted the sources here. You're consciously choosing to not be informed, and to do nothing yourself and expect random people to do work for you.
We're talking about major recent history from 2014. Unless they're 12, they don't really have an excuse to be this ill informed for an entire decade. The time it took to comment is a drop in the bucket compared to the rest of their time spent in willful ignorance.
It's OP's responsibility to give sources on the issue. Don't shoot the messenger.
Not in a meme community, that's not the point of the community
You're not a messenger, you're whining because you couldn't bother to Google something yourself
If you insist on the "meme" aspect, how is this post even a meme??
Learn what a meme is before commenting on the topic next time
Would you argue the same way if someone would post libs of Tiktok propaganda here?
No, I'd laugh at you for doing so
And you could have done the same and posted it for the rest of us instead of wagging your finger.
Number of ceasefires: https://kyivindependent.com/zelensky-gave-trump-list-of-all-ceasefires-violated-by-russia/
Number of talks: https://www.ukrinform.net/rubric-polytics/3784793-kuleba-ukraine-held-200-rounds-of-talks-with-russia-since-2014-but-that-did-not-stop-putin.html
The source for the meme appears to be a tweet from the Ukraine foreign minister. Zelensky has quoted similar numbers. These numbers are coming out of Ukrainian officialsā mouths and not 3rd party journalists and itās not at all clear on how theyāre counting since I canāt find easily any other sources.
Side note: with how bad Google is nowadays, people should never chide anyone else for being unable to locate a source themselves again.
"Russia violated all of the ceasefires and talks since 2014, but it is really important that the exact number is verified by 3rd parties."
You dismissing the overall point by focusing on the absolute least important detail. If the number of talks and ceasefires is greater then zero and Russia has violated all of them, then why does it matter if there were two dozen or two hundred?
Because details fucking matter, thatās why? It matters even if the side Iām on is the one potentially exaggerating. Donāt you care to know that? Or do the facts not matter to you anymore?
Because when someone starts arguing that there were 33 violations and not 35 or something along those lines I know they are just trying to derail the discussion away from the point that matters: Russia has consistently violated ceasefires and that is why security guarantees are needed.
Researching "20" is hard. Israel certainly likes to claim that other side breaks ceasefires. There is usually an opposing narrative.
I agree with you about sources, but instead of asking and waiting you can search for them as well. I did a quick search for some of the information in the image and I got some results about 200 rounds of talks since 2014. Not ones I recognize so I canāt say if theyāre legit or not but it only took a few seconds to get that at least that far.
I'm not OP, though. Not everyone will do the googling themselves and if you're posting stuff like that, I think it's a responsibility of the OP to supply the sources.
Otherwise, that's the exact same strategy misinformation peddlers like LibsofTiktok use.
LibsOfTiktok, on the right, was effective. They are, apparently, much better at motivating people than you are.
Also, let's not pretend you don't just disagree with what is being said. Nobody asks for sources until it's an issue somebody might pick up a sign over.
I don't get why you're comparing me to libs of tiktok. Do I look like I'm trying to be an influencer to you? O.o
I think it's naive to take anything someone as biased as Selensky is saying at face value.
Lol, first day on the internet, I assume? xD /j
You're arguing with one. What do you think OP is doing?
Ah, so you're not impartial. Funny how easy it was to figure that out.
This isn't disinformation unless you don't believe Zelensky. Besides that, we're talking about large scale violations.
If you go digging you'll find literally 10s of thousands of violations, shit just look at this from 2017 https://osce.usmission.gov/on-russias-ongoing-violations-in-ukraine-12/
I suggest using a search engine.
yeah, not exactly the most unbiased source, I recon. If something is disinformation or not shouldn't really hinge on whether you believe someone, btw.
So? Even easier to get sources, right?And even more suspicious that it doesn't ring any bells.
The sources you supplied are literally participants in the NATO/Russia conflict.
Pardon my French, but: Screw you.
Well the source is one of a number that document violations of the Minsk agreement. You don't just need to read that one and it's from 8 years ago I just grabbed it to show how long Russia has been ignoring their related ceasefire agreements. I think the source is relatively neutral but you are right it may have some bias, it's about as neutral as English language sources come though.
I think this post may be off in interpreting or wording because Russia has had major violations of a number of treaties, notably recently the Minsk agreement but I think Zelensky is talking about 25 major violations not 25 separate agreements.
Regardless of all of that, Russia has a very long history of not honoring their truces and ceasefires and using them as a reprieve to beef up their military forces before continuing to fight.
Your French has been pardoned but fuck you too pal.
The source still is the US government, i.e. NATO. It can hardly be interpreted as impartial.
You're touching on why "just google it" is a horrible advice: sources in english language will emphasize the western consensus who have a vested interest in weakening Russia and are in an active economical war with Russia. it's really hard to find english speaking, impartial sources.
From what I found online, while the claims of "genocide" are blown out of proportion, Ukraine has still also violated the Minsk treaty by attacking Donbas.
I think it's important to note that I don't want to condone neither Russia, nor Ukraine. Even if everything is true about Russian minorities in the Donbas: I don't think that being conscripted is too much better. But I also think that the Ukrainian state is using its' own population as cannon-fodder to fight a proxy war for the west (if it weren't a proxy war, the changing stance of the US wouldn't be as big of a problem).
Fuck states. All of them. No war but class war.
What do you want me to say, that it's clear Russia continually violates ceasefire for the past 20 years of various nation states?
Like idk you can go find plenty of sources that say that I'm sure some won't be in English but you're not going to ever find something from Russia themselves that says "yeah we violated this shit"
Whats wrong here? It should always be ok to ask for sources!
In this case the research is significant and it is reasonable to assume that avid readers here know the sources and need less research to respond quickly.
Here a quick overview:
Minsk Protocol (Sept 5, 2014)
Early on both sides supported militant groups with arms (e.g. the far right right Azov group for Ukraine and DPR for Russia), the governments did agree to a ceasefire, the groups didn't care and both sides violated it numerous times. Ukrainian supported troops were shelling near Donetsk (Sept 20, 2014) and the DPR executed full scale attacks. https://web.archive.org/web/20141023221330/http://www.skynews.com.au/news/world/mideast/2014/10/23/ukraine-rebels-vow-to-take-back-cities.html
Minsk II (Feb 12, 2015)
Ukraine did shell Horlivka (March 10, 2015) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Horlivka , killed civilians; claimed retaliation. The DPR tried to capture Debaltseve right before the ceasefire and failed to do so completely before it came into effect. As a result fighting within the city continued and the DPR even claimed the ceasefire did not include Debaltseve. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Debaltseve so this was also violated by Ukraine too, but now we see a shift towards more Russian violations.
Later violations
The last violations where Ukraine can be assigned any noticeable role in are around 2020. Now that the military is more organized the troops do follow ceasefire orders more strictly and violations for ceasefires after 2020 can be nearly unilaterally assigned to the Russian side. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minsk_agreements (follow the links from there to more recent ceasefires)
So the image/meme is mostly true but also propaganda (as to be expected). I also do not know where the number of 20 agreements comes from. I do know/find details of about 8. Maybe somebody else can provide a list?
So in summary: The message is true. Russia and mainly the DPR troops they support can not be trusted to follow ceasefires as long as the conditions at the front do not significantly change.
I like sticking to the facts and do not agree with the presentation in the image, but at least its still way way closer to the truth than Russian propaganda. In this case sticking to the facts would even have sent the same message and not give the Russians any point where they can base their counterpoint on. On the other side differentiated and detailed analysis is not that well suited to steer up emotions and support for the cause.
Thank you, seriously. It's really exhausting how much resistance you face when you try to question Ukrainian propaganda.
I absolutely agree on your point about misinformation. I was trying to hint that maybe none of this belongs here, despite me personally resonating with the "meme". I guess I am just rambling, don't mind me.
https://www.wsj.com/opinion/a-brief-history-of-russian-broken-promises-ukraine-war-cease-fire-6a725544
Use archive.is to circumvent paywall.
Slava Ukraini šŗš¦
I'm all for diplomacy. Finding diplomatic solutions to these kinds of problems is the ideal outcome.
When it's not ideal and you're dealing with someone irrational or uncooperative, then maybe fighting isn't the worst way to go.
Bluntly, I support Ukraine. They're clearly trying to make diplomacy work.
I can't say the same for Putin/Russia.
In some book there were cannons stamped with "the ultimate reason of kings". Seems appropriate here.
Quicksilver by Neal Stephenson maybe?
They will listen to reason.
Yeah remember that one :-)
This ^^^ so much
Do not trust Russia, and do not trust the US under current administration, or while the GOP still exists. We in the rest of the world are ON OUR OWN and must band together against this push of fascism across the world. This is not a drill, this is not a joke. Fascism is again on the rise, as it was in the 1930s. We all know where that led, so don't let it do so again!
Oh bother, you've upset the tankies, who totally haven't just been Russian trolls the entire time.
Seriously they should just assassinate Putin at this point. If he's anything like Trump then half of Russia will be joyful.
Oh he's worse than Trump, in that most of russia actually worships him. He's literally not giving his country a chance to think about alternatives.
Russians overwhelmingly understand this is a defensive war for them. The most extreme delusional propaganda we are fed is that provoking this war would help overthrow Putin with pro NATO liberalism. NATO is not a purely defensive alliance desperately trying to convince Russians of love and freedom from submission to them.
Yes, I'm sure Russians believe that invading another nation and sending their children to die is "defensive." After all, they're fed the propaganda of the fascist dictator, Putin. Just as the people of North Korea are made to believe the outside world is evil...
The far-right in Ukraine was slaughtering ethnic Russians for 8 years before the invasion, and letting NATO move in missile & troop deployments to the Russian border. Yes, that kind of thing makes people feel as though theyāre on the defensive.
Fuck Russia
It is time that the world recognized that the USA is just like Russia and China. Never, ever to be trusted. All the pretense has fallen away under Trump but the real America, supported by 70% of its population, is showing its true colours. They've bullied their "Allies" for 70 years to be their friends, but they've never been a friend back. It's all been a guise to get whatever they wanted and steal all the riches a country could produce or make other country's industry beholden to American corporations. While previous American Administrations may have believed in the soft power their approach yielded and understood how it made the USA rich, Trump does not.
"But Putin is my BFF, he pinky promised that he would not do it again."
Zelensky should have said that to Orange Krasnov and the other fucking Russian assets.
Or all three
His only hope is going to be assassinating Putin and hope the next person ends it.
Why can it not be uninformed, misled AND aligned with Russia (and stupid)?
Hrmm. What happened in 2014?
Can someone explain how you are supposed to get Russia to leave? Sanctions didn't work, lethal aid didn't work, F-16s didn't work, and striking Russia itself isn't either.
You can argue for the war to continue I suppose, but Ukraine isn't winning and I'm not seeing anything here that would change that fact.
These things haven't won the war, but they most definitely are working. Russia's economy is crippled, their military is running out of old equipment to cannibalize, and they lack the capability to produce the kinds of advanced military equipment they need. They've been throwing bodies into the meat grinder trying to overwhelm Ukraine, but despite the high cost they are making very little progress. This is not a great long term strategy, but it's the one Russia has been stuck with.
But what's the alternative? Right now Ukraine can only fight or surrender. While they fight, they can try to negotiate a peace deal, but so far the only deals Putin and Trump seem willing to consider are nearly indistinguishable from surrender. Give Russia everything they want, give up on everything you want, stop the fighting for now but put nothing in place to ensure that Russia won't just rearm and invade again later.
There's no evidence that Russia is going to lose steam economically or on the battlefield any time soon. Continuing to fight a losing war will only make any final deal between the US, Russia and Ukraine worse for the latter. There's a reason the 2022 treaty that was proposed looks unrealistic today, and whatever deal they make now will be much better than when they finally run out of men in the Ukrainian army.
With the situation as it stands, negotiating is the best way out if you actually care about Ukraine. If you just want to weaken Russia then sure, fight to the last ukrainian.
https://www.russiamatters.org/blog/russias-economy-collapsing
That's weird considering every single thing I've read about Russia's economy recently has been that it's going to collapse soon.
Edit: not a fascist
A lot of news about this conflict has been about what Ukraine would like to be true, rather than the facts.
Well, I ran this through several media bias checkers - it came back as unbiased. Site leans a little left, but that's about it.
So tell me again, what are you trying to say? Because if your answer is more or less 'it's propaganda' - I'm not sure I should entertain this topic any further.
I'm not sure I understand. The article you have linked concludes with:
Which just agrees with what I've said about sanctions not working.
This is the article written by Alexander Kolyandr and Alexandra Prokopenko. https://en.thebell.io/no-russia-is-not-on-the-verge-of-a-banking-crisis/
So, they dispute the idea that there will be a credit/ banking crisis. They do not dispute that the Russian economy is in bad shape.
So, no, they do not agree that sanctions would not work. In fact, they imply here that an external shock like tighter sanctions would likely cause inflation to continue rising.
What would be most likely to cause a man made crisis if not the value of the rouble decreasing further + a continued bloody war?
There's no evidence period about anything that's not propaganda right now. Either side could be days away from total collapse without any of us knowing it.
True, but there are a few things we can glean through the war propaganda. The fact that Ukraine is outgunned to this day on the battlefield isn't some big state secret.
Ukrainian propaganda that they've been winning all along. Russian military production is over 70% higher than at start of war, 30%/year last 2, and they gain territory every week with a weapons advantage including when new western arms shipments come in. Believing your fantasy is pro suiciding of Ukrainians.
The same deal from Russia was always on table for avoiding the war. Absolutely zero reason to think it was ever insincere or not meant to put both countries back at peace. If Ukraine's goal for a ceasefire is to rearm and resume terrorism operations on liberated regions of Ukraine, then Ukraine needs a new leader to get a lasting peace. Again, zero reason that Russia won't abide by peace it demands. US led Ukraine on the wrong track, and Ukraine Russia relations can get back on right track with "traditional attitude rulership"
You're right, the Ukrainians should just give up on all these uppity notions of national sovereignty and self determination. They are in Russia's sphere of influence, their place is to do what Russia says. It's their fault if they don't listen and Putin has to give them a black eye, that's just him correcting them and showing he cares.
They should welcome their Russian liberators, so they can finally see how wonderful life under Russian rule is. Just ask the people of Bucha and Mariupol, they'll be happy to tell you (if you can find a Ouija board in Cyrillic).
Are you sure that Ukraine is not winning?
It is a war of attrition with Russia against the amount of aid the West is willing to provide to Ukraine.
The only way Russia wins is if the US changes the balance of power by enriching Russia (dropping sanctions) or impoverishing Ukraine (dropping support).
Russia isn't winning, either.
So they should give up and let Russia re-arm and try again?
The F-16s mainly replace the losses of Ukraineās Air Force.
Yes, but they very much were not the game changers as touted by western leaders. Russia still very much has air superiority, which has been key for their battlefield results.
Ah, but have you considered that the good guy always wins?
This seems to genuinely be how libs think about this. There's no need for any practical considerations about what is achievable or how long it would take or how much it would cost, because the people with the best ideas will always come out on top, no matter what. The only way to lose is to corrupt the purity of the cause and of the ideal, practical/material considerations are unimportant and somehow unclean and distasteful to even consider.
"Just world theory," I suppose.
So you believe there is some magical weapon "X", when given to Ukraine, will make Russia leave? There is one, it's nuclear bomb lol. Other than that, it's not a specific weapon type that has to be provided, but a steady flow of a range of weapons.
The point I'm making is that they are receiving the weapons the US and Europe can make/spare, and they are still losing on the battlefield. If negotiating is not the way to go (as the meme implies) then what's the way to victory? As it's going, every man in Ukraine will die and they'll still lose.
If Russia is winning the war of attrition, why did they bring North Korea in?
The evidence for that is tenuous at best.
Lol
Oh, okay. So no need to fight wars anymore. We can tell who will win by eye. And the country who we eye-spot will lose the war should just throw away their sovereignty to the aggressors from the start since they can't win.
America spends the most on defense, so they'll probably win in any war. Then, I guess America should just de-facto rule the world. United Earth of America, everyone. Resistance is futile.
So you think that if they keep fighting they'll turn it around sometime in the future?
"Every man" will not die, because they intentionally not mobilising the young men. They also did hold for several months completely by themselves while West was scared and only talked about sending diapers & bandage. They also survived when US stopped their aid completely for 6 month. It's been 3 years since the hold against a supposedly "2nd army in the world", so they are definitely not losing. They did an incredibly well job given their resources, if they ask for more, who we are to decide for them?
You mean literal children and university-age "men"? I guess everyone else dying would be fair game though, right?
What an insane statement.
it means, "below 25 won't die". Because they try to limit suffering lol. Unsure what you found so insane in that. Try harder to be offended
"Everyone dying except those under 25" is not "limiting suffering".
The only reason they haven't lowered the age of conscription further is because it's very unpopular and the current government can't afford the political hit.
They have resisted to the best of their ability, yes. No one can deny that, but even then they are being pushed back more and more as time goes on. And that is, in fact, losing. Specially in a war of attrition like we are seeing.
They did an incredibly well job but are still losing the war and territory because Russia has more meat to throw on the battlefield and a bigger economy.
Dragging the war with foreign aid is not providing any resolution, itās making the EU look as weak headless chicken who canāt come up with a concrete plan to stop a war on its doorstep.
Yup, unfortunately still loosing some territory while inflicting heavy losses to the other side
Yup, agreed
"Dragging the war with current amount of foreign aid is not providing any resolution" FTFY
Collapse of russia.
People expect Ukrainians to fight to the last man, for honor or some shit, and its gross. People are dying, and they've been at a stalemate for years. The outcome of this was never going to be good, considering the West has never given a single shit about Ukraine. Even before the war, the US toyed with them and blocked them from joining NATO for YEARS. With all the wars the West loses, you'd think they'd know when to call it off.
Probably by getting NATO & the US out, and the far-right regime they installed dismantled.
A reminder, atleast Putin sees Ukrainians as his people just under the wrong leadership (even if it's imperialism and annexation). It's not like Israel where they want to wipe 5+ million people off the fucking region, ideally in concentration camps which is happening and documented. (Not endorsing Russia, I just fucking hate all of you)
Source: Zelensky.
For an interesting, not meme-like reading about these ceasefires, you could reach this timeline.
The meme talks about 2014 to 2022, your sub stack post about 2021 to 2025, so one is talking about the conflict leading up to the full invasion by Russia, the other is talking about what happened after the Russian invasion. They are closely related but not the same.
No, not the same, but it's a good start point.
Stop lying.
Okay.
I think somebody has misunderstood a comment made by Zelenskyy at the International Summit on the Support of Ukraine, held this February just passed. Zelenskyy said:
Zelenskyy is talking about the ceasefire which formed part of the Minsk agreements. Representatives from both Ukraine and Russia signed these agreements, with the final protocol's first point being:
This is the ceasefire agreement which Russia has violated. That is to say, there haven't been 20 separate ceasefire agreements, there was one which Zelenskyy told the Summit Russia had violated more than 25 times.
Ukraine had a ceasefire agreement 7 days after the invasion. The US & UK got them to walk away from it.
https://www.jeffsachs.org/newspaper-articles/6kwrs4pplmwj2nxzy9el73gx2w9cfn
I also canāt imagine this ends with the current far-right regime maintaining their grip on power, nor being allowed to continue the genocide of ethnic Russians in the east.
LoL. That upvote count. You bots canāt even feign organic.
As i just said in another comment: imagine the backlash if someone were to post something similar with putin face. People are being accused of being russian trolls for the slightest unaligned critic of ukraine government. I'm not questioning it but this post is what propaganda actually looks like
Ah yes, good old "Let me post any literal shit because if readers want, they must prove it themself". That's impolite, but understandable. But for God's sake, to post logically malformed statements and wait for readers to indicate it is a whole new level of egoism.
Not tell me, proud democrat, if Russia invaded with its army Ukraine in 2022, then with whom was Ukraine reaching those mystical 20 cease-fire agreements 8 years before? About what were there agreements when there litreally was no Russian army and Ukraine was fighting its own regions for years?
Fuck lemmy for leaking politics to every possible community and not removing it on user reports. What a cesspool of a platform.
We are not just believing propaganda anymore. Ukraine can either work to stop this war or keep it going with out US support. Good luck to them! Russia can say the same about the NATO and Ukraine but that wouldnāt fit the agenda.
So nothing to add? Wonder who is be propaganda slave!
You're not just believing propaganda anymore. You're also spreading it.
Yeah I spread facts not propaganda. Did NATO break its promise to Russia after Russia allowed democracy at its door step when Ukraine became a independent country?
Haha of course. An "oral agreement" that nobody has any record of. They called no takesies backsies, too!
Here's an actual promise that really was agreed to. Signed by Russia. In writing. You know, like what happens when countries actually agree to things in the real world and not in Russian propaganda la la land.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Budapest_Memorandum
You are a scum bag just like Zelensky! - Providing dirty links should get your account deleted! -
My bad for sending a mobile link. I am indeed a scumbag.
Please say you forgot the /s
Nah he's a known troll/kremlin boot licker
Oh, so weāre ānot just believing propaganda anymoreāāexcept for the part where you parrot Russiaās favorite talking points? Ukraine didnāt start this war; Russia did. Telling Ukraine to āwork to stop itā is like blaming a robbery victim for not handing over their wallet fast enough. If youāre done with propaganda, maybe start by questioning the one that excuses the actual aggressor.
When Ukraine gained independence, Russia's understanding was that it would accept the emergence of democracy on its doorstep in exchange for assurances regarding security. Specifically, the agreement entailed that NATO would not expand beyond Germany. In the early 1990s and again in 2000, Russia sought to join NATO, only to be rebuffed. NATO, in turn, has often relied on portraying Russia as a threat to justify its military expenditures and equipment buildup. The conflict in Ukraine was sparked in large part by NATOās eastward expansion, especially its support for Ukraineās NATO aspirations and the subsequent military aid provided to Kyiv. To understand this complex geopolitical issue more fully, it is important to engage with historical sources rather than be swayed by biased narratives.
If I were afraid of NATO, the last thing I would do is invade Ukraine. Putin isn't very good at this.
Its called a strategic win if russia would have allowed NATO in Ukraine and war breaks out the front lines will be with russian territory.
Why did they annex Crimea? Don't want to next to NATO countries? Why not move deeper into your own country to distance yourself from them?
Would you want a naval base from your enemy at your door step?
Ukraine's account of who broke ceasefires is as reliable as Israel's. During period in question, ethnic Russians were being massacred by nationalists such as Azov battalion paramilitaries. You'd need to examine each of the 20 ceasefires without playing favorites to get an honest account, which I can't do. Overall, Ukraine was the definite aggressor during this period.
i guess the continued shelling of civilians in donbass and the rise of the banderites is russias fault too
Your comment contains as many sources as there is punctuation marks. Do tell me more?
e: that came across as unusually short. I'm interested in learning of this shelling, I've not heard of civilian targeting.
https://www.ohchr.org/en/press-releases/2016/07/un-report-2014-16-killings-ukraine-highlights-rampant-impunity
I went hunting for sources and found this. It seems to highlight the chaos in the region more than assigning blame.
sorry I meant to reply but then forgot this account even exists lol. Here is a good list of links with an overview of the Ukrainian civil war from 2014 onwards:
https://lemmygrad.ml/post/7112898
specifially this documentary is interesting
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JM0VYkL_UI4
https://www.jeffsachs.org/newspaper-articles/6kwrs4pplmwj2nxzy9el73gx2w9cfn
Weird how banderites never "shelled civilians" before russian invasion, innit?
And then they suddenly have been doing it for 8 years
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shelling_of_Donetsk,_Rostov_Oblast
The Ukraine-Russia conflict has begun to sound a lot like the Israel-Gaza conflict, in so far as you've got these little media bubbles where "My side has NEVER done ANYTHING wrong and they just want to kill all of us, so everyone on their side is a valid target for shelling."
You were unable to understand a very short sentence? Alright, I'll bite.
Yeah, absolutely, these are very similar conflicts, essentially these are - one imperialist country is trying to completely erase another smaller one, by whatever means necessary. Again, even if this was done by UAF, this wouldn't have happened without r*ssian invasion.
Russian assistance to Donbas came after Banderite/Azov terrorism. Also, the ceasefire breaking accusations are against Donbas leaders who just wanted autonomy inside Ukraine until the SMO became the necessary action to protect them, and protect Russia against NATO.
Certain liberals simply cannot believe Ukraine might hold it's own violent reactionary elements, posed to do violence against ethnic Russian civilians.
That's why you had the Canadian parliament applauding a member of the Wauffin SS a few years back.
That's why liberals will refer to Russian conscripts as "Orks" and make up fanciful stories about 40 beheaded babies to justify hospital bombing in Gaza City.
That's why Americans elected a Mussolini loving convicted criminal to their highest office, for fear of a brown woman candidate being too nice to other brown people.
The propaganda machine is eating itself. Westerners are completely incapable of seeing through their local brand of fascist agitprop.
Biden was the most neocon/zionist/republican/warmonger the DNC loved, but manufacturing a war on Russia was not an election platform. I won't condemn liberalism, except for the complete stupidity of trusting DNC to be a liberal organization instead of warmongering neocons first. The gullibility that Biden/DNC must be good just because they are the lesser evil, just led to protests over the weekend for more war on Russia.
We've reached body snatcher level of political dysfunction. I'm still resistant to impune liberal rationality. Trump or Putin Derangement syndrome is simply disturbing people to be against peace. Let me assure everyone that war on Russia was and still is a bad idea. Surely a new war will happen soon enough for you to be happy again.
It drives me up the wall when you've got a Tech Bro / Finance Freak Cartel running the White House and the only response I see on these big liberal forums is "Putin is in control!"
Like Peter Thiel and Robert Mercer and Miriam Adelson and Linda McMahon don't exist.
I mean, technically sort of, yeah. Continued russian aggression and interference most definitely contributed to the rise of political extremism. Which just so happened to give the Kreml plenty of reason for further interference, such as the direct deployment of "volunteers" into the civil war.
Russia would have had the opportunity to support Russian communities in Ukraine peacefully, for example with beneficial trade agreements and cultural exchange programs. Unfortunately for these Russian communities, all the Kreml knows are diplomatic pressure and coercion and force of arms. As such, Russian culture was regarded as a mark of oppresion and the communities became targets of both Russian and Ukrainian nationalists - either as enemies, or potential agents.
Note: This is simply my, obviously non-comprehensive, personal understanding of the situation. Feel free to elaborate.
Before the full scale invasion, more than half of Kyiv residents preferred speaking russian over Ukrainian in day to day communication, myself included. If the invasion never happened, I'd still be speaking russian. They literally did it to themselves.
Interesting. I have a genuine question I hope you don't mind me asking. How come you prefer Russian over Ukrainian?
Right now I've switched to Ukrainian in almost all cases, so, right now, I don't. But, to answer your question about my past preference, it was mostly peer pressure. Most of my friends and large part of my relatives were speaking either russian or surzhyk (a sort of Ukrainian-russian creole, that varies depending on the region).
Since both exist only in russian imagination, yes
Of course it is, it always is. Russians are to blame for everything.
This, but unironically I guess.
Are these things that happened in the magnitude you are implying?